Professional Golf Tantrums

As usual, I’m going to leave the Augusta 2012 writings to professional writers. I’m sure they will be doing a much better job writing about how Bubba carved out that ridiculous hook from deep forest on the 10th to slamdunk Louis Whatisname and win the title. It was seriously the most ridiculous shot we’ve seen in a long long time.

But what caught the viewers attention was not so much of the big swinging pink driver player winning his first green, ugly jacket, but the shenanigans of Tiger Woods’ soccer kicking his 9 iron on the 16th after a bad shot.He got flamed for that. But seriously, why all the fuss?

Golfers have themselves to blame for every bad shot they make. Unlike football, tennis, basketball, squash, badminton, snooker…heck every game, even freaking Scrabble and Chess….your opponent would do something to you that would influence how you play your game. Golf is the only known game in the history of mankind where you are playing your own ball, with your own consequences of your own decision. Plus, you don’t have a shot clock…you are freaking standing over your ball for 30 seconds and you still can’t make a decent shot? Of course people would go ballistic!

Golf temper is part of the game. We won’t be human unless we go crazy now and then. The trick here is not when, or where…it is HOW. Here’s a list of how to professionally go Happy Gilmore over your shot.

1. The Curse

Power rating: 1. Let’s start off with the foul mouthed curse. Usually aimed at the offending ball, the offending club, the offending bird, the offending leaves, and at times, the offending caddie, or the offending best friend. It’s not effective, it just makes you look like a contractor playing the game. Anyone can do it. Even a homeless hobo.

Simplicity: 1. At times, people get creative with their curses and can do transitional curses in multiple language and in one breath. It sounds technical, but still, it’s quite simple once you get the hang of it.

Consequences: 1. You might get strange stares, but that’s about it. Most people don’t like to cross a multiple language cursing golfer with a driver in hand, and blood shot eyes and face as red as a lobster.

2. The Drop Club

Power rating: 2. The Drop Club is an intermediate tantrum technique, and is universally acceptable in all genres of golf. It has a better “power rating”, because many golf pros use this, thus it makes whoever who employs this technique look pretty professional. This is the unhappy cousin of the happier ‘Twirl Club’.

Simplicity: 3. There’s a slight complexity to this. It wouldn’t do to hit the ball, follow through, hold the club, then allow it to drop. That just makes you look stupid. The drop club must be done in one single movement, conveying the all important message that you know you “hit it wrong the moment the clubhead contacted the ball.” Obviously we know that as much as a chimp knows about thermodynamics. But you need to immediately let it go at two positions: Right at the end of your follow through (club dropsbackwards) or after your follow through, when uncoiling, dropping the club forward. Sometimes this technique is accompanied by the “Football Kick”, as demonstrated by Tiger Woods on Friday at Augusta 2012.

Consequences: 2. Generally this is a safe technique, since the ground absorbs the brunt of your fury….and it’s a ‘dropped’ club, so technically it won’t bounce back up to stab you in the artery. We recommend this as the starting tantrum to employ, since if people scold you or the marshal warns you, just tell him, the club slipped out of your hands.

3. The Slam

Power rating: 3. This is a more powerful demonstration of your temper, utilising the head (usually a driver) and slamming it to the ground, scattering pieces of dead bugs all over the place. Sometimes, this is done multiple times, usually to a 4/4 rhythm. This is known as the Multi-Slam technique.

Simplicity: 3. The slam is usually initiated after a bad drive, where on a retarded follow through that threatens every sinew of your already stretched spine, you uncoil from this unnatural stance and bring back your club downwards, slamming the head onto the ground. This is usually accompanied by The Curse.

Consequences: 5. The slam has unusually high consequence, especially when utilised with a graphite shaft driver. Sometimes, due to the ferocity of the slam, the head might loosen or worse, snap off. This can cause injury to self and others around (Like Henrik Stenson), or at severe times, even death (like CSI episode).

4. The Tomahawk

Power rating: 5. This is one of the big guns. Tomahawking is using your entire arm action with the single intent to bury the club (usually an iron’s toe) into the ground as deeply as you can. This is where the term, “Bury the hatchet” is derived from, since most golfers employing this technique are ‘hackers’.

Simplicity: 2. This is a lot easier than the Slam. This is where after hitting a bad iron shot, you turn around to ensure no one is within 10 meters of your explosive range, and using your entire arm and shoulders as if chopping a large piece of wood, you axe down your club with all the power you can muster. By and large, the favourite move of new players.

Consequences: 8. The Tomahawk is usually quite safe, because the iron usually buries deep into the dirt, and the only issue is that you need a crane to extract it out later. However, I’ve witnessed some tomahawks done in deep rough, and honestly this is VERY DANGEROUS. If the tomahawk lands on a root of a tree, broken wrist, bone and untimely death might be the consequences. Please do this with care.

5. The Furious Grass Cutter

Power rating: 6. The furious grass cutter is made famous by Sergio Garcia, when he hit a bad shot on a slope and then proceeded to continuously whack the slope and beat the slope into submission. This is a very potent tantrum and should be employed with care.

Simplicity: 5. This is complex, due to the balance required when you are hacking away at the slope. It must be done with enough ferocity to punish the offending slope, but not so much as to completely lose your balance. Those practicing pilates and yoga will appreciate this and are usually the best people to try this tantrum.

Consequences: 5. It’s a thing of beauty to see a golfer using this move. It’s probably not dangerous, since you’re swiping – not chopping…but if you lose balance, you might tumble back down the slope and end up looking like a true idiot.

6. The Club Snap

Power rating: 7. This is tantrum at its finest. Usually done with a driver, it demonstrates your herculean ability to snap things that displeases you. It’s like when you were a kid and snapping a pencil to show your power. Bad drive. Snap it, because I am strong and filthy rich. It’s a social statement of your immense strength and capacity to purchase more clubs. There is a very powerful variant to the club snap, which is called the Club-beating-the-head. This should NEVER BE DONE BY ANYONE EXCEPT WOODY AUSTIN, whose brains are the size of a peanut, thus allowing to have a very very tough exterior skull, something like Homer Simpson.

Simplicity: 4. It’s quite simple, but requires balance and strength. Just use your thighs as a levarage, and snap your club with both hands.

Consequences: 8. It’s a high risk tantrum, because not only you lose this club, you also might risk injuring your wrist or thighs. Also, if you happen to TRY this and fail, you will be viewed as one of the most idiotic failure golf has ever seen. Better to do some tests first, usually with some spare shafts and rods back home. Again, the variant of the Club Snap, the Club-Beating-The-Head has dire consequences if you are NOT Woody Austin.

7. The Club Fling

Power rating: 7. Like the club snap, this conveys to the world that your clubs are the 100% reason behind why you suck so badly. So throw ’em away. Buy new ones.

Simplicity: 1. This is a very powerful and simple move in your tantrum arsenal. Just fling the club forward as far as you can. Generally, you should throw your club forward so you can pick it up again on the way to your newly shanked ball.

Consequences: 6. A lot of things can happen when a club flies out of your hands. It could kill a wildlife, like a duck, hence the phrase “Dead Duck” is derived from here. It could maim a spectator or a maintenance worker. It could even cause your club to be lost. Either way, you need to be careful of your surroundings. This is a mandatory precaution for all “OUT OF HANDS” Tantrums maneuvers.

8. The Advanced Club Fling

Power rating: 9. This is by far the most powerful and simplest move you can make. Like the club fling, but with a destination: The WATER. Practitioners of this tantrum arts are well stocked with extra clubs, and well-off enough to sacrifice the club FOREVER. You just throw it away and never look back. The message you send here is, “Forget the past, move on to the future.” It is the singlemost powerful and positive statement one can make in golf.

Simplicity: 1. Find a body of water (not mud, mind you) and fling your useless, treacherous golf club as far as you can into the water! Usually accompanied by the ball as well, especially if you have missed a 1 foot putt to win RM500. Henrik Stenson does this best, when he simply shrugs and chucks the wedge over his shoulder into the pond without even looking at it again. Ultra coolness.

Consequences: 5. The only consequence here is that you lose the club. It usually won’t cause anyone pain since you have been so considerate as to deposit your club into the water.

9. The Hammer of Justice

Power rating: 10. The hammer of Justice is one of the special moves for tantrum throwing. It turns your relatively benign club into a weapon of mass destruction. The HoJ does not seek to destroy the club, like other methods do, but the surrounding environment within striking distance of its bloody rage.

Simplicity: 9. This is NOT simple. HoJ practitioners spend years honing their dark arts. They know which are the items that can be destroyed, and the amount of required strength to destroy it. For instance, Henrik Stenson (again, the Sith Lord of Tantrum arts), decapitated the tee box on the British Open with such accuracy that everyone was at awe at his master skill.

Consequences: 9. Very painful if you attack an Item, like a TREE, with the HoJ move. The club might rebound, snap and break your wrist or murder someone nearby. Always be aware of items, such as tee boxes that are not solid, nearby saplings, underbrush, and golf buggy.

10 The Complete, Psychological Meltdown

Power rating: 10+. This is the worst tantrum, because its a pyschological destruction of everything known to golf. Instead of a sudden flare of temper, this is possibly the most grevious of tempers and should only be done very very selectively, in fear of losing your friends, family members and being outcast as a leper to the society. You can view a whole montage of meltdowns here:

Simplicity: 10. Simply put, your entire mental health is washed away once you use this method. You will 6 putt, laugh at yourself crazily, walk slumped all around, refuse to talk to your friends, drive the buggy maniacally, purposely hit 5 golf balls into the pond or directed at a nearby house overlooking the golf course, chop up divots the size of Brazil and refusing to clean it, build sandcastles in the bunker, play Angry Birds as your friend prepare to drive/ or putt etc. The complexity of it is very high, since this is what we term as “The complete absence of the mind.”.

Consequences: Infinity. Once this happens, your golf career is likely over. You will never play again. It’s a lobotomy of golf. You will be golf’s vilest enemy, cursing this day as you lay at your death bed years from now. You will join one of those environmental hippie groups lobbying for the shutdown of all golf courses and turning it into a green lung. It is not just a retardation of your love for golf, it is the complete and utter devastation of it. It will be replaced by a magnificent, bottomless hatred of everything related to golf, except perhaps the possibility of sexy LPGA girls in short skirts. From here, there is no return, only prayers of existing golfers for one who has succumbed completely to the dark side.

Augusta 2012 Day One

The first major is here..and probably if you were to ask any PGA golf pros (maybe one of you reading this might actually be a very accomplished interviewer and has access to these guys) which major they would want to win if they had only one: Most likely the Augusta Masters would be their choice. It’s just not the awful-looking green jacket that makes the winner look like an idiot; it’s the massive tradition surrounding it. Augusta is like the World Cup in golf, except it comes every year, as opposed to every 4 years! It’s probably the only majors I’d stay up to watch, and admittedly, that too only for Tiger’s round. Here’s a quick breakdown of the 5 favourite character stories in Augusta this year.

The Comeback Hero. Tiger shot 72, thanks to some seriously retarded golf on the 17th and 18th, but he actually did pretty well not to look like a complete fool on the first and second. His swing still looks a little dodgy though and at times, like the 18th, it almost resembled the mighty duck hook that I have as my normal drive. We’re still rooting for Tiger though, since other alternatives are clearly as interesting as watching reruns of Home Garden Improvement.

The Prodigal Son. Rory. I really really really like this picture of him for two reasons: we don’t get to see his curly pubic head hair, and this stance resembles the normal stance I usually assume after every drive. Still undecided whether to hate or love Rory…he has a great game, for sure, and he is emotional…but at times, he comes off as just plain annoying. Not Sergio Garcia annoying, but enough to put us off. Anyway, he played well to a -1, despite a disastrous double bogey start, which also usually resembles my first hole in every game I play.

The New Colin Montgomerie Villain. Skinny Westwood. Who looks like the actual villain Willem Dafoe in disguise.

Willem Dafoe

Was never a fan of either skinny or fat Lee Westwood for some reason. Maybe because he comes off as a whinny, complaining guy much like his fat predecessor, Monty, who doesn’t seem to wish people well, or not too happy that a punk like Rory is beating the crap out of him everytime. Unfortunately he’s playing really well and now leads at -5. At one point, he had 4 birdies, and barely missed his fifth. Every story needs a villain anyway.

The low-self-esteemed No 1. He truly, remarkably is, Golf’s worst world no. 1. The PGA management must be flabbergasted at how a guy like this who only wins small tournament and again, resembles an overturned crab in terms of charisma would be the poster boy for best player in the world. No majors. World Number 1. My theory is that Luke wishes he wasn’t world number 1, because whenever he goes into a tournament as World No. 1, he immediately starts hacking like a nut. As in, he knows himself it’s such a stupid position to be when you haven’t done anything. True to form, he went out there to purposely sabotage his game and ended with a 75. He almost got away trying to disqualify himself by smudging a score to reflect 73, but PGA officials blamed it on the fax machine, and unhappily, Luke Donald has to play on. Watch for more of this self-saboteur in the coming rounds.

Henrik Stenson in World Golf Championships-CA Championship - Round One

The Stripper-Hacker-Golfer-With-A-Girl-As-A-Caddy. Henrik Stenson is unique is some ways. Aside from this horrifying picture of him in his undies, he’s also famous for forcing a woman to lug his bag around for him for 7KM every round. Many people conclude that he’s probably on the queer side, but who cares. I like this guy because he is probably the only person in the PGA tour that actually plays like us, on some holes. As in, he simply meltsdown.

18th hole, Augusta 2012. He shot an 8. I couldn’t get a video online yet, but here’s what happened from my viewing:

1) Snap hook a 3 wood into the woods on the left. Resemblance to myself: 100%

2) Duff his punch out and ended up in heavy pinestraws and not even out of the thick stuff. Resemblance to myself: 100%

3) Complain to official that he wants a free drop and is flat out refused because official doesn’t like the picture of him naked, although he vehemently shouts that he’s not going to strip, for crying out loud, because there’s no water hazard. Official doesn’t believe it and rathers play it safe. Resemblance to myself: 0% (just play it, Henrik and stop whining like skinny Villain!)

4) Due to his argument with official, and the fact that he still has his clothes on, he tops his shot 20 meters that skitters to the right. He stopped himself from tomahawking his club into the ground, turns around, and in a split second, decides to REALLY tomahawk it. Resemblance to myself: 100%

5) The official and commentators TSK TSK, and says, “Don’t do that in Augusta, naked Swedish man.” At this point, he screams that he’s not naked and was he eating crazy pills. Resemblance to myself: 0% ( I have no confidence playing golf naked).

6) He hits his 4th and simply airmails the green because he was already so pissed off. He immediately berates his caddy. Resemblance to myself: 50% (I’d airmail it too, but I wouldn’t berate my caddy…since usually I don’t have one. I’d choose to tomahawk my club again).

7) He clears everyone behind the green and rudely shuffles one clueless idiot who continues to sit there staring blankly at him. With three thousand eyeballs on him, he simply duffs his chip and doesn’t even reach the green. Resemblance to myself: 100%

8) He now putts from the fringe and it goes to about 2 feet from the hole. He misses his putt from 2 feet and finally settled in for 8, quadruple bogey. Resemblance to myself: 100%

And here’s the wonderful fact about Henrik…he is REALLY A HACKER who happens to be a PGA tour.

He was dead last in Augusta last year with an 83-74 score. This includes a QUINTUPLE BOGEY (8) for par 3 fourth and triple bogey on the 11th. His score in 2010? 80-75 and also miss cut with 5 bogeys and 3 double bogeys in round one. He truly suck. And that’s why we need to keep an eye out for him, because he’s our rep this year in the great fraternity of hackers.

On to day 2!!!

IK Kim and the one foot missed putt

I don’t know why.

If this happened to a PGA tour professional, I would revile that guy and condemn him to everlasting hacker folklore gleefully, delighting in the schadenfreude of the moment.

But if this happened to an LPGA professional (yes, even Michelle Wie), I would shake my head in disbelief and share an outpouring of grief at the absolute, complete, utter destruction of her self-esteem and possibly, her career.

I.K.Kim - Kraft Nabisco Championship - Final Round

Here’s a video of her being commented by a bunch of white blokes who obviously know as much about golf as I know about the history of fermented camel crap. And they still make fun of poor IK Kim at the end, oblivious that she could very well hire her South Korean assassins to yank out their intestines and tie it around their smug, pale-looking, jackanape, caucasian faces.

We’re not talking about a putt on the 16th to get within one of the lead, or keep the lead. We’re not talking about a 10 foot putt, or even a five foot putt, a knee knocker to win the title. We’re not talking about some kind of obscure, charity tournament to enhance Asian Heritage in Chattanooga Tennessee.

I.K.Kim - Kraft Nabisco Championship - Final Round

No. This is a ONE FOOT TAP-IN after a missed birdie putt, to WIN THE KRAFT NABISCO WOMAN’S MAJOR CHAMPIONSHIP.

ONE FOOT.

This will be down as the greatest short putt missed in the history of golf and possibly stretching into the next million years of golf when it has evolved into a bunch of big headed aliens tapping a holographic ball across the galaxy. They will recall in horror, when their denizens misses a tap in, that they have I.K-ed it.

We could probably compile a bunch of horror stories of golf, including the dumb-a#s two footer miss to win the Masters by that big loser Scott Hoch (notice the distinct bias-ness against men who suck and women who umm, had a bad game?). I mean, seriously, who would you chose to symphatise with:

Bald, fat Caucasian Octogenarian.

Playful, pretty Korean chic.

Not much of a choice, really.

But really. One foot. Major win.

Who could forget that sheer horror on her face when the ball horse-shoed around the trecherous hole and she spun around at her caddy, her tiny eyes wide with shock, hands over her mouth, mouthing a silent “OH MY #$^&#@# CRAP, I JUST LOST US 300K!!” in South Korean. We can only hope maybe she and her tall, good looking caddy hooked up later and he forgave her for making him lose so much money.

I.K.Kim - Kraft Nabisco Championship - Final Round

IK Kim, I can’t tell the difference between you and the 6212 Koreans on tour at the moment, but the hearts of all hackers go out to you. I can only dedicate this song for you (minus the disturbingly feline lead singer and the half naked woman slithering about) from the entire world of hackers trying to break 90 and 100.