![\"Trap](\"\/b\/imgs\/trap_five\/tf_title.gif\")
Golf, like fly-fishing (another sport I love), can be poetry. While we see more jerks and hacks than poems in our weekend foursomes, thankfully there are some swings worth emulating.<\/p>\nGolf, like fly-fishing (another sport I love), can be poetry. While we see more jerks and hacks than poems in our weekend foursomes, thankfully there are some swings worth emulating.<\/p>\n
After some deliberation, I’ve chosen the best golf swings of all time and ranked them in order from five to one. See if you agree. Mickey Wright’s joy was hitting the right shot with the proper trajectory for each situation. Mis-hits that turned out well apparently gave her no pleasure. Her desire to perfect shot shape and selection sounds like the kind of terminology that one might hear from Tiger Woods.<\/p>\n She was especially determined, like many legends in golf, to hone a perfect swing. She abandoned the principles she learned from her instructor Harry Pressler and began to hone her own swing. If you have a chance to look at Wright’s swing you’ll immediately appreciate her tempo. Her swing was technically sound by any modern standard. It’s a swing any player, male or female, could model their swing after.<\/p>\n Number Four: Steve Elkington<\/strong> His personality isn’t quite as silky as his swing. He’s opinionated and a tough competitor. He was playing at Royal St. George’s in 2002 with a torn rotator cuff when his shoulder made a cracking sound while trying to hack out of the deep rough. Ouch.<\/p>\n He misses the characters on Tour and says that personalities have become too bland in recent years. I agree and I think we can all agree that Elk has one of the silkiest swings in golf history.<\/p>\n Number Three: Ernie Els<\/strong> It doesn’t take much to understand how Els came to be called “The Big Easy.” While the results of his swing can be a little erratic (he plays golf after all) you’d never know it because his tempo is about the best on Tour. I don’t think there’s a player out there who generates as much power with as little effort as Ernie Els.<\/p>\n Number Two: Sam Snead<\/strong> Slammin’ Sammy was a powerful player. His swing was a microcosm of his overall attitude toward the game. He admitted he had a relaxed attitude toward the game, easy for a guy with talent to spare.<\/p>\n “I figured early that the best swing was a one-piece swing that let you get rid of all the hitches,” said Snead once, “The things that throw you off.” His swing had a minimum of moving parts, was fluid, and long.<\/p>\n Number One: Ben Hogan<\/strong> He has a mystique that is unique to his personality and his approach to golf. Hogan’s book Five Lessons: The Modern Fundamentals of Golf<\/em> is the most famous and perhaps best work on swinging a club.<\/p>\n He perpetuated the idea of a swing secret that allowed him to swing so consistently. My personal opinion is that his secret lies in the fact that he practiced the right things more than any player in history. Famous for “digging his swing out of the dirt,” Hogan spent countless hours on the practice tee honing that simple motion we’ve come to admire.<\/p>\n It would be right to say that Ben Hogan is the best self-taught player the game has ever seen. I would say that his swing is the most influential, his ideas widespread, and that simple motion the best the game has ever seen.<\/p>\n Photo Credits: © LPGA.com<\/a>, Unknown, Unknown, Unknown, Hy Peskin\/Sports Illustrated<\/a>.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Five of the greatest swings are on display in this week’s offering. Most of them will be remembered among the greatest champions of all time.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[21],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1740","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-trap_five"],"yoast_head":"\n
\n
\nNumber Five: Mickey Wright<\/strong>
\n![\"Mickey](\"\/b\/imgs\/lpga\/mickey_wright.jpg\")
With 82 career victories, including 13 majors, Wright is perhaps the best woman golfer of all time. She won a Mickey-slam, winning the final two majors of 1961 and the first two of 1962. Her expectations of herself were high and she obviously achieved them, winning an average of over five tournaments a year during a 15-year span.<\/p>\n
\n![\"Steve](\"\/b\/imgs\/pga\/steve_elkington.jpg\")
You’ve probably heard it before: his PGA Tour peers often said he had the best swing on the course. He has no wasted motion and no swing thoughts. Some of us hacks should take notes. “My swing is simple, compact, not a lot of moving parts,” said Elkington. “My arms are real long, 39 1\/4 inches. I guess that helps. Don’t think about it, really.<\/p>\n
\n![\"Ernie](\"\/b\/imgs\/pga\/ernie_els.jpg\")
Els owns two U.S. Opens and a British Open among nearly 60 international events. While he’s struggled recently, following his knee injury, Els is still a fan favorite and solid pick to do well in the next few years. Despite the impression that he isn’t playing up to form he’s 5th in the World Golf Rankings and has aspirations of once again recapturing the top-spot.<\/p>\n
\n![\"Sam](\"\/b\/imgs\/trap_five\/sam_snead_putt.jpg\")
It isn’t a surprise that the most prolific winners on the PGA and LPGA Tours, Sam Snead and Mickey Wright, have two of the smoothest swings in history. Each have a total of 82 victories on their respective tours. Each player had a long fluid stroke that seemed to easily stay on plane with hardly a hint of hit in their swing.<\/p>\n
\n![\"Ben](\"\/b\/imgs\/pga\/ben_hogan_1950.jpg\")
Hogan is the most influential figure in the science of the swing. Of all the classic swingers Ben Hogan has made an impression on generations of swingers.<\/p>\n