{"id":20028,"date":"2014-10-03T15:00:26","date_gmt":"2014-10-03T19:00:26","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/thesandtrap.com\/b\/?p=20028"},"modified":"2014-10-03T15:33:30","modified_gmt":"2014-10-03T19:33:30","slug":"a_convincing_argument_for_15_inch_holes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thesandtrap.com\/b\/thrash_talk\/a_convincing_argument_for_15_inch_holes","title":{"rendered":"A Convincing Argument for 15 Inch Holes"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"ThrashThe first time I heard the idea of fifteen-inch holes I rejected it. The idea was brought to the golf world’s attention by TaylorMade CEO Mark King as part of the “Hack Golf<\/a>” initiative. I lean much more toward the traditionalist view of playing the game as it was intended. I reasoned that fifteen-inch holes would make a mockery of the game that I love very much.<\/p>\n

Recently however, I had a conversation with a good friend who convinced me that there is a way to implement the larger hole and still keep the tradition of the game.<\/p>\n

As golfers we must accept that our game’s growth has stalled. In fact, it’s not only stalled, but is going backward. The game is headed in reverse. My initial reaction on how to fix this growth problem comes in identifying the problems with the game today. The number one killer is slow play, or time. It just takes too long to finish a round of golf. Golf needs to be faster.
\n
\nThe second problem is poor instruction which causes golfers to take too long learning the game. It has been said on this site many times that golf is hard. Being hard itself is not bad. Run with me on this for a minute. If you had never heard of baseball and I gave you a bat and put even a high school pitcher on the mound, I guarantee you would not even touch one of his pitches, not regularly. So how do you teach someone to hit the ball? You start with the ball on a tee. You throw underhanded next, then work your way up to trying to hit the ball from a pitcher on the mound. The only way to do this in golf, prior to 2014, was to shorten the hole. I feel like a 390-yard par four is not all that different than a 430-yard par four when I was starting out. I needed four to five strokes to get to the green, and then once on the green it was an adventure to make any putt.<\/p>\n

The proposal that I am making will not affect the traditionalist. They can play the course as it has always existed. My recommendation is this: three Sundays a month the course could put in a “family” green. This would be a temporary green short of the normal green. Place the fifteen-inch hole here. Now the children and all golfers new to the game can play to these much<\/strong> larger holes. Tee times for the larger holes can start at around eleven and a reduced rate can be applied to golfers who play these holes.<\/p>\n

I believe that new golfers will not care about playing to the “real” green and will enjoy playing shorter holes with a giant hole to putt toward. Good golfers who are playing with new golfers can work on their chipping and try to chip in. For me, I am a decent golfer and I would not mind if playing with my kids or my wife playing to this much larger hole in an effort to help them enjoy the game more. If my daughter wanted to get serious about the game we could start playing the real hole on the green. Or, she could play to the 4.25″ hole when she’d gotten there within regulation+1 or +2, and to the big hole when she’d made a bit of a mess of the hole to that point.<\/p>\n

\"Putting<\/p>\n

The larger hole most definitely solves two of the major problems facing golf right now. Slow play and that the game is too dang hard for new players. By enlarging the hole and<\/em> making it shorter golfers will finish holes faster, much faster. These larger holes barely necessitate the need to take the pin out of the hole. This will increase the speed of rounds. It obviously makes the game easier as well. You might even argue too easy but again if that is your feeling then you can start playing the real hole on the greens. People will have more fun and the game can grow with a new crop of golfers.<\/p>\n

Golf instruction will still need to improve for the game to grow. The larger hole does not solve this problem. The PGA of America must look inwards for this solution. Many of the best teachers I have worked with are not PGA accredited and some of the worst I have worked with are PGA Teaching professionals of the year. The teaching system is broken and must be fixed. The larger hole does not address this problem, but let’s get things going in the right direction by trying to make the game a little easier.<\/p>\n

I first rejected the idea of larger holes, but after a convincing argument by my friend I can now see the value of having using the larger hole idea brought forward by the TaylorMade CEO. I saw the change as something the whole game would have to adopt which I feel will push regular golfers like myself away from the game. Clearly it does not have to be that way, it can be a part time change done on “Family Days” and can help bring new players to the game.<\/p>\n

Photo credits: © Margaret Gallagher<\/a>.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The game of golf is struggling to find new players, I explore a way for larger holes to help grow the game of golf.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1425,"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":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[22],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-20028","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-thrash_talk"],"yoast_head":"\nA Convincing Argument for 15 Inch Holes (Thrash Talk) - The Sand Trap .com<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/thesandtrap.com\/b\/thrash_talk\/a_convincing_argument_for_15_inch_holes\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:title\" content=\"A Convincing Argument for 15 Inch Holes (Thrash Talk) - The Sand Trap .com\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:description\" content=\"The game of golf is struggling to find new players, I explore a way for larger holes to help grow the game of golf.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:image\" content=\"https:\/\/thesandtrap.com\/b\/imgs\/thrash_talk\/tt_title.gif\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@the_sand_trap\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@the_sand_trap\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Michael C. Hepp\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"4 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\\\/\\\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/thesandtrap.com\\\/b\\\/thrash_talk\\\/a_convincing_argument_for_15_inch_holes#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/thesandtrap.com\\\/b\\\/thrash_talk\\\/a_convincing_argument_for_15_inch_holes\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"Michael C. 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