Worst Shot of your Life

[jamo]

I'm trying to think of particularly bad full shots. I'm generally either playing great and most of my mess-ups are around the green or I'm playing poorly and all of my shots are the worst of my life. A few highlights:

• When I was 16 I played a bunch of junior golf tournaments in the summer in the 16-18 division. (I just found them online, actually.) I was runner-up in two tournaments by one shot each time. They didn't do playoffs for ties, so they gave first place to whomever had the best score on the back nine. Both times I (unknowingly) had extremely makable putts on the 18th hole to tie/win and missed.
• One time in high school on the driving range before a match I hit a ball between the guy next to me's legs. Another time on that driving range I took a full swing with another guy's putter and snapped the head off. 
• I played a tournament once when I was in college and was playing pretty well until the 12th hole. I hit what felt like a dead-perfect hybrid over a marshy ravine, but it must have just missed carrying it and I ended up making double. I had been swinging well but completely fell apart from there, went something like double-double-bogey-bogey-birdie to close out the round. It's probably wishful thinking but I really felt like I would have put together a good round if it weren't for that shot.
• Last year I was playing in the 18-hole finals for my men's league (my team had already won our division, and all of the division winners play each other after the playoffs are over.) I was playing awesome through 14, then yanked the crap out of my tee shot on the par-three 15h into wetlands. Made quad. Bogeyed the next hole, parred 17, so going into 18 I just needed a par to break 80 (which had become my goal after the quad). It's a medium-length par-five that I'm probably under-par on lifetime. Hit a great driver off the tee and only had ... I think a six-iron in. Maybe a seven. I put that one in the middle of the green, and had a big, sloping, uphill 30-footer for eagle. Ended up four-putting for a bogey and an 80. 🤮

[boogielicious]

16 hours ago, mcanadiens said:

Devou Park?

Not sure, it was so long ago. It looks like the right place though right near the Bluffs.

[Hoganman1]

Unfortunately, I've had way too many to count or rate as the worst. This past Winter it seemed like every shot I miss-hit ended up in an unplayable lie. In fact Phil or even Seve (RIP) couldn't recover from some of the places my poor shots landed. Thankfully that has gotten better.   One thing I've learned to do is to immediately put them out of your mind. 

[saevel25]

About 9 years ago, I was on a par 3 and hit the top of the ball with the bottom of the hozel. I proceeded to bounce the ball into my body.

[dennyjones]

2 hours ago, saevel25 said:

About 9 years ago, I was on a par 3 and hit the top of the ball with the bottom of the hozel. I proceeded to bounce the ball into my body.

I'd ask if you caught it because I don't see your flop shot challenge.     I tried it today for about 20 minutes and still either not fast enough or able to get it close enough to catch it.  

This past weekend, par 4 416 yard #16, I was pin high (nGIR) to the left of the green with nothing but grass between me and the pin.  There chips later, I was on the green.  I lost focus, got flustered, and mentally quit on that hole.   A triple bogey.   

I'm sure there are other bad shots but that is the most recent.  

[sjduffers]

Maybe not the worst shot I ever had, but here's one that I recall (I usually don't dwell on the bad ones...): trying to kill a drive with a driver (always a really good idea, right?), I caught the ball with the bottom of the club and the ball starting screaming a bit right, less than a foot above the ground, right into the right tee marker in front (e.g. the forward tee if I am on the middle tee) and with a beautiful arc sailed back over my head, for a net loss of 20 yards or so. I don't remember the middle of the hole, but I remember chipping in with a bladed wedge from just off the green, above the hole, on purpose!. 

Another really bad shot, was a snap-hooked 5 wood that hit a gentleman sitting in his cart by the next par 3, which tee box is well to the left side of our hole, but closer than our green. I am surprised that this sort of errant shot does not hurt more people there. I yelled fore, of course, but it was against the wind and he didn't hear it. It caught him at shoulder height, just a few inches below the side of his head. It could have been really bad. The guy was tough, and was joking that as a vet, he had been shot at by worst than golf balls... I was really shaken afterwards but glad that he was going to be ok.

Edited April 9, 2019 by sjduffers

[bkuehn1952]

So many choices, it is hard to pick just one for the prize.  I will go with the missed 1 inch putt on the first hole of my first Ann Arbor Senior Golf Championship.

The opening hole is a par 5.  I was in a greenside bunker in three and very nervous.  A decent sand shot got me on the green and my par effort stopped 1 inch from the hole.  I was relieved that I had not made a complete mess of the first hole by blading the ball out of the bunker or rolling my putt 10 feet past the hole.

As I prepared to tap in the ball, I looked up at something or became distracted and proceeded to tap my ball 45 degrees off line; it didn't even sniff the edge of the hole.  The other three players looked at me like, "Hey, this is a tournament!!  You shouldn't be goofing around!!!"  I assured them I had tried to make the putt and just had an epic failure.  7