Fred, Ernie, Louis, and Other Smooth Swingers

[iacas]

To the extent that one can say that a major champion's golf swing stinks, I'm saying it here: the golf swings of Fred Couples, Ernie Els, and Louis Oosthuizen kinda stink.

And before I get a bunch of people saying a bunch of things… here is a brief list of things I am not saying in this post:

• Their results stink.
• They should have changed their swings and/or would have had more success with a different swing. (Though, interestingly, all three were regularly talked about as having underperformed in their careers.)
• I (or anyone else I coach or know on a personal level) have a better swing.

What do these swings have in common? They're lauded as great swings. Why? Because they're smoooooooth. At real speed, we see the tempo and rhythm and flow and the way the swings "gather" at the top… and call them good because they're pleasing to watch.

A lot like this fella (originally from here, but since IG doesn't embed anymore…):

This guy got a lot of traction for a hot minute on how great his swing looked. But…

🤮

If this guy likes what he's doing… more power to him. But if he wanted to get better at golf… I have some ideas. 😉 I just hope the butt of his grips are clean, because if not, he's gonna have streaks across his right pocket.

I named a few people up above. Major champions. All lauded over the years, but…  Let's take them one by one.

Ernie Els

Known far and wide as "The Big Easy," Ernie won 19 times on the PGA Tour including four majors. But, the way he uses his lower body always bugged me:

Ernie's right knee almost surely increases its amount of flex, with a decent amount of pelvis movement toward the golf ball (really "early extension") during the backswing. I can't help but wonder if Ernie would have hit it much farther than he did (though Ernie wasn't a short hitter by any stretch of the definition, Tim Herron — a guy named "Lumpy" — outdrove Els in 1996) if he used his legs differently.

This unique knee action led to a bit of a "stuck" position on the downswing:

I'd be really curious to see Ernie's GEARS numbers for hips and shoulders, as the latter appears to lag well behind the former. But he didn't get the nickname "The Big Easy" for no reason.

Louis Oosthuizen

Some long-time people will know where I'm about to go with this one. The one-time major champion (his only PGA Tour win) has been called a "sweet swinger," but does the same thing that draws the ire of recreational golfers across the globe:

That's early extension, with Louis looking like | at impact. Though he wants to ride around on his tractor and maintain a farm, one has to hope he doesn't have any goats on the farm. 😳

Fred Couples

Fred's swing reminds me of a lot of 12 handicappers who don't understand why they keep fatting the ball and hitting across it.

His swing starts with a minimal turn and a lot of elbow folding as he pulls the arms across his chest. Ultimately, he'll add a little turn at the end… as the right elbow works almost completely behind his shirt seam and away from the golf ball, ending up well "behind him:

This is "stuck" — but to solve it, Fred will try to tuck his right elbow in, but being unable to do that completely or fast enough… he'll just instead add a bunch of right tilt to help the clubhead get down to the ground:

That's to say little of the "fake strong" grip that's well up in his left palm, and which plays significantly weaker than it does.

I can't help but wonder if Fred's back issues could have been reduced without the need to turn in right side flexion as much as he did/does.

---

Again, I am not saying in this post:

• Their results stink.
• They should have changed their swings and/or would have had more success with a different swing. (Though, interestingly, all three were regularly talked about as having underperformed in their careers.)
• I (or anyone else I coach or know on a personal level) have a better swing.

So, what am I saying? I'm saying two things, primarily, and I'm not even saying these apply in all cases:

Smoothness

A "smooth" tempo and rhythm will make any golf swing look better to a lot of people. Nick Price was a better golfer than Fred Couples, but few looked at Nick Price's swing with the reverence they reserved for Boom Boom.

Pros vs. Ams

Pros can get away with a lot of stuff because it's their job and they've likely always swung that way. That doesn't mean that a guy who plays or practices two times a week should be okay with these moves, because they're going to have a much harder time timing them or getting the peak performance out of them.

And I'll be clear about this, too: generally speaking, pros make simpler, easier golf swings than regular players. They often move their body parts less than an average golfer, with fewer compensations. Most good golfers don't trap their right elbow way behind themselves like Fred does. Most don't move their pelvis toward the golf ball during the backswings like Ernie or downswings as much as Louis.

Bad golfers do those and so many more things.

These golfers are the exceptions; not necessarily swings to study and mimic.

[saevel25]

36 minutes ago, iacas said:

And I'll be clear about this, too: generally speaking, pros make simpler, easier golf swings than regular players. They often move their body parts less than an average golfer, with fewer compensations. Most good golfers don't trap their right elbow way behind themselves like Fred does. Most don't move their pelvis toward the golf ball during the backswings like Ernie or downswings as much as Louis.

Bad golfers do those and so many more things.

These golfers are the exceptions; not necessarily swings to study and mimic.

When you look at the great ball strikers, they were not categorized as smooth swingers. Nick Price was known for his irons play. Tiger, not a smooth swinger. Scheffler today has a very aggressive looking swing. Maybe Furyk, but his swing is so loopy, it kind of has to be. But he struggled with distance his entire career. 

I think smoothness is akin to being not as athletic as you can be because you are compensating for something in the swing. You need more time. 

[iacas]

14 minutes ago, saevel25 said:

When you look at the great ball strikers, they were not categorized as smooth swingers. Nick Price was known for his irons play. Tiger, not a smooth swinger. Scheffler today has a very aggressive looking swing. Maybe Furyk, but his swing is so loopy, it kind of has to be. But he struggled with distance his entire career. 

I think smoothness is akin to being not as athletic as you can be because you are compensating for something in the swing. You need more time. 

I don’t even think it’s about having more time but rather whether everything “gathers” at the top or something like that. Fred has said in “Playing Lessons with the Pros” that from the top he’s going as hard as he can.

[billchao]

I’ve never looked too closely at Els’ swing, but I knew the issues with Oosthuizen and Couples. I hear people saying they want to swing more like Fred and I always think, “You kind of already do.”

[Ty_Webb]

I remember watching Ernie Els at Wentworth in about 1991 or so. It was before he was much heard of I think, but his swing on TV looked like he was dinking it. Then watching him in person, the clubhead went from P6 to P8 (assuming that P7 is impact) faster than I could see it. At that point I hadn't seen much pro golf in the flesh and so the speed was pretty astounding to me at the time.

@iacas - I had a lesson on Saturday and my coach was telling me that my right arm hangs naturally with the eye of the elbow pointing pretty much straight inwards. One of his players (who's a lot younger and a lot better than me) his elbow is pointing out almost when he's hanging naturally. I get it across the line at the top and he was telling me that he can pretty much tell where someone's arm structure at the top is going to be based on the natural hang of the humerus. Bottom line is there's not really any point in picking a player and saying "I want to swing like him". Anatomically speaking, it's highly unlikely that you and they are working with the same tools, so you need to figure out what's right for you. 

That's not to say there isn't value in looking at pro's swings. There are certain things that almost all of them do and those would be good things to try to copy. Other things that virtually none of them do. Don't do that. And watching Freddie, Ernie and Louis is probably not a bad idea if you want to work on your rhythm and tempo. I wouldn't try to copy their swings though. 

I do remember getting into quite the argument with someone on another golf forum. He was a guy who considered Hogan's swing as basically a perfect template that we should all try to imitate. I pointed out that Hogan was 5'7" and I'm 6'3" and he spent 12 hours a day practising and I, well, I do not do that. I'm lucky to snag 12 hours in three months to practise. He would not listen to reason though.

[iacas]

13 minutes ago, Ty_Webb said:

I had a lesson on Saturday and my coach was telling me that my right arm hangs naturally with the eye of the elbow pointing pretty much straight inwards. One of his players (who's a lot younger and a lot better than me) his elbow is pointing out almost when he's hanging naturally. I get it across the line at the top and he was telling me that he can pretty much tell where someone's arm structure at the top is going to be based on the natural hang of the humerus. Bottom line is there's not really any point in picking a player and saying "I want to swing like him". Anatomically speaking, it's highly unlikely that you and they are working with the same tools, so you need to figure out what's right for you.

It's too much for this discussion here… but… eh, I'll just say that I don't think the differences are often nearly as big as they can be made to seem.

But… that's not the topic here, so that's all I'll add to that.

[pganapathy]

One thing I will add here.  Smooth swingers make it look effortless, which is why we revere them so much.  And a flawed swing with enough practice can be very effective.  Just look at Bubba Watson and Jim Furyk for example.  They are the anti-template of any modern swing coach but they are effective at hitting a stock shot and playing well.

But I do have to ask the question, is there such thing as a perfect swing for all body types or is it multiple swings dependent on your different body type.  I got coached in the mid to late 80's and have a reverse C finish and was able to swing relatively well with that despite my lack of practice and am now a single digit handicapper

[GolfLug]

5 hours ago, pganapathy said:

One thing I will add here.  Smooth swingers make it look effortless, which is why we revere them so much.  And a flawed swing with enough practice can be very effective.  Just look at Bubba Watson and Jim Furyk for example.  They are the anti-template of any modern swing coach but they are effective at hitting a stock shot and playing well.

But I do have to ask the question, is there such thing as a perfect swing for all body types or is it multiple swings dependent on your different body type.  I got coached in the mid to late 80's and have a reverse C finish and was able to swing relatively well with that despite my lack of practice and am now a single digit handicapper

If one absolutely has to have a model, Erik has an old thread on Robert Rock's swing.

[iacas]

5 hours ago, pganapathy said:

But I do have to ask the question, is there such thing as a perfect swing for all body types or is it multiple swings dependent on your different body type.  I got coached in the mid to late 80's and have a reverse C finish and was able to swing relatively well with that despite my lack of practice and am now a single digit handicapper

No model, but there is a fairly narrow range of things.

Which is how you can classify the outliers: they still exist and can still have success, and we don’t have alternate universes to test theories. 😀

[snapfade]

I recommend that all new golfers learn Moe's swing. 😀. His swing starts at 1.30. 

 

[billchao]

2 hours ago, snapfade said:

I recommend that all new golfers learn Moe's swing. 😀. His swing starts at 1.30. 

 

I don’t.  There’s a lot more going on than most people think.

[WillieT]

On 2/12/2024 at 12:57 PM, iacas said:

These golfers are the exceptions; not necessarily swings to study and mimic.

I think you nailed it there.  I have heard these guys lauded for being smooth, yet it seems that the call has not been to "swing like Freddie or Louis or Ernie or even Moe (well Todd Graves hawks the Moe Single Plane swing).  Good question - would they have been better, i.e. more successful, if their "smooth" swing had been corrected?  Who knows, maybe this discussion is a reminder that just because is looks good means it is.    

 

[snapfade]

6 hours ago, billchao said:

I don’t.  There’s a lot more going on than most people think.

Tongue-in-cheek post of course. It makes my back hurt watching him. 

On PGAT Radio this evening they were talking with Fred Funk and got on the conversation of Scottie Scheffler's unique swing. They brought up a good point concerning his putting. The point was he doesn't have to be a good putter, he hits the ball close enough to the hole he can get away with being an OK putter.  Could Scottie win more if he was a better putter? Again, who knows? His swing has taken him to number one in the world.

[iacas]

20 minutes ago, snapfade said:

Could Scottie win more if he was a better putter? Again, who knows?

The answer is unquestionably yes.

[pganapathy]

6 hours ago, snapfade said:

Could Scottie win more if he was a better putter? Again, who knows?

Any player would be better if any aspect of their game was improved.  Even Tiger and Phil would have won more if their driver was better.  Look at it like this.  ANY improvement in any area of their game means a player will shoot a lower score.  Even one stroke can be the difference between second and first 😉