PGA Tour and Range Finder

[GolfBear]

Disagree. I just played a round with a couple of guys. One had a Skycaddie, the other a Bushnell Rangerfinder. I have a Bushnell GPS. The difference was only a couple of yards on almost every hole. Plus, and I could be wrong on this, but the rangerfinder can't tell you front and back distances only to the flag.

Isn't the "distane to the flag" the most important part? I don't care about the distance to the front, I want the distance to the pin!

[jamo]

Isn't the "distane to the flag" the most important part? I don't care about the distance to the front, I want the distance to the pin!

The pros have to deal with a lot of tucked pins, so they would want to know how much room they have to miss.

[iacas]

The pros have to deal with a lot of tucked pins, so they would want to know how much room they have to miss.

Right. The yardage book could be greatly simplified to almost nothing more than a map of the greens with some slopes drawn in and some measurements. Maybe some carry yardages off the tee. And that'd be it... they wouldn't need to contain the yardages to every sprinkler head, tree, etc.

[The Recreational Golfer]

Not sure how this would affect the pace of play. As long as it wouldn't slow things down, I'd be OK with it. Also, not sure how much it would help. After I air-mailed a few greens one day based on the distances that one of my playing partner's units indicated, I don't want to bother with them anymore. I'm not sure they would be an improvement for players who need to know the distances to the front and to the pin down to the yard (or the half-yard, in Johnny Miller's case).

[Mulligan]

I dont think it would speed up play that much for most players. Look at Rickie Fowler, he has to calculate yardages and plays plenty fast. Jim Furyk doesn't really need yardages for putts and the guy takes for freaking ever. Most of these players have personal sports shrinks telling them what and how to think for every type of shot, and helping them setup crazy pre-shot routines. I'm not saying this doesn't help certain players, it very well could and probably does to some extent. However, I think for some people they are going to take as long as they can get to take a shot, give them more time and they are going to use it.

If you take the yardage calculation out of it, just give them the shotlink data on the course. At least then they might be able to get their number before they get to their ball, and the small number of fast players can play faster (even though they'll be slowed down by their slower playing partners and groups in front of them).

[TourSpoon]

I think they should. Caddies already have the yardages, and pin sheets. Zap the flag, figure out that it's six paces over the ridge, and hit the damn ball.

In a perfect golf world this would happen, but with some of those guys they have that information and still take forever..."well if you hit the hard nine and bring it in high...or punch the eight...of course you could hit the draw and hold it against the wind...but wait for the swirling to stop...or maybe cut a fade and spin it towards the flag...blah, blah, blah."

This is why I loved to follow Chi Chi. He would walk up to the ball and say, "It looks like an 8" and hit it. If you weren't paying attention you would miss his shot. My point being is that slow tour players are going to be slow tour players.

Plus the range finder companies would love it.

You nailed this one. I am sure they are lobbying for this right now. I would love to have the lanyard concession on this one as the straps would be 2" wide with "BUSHNELL" written all over them.

I think the best point for the range finder is from off the fairways, on adjoining holes, and anywhere else the ground is not readily marked for yardage. The worst case would be the OCD player/caddie who uses the range finder to over-analyze the course. Could you imagine this conversation? "It's 246 to carry the bunker...275 till you run out of fairway...250 to the knob...252 to that twig by the knob...260 to the pine cone...280 to the hot brunette. OK, hit it 280!" And I digress.