The Road to becoming pro

[Tye Smith]

HI, my name is Tye Smith iam a junior in high school and iam on my way to playing on the PGA tour. i attended a US open qualifier last may(As a Sophmore in High School)and ended up being paired with to great players that had played in the masters and had played on tour for 15 years. i currently moved to to san antonio from North idaho iam talking to D1 schools to play for them on a scholership . I will be attending more PGA qualifying tournaments in the next year or so, and i hope i can get the support and prayers from you all. you can fallow me on Facebook i have a page thats called Tye Smith you can like it and fallow me thank you very much please feel free to respond  (:

[Clambake]

Good luck in your pursuit.     Is that Circling Raven in your avatar photo?

A tip when you're talking to D1 schools: spelling, punctuation, and grammar matter on applications.    They're also helpful here.

[Tye Smith]

That is not Circling Raven i love that course though i grew up in Coeur D Alene Idaho and thats all we played growing up thank you though, and i know about punctuation thank you very much though (: the course in my profile picture is Rope Rider GC where I had my US Open Qualifyer

[ApocG10]

No, he is right, you need to brush up on your spelling and punctuation. People will not take you seriously if you don't make an effort to look professional in all things, even posting on a web forum. The posts you have made in this thread show that you do not take it seriously, and that usually spills over into other areas in life.

And reach for your goals, but take your studies seriously. The chances of you actually making the PGA Tour is slim to none. Not trying to bring you down or anything, but make sure you have a backup plan.

[Tye Smith]

Thank you for the advice, i will take all into consideration as i continue my journey and become more educated. i want to thank you both for the information you have provided me with and i will use it to grow and make my self better so i can successfully achieve my goals.

[glk23]

This is a 16-17 yr old whose main form of "written" communication is likely the form of text messages or other electronic forms. By simplifying things (poor grammar, spelling, punctuation) for talking with friends and family works great, many in his generation use it across the board to their detriment. If you are hoping to get a D1 scholarship, you should assume every school googles you to figure out what type of student/athlete you will be. What do you want them to find? Leave the text talk to other places. And to show that I'm not just ragging on you, it took me a while to post this as my grammar and spelling tend to revert to texting if I'm not careful.

[slodsm]

Good luck to you Tye.

Take the advice on your communication skills seriously. I won't even text in shorthand skipping punctuation because it's an awful habit to get into. There are a lot of good young golfers out there shooting for these scholarships so you need every edge you can get.

[SAGolfLuvr]

Hi Tye,

I am in San Antonio too. I suggest you go to YouTube and watch a few vids from local teaching pro Jim Barker. Then answer him on one or two of his YouTube posts. Let him know what you want to do and I think he may point you in the right direction.

I am also a volunteer for pro golf events. That helps you get familiar with the world of pro golf and you meet lots of friendly, great goal oriented people. You should try volunteering for the upcoming Valero tournament. This is the first year in 7 years that I will not be attending because of job and school, but you sound like a fine candidate.

Good Luck!

[cooke119]

I found your Facebook page, I copied the following, " Well i won didnt finish well but i got the job done now TPC Major championship next weekend !! ". Please work on your writing, it matters.

[dak4n6]

Originally Posted by glk23

This is a 16-17 yr old whose main form of "written" communication is likely the form of text messages or other electronic forms. By simplifying things (poor grammar, spelling, punctuation) for talking with friends and family works great, many in his generation use it across the board to their detriment.

If you are hoping to get a D1 scholarship, you should assume every school googles you to figure out what type of student/athlete you will be. What do you want them to find? Leave the text talk to other places. And to show that I'm not just ragging on you, it took me a while to post this as my grammar and spelling tend to revert to texting if I'm not careful.

So true. My son truly believes that spelling and grammar are unimportant (as long as you get what I'm saying, what does it matter?), and it drives me nuts. He will be in for a rude awakening when he gets to college if he even gets accepted.

[JasonK88S]

Originally Posted by dak4n6

So true. My son truly believes that spelling and grammar are unimportant (as long as you get what I'm saying, what does it matter?), and it drives me nuts. He will be in for a rude awakening when he gets to college if he even gets accepted.

I have actually had tests in high school that honestly did not matter if you got the answer right or wrong but solely based on punctuation and grammar. The smartest kids in the class failed a lot of these tests due to poor "basic" writing skills. I loved those tests to be honest. Except studying for a week just to find out your teacher is tired of grading papers that he has to read multiple times in order to understand them.

[cooke119]

As an undergrad I had an English class where you had to write 10 pages per week. You could write about anything you wanted but it had to be 10 pages, single spaced, typed. Now mind you this was in 1974 or so, no computer to correct your grammer and spelling. Then once a week you sat with the professor and he graded your paper. This turned out to be one of the hardest classes I ever took, but it paid off given I write proposal for a living. (I still type like crap though).

[Tye Smith]

Thank you very much for your kind words of advice. I will most likely be playing in the Monday qualifier for the Texas Open this coming year, to gain more experience at the higher level of play. Regardless of the outcome of the qualifier i will still be watching or playing in it if the Monday qualifier is a success.

[CraiginKSA]

The "Road" is narrow and difficult.  Take a look at your home course.  Is it >7,000 yards?  Are the greens rock hard and super fast?  Is the rough ankle deep?  Are the fairways as narrow as a cart path?  Sand and water everywhere?

You take that course and shoot right around even or a couple under to make the cut.  The winner will routinely shoot 18 under on a course like that.  These guys are freaks.  They can hit 280 yard 3 woods with 5 yards of draw, suck a 6 iron back off the green...

In 2011 Steve Elkington made every putt inside of 4 feet for the entire year!  368 for 368!

Anyway, that's what you're up against.  Good luck!

[wadesworld]

If the PGA is a serious goal of yours, I'd talk to the parents about what it might take for the family to move south to somewhere where you can play year round, such as Arizona or Florida.  It's harder to have a shot at the tour when you can only play 7 months out of the year. Or, if nothing else, look for a college in a warm-weather climate, since you'll be spending most of your time at college anyhow.

[Tye Smith]

Yes, my home course to be exact is 7120 and the course rating is 74.6. We have had a few tour pros play here and shoot around par or just a few under. I have played some of the tour courses like TPC San Antonio Oaks Course, Red Stone where they have the Shell Houston Open. These course were Difficult but there not impossible as they seem on TV. I would say they do make the conditions harder when they play the PGA events there but, again i have played in a US Open qualifier where they made the Lay out very similar to a US Open Tournament. I understand the difficulty of this Goal to play on the PGA but if it was easy everyone would do it, Right?

[Tye Smith]

We just made the move to San Antonio, Texas because of this Goal thank you for the advice though. I am looking at colleges currently in Florida.

[mdl]

Pretty solid clean up of the grammar, punctuation, etc.

Good luck!  Wished I'd started playing as a kid to at least have had a chance to play in college.