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This topic aged like a carton of milk left in room temperature.

I take my hat off to Rory, WOWOW! That must have been WAY harder than winning it 8-10 years back. To struggle for a decade, and to finally achieve it, one of the great golf stories of the past 20-30 yrs. Boy and he tried to give it away! As for my prediction, obviously off off off. I truly think all the things l listed are real, but to a far less extent I was thinking. Maybe those were more true back in the 2016-2022 period. The pressure was huge, especially-obviously on the back 9. That blocked chip into the creek, that had to be all pressure. And I think the missed putt on 18 in regulation - that was crazy. It seemed like he didn’t take any time at all, that had to be insane pressure. But raising my hand, that pressure and those missed shots were nothing related to any of the factors I listed out! Just pure pressure, built up over 10 years, man o man. And watching the emotion, man that is touching, good for him, his family, for golf. And finally, to the guys I rubbed the wrong way, my bad, really not my style. You guys have been here for years, I’ve been here for 2 days. You’ve built a great site and a great community. Humble apologies, and if you don’t ban me I hope to come back and join up for some lively discussion. Peace!

Got my first hole in one yesterday, playing with son at Yocha Dehe (Cache Creek) in CA. 90% 9 iron, 140 yards, hole 16.

Thank you for sharing that. He was quite good wasn't he? I was curious, so took a look. He played 19 PGA Tour stroke play events in 2000. He was 263 under par (they did point that out at the end of the video). If you look at each event he played in and take the best score in each event for a player not called Tiger Woods, that combined field score was -259. So he beat the field - where the field resets every week - over the course of an entire season. That's mind blowing.

Update: we are officially booked for our Sunday round (6/22) at Cranberry Highlands golf course: Course Tour | Cranberry Township - Official Website Visit our gorgeous course and read descriptions about each hole. 11:10am | 11:20am | 11:30am | 11;40am tee times. Still working on the Saturday course.

If you're going to make claims, back them up with facts. Do you have any facts that support this claim that Rory does this when under pressure? Did the hyper aggression negatively affect his play when he won The Players this year making that 2 wins in 4 starts for him at that point? Can you provide some evidence directly showing how his hyper aggression has negatively affected his play? This isn't even accurate anymore, they called the divorce off. If you're going to criticize someone at least get your facts straight.

Current attendee list (10 confirmed, 1 tentative): @Hardspoon @iacas @bkuehn1952 @billchao @ChetlovesMer @Carl3 @StuM @vasaribm @DaveP043 @dennyjones @klineka (Tentative) I assume we'll have (3) total foursomes for planning purposes...maybe 4. I'll start to send out some preliminary thoughts on location and courses this week.

I wanna know how I even came across Prime Tiger in the first place. Does time travel exist? Can I tell him about what happens to him a la Marty Doc in Back to the Future? I'll take the shot at $100m. If I fail, 72 holes with Prime Tiger on a sick course somewhere sounds worth $1m to me. "Dear Tiger, at 1:30am on the night I go back you will be shot by terrorists. Just kidding, but no seriously though, your body is an absolute mess by the time you're 40. You have severe back pain starting in 2014, a career ending car accident in 2021 at Riviera (dude, learn how to drive), and uhhh let's just say you might wanna pump the breaks on those "extracurricular activities" you enjoy so much (I know, bro). Also, remember what I told you about AimPoint and the ball flight laws. Your friend in time, Jetfan1983."

I figured out the issue. The guy in charge of match play was trying to post these through golf genius. But when he leaves the scores for holes blank, it defaults to net double bogey. So he was trying to post +10 for 18 holes instead of +5 for 16 holes. There is probably a way to do this correctly in golf genius, but he’s not going to figure it out. I posted the score manually, and it passes the sanity test:

Looks like a ball at rest moved by an outside influence. Replace the ball on the spot, estimate the spot if its not known. Rule 9.6. If the original ball isn't immediately available, use another ball.

Day 201 - 2025-04-19 Played Pinehurst No. 10 today. Was a treat, and @NatalieB shot 67 (reds).

I was just thinking about this. 60 majors played in since 2010. 42% of them top 10 finishes. 22% top 5 finishes. My goodness, 9 straight top 10 finishes at the US Open, regarded as the toughest course set up for the Majors. WTH! That is different than jacked, so no. No, it doesn't. It is tough to win majors. He is in rare company by winning the career grand slam. It is much tougher to win majors in the 2010+ years than it was prior. Look at the most majors list. If you cut it off at 5+ majors. There are 21 golfers ever to have 5+ majors. 17 of them won their first major prior to 1987. Maybe you could say he should have two more if things go his way. I don't think he should be near 10 or anything like that. 5 is reasonable at this point. He is tied for 15th ever. He probably has like 20 to 28 more competitive major rounds in him. Maybe in like the short term yes, but he would have gotten used to it in short order. He is a world class athlete in the golfing world. His ability to feel his golf swing is nearly unmatched. To say that him getting a bit bigger in 2014 has impacted him over the next 11 years, without him just figuring it out is really an absurd statement. Tiger Woods changed his swing like 3x and was elite. He got bigger, not jacked, and was elite. We are not talking about Olympic weightlifters here, or jacked body-builders. FYI, doing weightlifting through a full range of motion gives you more flexibility. Do you want to know who can get into the deepest squats in the world, people with gigantic legs, the Olympic weightlifters. Want to know who can't get down into a deep squat, lazy people who don't work out. Could muscle mass as the "extreme" side of things cause some interference in a particular golf motion, sure. Rory isn't even close to being that size. Yea, it could be mental. Sometimes you just need to get over the hump again even though you have 4 majors in your pocket. You only get 4 chances a year at this. You have to be on your game to have a chance on Sunday. So, for the stars to align for him to have the chances to even learn from his mistakes is not that much. Being T-5, 6 strokes back and not having that pressure on the Sunday is not a learning experience on how to close out a tournament. It makes sense why it could take this long. Also, he is playing against other good golfers. Sometimes, the best golfers in the world get beat. Nope, it isn't. I would agree it was loss of confidence or nerves, plus other golfers just taking it from him than it being related to him working out. I am actually willing to say, it is 0.0000000000000000000000001% related to him working out. So, round that off to ZERO! Let's not play the victim card here. He wasn't able to bomb it 330 yards prior to 2014 because he was a kid who still had baby fat on him. Look at the rolling 10 round average since he started. It looks pretty typical. Lots of ups and downs because you can't be on all the time. Even back in 2014, he never really had a 10 round average were his stroke's gained approach was negative. If you say his size causes him issues, then there should be something crazy here. The dips in 2014 on look the same. Did he have some early year crazy spikes, sure. Sometimes a golfer catches fire for a year. There are things call outliers for a reason. So, this is probably why you started this. You dislike Rory and want to wish it into existence that he would never win another Master. Again, you are not the victim here, so stop these self-deprecating comments to try to buy some sympathy.

Does TST have an annual award for worst take ever? If so, this thread should get an early nomination. And while Rory is in great shape, he’s far from super ripped. IIRC, when asked he said that the green jacket he was wearing, which wasn’t tight on him at all, was a 38R. Not exactly Schwarzenegger size.

He explained it in the post round interview @ 6:12. It's a good interview where he talks about the mental struggle to win at Augusta, how there's been a lot of pent-up emotions since 2011 and that final round probably being one of the toughest days he's ever had on a golf course. I absolutely recommend spending 26 minutes on it. It provides some good insight on him as a player and person. There's been a lot of talk about him not winning majors and The Masters, which has been difficult for him. He's obviously got the game to win, but nerves seems to be a big reason why he's missed out on many of them. Some people seem to expect the best players to have a mind void of nerves and mental challenges when a lot is on the line, but that's simply not how it works. Some deal with it better than others, regardless of talent and skill. Rory seems to be one that struggle to keep nerves in check in those tense situations. This win is a huge monkey off his back and hopefully it will help him deal with those nerves the next time he's in a position to win a big tournament. That's the kind of person you don't even bother engaging with. No matter what you say and what evidence there is, they'll have an explanation for it.

Did you tell them that the PGA has nothing to do with the Masters?

I went to a concert when Rory was on 16. What did I miss?😜

This happened to Jordan Spieth as well. He won 3 majors. 2 in 2015 and 1 in 2017. Then he got all buffed up and now he doesn't win majors anymore. It's his huge muscles that are ruining his game. 💪

I’m 3 for 3 in willing Mickelson’s ball to find the water! 13, 15 and 16!

Do you guys follow the NFL draft? I do. Feels like Cleveland should have just taken the best player in the draft (Travis Hunter). But this is what happens when you trade 3 first rounders, plus 40% of your salary cap for a guy facing 24 counts of sexual assault and who plays roughly half of the games. The Browns can't wait for 2028 when they will finally be rid of the stink of DeShawn Watson.

Just tell Tiger you'll give him $10M if he lets you beat him on one hole. Hell, give him $25M.

Lots of clubs institute this MLR. Even when conditions don't lead to a lot of lost balls. I see no problem with it. It does mean you're hitting your fourth (if your tee shot is missing), of course.

Shedeur freeeeeeeeeeeeeeee fallin'. I'm definitely on board with the "Shedeur is bad" takes. Am I right? Dunno. Milroe's still there. I feel like he has way more upside than Shedeur but again, I could be wrong. He seems at least as good as Malik Willis to me though. My physical therapist loves Will Howard but he went to Ohio State so his opinion can't really be trusted. He any good?

I mean… Pickett's small hands won't be able to hold it down very well. 🙂

Got my second birdie of the year. One for each 9 hole round I've played this year. I'm using Bent Tree Golf Course in Sunbury as my home course because that's where the Wednesday Night league I'm in this year is. Hole 17 is a 130 yard par-3 with a green the size of a flea's footprint. Last night there was almost no breeze to speak of and it played at about 126 yards. I hit a smooth P-wedge to about 15 inches. Even I couldn't miss that putt. Tap in Birdie.

That demon did. And it was a big one. It showed in his press conference when he talked about Harry. I agree golf will continue to bring its stressors…but he removed a massive albatross and that will play to his favor for a long time if not the rest of his playing career.

Elbow feeling better, hit some balls on range a few days ago, and spent 15-20 mins working on slow backswings, then hitting into net today

Having to head to a playoff after missing that putt on 18….then sticking that approach. The demons are gone. Only the Golf Gods can get him now…..

I think Rose is great. Much respect to his consistency, professionalism, work off-course and a never give-up attitude. But I have mixed feelings about his Masters campaign. Afterall, the dude came within a putt of ruining the perfect ending to probably the greatest unfinished story in golf. 😱

Very respectfully, I disagree. I still believe there’s a small kernel of truth to my theory. Hey, you, iacas and many others here are extremely knowledgeable, know the game inside out, know the tour inside out. I’m just a schmuck who posted a take, admittedly unsupported and not up to reasonable high standards. There’s a background to my take - I’ll attempt to briefly describe it. Back when Rory first came on tour, I thought he was great - most folks did, his talent was undeniable, and his youthful happy go lucky looking demeanor made him even more likable. And he won early, fast - at the highest levels. And then the physical workouts started. That was cool, man he’s looking good. And as it went along, was even a bit shocking. But all was still good in the Rory fan club. But as a few years rolled along and the majors stopped, folks like me started to question the effect of the physical build up. (raising my hand here - - folks like me were probably concentrating 95% on the majors record, and failing to acknowledge his stellar play overall) The matches with Patrick Reed... Somewhere around that time, Patrick became “the most hated man on tour”. Raising my hand again, not sure if that timing is accurate, or even if that moniker was deserved. But when Rory got into the screaming flex-off, it definitely detracted from the earlier Rory likability. It’s kinda like he was lowering himself to Patrick’s level. Not so great, for me at least. As the mid 2010s rolled along, and the majors drought continued, and the near misses at the Masters happened, the dreaded ‘choke’ perception inevitably raised its head and persisted. I joined in with the chorus, not disliking Rory, but certainly questioning his ability to close the Masters or any other major. Rightfully or wrongly, it was there. Then LIV came along. As that developed, I saw the anti-LIV sentiment develop along with it, and I took offense to it. My thought - these guys are being offered life changing $$, and the anti-LIV folks are trying to stop them from getting it. And then when Rory rose to ‘lead’ the anti-LIV sector, that really rubbed me the wrong way. The press conferences, the parking lot shouting match - it just all seemed really distasteful to me. And it seemed far far away from the early Rory, who I really liked. So all that (in my own mind) led me down the “Rory will never win.. yada yada”. Not based on any real statistical analysis. Not taking into account the incredible stats and winning record he had amassed. Purely based on perception and cultural silliness. AND - the physical thing, which as I mentioned, I think there’s a tiny kernel of merit there. So - fast forward to Rory’s post win press conference. THAT was the old Rory I remembered! The totally cool guy, humble, forthright, honest, self deprecating. He’s probably been like that all along. And he’s certainly backed off the hard core anti-LIV persona, at least in public. That’s it. Just a stupid unsupported take from a dumbsh*t golf fan. For me, this was the most exciting major since the Tiger era. I really thought it would be a gladiator death match between Rory and Bryson. I’m surprised that Bryson fell off - - I thought he was well-set-up to handle the pressure. I’m sure he’ll be there many times in the future, along with Rory.

I've been watching golf for 35 years and I've seen my fair share of exciting events, but I cannot recall ever watching so much up and down in the fortunes of one player in one round of golf. How good the good shots were and how bad the bad shots were and how he was leading, then not, then leading again, then way clear, then tied, then behind, then leading, then in a playoff, then winning. Heck I aged just watching it on the TV - Rory must have gone through some stuff out there. Just incredible. Consider that Rory had two double bogeys, three bogeys, six birdies, and Rose made only 4 pars, 4 bogeys, and 10 birdies. 10! Round that place? Mind officially blown.

The upside is that you're so tense now that you can always blame your body for playing poorly.

Oh, I'm sad now. By his definition I am "jacked". Do I have to go back to being described as "in not too bad of shape for a guy of my age"? 🤣

It's been a while since I practiced. Injuries compounded last year and I could play but I didn't want to make anything worse with repetitive stress so I shut down practicing basically in early summer. Just kind of getting back into things now and I'm not surprised to see I've regressed a bit. Hitting the ball well enough to get 8 GIR yesterday but the misses can be really bad - tops and toe shanks. Just settled right back into the constant problem areas in my swing, mainly the wrists/club position at A4 and not recentering properly. Going to focus on getting solid contact consistently back before anything else.

One made a topic here about how Rory would never win a Masters… last Thursday afternoon! 🤣😜

So, @klineka and @Zeph are you guys trying to imply that winning majors is difficult? Perhaps, that's why Rory becomes the first golfer (not named Tiger Woods) in almost 60 years to win a career Grand Slam?

^^^ I think this year gave us something incredibly exciting, but also special. That list of career grand slam winner is something else. Well, except for Gary Player.

I'm going to pile on @TommyRude. The more I think about this take the funnier it gets in my head. Colin Montgomerie lost at least three majors down the stretch that I can think of. 1994 US Open shot 78 in a three-person-play-off losing to Ernie Els (and Loren Roberts). Montgomerie pulled drivers left and pushed them right the entire play-off round. 1998 Masters; pulled three of his last five approach shots left. Ended up finishing tied for eighth. 2006 US Open was tied for the lead (with Phil). He was sitting in the middle of the fairway on 18. Hit his approach short, pulled his chip shot long left, 3 putted. Therefore clearly, Colin Montgomerie's reliance on bulky musculature and overly testosterone driven attitude obviously caused these issues. 😁 If you want to go the other way, I know Brooks Koepka has credited all five of his majors to the fact that he's powerfully built. ... I'll suggest DeChambeau may say the same thing.

Happy for Rory. Sad for Rose. Not sad for Bryson.

Emotionally drained

Rory’s got the good walk going!

It’s hard not to cheer for a 5’ 9” guy who can bomb it. Plus he’s the face of the PGA Tour right now and seems quite a humble guy.

UPDATE: Even if I decide to retract my grovel, that first 5 holes was the most electric start that I can recall seeing at the Masters? Wowow! Even with my hyperbolic prediction, I’d hate to see him fall back now

I did it all for the Stussy.

Agreed. He’s probably the biggest name now that Tiger’s not around, and he’s been a fun player to watch all these years. I really hope he gets the jacket one day. Ugh, I could do without those two doubles. Good tee shots, then missing greens and not getting it done with the wedges. At least he didn’t dunk two like Cantlay, but four dropped shots in three holes is rough. He’d been going at it very well up to that point. The greens seemed very quick yesterday, as many on the course reported. As for Rory and The Masters, it’s 50:50. He’ll either win one or not, but ruling out the 35 year old world number two is just silly. This “super buffed” talk reminds me of when Tiger got some muscle and people thought he was huge. He wasn’t and Rory isn’t. You don’t have to gain a lot of muscle before it shows, especially in tight fitting t-shirts. He’s got the game to win it. Just have to make it work those four days and not let his head get in the way. Winning professional tournaments is difficult. Winning a major is even more difficult. The good news for Rory is that The Masters has the weakest competition of the majors. The top players are all there, but it’s a smaller field than the other majors.

Here's a drinking game for you. Every time the announcers say "The influence of Ray's Creek" or "Take your medicine" you take a drink. Just so you know I've been watching it for 10 minutes and I'd already be drunk.

The latest episode on low spinners vs bounce was very good. I listened while chipping in the basement. You all do a good job on letting each other speak and ask questions we would ask. 005: Low Spinners vs. Using the Bounce — What's the Better Short Game Move? Podcast Episode · The Spin Axis - Golf Podcast · 04/08/2025 · 19m

Right hand in particular too strong, face pretty closed coming down (resulting in you trying to push the ball right with the path).

I'd find a free fitting, take your clubs, and see what you can see. For example, we have a PXG fitter come to our academy every Tuesday, and he's great about sharing info about why he's having you hit a certain shaft or clubhead or something. And… if you don't see much of a change, skip it.

On my calendar thx @Hardspoon for putting this together