Geoff Ogilvy - Riviera, Slow Play, and Adapting to Modern Equipment

00:00:00
Speaker 1: Welcome back to another edition of the Frida Egg Podcast and our latest episode with Jeff Ogilvie. Before we get into a number of topics with Jeff, which include Riviera and the slow Play on Sunday, let's first talk about a exciting new announcement for the Fried Egg. We have partnered up with Summit Golf brands who make bee dratty fairway and green and zero restriction apparel products. We're really excited to partner with these guys. We share a lot of the same brand ideals. I've been buddies with some of them for number of years and it just was a really good natural fit. We'll have all Summit apparel in the pro Shop. We actually have a bunch of new items in there right now. Some be dratty polos, a fairway and green pullover, and some be dratty t shirts. So we'll get more stuff in there. But know what you like and really excited about this partnership. They are awesome people and they share a lot of the same ideals as we do about golf and kind of the future of the game. So excited to partner up with Summit and hope you guys enjoy this episode of the Jeff Ogilvie podcast.

00:01:19
Speaker 2: I Miss the Green. For example, I'm already upset. When I find my ball in the bunker, I'm really upset.

00:01:24
Speaker 3: And when I find my ball in a bride egg Friday egg, the dreaded Frida egg Frida egg Frida egg Brian egg Frida egg Bride egg Lie, I'm about ready to.

00:01:32
Speaker 4: Run off with the wedges everywhere. That's Cristy J. I used to do that. VJ got to number on the world. He changed his wedges every single week, brand new wedges every Monday, and if he got a flyer with his irons, that whole set went in the bag that day and he got a brand new set of irons every flyer. So some guys get like that.

00:02:15
Speaker 1: Was there a big difference when they switched the grooves at the wedges?

00:02:19
Speaker 4: Was that hard initially? Initially it was really weird that first sort of six months because they were crazy sharp and amazing grooves. I actually hated them right at the end, like the super spin milled groove things, just before they got banned or not or they got adjusted. I should say I had to get in a bunker for two hundred shots or something. With both of them, the fifty six and the sixty, to wear them at a little bit. They were too sharp. They were amazing. And then when they changed, we lost a lot of spin and the ball was rolling up the face. And I went from sixty to fifty eight because less spin. I think less loft sometimes helps you spin it. And then gradually they wereked it out. They worked out the milling on the face, they worked out how to make the new grooves inside the new rules be similar, and they got back to pretty similar pretty quick within the Euro I don't think. And now they've it's actually been a good thing for wedge design because it's it's put they've worked out to put the center of gravity higher. I don't know if you're the vocis now that you have quite a lot of weight up the top the top edge, and that's changed the flight That was that was to get all the spin back, so it's most of the way back. But at first it was a pretty big adjustment.

00:03:33
Speaker 1: Well what was it like when you went from wound to salad core?

00:03:41
Speaker 4: Wow? I mean that was a game changer. I turned pro in nineteen ninety eight using tour Biladas. I used a Tourblada at my European tour school which was Q School, which was nine eight, and used Balada the whole first kind of year or so. And it was at the end of it was two thousand the pro v came out, right.

00:04:02
Speaker 1: I think it was ye, yeah, nine yeah, gio thousand.

00:04:07
Speaker 4: Was it ninety nine Vegas or two thousand Vegas one of the things. I think it was two thousand Vegas because two thousand and one was that year that the USA Today article and stuff was out, So I want to say that was the change and from Balata because I didn't use professional like those kind of half those wound hard ones, you know, the professional and Max I had the Revolution and the really only solid ball when I turned pro that guys were using was the bridgestone that Price used to use, like the Precept TV and stuff like that. Remember those yeah, yeah, Precept the Japanese they were way in front of the curve. They had hard balls, like solid balls, not wound balls. I should say, well before US two thousand, as soon as it was thirty yard, that was the only time in my life that I actually when I said there's thirty yards in this ball of twenty it was true, Like it was just crazy. The first time I used the prov like it was amazing.

00:04:58
Speaker 1: I remember the SME. Remember you tee it up on the scene and it would go further. And then if I would tee up that was in high school. I tee it up with the titleist facing the club on par threes and you get more spin.

00:05:14
Speaker 4: That was a theory, right, you'd hit the brand name, you hit titleist a crossway, so you have the same kind of across the shot, the part three for irons, and then the T shot. I would have the scene vertically down the direction I wanted to hit it, yeah, and it would. I don't know if it did, but we're all convinced that it sounded different when you hit it off the scene and it went further. And I don't know if it did or not, but we're all convinced that it's fun.

00:05:41
Speaker 1: That's I feel like the Do you think that solid core ball changed the swing fundamentals a little bit?

00:05:52
Speaker 4: Partly? I think I think the whole the we've gone from, say, golf equipment evolved at at a normal pace right until that moment, I guess because that was kind of the time when titanium just showed up and it was coming into its own and the big head of drivers, bighead of drivers and solid cod ball all at the same time. That was the big jump. But we've gone from good players always had to try to keep spin off the old stuff, like it was everything spun a lot because the ball spun a lot, so it was a hitting you hit down on it a lot. And the modern equipment, especially with the way the track man and a low spin, and we're all trying to hit low spin. Everyone's trying to hit up on their driver a lot batter, and that's certainly adjusted techniques changed them. I mean it's I guess you just got to the right swing. The right way to use the body is still the right way to use the body, but I think there's people find it a different way now because the balls do something completely different. You've got to hit them really hard to get them in the air.

00:06:55
Speaker 2: Now.

00:06:56
Speaker 4: You know, modern stuff like a two players driver just doesn't work unless it's swinging at one twenty. You know, it just just falls out of the sky because it's geared to be hit hard.

00:07:07
Speaker 1: Do you think there's a so I think like that low spin knowing that everybody's trying to take spin off. And there's like that McDonald's quote when he's talking about the Haskell ball, right where certain holes got certain great holes became irrelevant because of the Haskell ball, and then indefferent holes became great holes.

00:07:30
Speaker 4: Right.

00:07:32
Speaker 1: Yeah, thinking about how players can't spin the ball like they used to, is there a way you could design a course thinking about that where you're using their lack of spin against them.

00:07:48
Speaker 4: Well? Perhaps, Yeah, this week's a at riv The tenth has clearly changed for a bunch of reasons, lack of spin and kind of control I would say on those sort of shots or less of which I don't necessarily think there is. I just think it's an adjustment of way you do it. But certainly the old ladder balls in the eighties were fun and really set up to hit pitch shots like you would be hitting into ten at riv And now it's it's that SHOT's completely irrelevant rif now in it. But if you played ten, if that was the only hole you played, it's seventy two times in a row and that was the only thing golfers played on, we would all end up with a ball that spun more. I think the course evolves the equipment rather than the equipment evolving the course. I think, you know what I'm saying. I think the course we could you could create a situation to get more spin on a ball if you just made a course that you needed more spin to play, you know what I mean.

00:08:51
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's what I was starting to think. Is like three hundred and so riv is like three thirteen. Is three point fifty the new three thirteen.

00:09:02
Speaker 4: We've talked about this a bit. I think it's a better hole now. At least the distance is better that everybody can get there, and it's better that not only can everyone get there, is that driver is actually too much for a lot of people. You know, if everyone's driver just ended up right there at the front edge and it couldn't really go in a bad spot, if it didn't go to the right, it would be not as interesting as the fact that. But most guys can get driver actually way past the green if they really catch one, and that's really terrible if you get past the green in the wrong spot. So it's kind of more interesting. It would be less interesting if everybody just hit a ten yard short, I think, because that's actually the easiest place to play from.

00:09:43
Speaker 1: And what you were saying, the modern driver, if you don't swing it really hard, it falls out of there. So it's actually a really hard shot to hit.

00:09:53
Speaker 4: It is, and it kind of do you like draw a three word like kind of down the front left of the green or do you try to out your driver or it's I think it's getting more. I think the tenth that rip has a few issues with the green. I think it's too pitched now. I think the bunker has built up the right hand side of it so much that it's too steep a little bit. They've lost a few pins, but outside of that it's become a better hole because it's even more of an in between par hole now. And they're always the fun ones, right the thirteenth, the masters, you know, like the the half par holes.

00:10:28
Speaker 1: What do you think about the fifth at Trinity compared to tenth at Rip.

00:10:34
Speaker 4: Fifth at Trinity was great, the little one with the no bunkers around the green. Yeah, that was a great hole and it played great that week too, and again because we all hit it over the grid. Driver was too much. So it's not it wasn't just not just a matter of hitting on the right line. It's the right line and the right distance, and when it was firm like it was the right line in the right distance, it was quite difficult, especially with a bit of wind. I think firmer golf courses would certainly encourage players to have a bit more control and maybe spin the ball a little bit more. I mean, because when the ball just hits and stops on the fairway and hits and stops around the greens, there's less It doesn't matter as much how it got there. You know, whether it was high in spinning or low and not spinning. It hits and stops, the flight is less relevant. But as soon as it gets firm, you'd see a variety of balls. I think some guys would take the risk and just prepared it as far as they won, even if it was going to bounce a bit more into the trees and not be able to shape it, and no other guys would choose the ball at shape. Back in the when I first started, Duval David used to talk about he knew it went further when he hit it with less spin, but he preferred a driver that spun the ball quite a lot because he knew where it was going and it was a lot safer way to hit it, So he actually sacrificed distance to hit it straight up, at least in that period when he was playing great, which I found interesting because you don't hear anybody say that. Now come out and say, oh, you know what, I've just set my driver up to go not quite as far because it's easier to hit straight. And when's the last time you hit someone say that?

00:12:10
Speaker 1: Yeah, nobody, it's it's the drivers. If you hit it far. I think eight of the top ten and the strokes gained last year off the tee made it to the FedEx Cup. So if you had it far up straight, like, there's no way. I mean, I think about this all the time. It's like for Camera Champ, for example, the unbelievable driver of the golf balls. It's so hard to shoot a bad score when you have wedge in your hand fourteen times right.

00:12:41
Speaker 4: And what we're kind of noticing, I think, is these guys who are hitting it far are actually the ones who have the best golf swing, because we're getting to that point where everything's maxed out, and so really the only way you can stand out distance wise is to swing it really really well, to swing it that fast, and when you swing it really, really well, you hit it straighter. Actually, it's changing. The traditional logic used to be long hit has sprayed it right, not true anymore. Cameron Champs one of the straightest hitters in golf. So it's Dustin. I mean, I've never seen anybody drive it like Dustin kN Mickaelroy straight with the driver, you know, incredible, Like these guys have the best swings, so they're long and they're straight. It's I mean, they're really fun to watch. It's it's incredible, but you feel bad for that guy who can't create, who's got maybe a little bit of a dodgy swing but maybe a real crafty around the greens. It's getting harder and harder for that guy to And look, that's the majority of the tour used to be slightly dodgy swings and real crafty, you know what I mean. It's it's harder to stand out for the the crafty guys. I mean, Cooch has had a good run so he's still doing it, and Zack Johnson and Steve Stricker and you know that the guys, I mean, just the except those big.

00:13:51
Speaker 1: Kids badly has had unbelievable longevity.

00:13:57
Speaker 4: Badly he has because he's a great putter.

00:14:00
Speaker 1: I mean I can't believe he's like been on tour forever. I remember watching him. I thought he was going to be the next major. I watched him at the nineteen ninety seven US Junior because it was at Kawai Farms. I mean I was a little kid watching and he was unbelievable. I mean, he was a superstar at seventeen.

00:14:20
Speaker 4: He was as polished at that age as anybody I ever saw. He won the Australian Open as an amateur against all of US, beat Norman and Montgomery down the stretch, so that was legit as an amateur. The next year, he turns pro the week before the Australia Open and wins it again. I mean who does that first week their term pro defends their national Open. I mean outrageous. And then just he just he lost his golf swing a little bit and maybe chased it a bit hard. But he was always an unbelievable putter. His ball striking has come and gone, I should say it say great periods and poor periods, but his short game has always been outrageous, really good.

00:15:00
Speaker 1: Good do you ever chase anything? Me with like your swing, you try and try, like you know, you hear about Kimer with a with a draw for Augusta all the time. You know, Luke Donald's trying to get more yards and then lost it, Like did you ever try and just like overhaul something.

00:15:22
Speaker 4: It was? I mean, it's always been a work in progress. Like I think I had this great patch when I was really young that felt so good and golf felt so easy, and it was obviously I was technically swinging it really sound or I knew what I was doing, but I didn't know how I was doing it. I was just swinging it and feeling good and it I had just the ball went where I wanted it to, and I never really got that back. I mean, it's probably safe for everyone who plays golf when they were a kid. Golf is easy when you're a kid, right, yeah, because you don't think about it. And I was if I was doing anything, I was always trying to make it feel like that again, and I never quite worked it out, like or not yet at least, but that I never really decided because I could always kind of draw it if I wanted to. If I wanted to, I had trouble with the drawer and the driver later on, and I'd look at lovingly at Rory's bullflight and go, how to you to draw like that with a driver? You know? But that was more of a wishful grasses growing on the other side rather than a chase, you know.

00:16:21
Speaker 1: Yeah, Yeah, that's that's. Yeah. I think that's the right way to do it, because everybody's always envious to somebody else what they have. Like you always watch somebody and you're like, God, if I can only put like him, That's what I always say to myself. Hey, so riv last week, Jabie Holmes wins. But we could talk about the slow play thing. But I'm curious, what's your take? So I found I've been keeping this stat for like the last three years running. Now, so youngest winner at Riviera since Adam Scott. Adam Scott was the last guy younger than twenty nine to win riv and only two guys that are twenty nine, Bill Hays and Charles Howell, one in their twenties at riv in the last fourteen years.

00:17:07
Speaker 4: Why wow, Well you've picked out some good names here too. I mean Bill Hars and Charles Hall have been pretty have proven themselves over a long period. It's up to have been some of the best players on tour right, so is Adam Scott. So it's obviously a course that suits a great player, and maybe there's a certain aspect of the course that you have to have played a lot of golf to do well around. It is quite a local knowledge course. Riv It seems really weird at first, tricky at first, I should say, it seems simple on the surface, and you find yourself missing greens in the wrong spot and three putting a lot, and the greens are really tricky on the weekend because they push that poor a little bit and it gets a little bit bumpy and fast and bumpy. It's really kind of scary for us. I mean fast and smooth it's not so scary, but fast and bumpy's really scary. And I think great putters an experience doesn't get freaked out by that. But when you're young, you do a little bit. You need a complete game to win there. You just you need to move it both ways. You need to have a real understanding of strategy and lay up. There's a lot of teasing a layups, partly a lot of places you can't miss at Riviera and do any good. It's just an experience course. I guess that's an interesting stat though, because there's some pretty impressive players and the twenties in the world in there.

00:18:31
Speaker 1: That's I keep I was when I thought I thought it was going to end, because I thought Thomas was going to win. But you know, Thomas winning it's I mean, he's about as good as I guess. I mean, he's got everything. But then Holmes wins and extends it another year, like unbelievable.

00:18:48
Speaker 4: It's interesting. They're all becoming very long hitters at riv too, right, Bubba, I mean Bubba does well there. JB. Thomas was up there. Freddie always used to be up there. It's becoming a bit of a paradise. And it's not a thought of like that. But as long hitters w do well there now, yeah, usually there pretty well.

00:19:09
Speaker 1: The thing though, now the tour is predominantly long hitters. Now you have to keep that in mind. But like the thing I try and look at is like, is there a variety on the leader board?

00:19:20
Speaker 4: Right? You know?

00:19:22
Speaker 1: And and when it was wet this year, so I think everybody was a long hitter this year, But you know, last year you had Kevin nah finished runner up with Tony fen Now the year before you had Scott Brown was a runner up.

00:19:35
Speaker 4: Yeah, they're not. They're not what you would consider long hitters are.

00:19:38
Speaker 1: No, that's I mean. But at the same time the long hitter seemed to be winning. I mean John Merrick that he's not long, he won. But at the same time that's there how many more long hitters? I mean, what's the better question really is what's long now? Obviously like Bubba JB and Dustin are really long, but three hundred is not really long.

00:20:04
Speaker 4: No, long is the guy? It's the carry distance. That's what I feel like. There's quite a few guys who max out the driver and get a good ball flight and swing it at one sixteen and hit at three fifteen or whatever because they just max out everything right. But then there's that guy like Dustin or fen Now or Rory who can fly at three twenty if they need to, like just all in the air, just wash what JP can do the same thing.

00:20:31
Speaker 1: Speaking of what do you think about that changed that proposed change to the fifth at Augusta or that they did they moved the t back forty Bergman's Road and then they move but they moved the bunkers back.

00:20:46
Speaker 4: Yeah, I don't know. I'm not. I've never been big on any of their changes because I just think, can't you just leave well enough alone. It's such a great place anyway, But they do it so seamlessly. I'll have to wait to see what it looks like because they do it so well. When they do it, it's quite a big t shot anyway. Like it always blew me away that the last couple of years there was a couple kis who could actually hit it over those bunkers because it was I could hardly even get it to the bunkers. Like, it's quite a big hit up five. It plays, It plays longer than it measures because it's uphill the board as at roll because of the way you hit it, So it's going to be a beast. It could turn into the hardest hole on the course. And by the way, that's the hardest green in the world. That hit is seven eye into, So I don't know what it's going to be like if guy's hitting three irons into it.

00:21:30
Speaker 1: I appreciate that they are going to have to hit like a mid mid iron in now, because.

00:21:37
Speaker 4: Oh yeah, bunkers have to be relevant right, they have to matter.

00:21:42
Speaker 1: Yeah, because you didn't even have to hit. You didn't even have to challenge the bunkers. And you have a short iron in right, mid iron short iron. Now, if you challenge them, you've got a mid iron in if you If you don't, you're going to have like a four iron in.

00:21:57
Speaker 4: I mean I've always had like a mid iron into there, really. I mean, I think the shortest I would get is like an eight on for me. As I said, the way they cut the fairways and stuff, it's really you've really got to smash it up there to get much less than one sixty. So I'll be disappointing if it plays too long.

00:22:13
Speaker 1: We'll see back to uh, back to JB. And you're not on Twitter. The world went went was outraged by the slow play at riv I think it was like the first moment it was coming off of the couture thing. It was like the new couture thing was slow play, Like what do you what do you think about how long it takes around it takes to get around and professional golf.

00:22:43
Speaker 4: I think it's a complete joke how long it takes to play around in personal golf, especially the three balls, which is every Thursday Friday, and usually on the West coast because of the daylight. It's brutal, but I mean it's been brutal forever and things naturally go their way. And it's obviously slowed down because of the length of the course, a length of the walk, I mean, all that you can, but you can, I can build in from there. Whatever it was three three hours to play in nine in twenty and four hours to play nine in eighty or whatever it was, but five and a half now or something. I can get that. It slows down gradually because everything's bigger and longer, and maybe there's more players in the field. I don't know, but ah, the lack of no, I don't it's such a there's so many different reasons people are slow, from taking too long to prepare for their shot, taking too long, standing over the ball, go to the bathroom at the wrong time, not paying attention, not hitting when they're ready, not getting their numbers until it's their turn. I mean, there's there's an infinite number of reasons why it slows, and that's why it's very difficult, I think, come up with a p that's actually going to work. The only the only place in the world that professional golf has played at a sensible place is Japan, and it's incredible. Like if the official comes up and says, hey, guys, you're two minutes over your time, speed up, they run. They literally run of the fairway because they're so ashamed of being the one who's holding up the field and that that really great Japanese thing that they have, that feeling that they have. They run and you play in four hours. So yeah, in other words, the players have to decide to get faster. Everyone has to sit around and not accept the way JB was. Like I didn't I didn't watch on Sunday particularly, so I didn't see how slow it was, but I know how it gets, and he does get quite deliberate, especially when he's in contention. He's quite good on Thursdays and Fridays. He does slow down the bigger the moment, which is quite common, but he plays well that way, so he's going to keep doing it until everybody just decides to not let him do that. It's not him, it's everybody. We just need to not accept if the players decided to play faster, they would just play faster. That is what I'm saying. I think that's the only way. Everyone just has to decide. You know what, this is a joke. We're not playing in five and a half anymore. Let's just play faster and if the slow players out here don't spit up, we'll just peel pressure of them into it. That's I think that's the thing that's going to work.

00:25:23
Speaker 1: What it's unbelievable to me that so I think that picking your yardage, seeing the lie, judging the wind all quickly, like being able to synthesize all that information quickly and make a decision is a real skill, and in the current setup, that player is actually being hindered like a a fast player has to adapt to the slow player.

00:25:58
Speaker 4: M hmm, definitely, definitely. I've always found it difficult to play with, say the really really slow players. We don't have to mention them, but we know who they are, the really what they really Traditionally everybody knows they're really slow, because it kind of makes me a bit frantic because I feel like I have to go a little bit faster to make up the difference. Because the unfair thing on tour and that this is what creates the animosity between the players and stuff is that you play. If too fast players are playing with one slow player, you end up on the clock because you can't make up the difference for a slow player. Slow player just plays as slow as he wants usually, and then you get on the clock, and it's very difficult to play golf on the clock. Nobody likes player the clock because you want Even though most guys don't back off shots, it's still nice to know that you can. But when you're on the clock, you can't. So you're over the ball thinking this better be right, This better be right. I can't back off. This better be right. And that's not the right thing to be thinking when you're playing.

00:26:55
Speaker 1: Ah, what about the what about lining up the bar? How much of an impact was that? Like, I don't think that was really a big thing back in the like you know, the say nineties, and now everybody lines up that ball on the greens. I think about it. I used to line it up and then I went away from it because I could never trust the line. And now I do nothing. But I'm I think I got I think for a period I was really slow on the greens when I was lining up the ball.

00:27:28
Speaker 4: There are certainly people who do that quite fast. Tiger's always done it. Brad Paxson always did it, and they've putted at a reasonable pace. I mean, Tiger's always played at a good pace. Tiger slows down on a really difficult part or chip or something like, he takes it in an order of amount of time, but always it's a pretty good one and gets it up and down, so the net result is good. But general play, he was fast and putting, and he lined it up and he didn't get too amle about it. He just put it down in put But some guys, especially with the way the green books, the green books were getting, take a really long time to get that line right and that yeah, again there's an infant. There's a lot of different reasons why it's slow. Mostly it's no attention. And no, I was always brought up and thought that if you just keep up with a group in front, that's the way you play golf. So you constantly just play and try to just keep that keep up with a group in front. That's really that's really the only thing you need to do to pay attention to your pace of plate, don't you think, is keep up with the group front. And if everybody does that and you get their first group playing at a sensible speed, then it's fine. Some guys don't have that radar. Some guys just don't. They don't notice where they are relative to the field, and they can fall two holes behind just because they get in their own head about their analyzing or whatever they're doing, and they just don't have that let's say, care factor. They just don't. Some people just don't have that internal clock and don't feel impatient a bit about it. I do. Some people don't. It's just one of those things. I think.

00:29:03
Speaker 1: I think that's understandable. Like I always think when I finish around a tournament round, I'll drive home and I won't remember any second of the drive home because I'll be just replaying that and you're in your hole, like you're in a tournament golf, You're in a completely different world.

00:29:21
Speaker 4: You know, the hit is completely Yeah, So I can.

00:29:24
Speaker 1: Understand where somebody would get out of that. I think about it. It's like the shot clock in the NBA, the game clock in the NFL. I've said this a couple of times, but like Tom Brady's the greatest quarterback ever because of the game clock. If there was no game clock, like the play clock. I don't think he would. I don't think he would be great because his skill is he gets to the line, he sees what the defense is in any audible is quicker than anybody else can.

00:29:55
Speaker 4: So yeah, he does just quick, so.

00:29:58
Speaker 1: You just quick. He sees where the safety is, he knows exactly what they're in, and he makes he changes the play and he kills the defense just picks him apart. And it's like the same thing goes for golf is if there's a shot clock, the more talented golfer would have an advantage because anybody, Yeah, for sure, because if you if you have all the time in the world, you're going to figure it out. Like there's a reason tests in school are timed.

00:30:33
Speaker 4: Right, Yeah, but do we need can we just have it making a gentleman's agreement to so how to display faster?

00:30:42
Speaker 1: But you could.

00:30:44
Speaker 4: The thing I don't like about the shot clock is if it became universal and you're standing on twelve at augusta. This is my example for why I don't like this, or fifteen in Augusta and you're standing on twelve and you've got thirty seconds to hit it. But it's one of those weird windy days when it's down in the wind down, When in the wind down, win in the wind and one guy gets it like in a nice spot, and then you've got thirty seconds to hit and you hit it and you hit it up in the trees or in the water because you weren't allowed to back off and wait for the right wind like that. It's too big a tournament to be put in. That's not fair. Tom Brady's playing indoors. Mostly it's different, like it's a different scenario. Everyone there is playing at the same time, Tom is, you know what I mean. But the guy on twelve is hitting a shot at a different time than everyone else in the field. So it's thirty seconds for one guy in the first group is maybe completely different from thirty seconds for a guy two hours later on the same hole. So that's the reason I don't like it, and I hope we don't get there. But you are right in that the great, the really really great players when you play those old experienced like great player, you know the I don't know who the David, Tom's or the Jaha. So you know the guys who played golf, professional golf forever. They they walk up to their ball and they know it's six sns before they're ten yards from the ball, Like they already know the shot they're going because if they're assessing it on the way up and they're doing it and the caddy is really just filling in the distance gap, but they kind of knew that they were going to a six. They know that short left of this hole is better. They know the winds a little bit out of the right because they've been looking at it all day. They know their six eye is not going it's only gone one seventy five this week because it's a little bit cooler. I mean, they've got all of that under control. They work up, grab the club and hit it. I think the age group that's on tour nowadays have learned golf on the range, not on the course, or more so at least more of a technical like sports psychology like range kind of development, rather than out the back of the caddyshack just playing thirty six holes a day. There's a different and you end up a different style of golfer. When you play holes at all, you do you get very efficient at that process, reading the lie, reading the win, reading the club, because that's what you do every hole, every shot on the rain, because it doesn't really matter where the ball goes. You're kind of you're always going through that full routine and you're kind of creating a bigger thing there. Does that make sense, becauess?

00:33:11
Speaker 1: The most beautiful thing about golf is that, no matter what, you'll never hit the same shot. The conditions are always a little bit different. The wind might be a little bit different, like even a T shot, Like you're never going to have the exact same T shot on the exact same hole day to day.

00:33:27
Speaker 4: No, it is a beautiful part, and I think when you approach it that way, it's easier when you try to make every shot the same shot, which is kind of what happens in like modern practice a little bit. You know, you're looking for these perfect numbers. I mean, it's not true. The coaches will also say this is not what we're doing. But it's much more that way than Jack Nicholas playing thirty six holes a day or whatever. It's a different style. So when you play a lot of golf, I think you get good at playing golf efficiently at an efficient speed when you hit a lot of balls on age in that style, you get very bad at pulling the trigger because you never have to on the range. You know, you always go through your process with your sticks and your alignment and your track man, and it becomes more of a science project a golf shot rather than just kind of like a little unfolding story if you're like around the golf is so, I think that feels to me when I watch these young guys play, is that they look like they haven't played enough rounds of golf in the development. They've hit a lot of balls, which is why they execute great shots, but it seems like a science project. Each shot, you know, different.

00:34:44
Speaker 1: Yeah, that makes sense. And then that's why at the same token, when things get windier, when the greens get a little bumpier and faster, where the experience matters because those are the guys that have seen it more right.

00:35:02
Speaker 4: I think. And JB's his defending argument that it was tough because it was windy is true. It is very difficult to play a course at riviera and super wind. You have to back off a few parts, you do. If you want to win, You're going to have to back off a few times. There's just no way around that. He was obviously taking way too long, But he is right, it does get slower when the wind picks up and the weather's bad. It just it's going to But if it didn't, if we were forced to play at the same speed, it would certainly be a massive skill to be able to play. And maybe it should be, as you're kind of saying, I feel like it should be part of the skill of being a good player, being able to play in a normal amount of time. Like I actually agree. I hope we don't get to a shot clock, but I agree that playing at a sensible speed. I mean, how hard is it to play golf for four hours? It's just not that hard.

00:35:59
Speaker 1: The tough thing is like having the volunteer. You can't enforce a shot clock all the way through, Like that's impossible. You'd have to have volunteers, you have to, Like, there's there's no way you could ever enforce a shot clock anywhere, but the PGA Tour really because of the number of people and who's timing it. It's not gonna be a shot link volunteer that's timing someone. But what if you had time out, just like you get six timeouts in basketball when you need more time, you got you got some in your back pocket. But at the end of the day, it goes against the whole ethos of the game because it's a game of honor. That's the That's the thing I think is this game of honor and these guys the slow play is almost it's it's disrespectful to the faster players.

00:36:57
Speaker 4: Well that's always certainly be trip. They're not trying to have no respect, but they do. The effect is the ones who's slowed down the field not caring about the other players at all. That's what rubs people the wrong way. But it just needs I don't know. I just think it's all taken so seriously and there's so much money in play that I don't know, we're going to have to We're going to end up coming up with some crazy, weird policy probably that like shot clocks or something, which would be a shame. But if that's what we need to do to make it faster, then that's what we need to do to make it faster, right.

00:37:37
Speaker 1: I don't like the money argument at all. I think it's I think it's complete crap. They play for eight million dollars every single.

00:37:44
Speaker 4: Week they do. That's a lot of money, but.

00:37:51
Speaker 1: You're growing the same way as the US an.

00:37:55
Speaker 4: True true, So you're probably right. It's taken it. It's just everyone takes everything very seriously. The the Bryson de Shambeau direction, if you like, is people are going more that direction in golf. You know, he's the poster bye boy for really what a lot of people are kind of treating golf. You know, like the no stone unturned approach, which if you get like that on the golf course, He's not necessarily very slow. I don't think Bryston. He's deliberate. Guys who go that's the way the whole sports being treat it, right, So that just just more stuff going on in people's heads when they hit shots. Yeah, I don't know, this has been. This has been I've been a pro for twenty years. This has been a conversation every year for twenty years, and from what I'm told, it's been a conversation for one hundreds.

00:38:48
Speaker 1: So so the only only solution would be player lad.

00:38:53
Speaker 4: Well. I don't think that's the only solution. I think that's the best solution because, as I said, I think the only plays I've ever seen fast professional goal for at least in my time has been in Japan, and that seems to be a peer pressure thing that makes that happen.

00:39:09
Speaker 1: That's because Brooks, I mean, Brooks made a comment about a couple comments about how long it takes and about how he goes and sits on a toilet for five minutes to get put on the clock on purpose, and then Adam Scott said something, so I guess maybe more people are speaking up. I was I was hoping that we were going to hear something after the tournament, but I think that's that's where it has to go. People just have to keep talking.

00:39:42
Speaker 4: I think the way it's going to happen is not from a policy standpoint. It's that the players gradually get fed up and they basically make it very uncomfortable. The two are uncomfortable places to be. They're not being rude or mean, but basically, when a play is too slow, the players need to call them on it, say mate, you have to play faster than this. This is not right. We're going to the next tea. We're going to play because this is a joke. You're holding up the field. And if more players did that, which is kind of obviously what happens in Japan, it's like you're the one holding us up, mate, hurry up. Yeah, all the players, the majority of the players doing that in a nice polite way, but like, look, beat, this is we're playing fast, you play faster. I think gradually that might happen. Or my my one idea to the tour, like the lasted of five or six years I've been on the pack, and on the pack, you're always inevitably to I have debates about slow play, but we time people. We time people with the shot link, right, So we have a I don't know if it gets public, but certainly on our website we can see on our stats, we can see how long it takes us to eat shots. And we have a speed rating. You know, twenty four seconds is Zach Blair and two minutes as JV. Holmes. Right, it doesn't change that much. It changes from twenty eight seconds to forty seconds or something. But like we all an average speed we hit shots for the year, So why can't we instead of finding the slow players because punishing the bad hasn't worked, because we've been finding slow players for a really long time and nothing happens. They stay slow and they just pay the fines. How about we reward the fastest players, how about we pay them with the fine money that the slow players are paying, you know, or the most improved. So if I was twenty nine seconds and fiftieth on tours, I mean for speed last year. If I go to twenty six seconds and get to tenth, I've improved forty spots. I get I get paid for that. There's actually an incentive pool of money for the guys who speed up, so there's a reason to get faster. At the moment, there's no reason to get faster. As long as you're not getting fined, you don't have to change. But what if you've got faster, And what if we paid the players who improved every year the most and actually put them on USA today. You know, top five fastest players on tour. These guys bang, we paid them this issue because they're fast. Do you think that would work?

00:42:05
Speaker 1: I think that would work. I think here's the big thing from it is that the way I look at it from just a fan is that the product stinks with slow play. Like I am a golf nut and I was who wants to come watch somebody plumb Bob for two minutes on a Sunday afternoon like versus you're competing against the NFL, the NBA.

00:42:34
Speaker 2: Like.

00:42:35
Speaker 1: The two sports that have pace of play issues are baseball and golf, and they're the two least popular sports with younger generations.

00:42:46
Speaker 4: Corn Yeah, yeah, when you say it like that, you're right, Like the UH, as long as the real golf tournaments, you know, the ones that really historically matter, like the majors and National Life and stuff, they stay with the proper rules of golf. I don't see why you shouldn't. Actually, when you say like that, do whatever you can to make the product better whatever that is.

00:43:10
Speaker 1: Think about how much better coverage would be if they actually knew when somebody was going to hit a shot.

00:43:16
Speaker 4: Yeah, yeah, you're right, you're right.

00:43:20
Speaker 1: Right now, they just guess. They're like, oh, we're going to cut over to JB. And little did we know this was his first of four plumb bobs on the green.

00:43:30
Speaker 4: Yeah, and he's twenty seven practice rings with a pitch shot and stuff like. It is difficult. It must be a nightmare for the producers. They both, I mean Lance and Tommy, I know both the producers in the US, and they tell you it's a very difficult sport. Golf. There's so much of that, and their nightmare is cutting to cutting to the guy who's about to pull the club away and backs off and doesn't hit it for three minutes. Right.

00:43:50
Speaker 1: That's that's why I noticed that what they were doing. They'd cut to JB. And they'd notice he was just at the start, and they'd cut to somebody else and then come back to him. So they were adapt but it just makes it impossible. And that's the way I kind of think about it is like from a from a long term product standpoint, slow play, that's that's it's really bad for the product, which is what you know, the PGA Tour is what it is.

00:44:16
Speaker 4: That's the product. Product is entertainment really, so make it more entertaining. And if that's fast, that's faster. I guess there's just got to be a way to do it that keeps golf traditionalists like you and me happy that it's still golf.

00:44:35
Speaker 1: I think paying people actually incentivizing fast play makes a lot of sense to me, and you're getting the find, Yeah, makes a lot of sense.

00:44:45
Speaker 4: Because everything if what we've been doing in anything really hasn't hasn't been working, then don't you do the opposite, Like, Okay, if finding the slow players doesn't seem to make the slow players get faster, how about we pay the people. Maybe you pay the five fastest players for the year, and you pay maybe if it's just even if it's retirement money whatever, Like, there's a big reward and the most improved from last year. So these are your shot like numbers. The ten players who improve their time the most over this year will get paid. What about an incentive to get faster?

00:45:20
Speaker 1: What if everybody that makes the cut, your money gets safened off based off if you're you get you have your finish and then you have your piece of play finish. Yeah, and if you finish high and piece of play you get extra money. If you finish low and piece of play you get less money.

00:45:45
Speaker 4: Yeah. You can lose up to I don't know, ten percent of a check for being too slow as something, or gain on your check something I don't know. Yeah, there's got to be I think it has to be positive reinforcement because I think you can keep finding the slow players if you want, because it's a good revenue raiser. It's like speeding tickets, right, but it doesn't make people drive slower and it doesn't make people play faster golf. They just pay the fine. I mean there's a there's a few guys, and everyone who's followed the tour could probably guess, and there's who they are. They just basically pay the fines every year and except that they're going to have fines, and that's the cost of doing business for them, you know. But it's it's like an it's like an insurance policy for them, Like they know they play well when they play those so they just pay the fines and that's how they do it.

00:46:27
Speaker 1: I think they shouldn't have to pay fines to the tour. They should have to pay they should have to walk and hand the money to the fast players.

00:46:35
Speaker 4: I think one hundred percent think the fine money that they get, the sanctioned money, should be paying the reward money. One hundred percent. That would be so.

00:46:42
Speaker 1: Good, And but they have to they have to hand it to the to the reward people. They don't pay it to the tour. They hand it to the people that are fast.

00:46:53
Speaker 4: At east Lake on the Green for the FedEx Cup champion does this thing. They have a slow players. Slow players pay fast players like ceremony. That'd be great, you have to National TV.

00:47:04
Speaker 1: All right, that's it for part one of this session with Jeff Ogilvie. We will be posting Part two later this week, probably Wednesday night or Thursday morning, and we talk a lot more about Jeff's experience in the vic Open, the congruent men's and women's event, and as well as a bunch of other things, some stuff about Augusta Majors and the latest happenings on tour. So look forward to that. I hope you guys enjoyed Part one.

00:47:40
Speaker 2: I miss a green, for example, I'm already upset when I find my ball in the bunker, I'm really upset. And when I find my ball in.

00:47:47
Speaker 3: A Frida egg Frida egg, the dreaded Frida egg, Frida egg, Frida egg brid egg, Frida egg.

00:47:52
Speaker 2: Bride egg lie, I'm about ready to run off of the hup

00:48:02
Speaker 3: Sat at Su