Hi, This is Fred Green of Golf Smarter with the first of two episodes
where Tony Manzoni made his tenth appearance on Golf Smarter number five hundred and ninety
four in May of twenty seventeen. It had been two and a half years
since we'd last spoken to Tony, and clearly we had a lot to discuss
creating an episode longer than most. Now, after this week, there are
two more episodes with Tony. I know I said that last week, but
I decided to bring back Tony's very last appearance, back when he announced his
new golf school with two of his closest friends, but it was just before
his cancer made it tough to carry that through. Tony's book, The Loss
Fundamental, is available on Amazon, and his DVD, which we converted to
a private link online, is also available when you write to me. For
the most comprehensive information ever collected on Tony, please go to Golfsmarter dot com
slash Tony, and while you're there, check out how to make a tax
deductible donation to our Tony Manzoni Memorial Golf Smarter Fund to benefit the first t
of Coachella Valley, where Tony lived and taught for decades. If you'd like
to access that video, please write to me directly Golf Smarter Podcast at gmail
dot com, or click on the Heyfred button when you visit golfsmarter dot com.
Take your golf game to the next level, one club at a time
with Tony Manzoni. This is Golf Smarter, sharing stories, tips and insights
from great golf minds to help you lower your score and raise your golf IQ.
Here's your host, Fred Green. Welcome back to the Golf Smarter Podcast.
Tony. How are you, Fred? I am doing well and so
glad to hear from you again. It's been quite a while, but let
me let me give the audience just a taste of how many times you've been
on this pot podst uh the first time back in twenty ten we were introduced,
and since then you've been on twelve different episodes two fifty one. And
take notes of this, folks, because after you hear this conversation with Tony,
you're gonna want to go back and listen to other things he has to
say. Because I've had Golf Smarter listeners have told me that they've traveled cross
country to go get lessons with Tony. Right, you've had people come in
from New Jersey or Connecticut or something, Tony. Yeah, the doctor come
in from New York. He runs one of the largest hospitals there, and
he came in for a two day golf instruction period, and you know,
it just kind of I was kind of I was, well, first of
all, I was flabber guest at number one, and you know, it's
a big compliment, and he's turned out to be just a wonderful friend on
top of it. Oh that's great. Oh that's great. I have a
feeling I know who you're talking about. So two fifty one, two fifty
four, two ninety one and three twenty eight, four oh eight, four
nine, four thirty eight, and four thirty nine, four fifty six,
and four fifty seven, now four fifty seven, back in twenty fourteen.
Really, you haven't been on that long. My favorite it's one of my
favorite titles of all time. And the question I posted to you, Tony,
if Tiger Woods called you for help, what would you say? I
loved that. That was a great episode. So I don't really twenty fourteen
was the last time you're on. That doesn't make sense. Anyway, it's
great to have you back on the show. Thank you so much. I'm
very pleased, Fred, And it's been a long time. But you know,
as as as we get older, time goes by a little faster,
I mean a blinket than I am an old man. So I'm not even
gonna ask this time how old you are, because I think I asked you
before, which was rude, and I'm not going to do it again.
But you've outlived a lot of your friends. Let's just say that geometers turned
over a few times. Yeah, and you've outlived a lot of friends and
a lot of famous people that you hung out with down in the desert,
isn't it true? That's true. I mean starting out with the number one
guy, Frank Sinatra. His desk was you know, it was a catastrophe
for all his fans, including myself. Yeah, I bet. But didn't
you tell me once that hanging out with Sinatra and the rat pack down in
those days down in the desert kind of had a negative impact on your golf
career, didn't it? Your professional touring golf? Well, when his the
lady that ran his compound, her name was Vine, and I was working
at mission Hills Country clubs head professional. Once I got invited, it seemed
like I got invited just about every night because he was retired at that time,
and I was opening up that pro shop, you know, close to
five point thirty every morning, and I was leaving the Sinoptra compound after two
o'clock in the morning every evening. So yes, everything suffered a bit,
but I couldn't pass that opportunity. No, it was just it was an
incredible thing. Yeah. I mean there's there are golfers who have played on
the tour who said, yes, I played on the tour and I won
once, but none of them get to say, but I got to hang
out with Sinatra every night for way too long. Yeah, it was.
It still feels like a Fellini film to me, with on the people I
met and the unbelievable dinners and conversation. It was just incredible. That's amazing.
Also, I've been promoting this podcast that I've been putting out recently as
a show that I did in nineteen eighty seven, but it's just so much
fun that I had to bring it back. Of this show Radio Baseball Cards
that's hosted by the late Don Drysdale. You knew Dry as well, right,
I did. I met him on a couple of occasions, and I
also knew his wife, who was involved in a lot of golf activities,
and you know, she was an Olympic champion and unbelievable gal. But Don
was a unique individual and very nice. Obviously one of the great pitchers of
all time. And I have a baseball signed by him that I cherish.
Unbelievable. All right, Well, let's talk about golf now, enough history
on where you've been in the marks that you've left. I had this idea,
and that's why I wanted to talk to you about taking your game to
the next level, one club at a time, right, because there are
some clubs for some people just don't work, right they Oh, yeah,
right. You know, I think golf clubs, as we all know that
play and suffer through this challenge, some golf clubs don't like you. I
mean, I've had wedges that I wanted to tie to my car and drive
around the block. Let me pay them back with all the skull shots that
I hit with him. So I've often said that I had a five iron
that I was allergic to. I know exactly what you mean. Yeah,
all kidding aside. That's why getting fitted is so important, because then you
eliminate the blame factor. I recently was fitted for a new set of clubs,
and I really love these clubs, but there seems to be one club
that is not cooperating. I've got I'm hitting everything where I'm pointing, I'm
my target. It goes to where I'm you know, focused on, except
this one club just takes this huge right turn every time. Is that possibly
because the set there's one club that was not correctly made in that set?
I mean, what can I do that? Sure? Sure, well often
lie it changes, especially if they're they're not cast clubs, and even cast
clubs, you can move them a little bit. So yeah, that happens
a lot. Or it's you know, it's because you fear hitting the shot
with that club, which compounds the problem. And sure, you know probably
in most cases that's it. There's a it's so difficult to stay in that
have that feeling that you're going to hit a good shot prior to hitting it.
And I think that's the challenge for everyone at every level. Yeah,
you know, I haven't had them long enough to fear the club, and
it's a club that in previous sets I've been you know, really excited about
Oh good, I've got a six iron shot that I want to make here,
and now this six iron is baffling me. I'm just wondering if maybe
I should take it back to the club fitter and say, can we test
to see if this is within its correct specs? Is that? Oh?
Sure? They could do that quite easily. They can check the loft and
lie on the club, and they can also check the shaft you know,
if it's you know, performing properly, and they have they have your whole
set that to go go buy, so they can just you know, make
sure that it is matched. And this does happen, there's no question about
it. But I'm glad to hear that you had your clubs fitted. And
that's really an important thing, you know when you when you think of the
the top professionals have it done. We we meager players must have it done.
And that's the problem. Most people will go and buy a club right
off the rack, and then they're chagrined when it doesn't work for them,
and a lot of times it's just because the club doesn't fit right. Well,
what about they if they go into the shop and said, hey,
you know what, I hit my friends driver and I crushed it. I
want to buy that driver. Yeah, it's it's hard to replic. I
mean, I have a good friend that is he's noted for those kinds of
things, and he'll go and he'll try a demo club, but he'll want
to buy that demo club, you know, And a lot of times they
said, but we can't sell you this one, but we'll get one like
it. But he refuses to do that because psychologically, if he gets another
club that has the same name and it's supposed to be the same thing,
and hits a bad shot with it, he's not going to say, well
that shot was because I swung poorly or did something. He's going to say,
no, this isn't the same club. So there they were, right
back to that psychological thing that we all fight. Yeah. Actually, about
ten years or so ago, I remember having a conversation on the show with
Kenny Nicholson when we were working with Edwin Watts Golf, and he said,
if you have an opportunity to swing a friend's club and you like it,
try to buy that club off your friend, because you're never going to find
it that exact right club in a Yeah, that's true. Yeah, there
was no question I was going to get fitted. I we've been advocating being
fitted, you know since the very beginning. We've talked to guys like Tom
wish On, one of the you know, the great custom club makers in
the world, and getting fitted is so important. But I always when I
recommend to people to get fitted, they're like, you know, but I'm
not. I'm going to wait till I get more consistent. I want to
wait until I feel more comfort. What do you tell people who who have
you know, who aren't don't feel like it's necessary yet they're going to get
to some place where they're going to do that. I can tell you that's
a fallacy to say that I'm going to wait till I'm going to be more
consistent. You better have a lifespan of about two hundred because the only guy
I know that got to that point was and Hogan. Everybody else mishits the
ball and that's just the nature of the sport. Really well, it isn't
even a sport. It's a challenge. That's the nature of it. I
mean, think about it. It's the little ball sitting there not a very
big target. And we're swinging a golf club's in the sixties, seventies,
eighties, nineties, depending on your speed and youth at that little creature down
there, and we're told to hit through it. But it's really hard to
hit through it without trying to hit it. And that's it's a constant it's
a constant challenge. And say, I'm going to wait till I get consistent.
It's just, you know, you want to start laughing. But a
lot of people feel I've heard that said before, and I say, you
know you're going to wait a long time. Pal. The whole thing about
getting fitted is the clubs feel good. You get a sense of oh,
the weight feels right. I feel like I could swing this club. And
it gives you confidence. It really does. Of course, if they're all
somewhat the same, they can't be exactly the same. But if they're somewhat
the same, especially the shaft, you got a much better chance to hit
your Mishits can get much better. Right. So somebody recently said to me,
I want to be more consistent first, and I said, well,
how do you score? What do you generally shoot? He goes, well,
you know, I pretty much shoot in the upper eighties low nineties consistently.
I said, well, then you are consistent. What's the problem.
Well, I have mishits during the game. I said, well, everybody
has mis hits. But there are you working on the things that you're not
good at when you're practicing? Oh, I never practice. I don't have
time to precic. Well, then you're never going to get consistent if you
don't practice. And you know you want to talk about getting consistent, you
want to talk about getting better, right, Yeah, that's right, that's
right. And really we learn more about our game when we mishit the ball
then we hit than when we really you know, you hit it pure when
you you know generally when you drive it down the middle and you just clocked
it, Uh, you're just you know, you look and you get so
excited, but you don't get a lot of feedback because you're kind of in
that zone where you're not really thinking about how to do it when you hit
a poor shot. And this is a I all the golf teams have had
through all the years with these young guys, I tell them, listen,
don't let when you hit a poor shot, your first thought is anger.
What you should do is watch that ball and blueprint in your in your mind
of what what's the spin on it is? The spinning right left? Whatever
are you? Did you hit it thin or did you hit it fat?
And and then then there there's a there's a remedy for those things. But
if you don't, if you kind of black out and just get mad,
you know you that's the time when you learn. And that's why turing pros
are so darn good, because they get they they when they know when they
hit a ball and they block it, they know what they've done and they
can make a quick cure. But they're really conscious of what happened. They're
not. They don't just bluster and slam the club on the ground and so
forth. My favorite is when somebody says, you know they're having a problem,
Oh, well, I know what I did wrong. It's really how
do you know that? Have you ever had a lesson? Have you ever
had anyone tell you what your issue is? No? But I just know
I've watched a lot of TV, so yeah, I know what I'm doing
wrong. Oh okay, we'll let it go at that. The other thing
about being fitted for clubs and having clubs in your hands that you feel have
been not custom made, but customized for you. Is your level of confidence
when you're playing. I know that I've only been playing with these clubs now
for just under two months, and my last round I walked out there,
I had so much confidence when I walked off the range that I was able
to carry through the round, that I had one double bogie in the round,
and I just you know, I shot an eighty and I was just
ecstatic. But it felt great the entire time. So the amount of confidence,
sure, that's a wonderful feeling, you know, because the game is
a field game, and it's wonderful when when you have something in your hands
that feels right. And there's lots of times where you'll have a golf club
that doesn't feel right. And I promise you don't beat your head, you
know, beat yourself over the head trying to make it feel good. Get
it, get another one. You know, I told you about the three
what I had for so long, and I just you know, just plagued
me. And instead of replacing it like I should have immediately, I fought
the darn thing and it just wasn't for me. And and so I suffered
with a lot of bad shots, whether it was psychological or the club was
really too heavy or whatever. Uh. And that's the best advice I can
have anybody. If you have a putter or whatever that you feel like you
can't putt with, get another one. I mean, you know, that's
okay. I mean even the touring pros do that. Yeah, but the
touring pros seem to change their grip on their putter a lot too. Well,
that's you know, that's probably you know, when you're putting for a
million dollars, it's a little different than when you're putting for two dollars.
So what happens is that we started getting too involved in the action and we
we we acquire a little bit of a hint a flitch, like they call
it the yip, or you where you're you're too involved with impact, especially
with the putter, or you're in putting the ball is just a matter of
swinging the putter back and forth in a rhythm. But they've made so much
about it. So you know, with all these claw grips and this grip
and that grip, and the big grips now are very popular because the hands
are taken out of it a bit, But I think the big grips take
away the feel of the head, and that was very important. If you
look at the putters of the past and some of the great guys that putt
it, they had very small grips because they wanted to feel the way to
the club head. So you know, it's it's all relative. But right
now that seems to be the thing. You see, the grips on most
of the putters are pretty large. Yeah, yeah, they're thick grips.
I love having the thick grip on my putter just because it keeps me from
squeezing too tightly. It allows me to loosen my hands. Yeah, that's
very true. You know, you can use more of a shoulder arm stroke
opposed to you know, more of a popping or handstroke. You look at
you know, some of the great putters were you know, they hinged the
putter back and through, like Billy Casper and people like that, and and
today's world you get Seneca who kind of pop putts everything. But you know,
you know, when I teach, I have a lot of juniors I
teach that have done very well, and I don't emphasize a lot of technique
and putting. I really want them to have a natural feel and to train
them if anything on distance control, their eyes will eventually get used to work
what square is. But when you start talking about putting and how to do
it too much, I think you get people too conscious of the stroke during
putting the ball and what are we doing when we're playing. We're rolling the
ball on the surface. And you know, if you just keep it simple
like that, you take these little kids, you give them a putter and
a ball, and you see them put terrific because their mind isn't clogged up
with all this technique. I think that's that's it's been so overdone and there's
so many things you can buy where you're putting. Take the putter straight back,
and good lord, the greatest putters in the world didn't take it straight
back. Some of them cut the someone blocked hook the butt and George Lowell,
gosh, Maxwell, I've seen so many guys cut cut putts, but
that was their natural way of doing it and they didn't question it. It's
like, you know, it's like Jim Furick with his golf swing. You
know, if you wanted to break that down and say, well, that's
not on plane. Well it is on playing when he hits the ball.
So I'm a you know, as I teach, and I've been teaching a
long time at every level from turing professional to twenty five handicappers. The less
you say the better, the more more they can the more they can see
it and feel it based on words you give them, the better, the
more technical you get. Most people can't handle that, you know, And
I think most people do their best when they see it more than when they're
told how it's supposed to happen. I know as a kid that I can
eat. I learned to play golf watching the people hit the ball that I
caddied for not to be said about that. What did you mean when you
said cut putting? Well, there's there's I'm trying to think of the guy.
But he was a great putter on tour, and he literally cut across
the ball. He swung from out to ind so he put side spin on
it. That would literally make the ball. The spin would be going from
left to right. And you know, we've heard many times you get a
get a range ball and get the stripe straight so that when you put it,
the stripe doesn't wobble. You know that's that's an effective tool to practice.
But who's that. I'm trying to think of the guy that was the
greatest putter of all time where he hooded the putter going back and then hit
from in into out like like you're hooking the ball, and he won a
million tournaments because he was such a great cutter. My point here is this,
you gotta do it the way it feels. And once you get away
from the actual feel of your putting stroke and now you start trying to manufacture
it, you're gonna get in a lot of trouble. All this stuff about
well, don't let your wrist hinge or it has to be a flat wrist
through impact. No it doesn't, No, it doesn't. In fact,
a lot of times when you're trying to push that thing through with the wrist
stained flat, you blockhead it all the time. I mean there's been putters,
Bobby Jones, Arnold Palm, there has been all kinds of ways of
doing it, and you gotta find the thing that feels comfortable to you,
whether it's grip, stance, alignment, what feels comfortable to you, and
then just roll the ball on the surface. Just get to get to where
you can roll the ball and get away from all this other stuff. And
first of all, you won't get the yips doing that. But boy,
when you start overthinking putting and look at Ben Hogan, that's what he did,
and you know, it's just it's a shame to see it. I
have young boys I train and they start saying, Coach, I can't putt,
which is just ridiculous. I said, you mean, you can't roll
the ball on a flat surface and they looked at me like, well,
what do you mean. I said, yeah, you can, but not
into a hole. Yeah. So, but you know, it's honestly,
I think the less you emphasize putting, the better you'll putt. The more
you talk about it and think about it, I think it puts a block.
I think that's where all that stuff comes from. I think with Hogan,
he hit it so close in his later years and he felt like he
should be rewarded for that. You know, like a dog with a good
boy, he goes outside and does his business. When he comes in,
he wants a cookie, But in golf, there is no cookie. You
still got to get the ball in the hole, whether it's a five foot
putter or a fifty foot putt. And I think that's what happened with Hogan
because he made statements that said, you know, the putting shouldn't be so
important, you should get points just for getting it close to the hole.
Well, that was his frustrat coming out because he did hit it so close
and and and unfortunately he did have the yips. He couldn't pull a putter
back on a short clut. Wow, that's so interesting. I mean I
watched him at the Olympic Club, the only time I had the pleasure of
seeing him play golf, and and at the Olympic Club he played in the
I think it was the Open, and I mean he hit every fair with
every green, and I don't think he had more than a twelve foot put
all day. And the only plus he made were kickings. But when he
got that four or five footer, he couldn't His pant leg would be shaken.
He couldn't pull a putter back. Wow, you think about that.
This is this is a guy that could hit a go in a motel and
hit a two arm right down the hallway and not hit either side of the
wall. I mean that's what he could do. I mean, that's that's
a genius. So now you walk up to him and say, Ben,
you mean to tell me that you can't take this quarterback and roll the ball
on the green? What? What? What do you? What are you
thinking about? See? But you know, of course you couldn't do that.
But I mean that that's that's the silliness of putting. And look at
all the look at all the apparatuses you can buy to put better. I've
never heard anybody describe using the analogy if it is an analogy or not true.
About hitting a two iron down a hallway in a hotel room and not
hitting the walls, is that actually a story that happened or is that just
from what you know? You hear all kinds of stories about him, just
like you do more Norman. But he actually had a bet that he could
do it, and he did right off the carpet. Phenomenal the guy could.
He could not only control the flight of the ball, but the trajectory
of the ball. He was It was magical. I believe me when I
tell you it was magical watching him play. That Olympic Club is really hard
courses, you know. And then they had it set up for the Open
and he made it look like, you know, toy Land. It was
just he just went around a golf course and just diced it. And in
fact, I was a very low handicapped player. I was in the plus
area, and when I saw him play, I realized I really don't know
how to play golf. And it was watching a master, you know,
do a painting or something. I felt. I was happy to see it,
but I was very insecure. When I got in my car, I
can say that that's really interesting and painful. Well, I think that take
this idea of taking your game to the next level one club at a time,
which I suggested, but I do want to cover it. I think
starting at the putter is a great place to start with that. So I'm
going to toss out these club names and give me a thought or a tip
on what you can do to take your game to the next level with that
specific club. And let's start with the putter. You know, again,
with the putter. What I teach I teach people to hold the putter comfortably
and any way they really want to hold it within reason, And I work
on I work on distance control, whether it's a five foot putt or a
twenty foot putt or a fifty foot put I don't tell them to get it
into a circle around the green. I tell them to try to roll it
into the hole on all putts, because I think that's a natural feeling.
Where you're saying put it in a three foot circle. Now you bring it
into another and another situation that you have to deal with. So in putting,
and I'm teaching them to roll the ball. In fact, in fact,
one of the great pro said, if I were going to teach putting
today, and this is this is the fellow that helped Jack Nicholas putt,
he said, I would put somebody on the green with no holes, and
I would teach and to roll the ball distances, teach him how to roll
the ball and not hit it and skid it, but roll it. And
I believe that quite a bit. So I actually want to go to a
different club that I saw a video tip that you did that I've used ever
since, and I'm going to go to the eight iron for using it around
the fringe to get the ball onto the green using your eight iron club cutter.
Yeah, Paul Runyon was was the first guy that really did this where
he would take the take an eight iron or a seven iron or a five
iron, whatever, depending on the distance you had to cover. Uh.
And he would take the heel of the club off the ground so that he
could get the shaft in the same alignment as your putter, and he put
his hands on it on the lengths in some cases if he had a five
iron, and he just slide his hands down near the medal, but so
that he was replicating standing up with his putter. And then he used a
putting type stroke, now not exactly. The club had to come up a
little bit, but he used more of a one lever stroke opposed to cocking
the wrist or doing anything like that. And the idea was is to find
out how far on the green you had to land the ball and then let
it release to the hole. So if you were up close, you'd be
hitting an eight iron, nine iron or even maybe a pitching wedge. You
wouldn't use this on a with a sandwich, it's too much loft. But
that's a much simpler way to chip. Most people will pull out their sand
wedge or pitching wedge and then use it all around the green when they're chipping.
I'm not talking about pitching the ball. I'm talking about chipping it,
and that's a much more difficult shot, much more difficult. Yeah, it
is. I when I was telling you that this eighty that I shot the
other day, I only had I had six one putts on the front nine,
I was one over par. After nine, I only had one birdie.
But that means I was coming up short on my approach shots. But
I was getting it close to the hole. And a lot of times I've
been using that eight iron chip and it Once you learn to control that,
once you feel comfortable with it, it's a great shot to have in your
bag. Oh yeah, because you know when you're chipping, you're not trying
to impart backspin. You want the ball to release the hole and quicker you
can get it on the green the better. When you have a more lofted
club, you have to lift the club a bit and hit down on the
ball a bit, and that brings them into a lot of areas of getting
tight with the hands and either sculling it or hitting way behind it. They
call it chilly dip, but both of them are hideous, especially the skull.
Like the guys did one time, how far do you hit the I
hit my sandwich about one hundred and fifty yards just really, he says,
yeah, from a green side bunker. Yeah, you know, that's that
happens. That happens with these clubs that are constructed that way. You have
you have to be a little bit more accurate in your stroke or with a
punty of stroke. Even if you hit a little thin it doesn't really affect
anything, and you know, the ball will roll just about the same as
you did if you hit a peer. I've noticed a lot of people will
take a lob wedge or a high lofted club if they're five, ten,
fifteen yards off the green, Well, let's just keep it at ten yards
off the green and in. But they're trying to get the ball to land,
land softly and then trickle up. But isn't the goal. Shouldn't you
try to get the ball onto the flat surface as soon as possible and let
it release, let it roll as long as it you know can or do
you want to try to drop it in? No? No, And when
you're when you're doing those kinds of things, you you've got to you've got
grain to deal with. Uh. Sometimes you know you have a set the
green goes up or you'll have a second lever. Uh, your your your
target is way too small when you do those kinds of things, and sometimes
you impart back spin on it where you pinch it a little bit and you
get too much back spin. So you want to get all that out of
there. You want to just get that ball on the green and let it
release of the hole. It's just an easier shot. I mean, that's
that's the bottom line. Because the nerves do the nerves do get get in,
especially if you've got that ball a little bit of tight grass. It's
it's much better to take an eight or nine ir or seven iron. Just
putchip it. It's so much simpler. Is there a rule of thumb to
how much a ball will release depending on which club that you use, Like
if you're using the eight iron versus a pitching wedge and you're just you're chipping
it up up on the green. Sure, I mean, let's just say
that if let's say we're going to land the ball a yard or two under
the green, If you land the ball a yard or two on the green
with a seven iron, the ball is going to release a lot farther than
it does a nine iron, unless you're unless you're unless you're hitting it harder.
But if you're consistent in your stroke, so the less loft you have,
the more it's going to release. So so you don't I mean,
I don't just use the eight iron when I chip, because if I have
a if the pins way back and I'm in the front of the green,
I'll take a five iron and do the same thing because I know that my
target is still going to be where I want the ball on land. It's
going to be the same as if it was an eight iron or a nine
iron, but the ball is going to release farther because I have less less
loft. So it's it's really about where you want the ball to land,
and then you decide which club to use from there exactly, and and how
do you pick the area of where you wanted to land you looking for?
For me, you know, for me, it's unless the pain is really
I mean the cop is real close. For me, it's about a couple
of yards on the green, four or five feet and then let it release.
But again, my target might get a little closer to me if it's
a short a short chip, but again my target, my landing target is
always close to me. Opposed to if I had a sand wedge or a
lob wedge in my hand. All right, now, let's go back to
our wedges, back to this one club at a time. Let's go I
guess with your lob wedge. If I carry I carry a sixty degree,
a fifty seven degree, and then a fifty two and a pitching wedge,
which is what about a forty eight? So I carry I like to carry
a bunch of wedges with me as opposed to carrying a lot of hybrids or
fairway woods. So the lob wedge, what can you do? What will
that help you do to get your game to the next level? And what
should you be practicing? Which with a high lofted club like that, Well,
the low blodge is strictly for hitting the ball high and soft. So
it's a shot where you want to you know, you're above the green or
excuse me, below the green, and you need to throw it up there,
but you don't want it to release. That's what the lobledge is for.
Because of the loft, you can go at it with a little bit
of speed and the ball will just go higher. And that's shots you should
practice a lot because there are times you need it. But I know so
many people that overdo it when they have a much simpler shot where it doesn't
call for that kind of shot, but they still do it. In fact,
Phil Nicholson is one of the guys that does that. But you know
he's like a wizard. But you can't. Yeah, let's not compare ourselves
to what Phil Micholson can do, because well you can't. Even guys on
tour can't do that. Yeah, exactly. But you know, when you're
in and around the green, which is the scoring area, whether you're pitching
the ball on, you want to do it the simplest way, the way
that even if you miss hit, it doesn't become a catastrophe. When you
start lifting that club up and bringing it down on the ball in a more
steeper angle, it brings in the mishit is going to be. It could
be horrendous, or you line driving over the green into a lake or something
like that. Where when you're using a more level to the ground stroke,
if you hit a little bit thin or a little bit fat, you don't
lose, it doesn't hurt you. And that's what I when I play,
and even when I played well, after being around Paul running and listening to
him, my game improved dramatically. Even when I would miss a lot of
greens, I could get it up and down a lot easier than I had
in the past, because I was one of these guys that wore out my
sandwich. You know. Yeah, well turning. I think the best thing
I ever heard about that was trying to turn three shots into two. Sure,
sure that that's that's the whole name of the game. And everybody misses
greens. Everyone does. As I tell my boys, if you hit ten
balls, the seven of them better be with the short clubs, the scoring
clubs, because the driver okay, yes, the drivers. It's built for
one thing, to get the ball in play with a fairly good distance.
But it's not it's not a long drive club as it's been you know television.
That's all they talk about as well, Yeah I hit that four hundred
yards and three fifty and whatever. They don't tell you that the ground as
hard as a highway number one. That's how they said you get four four
hundred yards a roll. They don't tell you any of that stuff. But
it's too much emphasis on that and not enough emphasis on you know, distance
contry role taking the right club ken Vent, sure you should tell me when
you got a seven iron to the green, take a six iron out and
hit it. You're gotta be surprised because if you really, if you kept
the chart of every time you hit a ball to the green, were you
short or long, ninety percent of the time you're short, you're short.
So yeah, absolutely, so it was a you know, and there's something
I followed and it improved my game. I got the ball a lot closer
to the hole by doing that, and he got that from Hogan. Yeah,
club up, that's just club up on your approach shots, no question.
Like when I'm talking about the three shots to two. If you're you're
the point is you want to chip up to the green and get it close
enough where you can one putt. Where I play with people, if you're
pitching doing a pick shot from thirty yards or twenty yards in there, if
you get it on the green, they're like, hey, great shot.
It's like I left myself a thirty five foot putt. That's not a great
shot. I mean, yeah, I'm on the green, but big d
I mean, the point was I wanted to get I wanted to get within
five feet of a hole. Well, I'll give you a good example of
that. I've got a lot of young boys that can hit it the long
ways, okay, and we look get on a par five and they can
reach it with a three wood in some cases, I mean, I mean
power five that's like five fifty or five seventy five. And I tell them,
look, the trajectory of that ball coming in is either gonna if you
mishit it you're gonna get You're gonna bury it in the lip of the of
the green side bunkers, or if it hits the green, it's going to
the back of the green or maybe even over. So you're always gonna be
looking at a forty or fifty foot putt that you've got to get down in
two and a lot of times your three putt it and now you say,
god, I hit the green in two and I've made a five. Okay.
It's much simpler if you can hit something up there were in your scoring
range, like sixty seventy yards. Now you can take your sandwich and throw
it up there and you can get a So you're gonna make a lot of
birdies that way. But again, you hear that the announcers talk about these
guys, well, Bob, you know, he's got a seven iron,
it's two hundred and twenty five yards, and so you know, these kids,
that's what they're trying to do. It's just it's insane. I think
that the broadcasters of golf, some of them, not all of them,
but some of them, have hurt the game so much because, first of
all, we don't get the ball that the pros play with. Believe me
when I tell you that that ball is custom made to their swing. So
they they got a hot ball, and that's why. That's why a guy
like you got the one of the masters and he's got eight are out and
he's hit close to two hundred yards. Come on, I mean, yeah,
it serves you. Come on, that's not possible unless that club is
jacked up or the ball jacked up. Interesting, and that's that's the that's
the reality of it. I mean, it's these guys aren't These guys aren't
any strong than Ben Holdenner guys like that. But but the ball and the
club they're using is is they're they're juiced up, no question about it.
Yeah. Well, yeah, they seem to be talking about spending a whole
lot more time talking about distance and how they boom it and not the wizardry
of the short game. And I think that that these you know, since
the Tiger effect has come in and courses have gotten longer and longer and longer,
they're playing into you know, by making the courses longer, just playing
into their hands, make it tougher on the short game, and let's see
what they can do with it. Sure. Sure, I mean when they
play some of these real tough courses in the New York area and the Midwest,
they don't tear them up. You don't see twenty underpower or any of
that time. But they set the golf the golf courses are set up for
scoring. They get in there and they cross cut those fairways. The fairways
are faster than some of the greens that the guys in the thirties and forties
and fifties played on, and they just get make the golf course fast.
And it's great for television because there's the zillion birdies and so forth. But
what they've done is they've taken the shot making out of the game. Even
the ball. You know, it's hard to move the ball left to right
or right to left now purposely, I should say. And so you know
it's a shame. I think it's a shame in a way because they've made
a lot of great golf courses that were tremendous courses to play, and they've
kind of made them obsolete because of what they've done with the equipment. Well,
and the other thing that kind of makes me crazy is there customize these
courses for a tournament that may happen once a year at best, or once
every five or six years, and so that means they're customizing the course for
point one of the amount of golfers that are going to play that course,
but it gets TV exposure. That's one of the things that irritates me more.
You know, I have a lot of clients that belong to very posh
golf courses and these courses are all everyone's looking to get more members. So
what do they do, Well, we've got to get a younger group.
And you know that the membership's three or four hundred thousand dollars. Not too
many young people that have that kind of money to throw around, but that's
what they get in their heads. So now they put a set up what
they call the championship teas and they're so far back on the whole. The
average guy out there is in the late sixties and the early seventies and they
can't hit it out of their shadow. So what are they doing, you
know, instead of setting up teas that for your membership, if you got
a lot of guys that are seventy, you're up teas, and especially the
ladies sees should should correspond to the distance that they those people hit the ball
so that they're in the game. You know, many years ago I did
the Mixed Team Championship, and when we were figuring this thing out, we
went we looked at the two averages of ladies and men, and the ladies
needed a seventy five yard advantage off the tee because we had to take in
consideration the second shot, not just the first shot, of course, So
if man, if the average guy hit it a drive and eight iron,
we wanted the same for the gals. You can't get it exact, but
we wanted to be close. You go on golf courses today and you'll see
the men's tees and you see the ladies sees maybe ten, fifteen, y,
maybe twenty years forward. That's just insane. Now you've got these gals
out there, they're beating driver three wood with no chance of getting here,
and they're hitting five round on the third shot on the par four. That
takes the fun out of the game. It is an unfair challenge. It's
an unfair challenge. Well, I think that was the whole point of play
it forward, right, exactly. If you want to give people back into
the game, they've got to be able to. I'm not saying make the
golf courses easy. I'm just saying make them fair for the person that's playing.
You can't do it exact, but you can do a lot better job
that's being done. I can tell you that. And if and if Joe
Blower his wife can every now and then get in the low eighties and and
hit the green in regulation changes everything in their mindset. But if it's if
they're out there and they're shooting in the hundreds and it's arduous, they're not
going to want to do this all the time. No, So it just
takes it deflaates everybody. You know, we all have an ego. Yeah,
and let's not even call them the ladies teath Let's just call them the
forward teas right forward. Sure, you know it's like I don't. I
don't like like I'm usually the long driver when when I'm playing with my group,
but that doesn't mean I'm scoring better than anybody else. I can hit
the ball farther, but not with my irons as much. And I think
the whole point of playing forward is that, like the pros, you should
have an eight iron or less for your second shot, So absolutely move it
up. Let's just say a short hitter. Okay, so a short hitter,
you should probably be hitting a drive and maybe a five iron rescue club
or a six iron rescue club. But when you can't reach the green in
two on any part four, then you're hitting too far back that the tea
isn't right for you. You've got to move up. And the golf courses,
they talk about it all the time, but no one really scientifically goes
on that golf course and measure the golf course out and then charts. Okay,
this is where mister and missus Jones are going to hit the golf ball
and then intelligently put team teas down and make those teas not after thoughts,
make them actually a teen ground for mister and missus Jones, And I promise
you if they would do that, you'd see more people smiling when they came
off the golf course instead of frustrating or just feeling like I'm old. I
know in my own case, I was a very long hitter of the golf
ball and not a big guy, but I always could really clock it.
Now that I'm eight zero, which I can't believe, but I am,
I can't hit it that anymore. So you know, my best drive is
two thirty two forty sometimes. Wow, that's still pretty good. I still
hit it out there pretty good for an old guy. But still, you
know, when I go on and play with my students, you know,
I feel like I should put a tap of a dress on or something,
because they're popping at fifty sixty seventy yards past me with no problem. Yeah,
the age of their great grandfather exactly. So if I can't, I
can't compete with that because they're longer with their iron, they're longer with their
would come on. So I have to play up, and there's nothing wrong
with that. For God's I mean, that's that's what I'm saying. Instead
of building championship teams to bring more people at your golf course. Set your
golf course up so people can play it. It's still a challenge. But
if you have a good day, you get a good score. For some
people, even when they have a good day, get a good score because
of the distance factor. You know, it's very It really is obsessed me,
especially for the gals. They honestly, I think they're no one wants
to see it, but they're kind of an afterthought when they come to the
designing of the golf course or the placing of the teas and silver. They're
just an afterthought. It's it's wrong, It really is. Yeah. I
had a thought, No, I lost it. I was gonna say something
about, well, we were talking about you know it's me I get on
tangents. Oh we both do, don't we both? Well? Oh no,
I remember. What I was going to say is that how many times
I've played with gentlemen who are in their seventies who can't hit the ball more
than one hundred and fifty yards except they're playing bogie golf because they hit it
dead straight and they can put you know, So it's not about the big
war's just keep it in the fairway and getting the close, there's no question
about it. But those people too play a lot of golf and either they're
blessed or they practice the short game a lot. But I mean, the
average lady and man don't put that much time into practice. They'll take a
lesson here or there. I'm just I'm an advocate of of It isn't so
much a play up, but to set the golf course up to accommodate what
your general membership is, not the the one guy that calks it or not
the one guy that can hit it one hundred yards, but that middle range
group, and you'd make your golf course make everybody happier. Yeah, And
unfortunately, unfortunately, the way they set the tour up, it's the opposite
of that. It's all it's all predicated on distance. Yeah, you know
what, Tony, we have so many more clubs that I'd like to cover
about, you know, taking that to the next level, like the sand
wedge, your long irons, your hybrids, your fairway drivers or fairway medals
or fairway woods, whatever you want to call them. And you're driver.
So can we do as we have done many times? Can we do part
two of this for next week's episode? Sure? I'd love to. Uh,
you got to put a module on me at times, because no,
no, instead of the muzzle, I'm just gonna let you go longer.
We're just gonna go on longer. That's all all right. So that's great.
We're gonna do part two on this and continue this conversation of how you
can take your game to the next level, one club at a time with
Tony Manzoni. Tony, thanks so much for your cooperation on this. It's
always my pleasure.