Speaker 1: Hi, I'm andre Atto. I'm from Henderson, Nebada, and I
Speaker 1: play at Revere Golf Club and this is Golf Smarter.
Speaker 2: Golf Smarter number one twenty nine.
Speaker 1: I want to continue your work. We're different people but
Speaker 1: a lot of commonality, but we both like to talk
Speaker 1: about golf. And the people I have talked to for
Speaker 1: episodes that I've recorded, a lot of it is about
Speaker 1: different approaches to how to swing the club. But what's
Speaker 1: interesting to me is how to improve your game. But
Speaker 1: what's also interesting to me is the stories of the
Speaker 1: people behind what they did and how they came to
Speaker 1: doing that, and that is really fascinating to me. And
Speaker 1: I love the different viewpoints people bring to it. It's
Speaker 1: like anything. If it's movies, if it's baseball, if it's politics,
Speaker 1: everybody's got their unique take on it. And so the
Speaker 1: point isn't the technical stuff, because I'm not qualified to
Speaker 1: be a technical golf person. But I'm so frustrated by
Speaker 1: the world of you got to be in the right position,
Speaker 1: you got to do this, you got to do that,
Speaker 1: where you get caught up in trying to be perfect
Speaker 1: and trying to consciously do things, and so that's a
Speaker 1: lot of what the show is going to be about
Speaker 1: is people talking about practical advice about here's a couple
Speaker 1: drills that you don't need to take lessons.
Speaker 2: So long, Fred, Hello, josh Ah, there's a chain to come.
Speaker 1: This is Golf Smarter, sharing stories, tips and insights from
Speaker 1: great golf minds to help you lower your score and
Speaker 1: raise your golf IQ. Here's your host, Fred Green.
Speaker 2: Welcome back to the Golf Smarter podcast.
Speaker 1: Josh, Hey, Fred, thanks for having me.
Speaker 2: Well, you know it's a little bit more than that being.
Speaker 1: Here it is, but thank you for having me on regardless.
Speaker 2: Yes, well you know you reached out to me recently
Speaker 2: saying I don't know if you remember me. I was
Speaker 2: on your show in twenty ten after I wrote a
Speaker 2: book called Straight down the Middle, and I'm like, of
Speaker 2: course I remember you. That was a fun that was
Speaker 2: a fun book and really entertaining for me, a really
Speaker 2: entertaining interview.
Speaker 1: Oh well, no, Ill, I recall having a very good
Speaker 1: time when we talked last time.
Speaker 2: We really did. We really did. So you I need
Speaker 2: to talk to the audience for a minute if you
Speaker 2: don't mind, Josh, I mean step The reason Josh is
Speaker 2: here today is we're making a change here in Golf Smarter.
Speaker 2: I want to thank all the Golf Smarter community, the
Speaker 2: ambassadors and the and golf smarters. Josh, don't know if
Speaker 2: you ever heard that term, but we call our golf
Speaker 2: itself Golf's martyrs. I'm a golf martyr, yeah right, and
Speaker 2: which kind of translated to golf Smarter at some point,
Speaker 2: but it went turned into golf Smarters. I want to
Speaker 2: thank everybody for all their support over the years, and
Speaker 2: also their support for or this time that I've taken off.
Speaker 2: I've been off since early December. We've been playing the
Speaker 2: old episodes, and in that time, I was trying to
Speaker 2: figure out what's next for me because I turned seventy
Speaker 2: last August and I knew that I was going to
Speaker 2: be retiring at seventy, but I didn't know what to
Speaker 2: do about the podcast. I was really torn, do I
Speaker 2: walk away from it? Am I done? You know? Ever
Speaker 2: since the episode four hundred, I've been going, yeah, I
Speaker 2: think I'm getting close to me And here we are
Speaker 2: at episode one twenty nine. An episode one thousand with
Speaker 2: Jim Nantz was probably the peak of my podcast experience,
Speaker 2: and I've been just trying to figure out what's next,
Speaker 2: what's next? And then Josh came to me and said, hey,
Speaker 2: I'm thinking of starting a golf podcast. Maybe I can
Speaker 2: come on your show and promote it. And I'm like, oh, man,
Speaker 2: you just missed me because I'm not doing the interviews anymore.
Speaker 2: Last interview I did was in actually I did it
Speaker 2: in October, we published it in December, and I haven't
Speaker 2: done one since. And it seems like it's been like
Speaker 2: six months as I've done an interview. And I suggested
Speaker 2: to Josh, you know, if you're going to start a
Speaker 2: golf podcast now, it's very different than when I started
Speaker 2: it in twenty two thousand and five, because when I started,
Speaker 2: there was like two other golf podcasts and those quickly disappeared.
Speaker 2: And so here we are with Golf Smarter is the
Speaker 2: longest running golf podcast out there, and we've built this
Speaker 2: wonderful global audience of people who love Tony Manzoni as
Speaker 2: much as I do, who keep listening to the old episodes,
Speaker 2: which I'm truly grateful for. And I said, so, if
Speaker 2: you're going to start a golf podcast, it's going to
Speaker 2: be at least five years for you can either generate
Speaker 2: any revenue or build enough of an audience to generate
Speaker 2: some revenue. So maybe you'd like to take over Golf Smarter.
Speaker 2: And so I started reading Josh's book again and I'm like, wait,
Speaker 2: this is Golf Smarter, and I need to ask you, Josh,
Speaker 2: what was your the journey that you wrote about in
Speaker 2: the book Straight Down the Middle, which was your second
Speaker 2: of three books. Correct, yes, but you're so far your
Speaker 2: only golf book.
Speaker 1: My only golf book, yes, the only ones. I'd like
Speaker 1: to say, the only time I'll ever be paid to
Speaker 1: play golf in well, hopefully not.
Speaker 2: But I started reading the book again, I'm like, my goodness,
Speaker 2: this is like my voice. This is so interesting to
Speaker 2: me that he's on a journey that I feel like
Speaker 2: I've been on for a long time, on different ways
Speaker 2: of approaching golf instruction, a lot of mental game stuff.
Speaker 2: And I said, you know, maybe you should just take
Speaker 2: over the show, and he was kind of your eyes
Speaker 2: when I when I suggest yes, you kind of bugged
Speaker 2: out of your head. And we've had multiple conversations since then.
Speaker 2: And this episode here is to introduce the new host
Speaker 2: of Golf Smarter, Josh Carp.
Speaker 1: First of all, I can only hope that I will
Speaker 1: be at this as successfully and as long as as you.
Speaker 2: Were, and you being here as long as that.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, well, you know, a thousand episodes is a
Speaker 1: fairly daunting, daunting hill to climb. But but no, thank
Speaker 1: you so much for this opportunity. You know, I've always
Speaker 1: loved the show, and like I said, I had the
Speaker 1: best time, you know, when I was on fifteen years
Speaker 1: ago now, which is hard April.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and then he has played as a Mulligan episode
Speaker 2: as number one hundred and thirty three.
Speaker 1: So that's and your memory is killing me with the.
Speaker 2: Kidding. I get lost in conversations. I have a spreadsheet
Speaker 2: with everything.
Speaker 1: But no, I mean, I'm really honored that you would
Speaker 1: even think of me to do this, and I'm really
Speaker 1: excited to have the opportunity to carry on you know,
Speaker 1: your your work and such a great brand, and you
Speaker 1: know with just you know, I'm this, as we both know,
Speaker 1: came out of the blue kind of right. It was
Speaker 1: just just an email led to this, and and I'm
Speaker 1: really excited and uh and and like I said, it
Speaker 1: is carrying on a really a really great brand and
Speaker 1: a really great show. And I just hope I can
Speaker 1: do as good a job as you've done with it
Speaker 1: over all this time.
Speaker 2: Well, that's why I feel so confident in the in
Speaker 2: this move, because I've listened to a couple of your
Speaker 2: other interviews and we got to establish what you do.
Speaker 2: I mean, like I approach this show as a recording
Speaker 2: engineer who had the right equipment, with a lot of questions,
Speaker 2: and it just you know. And then sometimes even when
Speaker 2: I told people I'm a golf journalist, I would do
Speaker 2: the air quotes on journalists and cringe when I said
Speaker 2: it because I never really felt like I was a journalist.
Speaker 2: I was just a guy doing a podcast, which I
Speaker 2: never anticipated the podcasting would be ubiquitous to like the planet.
Speaker 1: People are like, oh yeah, good lord, Yes, yeah.
Speaker 2: It's everywhere. And now like when I was coming through radio,
Speaker 2: it's if you had a radio show but you also
Speaker 2: had a column in the newspaper, or if you wrote
Speaker 2: a book, or if you were on TV. It's like, wow,
Speaker 2: cross media.
Speaker 1: Right right now.
Speaker 2: In that cross media conversation, people add, and I host
Speaker 2: a podcast.
Speaker 1: Right well, and nobody's writing a column for the newspaper anymore.
Speaker 1: I mean, because all the you know that it's unbelievable
Speaker 1: that we've witnessed this huge change in the way the
Speaker 1: world operates, you know, media wise, I mean as well
Speaker 1: as otherwise. But just you know, I was talking to
Speaker 1: somebody the other day and I was like, either there
Speaker 1: will be no newspapers in ten years or there will
Speaker 1: be such a backlash that we're all going to be
Speaker 1: reading the newspaper again, because it's just such a you know,
Speaker 1: it was such I mean, such a staple you know,
Speaker 1: of journalism and of what being you know, being alive
Speaker 1: in America. Wasn't that time, right, I mean that was
Speaker 1: and now it's just everything changes so fast. So it
Speaker 1: is now there are a lot more a lot more
Speaker 1: podcasts than there are guys who are writing columns for
Speaker 1: the Chicago Sun Times or the same.
Speaker 2: You would believe the number of podcasts that are generated
Speaker 2: by AI voices. Oh massive, there's like and so I
Speaker 2: can testify here to everybody, Josh and I are real.
Speaker 1: They would not create AI like me.
Speaker 2: For sure, or me. But the fact is you're more
Speaker 2: than You're not a recording engineer. You're a journalist U
Speaker 2: and a writer and a producer and actually, can I
Speaker 2: use the word journalism professor.
Speaker 1: Let's say, instructor, a journalism instruct since I have no
Speaker 1: officialstigious university. Yes, I teach. I not as much anymore,
Speaker 1: but for I occasionally teach journalism at Northwestern and I've
Speaker 1: taught for years. I was like teaching multiple classes there
Speaker 1: every semester. Yeah, and I'm I'm a I'm an actual journalist,
Speaker 1: and I think I'm you know, got to the point. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I do a lot of print work or I have
Speaker 1: for you know, different magazines. I've written for Vanity Fair
Speaker 1: and Esquire and uh and Playboy, and I've had a
Speaker 1: pretty regular gig at a at a thing called Airmail,
Speaker 1: which is which is an electronic magazine that was started
Speaker 1: by Graydon Carter who used to run Vanity Fair and uh,
Speaker 1: you know and that. And it's funny because I really,
Speaker 1: you know, as far as golf writing, I mean, I
Speaker 1: really I wrote. I wrote the book straight down the middle.
Speaker 1: And before that, I used to write for Links magazine,
Speaker 1: which was, by the way, a fun gig, and that
Speaker 1: was I got paid to play golf for that too,
Speaker 1: and that was really fun, you know, getting to go
Speaker 1: around and play you know, different you know, courses and
Speaker 1: write about them. But but mostly I mean I write
Speaker 1: about popular culture. I write about the making of movies. Uh,
Speaker 1: usually the making of really kind of screwed up movies
Speaker 1: like Caligula or or the Last Movie, which was Dennis
Speaker 1: Hopper's follow up to Easy Writer That Like, and he
Speaker 1: ended his career just as it was, as he was
Speaker 1: the most important director in Hollywood for five minutes. And
Speaker 1: then just weird little stuff. I I you know, I
Speaker 1: wrote a thing about the more recently the Burt Reynolds
Speaker 1: Dinner Theater in Jupiter, Florida, and all the all the
Speaker 1: crazyness that went on there. But yeah, so I mean,
Speaker 1: I'm I'm you know. And then I've written books. I
Speaker 1: wrote a book about the making of the Orson Wells
Speaker 1: movie The Other Side of the Wind, which was kind
Speaker 1: of this insane ten year making of this movie that
Speaker 1: he never finished.
Speaker 2: I would say that book.
Speaker 1: The name of the book is called Orson Wells's Last Movie,
Speaker 1: not my choice. They always changed my titles. But uh,
Speaker 1: and then and then my other book is called A
Speaker 1: Feudal and Stupid Gesture, which is about Doug Kenny and
Speaker 1: the guys who started National Lampoon Magazine and made Animal
Speaker 1: House in Caddyshack, and then Doug, who was kind of
Speaker 1: the genius behind all of it, very mysteriously fell off
Speaker 1: of a cliff in Hawaii and died at a young age,
Speaker 1: and nobody ever kind of really knew what happened to him.
Speaker 1: But you know, so it's I'm I'm really a kind
Speaker 1: of a pop culture and kind of Hollywood you know,
Speaker 1: making of films type writer. But you know, I've always
Speaker 1: I mean, I've been a golfer since I was about thirteen.
Speaker 2: Got one on me there too.
Speaker 1: Well, No, I mean my interest in golf is you know,
Speaker 1: I started playing when I was a teenager, played on
Speaker 1: my high school team, was not the number one player
Speaker 1: on that team, played on a very bad Division III
Speaker 1: college team, and was certainly not the number one player
Speaker 1: on that team. But I've been kind of, you know,
Speaker 1: had this whole thing of being like stuck for many
Speaker 1: years as about a you know today, a Division three
Speaker 1: golfer is you know probably you know, a single digit
Speaker 1: you know, or scratch player, you know, McAllister College in
Speaker 1: nineteen eighty, eighty five and eighty six. You know, I
Speaker 1: was like a thirteen handicap and I was good enough
Speaker 1: to be the you know, number five guy in a
Speaker 1: team where probably our best player was a five. But
Speaker 1: I I just I've always loved golf and it's always
Speaker 1: been kind of such a The people involved in the
Speaker 1: game have always fascinated me. The different approaches to the game,
Speaker 1: you know, I have always interested me, and I just
Speaker 1: I love the history of the game and I love, uh,
Speaker 1: you know, kind of trying.
Speaker 2: You know.
Speaker 1: My my great dream, which will never come to be realized,
Speaker 1: is to look like Sam Snead when I sing a
Speaker 1: golf club, which having been at a uh what's it
Speaker 1: called a simulator with one of my kids the other
Speaker 1: day and they replayed my swing and I was like,
Speaker 1: that is not Sam Snead. That is that is decidedly me.
Speaker 1: So no matter how good it feels like I'm swinging,
Speaker 1: you know, I'm always kind of on the quest to
Speaker 1: have a better swing, you know. I just I just
Speaker 1: love the game and I love, you know, everything about it,
Speaker 1: and uh so I'm really excited to be able to
Speaker 1: talk about it, you know, and you know, and do this,
Speaker 1: you know, going forward.
Speaker 2: Josh, I want to I want to discuss your book,
Speaker 2: your second book, Straight down the Middle, which came out
Speaker 2: in twenty ten is, which is how we first met.
Speaker 2: Because there are many people in that book that have
Speaker 2: been featured on Golf Smarter.
Speaker 1: Our guests, our guest lists overlap or by by by
Speaker 1: by chapter's overlap with your guests.
Speaker 2: Yes, right, And actually the next episode we're going to
Speaker 2: do next Tuesday. Next week, we'll be with Jim Waldron,
Speaker 2: who's not only featured in your book and been featured
Speaker 2: many times on Golf Smarter, but he's giving me golf
Speaker 2: lessons right right, taking for the first time, I'm taking
Speaker 2: golf lesson. So anyway, we're gonna both interview him, and
Speaker 2: then after that it's going to be Golf Smarter will
Speaker 2: cantinue twice a week each each beginning of the week,
Speaker 2: each Tuesday will be Golf Smarter with Josh carp and
Speaker 2: Corrected Mistakes are we calling? Are we saying that.
Speaker 1: Golf correct mistakes golf? Which comes just to clarify for
Speaker 1: everybody that please it. When I was kind of working
Speaker 1: on doing a podcast, you know, golf podcast before you
Speaker 1: and I talked, I had, you know, it was kind
Speaker 1: of come looking around for titles and and you know,
Speaker 1: wanted to have something that was related to kind of
Speaker 1: the history of the game and especially the history regarding
Speaker 1: the swing, because I interviewed a lot of people about
Speaker 1: various players throughout history, various approaches to the swing itself,
Speaker 1: and you know how how you know how guys like
Speaker 1: you and I can get better. And obviously the one
Speaker 1: person everybody looks to is is Ben Hogan, and and
Speaker 1: he famously said that a golf swing is a collection
Speaker 1: of correct mistakes. And I, for my game that certainly
Speaker 1: was applicable. And so I kind of want to do
Speaker 1: invoke you know, I wanted to invoke the history, and
Speaker 1: I want to invoke you know, the iconic uh, these
Speaker 1: iconic figure So it's gonna be Golf Smarter's correct Mistakes
Speaker 1: on Tuesdays, on Tuesdays and Fridays, right, Fridays will be
Speaker 1: my old episodes.
Speaker 2: We'll continue with that because we're only up to like
Speaker 2: halfway through what I did. And you know, again, mulligans
Speaker 2: are just episodes that are more that are most relevant today,
Speaker 2: which is basically golf instruction. We don't look at rules
Speaker 2: or tournament events, which we rarely talked about anyway, but
Speaker 2: golfers we can talk about always as we continue to do,
Speaker 2: whether we're talking about Ben Hogan or our Bobby Jones
Speaker 2: or Tiger Woods, which I just a moment on Tiger Woods.
Speaker 2: How ironic was it that the week that Tiger had
Speaker 2: this another accident in a car. And we don't have
Speaker 2: to go on and on about that too many people
Speaker 2: have already, But that week, as we're replaying all the
Speaker 2: old Tony Manzoni episodes, that week the episode was called
Speaker 2: if Tiger called Tony for help, what would he say?
Speaker 2: And it was about the golf swing, not about the
Speaker 2: Battle's drunk driving quiz, because Tony Manzoni is partying time
Speaker 2: in the sixties and so he's well aware of that too.
Speaker 1: Sure, yeah, that's no. The whole thing with it's really yeah,
Speaker 1: I don't, I know, we don't want to spend the
Speaker 1: time time on Tiger, but it's you know it, you know,
Speaker 1: not to make light of any of it, but I
Speaker 1: remember when his whole thing happened with his wife and
Speaker 1: you know and all that, and I my my major
Speaker 1: recollection was, you know, how it was being covered, like,
Speaker 1: you know, there were helicopters flying over his house and
Speaker 1: there are news trucks, and I thought, this guy has
Speaker 1: just gotten caught cheating on his wife. And he has
Speaker 1: now stuck in his house with his wife, his mother,
Speaker 1: his mother in law, and probably a bunch of lawyers.
Speaker 1: And I was like, for any of us who envy
Speaker 1: the life of Tiger Woods, I was like, this is good.
Speaker 1: I'm like, whatever he's got, this has got to really
Speaker 1: be dampening that entire experience. I mean, you know, it's
Speaker 1: it's interesting because he's such a.
Speaker 2: Disciplined you know, kind of all that kind of all
Speaker 2: went out the window after his father passed. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 2: I went nuts, yeah the way.
Speaker 1: And it's odd because you know, I was talking to
Speaker 1: somebody and we were talking about a different athlete, but
Speaker 1: I was like, you know he I mean, obviously his
Speaker 1: dad was a huge influence on him, but yeah, there's
Speaker 1: kind of that. You're Marv Marinovich. Todd Marinovich's dad, the
Speaker 1: quarterback for the USC who was raised to be a
Speaker 1: quarterback and never had a piece of cake and never
Speaker 1: had a McDonald's hamburger and was very good at USC,
Speaker 1: played for the Raiders, just totally lost it once he
Speaker 1: kind of got out in the world. And I think
Speaker 1: that's a really hard I mean, I think you have
Speaker 1: to be and I think Tiger is a very mentally
Speaker 1: strong person, obviously, because on the golf course, you know,
Speaker 1: nobody has I've you know, Nicholas maybe you know, has
Speaker 1: had that kind of mental toughness. But like you know,
Speaker 1: it's it's it's not a super balanced upbringing when you
Speaker 1: are under that kind of you know, just when you're
Speaker 1: being driven to be something by an outside force. You
Speaker 1: know who's who's your parent. And that's nothing against his dad.
Speaker 1: I mean, it's just you see it everywhere. I mean,
Speaker 1: you see it on the little league fields, you see it, right,
Speaker 1: and you know, youth hockey. I mean, my kids all
Speaker 1: played sports, and there are all these people you know who,
Speaker 1: especially when they're young, who think, you know, oh, you know,
Speaker 1: home run, he's you know, he's Willie Mays, you know,
Speaker 1: and it's and it and all this intensity gets thrown
Speaker 1: at a kid and and I think, you know, as
Speaker 1: talented as he was and all that, you know, I mean,
Speaker 1: it's got to it can't have been easy to grow
Speaker 1: up with somebody driving you. And I think once that
Speaker 1: goes away, it gets very hard to hold it together.
Speaker 2: And you don't mean driving the car for you, No,
Speaker 2: not driving now. He needs now he needs a driver. Yes, now, Tiger,
Speaker 2: you are so lucky that you didn't get hurt or well,
Speaker 2: you didn't hurt somebody, because God forbid that Tiger Woods
Speaker 2: ends up in prison for the rest of his life.
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, no, I mean that's yeah.
Speaker 1: I mean, And I and I last thing I'll say
Speaker 1: is I you know, it's funny, you know, because you know,
Speaker 1: you look at people and you think they all have
Speaker 1: you know, like Tiger, and you go, oh my god,
Speaker 1: what I wouldn't give, you know, to have that kind
Speaker 1: of talent, that kind of money.
Speaker 2: And remember Charles Barkley thing about b don't make me
Speaker 2: as your role model, you can use me as a
Speaker 2: goal model. I always loved that. I always love that
Speaker 2: because you don't want to be Charles Barkley, but.
Speaker 1: No achieve his success, right. And I and I guess
Speaker 1: I you know, I feel I feel for Tiger, you know,
Speaker 1: I mean, I really do, because because I you know,
Speaker 1: it's just because we love him, yeah, right, I mean,
Speaker 1: and there's never nobody I mean, you know, it's it's
Speaker 1: like Michael Jordan, you know, watching a guy like that,
Speaker 1: you just watch them and it's like you're seeing something
Speaker 1: you're never going to see.
Speaker 2: Again, right, right, all right, So so that's not where
Speaker 2: we were going. I want to talk about straight your book,
Speaker 2: Straight down the Middle, which I'm thoroughly enjoying. Again, I
Speaker 2: highly recommend people to get to know Josh, read this book,
Speaker 2: you know, and then follow the podcast and you'll, you know,
Speaker 2: it'll you'll ease right into it. So what why was
Speaker 2: it feeling like I was listening I was reading about
Speaker 2: golf smarter? I mean, with all these people, is that
Speaker 2: something that was behind it? Or well? I think am
Speaker 2: I fishing for a compliment here?
Speaker 1: No? I mean I know, first of all, I mean
Speaker 1: I think there is this this you know, way in
Speaker 1: which you and I certainly overlapped and our interests and
Speaker 1: the people we connected with. Yeah, but I think you
Speaker 1: and I, you know, as we've discussed kind of off
Speaker 1: the air, have a lot in common and uh, you know,
Speaker 1: and I just think, you know, it's it's funny. I mean,
Speaker 1: you know, the book Resident they did with a certain
Speaker 1: group of people, and it's very interesting, you know, for
Speaker 1: the first doesn't happen so much anymore. But I'd say
Speaker 1: the first ten years after it came out, I would
Speaker 1: get an email, you know, once a month from somebody
Speaker 1: who said, you know, I read your book, and this
Speaker 1: actually is is kind of hilarious in some ways because
Speaker 1: they would say, you know, I read your book and
Speaker 1: I went out and I had a hole in one
Speaker 1: on the second hole, my first hole, And they'd say,
Speaker 1: and I knew, and I have never had a hole
Speaker 1: in one. Wow in my life certainly, But I mean,
Speaker 1: I would say that either a hole in one or
Speaker 1: shot the best round of their life. And I number one.
Speaker 1: Will just give you a disclaimer as someone who is
Speaker 1: about a twelve handicaper, I've improved my game by about
Speaker 1: five or six strokes when I was doing the book.
Speaker 1: I am no one to be giving anyone golf advice.
Speaker 1: So it was you know, but it was Yeah, the
Speaker 1: book really it was so much fun, and it kind of,
Speaker 1: in a weird way, wrote itself because it was just
Speaker 1: this journey to try to find alternative ways to improve
Speaker 1: your golf game, kind of beginning with you know, the
Speaker 1: really beginning with Michael Murphy's. Uh, the idea came from
Speaker 1: the fact that you have three of the best selling
Speaker 1: golf books ever written. Or then Golf by Joe parent
Speaker 1: in a book. What yes, he's in the book.
Speaker 2: He is in the book book, and also episode one
Speaker 2: of Golf Smarter.
Speaker 1: And I didn't know he was your first guest.
Speaker 2: He was Episode one.
Speaker 1: That's that's a good first guest, by the way, it's
Speaker 1: a good gut And then Michael Murphy's Golf in the
Speaker 1: Kingdom and the Legend of Bag of Vance by Stephen Pressfield,
Speaker 1: all of which have something in common, which is that,
Speaker 1: you know, here's those you know, I said, I'm like
Speaker 1: a pop culture writer, and I was like, okay, here's
Speaker 1: this game that I have always associated with, you know,
Speaker 1: plaid pants, people my dad like, who were my dad's friends?
Speaker 1: And Pat Summer all and here it is the three
Speaker 1: of you know, maybe the five best selling golf books
Speaker 1: ever are all rooted in Eastern spirituality. And and I
Speaker 1: had this just totally hilarious experience I had. There's a
Speaker 1: guy named sak Young Rimpochet who is leader of I
Speaker 1: can't even remember what the name of the organization is anymore,
Speaker 1: but a big Buddhist organization in the US. And I
Speaker 1: went to a meditation seminar on a Friday night with
Speaker 1: my wife and as I think I say in the book,
Speaker 1: I was the only person. They're wearing a white sox hat,
Speaker 1: which immediately labeled me as like, you know, the absolute outsider.
Speaker 1: And we did, you know, we did meditation and stuff,
Speaker 1: and I'm like sitting there going You're like, I just
Speaker 1: want to go eat. I want to you know, go
Speaker 1: see a movie. You know, I couldn't do anything to
Speaker 1: get out of there. And you know, I'm trying to
Speaker 1: be nice, you know, and be a good boy for
Speaker 1: my wife and not act like a child. And when
Speaker 1: we go around the room after a meditation session, somebody says,
Speaker 1: the guy says, you know, talk each of you talk
Speaker 1: about how you know, meditation has impacted your life, and
Speaker 1: everybody's gaining some deep understanding of the world. And they
Speaker 1: get to me and I had been meditating for about
Speaker 1: six months and I was like, you know, it's taking
Speaker 1: a couple of strokes off my golf game. And they
Speaker 1: all looked at me like, oh, you know, like this
Speaker 1: ye'ar they're about to like, you know, all the Buddhists
Speaker 1: were going to stone me for mentioning golf. And the
Speaker 1: guy who led the thing said, well, you know, the
Speaker 1: sock young is an avid golfer. And I thought, oh,
Speaker 1: that's a great magazine article, right, I'll go, you know,
Speaker 1: and it'll be like the you know, Dali Lama thing
Speaker 1: in Caddyshack, and he'll be wearing robes. And of course
Speaker 1: that never happened. But I started thinking about this and
Speaker 1: I thought, you know, this could be such a fun
Speaker 1: book because there's so much alternative golf instruction out there,
Speaker 1: and so I, you know, I just started finding people
Speaker 1: who had kind of esoteric, kind of Eastern tinged methods
Speaker 1: of teaching golf. And of course that involved Joe Parent,
Speaker 1: that involved Jim Waldron, involved Jamie Zimron and I'm tried.
Speaker 1: I don't even know who else is on your show
Speaker 1: that I worked.
Speaker 2: With, but Michael Murphy was mentioned.
Speaker 1: Yeah, Michael Murphy. Michael Murphy I did not play with,
Speaker 1: but but I certainly was inspired by his. And the
Speaker 1: final chapter though, is U is an outing at h
Speaker 1: AT in Wisconsin at h Well. I talked to Fred.
Speaker 1: He did not work with me, but he was very
Speaker 1: very kind. But I I went to Whistling Straits and
Speaker 1: played in an outing with the Shivas Iron Society and
Speaker 1: that was the final chapter. So that was kind of,
Speaker 1: you know, Michael Murphy inspired thing, and that was really
Speaker 1: that was a really great experience. Man, it was just
Speaker 1: such a great group of people, all from different walks
Speaker 1: of life, all of whom have read this book, you know,
Speaker 1: Murphy's book and had it impassed. Yeah.
Speaker 2: Yeah. And Ben Klein is now the is now running
Speaker 2: Shivas Iron Society. Played golf with him down in Carmel
Speaker 2: about two years ago. Okay, and so yeah, still love
Speaker 2: Shiva's Iron. Still love the group and the people associated. Yeah,
Speaker 2: and so this is why, you know, to me, I
Speaker 2: never thought of it as, oh, we're going to take
Speaker 2: an Eastern philosophy view of golf. It just kind of
Speaker 2: worked out that way when I started thinking about the
Speaker 2: mental aspects of it, and it all kind of fell
Speaker 2: into place as we did over the years.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Well, yeah, the mental game stuff, you know, it's
Speaker 1: and you know, the mental as far as my mental game,
Speaker 1: if I have one, has certainly evolved over time, but
Speaker 1: it really that stuff has really remained the core of it.
Speaker 1: I mean I learned things like, you know, when you
Speaker 1: triple bogia hole that you have to you can't go
Speaker 1: to the next hole and think I Am going to
Speaker 1: kick the crap out of this ball and make up
Speaker 1: for all those strokes with one shot, which I have
Speaker 1: had all have done, right, you know, and so you know,
Speaker 1: and I'm able to, you know, kind of stop myself
Speaker 1: and say, you know, I remember it's just a game.
Speaker 1: I remember, it's just a nice walkouts walk in nature.
Speaker 1: I remember that it's time with friends that I'm supposed
Speaker 1: to be enjoying myself. I don't. I still have, but
Speaker 1: I don't, you know, frequently drive home after you know,
Speaker 1: shooting a bad round and you know, doing that whole
Speaker 1: thing where I'm like, I'm never playing this game again.
Speaker 1: I don't know what I was thinking. But I used
Speaker 1: to do that. I mean, I used to beat myself
Speaker 1: up up on the course like you cannot believe. And
Speaker 1: after I played, I like, you know, and what's the
Speaker 1: consequence of my my shooting an eighty five or ninety three?
Speaker 1: You know, it means nothing to the world, but it was,
Speaker 1: you know, it gets you out of yourself to take
Speaker 1: that different perspective.
Speaker 2: Well, I really do hope that listeners will go out
Speaker 2: and buy the book. I'd like to see a bump
Speaker 2: in your sales on the book. But also it's just
Speaker 2: a great way to understand where the where this podcast
Speaker 2: is going to go in the future and where is
Speaker 2: it going to go? What do you what do you
Speaker 2: envision the future of golf smarter to be?
Speaker 1: Well, you know, I want to continue your work and
Speaker 1: it's just going to be me doing it with maybe
Speaker 1: a little more. Yeah, we're different people, but like I
Speaker 1: said before, you and I have a lot of commonality
Speaker 1: and we both like to talk and we like to
Speaker 1: talk about golf, and so what I really want to do,
Speaker 1: you know, I mean a lot a lot of you know,
Speaker 1: the people I have talked to, you know, for episodes
Speaker 1: that I've recorded, you know, a lot of it has
Speaker 1: kind of swing, you know, about different approaches to how
Speaker 1: to swing the club. But it's also just about the
Speaker 1: game and it's really about getting you know, what's not
Speaker 1: is what's interesting to me is how to improve your game.
Speaker 1: But what's also interesting to me is the stories of
Speaker 1: the people behind absolutely what they did and how they
Speaker 1: came to doing that. And it's you know, and that
Speaker 1: is really fascinating to me, you know, because you just
Speaker 1: have one thing that always blows me away is several
Speaker 1: of the people I've interviewed, you know, they say, oh, yeah,
Speaker 1: I picked up the game at sixteen, and you know,
Speaker 1: by the time I was seventeen and a half, I
Speaker 1: was shooting sixty eight and I just think, way, way,
Speaker 1: way wait, whoa, whoa, whoa. And then you have people
Speaker 1: like you know, Crystal Garcia, who I interviewed and who
Speaker 1: I think even viewed as well, who was shooting one hundred,
Speaker 1: and you know Red Hogan's I'm you know, Red Hogan's
Speaker 1: Five Lessons revamped his own swing based you know, and
Speaker 1: his theories based on that, and is now teaching golfer living.
Speaker 1: And I love the different viewpoints people bring to it
Speaker 1: because it's, you know, it's it's like anything, you know,
Speaker 1: I mean, it's you know, if it's movies, if it's baseball,
Speaker 1: if it's politics. Everybody's got their unique take on it.
Speaker 1: And so it's really interesting to hear, you know, like
Speaker 1: and just use Kristo's an example, you know, my whole
Speaker 1: their last you know, probably from nineteen ninety five to
Speaker 1: two thousand and fifteen, I can't tell you how many
Speaker 1: times there had somebody say, oh, well, he's coming over
Speaker 1: the top. That's his problem. He's coming over the top.
Speaker 1: And you know, he teaches, he says, his whole thing
Speaker 1: is He's like if you really watch videos of you know,
Speaker 1: the great golfers of the twentieth century. They're all coming
Speaker 1: over the top. And the point isn't the technical stuff
Speaker 1: because I'm not a technical you know, I'm not qualified
Speaker 1: to be a technical golferson, but just how it takes,
Speaker 1: you know, it's not so much about whether you're I'm
Speaker 1: so frustrated by the world of you know, you got
Speaker 1: to be in the right position, you got to do this,
Speaker 1: you got to do that. Where you get caught up
Speaker 1: in trying to be perfect while you're playing and trying
Speaker 1: to consciously do things, and what really is is it's
Speaker 1: about kind of learning different skills that just you find
Speaker 1: your swing. And so that's a lot of what the
Speaker 1: show is going to be about is people talking about
Speaker 1: different ways they've found their swings and their methods and
Speaker 1: where they came from and how they got there, and
Speaker 1: then you know, just kind of some real practical advice
Speaker 1: about you know, here's a couple drills that you know,
Speaker 1: you don't need to take lessons, because that is one thing.
Speaker 1: I mean, how much golf instruction is out in the
Speaker 1: world on YouTube, oh my gosh and Instagram, and it's
Speaker 1: all contradictory and so much. Yeah, yes, I.
Speaker 2: Mean you can't you know these That's the thing is
Speaker 2: like I always had people I can't tell you how
Speaker 2: many instructors I've had on the show that said I
Speaker 2: found Ben Hogan's secret. Well, who am I to dispute it?
Speaker 2: And I think that that one of the things that
Speaker 2: you said rings true for both of us, which is
Speaker 2: why I thought you'd be such a great host for
Speaker 2: the show, is that we're not qualified to teach. We're
Speaker 2: here to learn. And I think that that it is
Speaker 2: become a voice to a lot of people going. I
Speaker 2: don't want to hear what the odds are or what
Speaker 2: the payouts were to last week's tournament or next week.
Speaker 2: I don't want to have two instructors talked talking to
Speaker 2: themselves and nobody understanding what they say. I mean, I
Speaker 2: just wanted to have a show that allowed me to learn,
Speaker 2: but also gave voice to the recreational golfer. Right, And
Speaker 2: so I think that you know, I'm a twelve handicapped
Speaker 2: Now I was low at one point and now I'm not.
Speaker 2: I feel like i'm not, but I'm still like, hey,
Speaker 2: I'm still at twelve. That's pretty good. But I'm not
Speaker 2: qualified to teach right. Yeah. And at a very funny situation,
Speaker 2: my buddy Kevin and I were playing and around at
Speaker 2: one of our favorite courses, Foxtail North recently, and there
Speaker 2: were the and we teed off. There were two guys
Speaker 2: were teeing off behind us. We were twosome. We said,
Speaker 2: you want to join us. They're like, no, no, that's okay.
Speaker 2: You guys, we're we're not very good, so you guys
Speaker 2: just go ahead and play in front of us. It's
Speaker 2: like fine, okay. So we didn't play with him, but
Speaker 2: I talked to him at tea boxes a couple of times.
Speaker 2: Then they pulled up to one of the tea box
Speaker 2: and number ten or eleven and one of the kids,
Speaker 2: two young men, and he said, do you mind if
Speaker 2: I ask you a question? And I was like sure,
Speaker 2: go ahead, and he goes, how do you get the
Speaker 2: ball off the tee? How do you hit the ball
Speaker 2: straight off the team? I'm like, you're asking, We've never
Speaker 2: talked and you want to ask me that question. It's
Speaker 2: like a right, don't know. And Kevin started giving him
Speaker 2: lessons and showing him his hands and doing things, and
Speaker 2: I'm like, just slow down and don't try to hit
Speaker 2: it hard. That's all I'm gonna tell you. I don't
Speaker 2: want to say just slow it down. If you try
Speaker 2: to hit it hard, you're gonna go over.
Speaker 1: You get it.
Speaker 2: You create tension in your body. And this is all
Speaker 2: stuff I've learned in the show. You got to loosen
Speaker 2: the tension and stuff. So yeah, the fact that you're
Speaker 2: not qualified to teach, but love the game and loved
Speaker 2: to improve and want to hear great stories. And well
Speaker 2: you said we like to talk. Do I like to talk?
Speaker 2: I like to listen?
Speaker 1: Yeah, I prefer to listen. Right.
Speaker 2: But one of the things that happened while in this
Speaker 2: six month period that I've been trying to figure out
Speaker 2: what I was going to do next, whenever stories came
Speaker 2: across my desk that usually I'm like, oh that's interesting.
Speaker 2: I want to get that person on the show, right,
Speaker 2: I started seeing those stories going yeah, I'm not interested.
Speaker 2: I'm like, oh, that's gonna tell me something. I just
Speaker 2: wasn't interested in pursuing it. I'm like, yeah, I think
Speaker 2: I'm done. I think I think it's time. I'm done,
Speaker 2: But I am going to come back. Oh yeah, right,
Speaker 2: are you gonna Besides being on Fridays, right. I'd love
Speaker 2: to occasionally say hello, you.
Speaker 1: Are welcome any any time and as often as you
Speaker 1: would like to like to be involved, and I would
Speaker 1: hope that you would.
Speaker 2: Well, of course we're going to do next week. We're
Speaker 2: going to have Waldron one.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: One of the things on your CV, your resume just
Speaker 2: call them, uh, is you're a producer.
Speaker 1: Yes.
Speaker 2: Can you tell me more about that? That fascinates me? Yeah, well,
Speaker 2: I as producer, I mean so many different things that
Speaker 2: depending on which media, your medium you're discussing. You know,
Speaker 2: I was a radio producer, which was what I made commercials,
Speaker 2: or I produced the morning show or you know, but
Speaker 2: but that's not what you're doing.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Yeah, I mean I I I had I really
Speaker 1: lucked into it. You know, it's funny. I mean, I
Speaker 1: I remember when I started my career, my whole goal
Speaker 1: was I was like, I just want to be able
Speaker 1: to make a living as a journalists and support my family.
Speaker 1: And that happened way more quickly than I than I
Speaker 1: thought it was going to. So I was kind of like, okay,
Speaker 1: and then you know, everything I've done has kind of
Speaker 1: I just you know, I get to this point where
Speaker 1: you know, I look back five years and say, wow,
Speaker 1: I never thought I'd be doing this. And in like
Speaker 1: twenty fifteen, I was. I was working on a TV project,
Speaker 1: Like I was. I was writing a TV script that
Speaker 1: I sold but the to to a famous actors production company.
Speaker 1: But and then it never went really far past that.
Speaker 1: But we worked on developing it and stuff. And when
Speaker 1: I was working on that, I got a call from
Speaker 1: the guys who had who had optioned my first book,
Speaker 1: A feudal and stupid gesture, and and they were like,
Speaker 1: you know, and they had been trying to get it
Speaker 1: made for about five years, and it was always you know,
Speaker 1: the story of oh, you know, so and So's in
Speaker 1: so and So's in so and So's in but we
Speaker 1: got half the money, but we don't have the other half.
Speaker 1: And it's a very trick you know, it's a tricky
Speaker 1: the way thing that I learned a lot about how
Speaker 1: the way things work with all that in Hollywood. Anyway,
Speaker 1: long story short, they went into a meeting at Netflix.
Speaker 1: And this was right before Netflix got into This is
Speaker 1: at the absolute beginning of them getting into original production.
Speaker 1: You know, they were still the company they were they
Speaker 1: had Netflix, but they were still you know, just kind
Speaker 1: of coming out of that sending back your DVD's era,
Speaker 1: and and they went into a meeting and they came
Speaker 1: out forty five minutes later and they're like, done, deal,
Speaker 1: We're making the movie. And so I'm like, oh my god,
Speaker 1: this is like talk about something I never thought would happen.
Speaker 1: Yea and am around the same time, you know, the
Speaker 1: one thing that happens. You know, people don't just email
Speaker 1: you about your holes in one they or their holes
Speaker 1: in one. They all kinds of people email you and
Speaker 1: you write a book and they say, hey, I'm a director,
Speaker 1: i'm a producer. I'd like to, you know, make a
Speaker 1: movie out of your book. And I just kind of,
Speaker 1: you know, it was like you know, I at first
Speaker 1: it was really exciting, and then you start googling them
Speaker 1: very flattering and then but then you kind of get
Speaker 1: where you google the person you go like, well, I
Speaker 1: don't see that they've ever made anything. So I got
Speaker 1: an email shortly after the deal got made for my
Speaker 1: first book to be made into a movie, and it
Speaker 1: was from a guy and he just said, you know, hey,
Speaker 1: I've wanted to make a documentary about this Orson Wells
Speaker 1: movie forever. And I just read your book and blah
Speaker 1: blah blah, you know, do you want to talk? And
Speaker 1: I wasn't, you know, And I was like, yeah, sure,
Speaker 1: of course. And then I googled him and I was like,
Speaker 1: oh my god, this guy is like really legitimate. He
Speaker 1: had won the ass for Best Documentary like two years before.
Speaker 1: And his name is Morgan Neville and he's great. And
Speaker 1: he let you know, he had me work as a
Speaker 1: producer and the Source and Wells documentary and then and
Speaker 1: and really, I'm you know, I'm not producing in any
Speaker 1: kind of technical way. It was really you know, and
Speaker 1: I wasn't writing it per se, but I was doing
Speaker 1: a lot of the interviews. I was doing a lot
Speaker 1: of you know, I was he was certainly the creative
Speaker 1: person behind it, but I did a lot of the
Speaker 1: interviews and also was allowed to have a lot of
Speaker 1: input into some of the creative stuff. And I love that.
Speaker 1: And when you're a writer, you spend all your time
Speaker 1: unless you're interviewing somebody alone. And I love the collaborative
Speaker 1: nature of working on a film. And I love movies.
Speaker 1: I mean, that's you know, another thing, you know, I mean,
Speaker 1: I love movies like I love golf. And and then
Speaker 1: I've worked as a consulting producer on his One of
Speaker 1: his more recent ones that just came out in December.
Speaker 1: It was called Breakdown nineteen seventy five that was on Netflix.
Speaker 1: That was about the basically the movies of nineteen seventy
Speaker 1: five and how they reflect the culture.
Speaker 2: Oh really, Oh yeah. I was like. My wife and
Speaker 2: I started watching. She goes, oh, this isn't about nineteen
Speaker 2: seventy five, and I'm like, no, it's about the movies
Speaker 2: of nineteen seventy five that were commenting on American culture, right.
Speaker 2: It was like and I loved it. I thought it
Speaker 2: was fascinating.
Speaker 1: My wife, Oh, it was a blast. I mean, I
Speaker 1: had so much fun working on it. And I love
Speaker 1: to learn about stuff, you know, and I got to
Speaker 1: learn about all, you know, all kinds of you know,
Speaker 1: felt like I didn't know much about the Church Commission,
Speaker 1: and all of a sudden, I'm trying to find movies
Speaker 1: that reflect what's going on in the Church Commission. And
Speaker 1: it was just you know, and I just I love
Speaker 1: I love doing that stuff. And I have other you know,
Speaker 1: TV and film projects that I'm working on right now,
Speaker 1: both as a producer and a writer. But yeah, so
Speaker 1: I mean and and I you know, and I have
Speaker 1: other you know, film ish projects in development that I'm producing.
Speaker 1: But I'm really, like, I would say, a creative producer
Speaker 1: more than a producer producer. Like if you put me
Speaker 1: in charge of the production, like the woman who is
Speaker 1: my co producer on the orson Wells One, I mean,
Speaker 1: I could not do what she does. She made sure
Speaker 1: everything got done and I just did my thing. So
Speaker 1: that's kind of what I'm gonna.
Speaker 2: Okay, okay, good, Well, I'm glad we got to we
Speaker 2: get to learn more about that. Yeah, so I'm curious here.
Speaker 2: Do you have any questions for me?
Speaker 1: I certainly do. Oh so let's first of all, tell
Speaker 1: you know, tell me a little bit about what's been
Speaker 1: going on with you, you know, since you've decided to
Speaker 1: step away from golf murder, and you know what and
Speaker 1: what you plan to do other than and I know
Speaker 1: golf is a big piece of it. So I want
Speaker 1: to hear about that.
Speaker 2: Well, it's in interesting because there was no plan. There's
Speaker 2: never been a plan. I'm not good at that. We
Speaker 2: have that, yeah, I'm never never good at the plan part.
Speaker 2: I just felt like, you know, I turned seventy in August,
Speaker 2: and I felt like I'm ready to retire. And what's
Speaker 2: so fascinating is everyone's asking me, what are you going
Speaker 2: to do? What are you going to do? What are
Speaker 2: you going to do? And that is what I've given
Speaker 2: all a tremendous amount of thought because I've been doing
Speaker 2: my whole life. I've been incredibly blessed that I was
Speaker 2: able to go into business for myself in nineteen eighty six,
Speaker 2: and I've had to reinvent myself many times doing that,
Speaker 2: which was great advice from one of my mentors. It's like,
Speaker 2: you need to listen. When you're self employed, you got
Speaker 2: to reinvent yourself every Monday. And I've had some luck,
Speaker 2: I've had some good fortune on some projects, and so
Speaker 2: my feeling is right now, I don't want to do anything.
Speaker 1: I just want to be yeah, which is hard, right,
Speaker 1: which is.
Speaker 2: Really hard to do. But I just want to just,
Speaker 2: you know, appreciate where I am in my life and
Speaker 2: value this incredible relationship that I've had with my wife,
Speaker 2: going on forty six years this year will be married,
Speaker 2: and we have three amazing grandchildren and our sons are
Speaker 2: doing well, and I just want to focus on that
Speaker 2: part of my life going forward in the you know,
Speaker 2: because like when I turned seventy, I remember saying, We're
Speaker 2: at dinner with some friends, and I said, you know,
Speaker 2: the big birthdays are when there's a zero on it, right,
Speaker 2: those are always the big birthdays. And so I guess
Speaker 2: this is one of the big birthdays. But the thing
Speaker 2: is why may only have hopefully one maybe two left
Speaker 2: in those. So it's like, do I need to do? No,
Speaker 2: I don't want to do. And so I've decided that
Speaker 2: in thinking a lot about it, one of my favorite
Speaker 2: times of my life was growing up and having recess.
Speaker 2: That's what I want to do. I want to have recess.
Speaker 2: So I've been acting like a teenager. I sleep late,
Speaker 2: and then when I get up, I'll spend an hour
Speaker 2: reading articles and laying in bed, you know, with my iPad.
Speaker 2: Then I get up and I'll do yoga and stretching.
Speaker 2: And then it's a choice of do I practice golf,
Speaker 2: do I play golf, do I go swimming? And then
Speaker 2: there's always got to go for a walk because I
Speaker 2: got a dog, so I got to walk. We like
Speaker 2: to hike, and Joanne loves to hike, and I always
Speaker 2: say I love to hike too, but every so often
Speaker 2: I want to hit something, so I want to walk.
Speaker 2: I want to walk more. I want to play, you know,
Speaker 2: I definitely want to play more. And I'm actually and
Speaker 2: listeners who've been with me for a while will know
Speaker 2: that I've always talked about I've got a golf course
Speaker 2: right outside my window here, but I'm not a member.
Speaker 2: I've put in my application to become a member of
Speaker 2: the golf course because I was looking at different places
Speaker 2: of where I could go and become a member, and
Speaker 2: I'm like, why am I looking other places. There's a
Speaker 2: golf course in my backyard right right, and they have
Speaker 2: a great practice facility, and they have tennis and pick
Speaker 2: a ball and a full gym and a great restaurant
Speaker 2: and swimming pools. But a swimming pool is like, they
Speaker 2: don't designate laps for swimming, and it's only open from
Speaker 2: May to October. It's come on, this is Marin County.
Speaker 2: What are you doing. I swelled swim twelve months a year,
Speaker 2: so anyway, the swimming part may not work out for me.
Speaker 2: But the great restaurant and the practice and one time
Speaker 2: I did an interview with somebody, We're talking about the
Speaker 2: value of golf country club membership. And I say, yeah,
Speaker 2: I guess the coolest thing is you can play as
Speaker 2: much as you want. He's like, ah, that's the difference.
Speaker 2: I get to play as little as I want. I'm like,
Speaker 2: what do you mean? He goes, if I want to
Speaker 2: play three holes today, I'll play three holes. I want
Speaker 2: to play five, I want to play nine. I can
Speaker 2: do whatever I want. I can play as little as
Speaker 2: I want, not as much as I want. And to
Speaker 2: me that was like, oh, so I can go. I
Speaker 2: have two holes right in my backyard. I could play
Speaker 2: these two over and over, or I've even set up like, oh,
Speaker 2: there's a five hole loop that I could just do,
Speaker 2: start on the next hole and end here and do
Speaker 2: that and go practice. So that's what hopefully in my
Speaker 2: feudre And then we love to travel, so I want
Speaker 2: to continue traveling doing a lot more so it's you know,
Speaker 2: and listen to podcasts.
Speaker 1: What's where? Where do you want to travel? Like is
Speaker 1: there any place you're dying to go to that you
Speaker 1: haven't been or that you want to go back to.
Speaker 2: Or yeah, Joanne's in charge of booking those trips. But
Speaker 2: I have my three years ago I said for my
Speaker 2: seventieth birthday, I want to spend a month in Australia.
Speaker 2: Well we're not even booking a trip to Australia yet,
Speaker 2: and it's like, well, can we just go to New
Speaker 2: Zealand then yeah, well we'll get there at some point,
Speaker 2: but there's other places we got to go first. So
Speaker 2: we love international travel. We love exploring. Uh. I would
Speaker 2: love to just be able to get in the car,
Speaker 2: go away for two days and go play golf somewhere,
Speaker 2: you know, just do road trips for golf and I
Speaker 2: we we really I want to go back to South America.
Speaker 2: I love South America. I feel like Europe is like obvious,
Speaker 2: you will go to Yeah, yeah we did Europe, we
Speaker 2: did last year. But I love I live the Far
Speaker 2: East and I love South America. I want to go
Speaker 2: back to Australia, which I went once, but I want
Speaker 2: to go to New Zealand as well. I love to
Speaker 2: travel more with my golf clubs. We don't usually do that,
Speaker 2: but this country club here is a Troon Privey course,
Speaker 2: so I'll be able to go and take advantage of
Speaker 2: the Troon courses, which would be awesome.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: The problem with this golf course, we put our deposit
Speaker 2: in for membership, and it's like, oh, there's a year
Speaker 2: long waiting list. Wait a minute, I'm ready now. Oh well,
Speaker 2: you got to wait for people to quit or die,
Speaker 2: and that's not going to happen in the spring, that's
Speaker 2: going to happen. So and even though Ken Doherty, who
Speaker 2: is the director of golf here, it's been on the
Speaker 2: program multiple times, you know, and I did video work
Speaker 2: for this golf course. I produced some videos for them.
Speaker 2: Sorry it doesn't count. Nope, you're starting from scratch. So
Speaker 2: I don't know when i'll we get to be a
Speaker 2: member there, but that's one of the things that I
Speaker 2: want to do.
Speaker 1: Yeah, for sure. No, that's no. It's funny, like you know,
Speaker 1: I always think about what it would be to stop doing,
Speaker 1: you know, and to just try to like enjoy what's here.
Speaker 2: We've always said about ourselves, we're not human beings, we're
Speaker 2: human doings, right, and we're constantly on the move and
Speaker 2: you know, very fast paced.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's really I mean, I've always I remember my father.
Speaker 1: I always thought he ran a family business and I
Speaker 1: always thought, man, they're going to drag him out of
Speaker 1: there on a stretcher. By his feet when he's ninety
Speaker 1: eight years old and he's going to be telling people
Speaker 1: what they should be doing on the way out the door.
Speaker 1: And he sold the business when he was my age
Speaker 1: actually choose it was the bakery of my age. Yes,
Speaker 1: I am fifty nine years old, okay, and I was
Speaker 1: actually many years for golf smarter. Yes, as a brief digression,
Speaker 1: I was just in Mexico and spring break with my
Speaker 1: kid and I went to play golf and I took
Speaker 1: an uber and I was having a little bit of
Speaker 1: a language barrier with this kid who was driving the uber,
Speaker 1: and he was twenty five. But I said how old
Speaker 1: are you? And he said I'm twenty five And he
Speaker 1: said how old are you? And I said I'm fifty
Speaker 1: nine and he said, you look great for seventy nine,
Speaker 1: and I it's fifty nine.
Speaker 2: You know. I was like, oh, well, you look like crap.
Speaker 2: I know.
Speaker 1: Well, that's why I was. It was like seventy nine.
Speaker 1: I guess I look good for seventy nine. But no,
Speaker 1: it's yes, I'm fifty nine years old, and I'm actually
Speaker 1: you know, it's funny, you know, as I'm about turned
Speaker 1: sixty in October, and I really have No, it's I'm
Speaker 1: excited to turn sixty, which I never would have thought
Speaker 1: I would be. But I'm just kind of like, you know,
Speaker 1: it's a nice it's a nice time in my life.
Speaker 1: And I'm about to have my youngest goway to college
Speaker 1: and have some small version. I still have to pay
Speaker 1: for college, so I can't I can't start traveling like that.
Speaker 1: But I you know, I'm I'm kind of excited for
Speaker 1: what that new world is going to be for me.
Speaker 1: So I think we're both going through different versions of
Speaker 1: similar stuff.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah. Oh and one one more thing that I
Speaker 2: do do my daily routine. I also have now started
Speaker 2: not only do I do my stretching and yoga in
Speaker 2: the morning, I do it before I go to bed.
Speaker 1: That's smart.
Speaker 2: Oh my god, is that helped my sleep? Because that's
Speaker 2: been tough.
Speaker 1: You know who is a big advocate of that. No,
Speaker 1: Ricky Henderson. Really he stretched before he went to bed
Speaker 1: because he said he will couple lose WHOA.
Speaker 2: I didn't know.
Speaker 1: Yeah, isn't that wild? But I've I've actually and I've
Speaker 1: done I've been just Ricky being Ricky, Ricky.
Speaker 2: Being Ricky man. Oh god, so many stories, you know,
Speaker 2: It's so interesting because I don't know why I just
Speaker 2: got jones to look at this, but episode five hundred
Speaker 2: was on my sixtieth birthday. Oh really yeah, it was
Speaker 2: published on my sixtieth birthday.
Speaker 1: And who wasn't uh.
Speaker 2: Richard Cessna and the goal and the it was golf's
Speaker 2: ultimate goal, shooting your age or lower, which interesting I'm
Speaker 2: just looking at that now. But which is interesting about
Speaker 2: that is that one of the goals I've set for myself.
Speaker 2: I think there are three golf goals in life, and
Speaker 2: one is a hole in one, two is going to
Speaker 2: the Masters, and three shooting your age.
Speaker 1: Right.
Speaker 2: So I've done the first two, only one hole in one,
Speaker 2: only one appearance to the Masters last year, and maybe
Speaker 2: never again, but hopefully Chet if you're listening, I'll go anytime.
Speaker 2: And then the third one is I want to This
Speaker 2: is why I'm taking lessons from Jim Waldron is I
Speaker 2: want to be able to shoot my age before I
Speaker 2: turn seventy six. I've shot, I've shot pre below seventy
Speaker 2: five a couple of times, so I know I can
Speaker 2: do this.
Speaker 1: I want to shoot that's that would be a great achievement.
Speaker 1: I mean that, I mean I mean, I I because
Speaker 1: it's just you know, it's it's funny like it. First
Speaker 1: of all, I'm sure you will be able to do it.
Speaker 2: You know, I'll come back and report it.
Speaker 1: Damn. Yeah. But it's so you know, it's for me.
Speaker 1: The main challenge with that is always when you're playing
Speaker 1: so well, not thinking about how well you're playing, you know,
Speaker 1: and not going off the rails because you're like, oh
Speaker 1: my god, I just part of the first.
Speaker 2: To score a card. Just be surprised at the end.
Speaker 2: Don't look at that.
Speaker 1: Yes, yeah, exactly. Well that's a good goal. I like it.
Speaker 1: I It's gonna be a little while. I don't think
Speaker 1: I'm gonna be shooting any fifty nine anytime since.
Speaker 2: So, okay, but your show go.
Speaker 1: Now I'm taking over. This is not yet, yeah, I know.
Speaker 1: So So for you know, if you've done a thousand
Speaker 1: plus of these interviews, and I know Tony Manzoni was
Speaker 1: you know, is incredibly popular, but who's and I know
Speaker 1: Jim Nance was a big, you know, huge thing for you.
Speaker 1: You know what, I guess who's the most fun interview
Speaker 1: you've ever had? And what was the most unexpected interview
Speaker 1: you've had with somebody? What you know, where you just
Speaker 1: were like, it went completely differently than you ever thought
Speaker 1: it would.
Speaker 2: Oh God, there's a long list of like when people
Speaker 2: like and people has always always asked me, Oh, you're
Speaker 2: a new podcast, who is your favorite interview? Well, now
Speaker 2: I can go jim Nantz. Bump done. Oh that's a
Speaker 2: get Oh good job jim Nantz. But I've always loved
Speaker 2: the crazy stories. And there's a couple that always jumped
Speaker 2: out to me. There was one the young man who
Speaker 2: snuck into North Korea to play in the North Korean Open.
Speaker 1: Oh is the kid?
Speaker 2: So wow, yeah, I'll find it. Let's see from Korea
Speaker 2: and oh wait, that's not what I meant to do. Fine, okay,
Speaker 2: so this young man this was no, not him, I'm
Speaker 2: gonna find it and nope and nope. Come on, did
Speaker 2: I really mention Korea that many times in this show?
Speaker 2: Justin Crybec? Okay, so this was in twenty fourteen. Justin Crybec,
Speaker 2: who was in his mid twenties, a time he had
Speaker 2: dual citizenships, so he had a European and an American passport,
Speaker 2: and he loved golf, but he knew he was not
Speaker 2: good enough to play in a national open. But really
Speaker 2: wanted to play in the National Open, and so he
Speaker 2: was able to use his other passport. He lived in
Speaker 2: San Francisco in the Financial District, and he snuck into
Speaker 2: North Korea and tells this whole story about how he
Speaker 2: played the North Korean Open. Wow, and he had crazy
Speaker 2: stories about like they told him don't look, don't you
Speaker 2: can take pictures except for like holes four, five and
Speaker 2: six or something, And he's like, why they said, just
Speaker 2: don't take pictures on those holes. And he remembers walking
Speaker 2: down the fairway and there was somebody in the bushes
Speaker 2: with binoculars watching them.
Speaker 1: Oh my god.
Speaker 2: And then and the other great story was how after
Speaker 2: one of the rounds, he went to his room and
Speaker 2: went to get something out of his safe and he
Speaker 2: couldn't open it. The combination to change and he had
Speaker 2: stuff in his safe. So he went to his handler
Speaker 2: and it's a great episode. It was a great episode.
Speaker 2: This was when it was the nineteen twenty sixteen. In
Speaker 2: September twenty sixteen, episode five poin fifty eight. He went
Speaker 2: to his handler and said, Hey, I can't get into
Speaker 2: my safe to get stuff out, and she said, what
Speaker 2: are you hiding. He's like what goes, Why do you
Speaker 2: have to put things in a safe? What are you
Speaker 2: hiding right? And he's like, oh no, no, no, no.
Speaker 2: In the United States, well like people steal things out
Speaker 2: of hotel room, so we put things in the safe
Speaker 2: just to make sure he doesn't get stolen. She goes,
Speaker 2: good answer, I'll get someone to open it for you.
Speaker 1: Oh wow.
Speaker 2: So going into the final round, he was like two
Speaker 2: shots back of the lead. Get up, and he got
Speaker 2: to the eighteenth hole and kind of panicked because he
Speaker 2: didn't want to win, and so he got He had
Speaker 2: a snowman on a par four in the eighteenth hole,
Speaker 2: and so he was able to go home. And then
Speaker 2: he went home and he went back to San Francisco
Speaker 2: and went back to work, and so like here we
Speaker 2: talked about it. He did this in twenty fourteen. I'm
Speaker 2: talking to him in twenty sixteen and I said, so,
Speaker 2: how come I couldn't find any articles about this anywhere?
Speaker 2: And he goes, huh. I said, did you have have
Speaker 2: you ever talked to the press about this? And he
Speaker 2: went no, No. I got home, went back to work.
Speaker 2: I'm like, wait a minute, I'm breaking this story. This
Speaker 2: is the first time the story's being told. He goes, right,
Speaker 2: I'm like, whoa, okay, an exclusive for goals?
Speaker 1: Yeah right, no, god, that's that's one of my favorites.
Speaker 1: That's wild. That's an amazing I like. And then just
Speaker 1: to go back to your normal life. Yeah, exactly, it's
Speaker 1: always fascinating to me.
Speaker 2: Then there was the insurance salesman. Uh oh boy, yeah, no,
Speaker 2: it's not going to be never mind about that. I
Speaker 2: can't find it. An insurance salesman who was having a
Speaker 2: great round playing with some buddies and he's in his
Speaker 2: mid sixties, early sixties, and one of the guys he
Speaker 2: was playing with he didn't know the fourth he was
Speaker 2: new to him, said to him, doing a great day.
Speaker 2: He goes, yeah, I'm really playing well today. He goes,
Speaker 2: did you play in college? He goes, no, No, I
Speaker 2: played baseball. He said, do you still have eligibility? And
Speaker 2: he said, actually, I think I do because when I
Speaker 2: played baseball in college, I got injured and never went back,
Speaker 2: so I guess I'd still be eligible. He goes, you
Speaker 2: want to be on our college golf team? What he says,
Speaker 2: I'm the coach of the community college here and we
Speaker 2: have a space open and would love to have you
Speaker 2: join the team. And he's like, okay, But what he
Speaker 2: didn't realize is he had to go to class right
Speaker 2: to take classes. And then one time it's a community college, right,
Speaker 2: So one time he went to they were on a
Speaker 2: road trip and he knocked on the door of one
Speaker 2: of his teammates and said, Hey, I'm gonna go grab
Speaker 2: a beer. You want to come with me and goes,
Speaker 2: I'm not old enough to drink, and I got homework
Speaker 2: to do. I kind of study. He's like, oh god,
Speaker 2: what am I doing here? So those are two stories
Speaker 2: that stand out as favorites. But then the multiple conversations
Speaker 2: with doctor Bob Jones about his grandfather have always been
Speaker 2: really special for me, and that's why we always show
Speaker 2: aired them on the on the week of the Masters.
Speaker 2: We're not doing it this year. He's I spoke to
Speaker 2: him recently. He had some heart issues, but he's better
Speaker 2: now and he's very interested in talking to you. Josh.
Speaker 1: Oh great. Well, that's as we discussed the other day.
Speaker 1: I mean, I'm I'm I've been dying to talk to
Speaker 1: somebody who can talk to me about Bobby Jones because
Speaker 1: that is I watch I have you ever seen the
Speaker 1: videos of him, the movies he made for Disney. Yes,
Speaker 1: those are incredible, Like and you see.
Speaker 2: How what a special man he was.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, and you just the beauty of how he moved,
Speaker 1: you know, swinging at golf club, you know, and you're
Speaker 1: just like wow, like look at you know, and you
Speaker 1: know the last great amateur, right, you know, the last right?
Speaker 2: So all right, So anything else.
Speaker 1: No, sir, I have other questions, but I think our
Speaker 1: time is probably all right.
Speaker 2: Then listen, then this is what we're gonna do. We'll
Speaker 2: be back next week. This Friday will be let's see
Speaker 2: this Friday, is that gonna be another We all done
Speaker 2: with Tony Manzoni. I think we're all done with the
Speaker 2: Tony Manzoni episodes for twenty twenty six, which are always phenomenal.
Speaker 2: And yeah, yes, next week, oh, next week's episode on
Speaker 2: Mulligan's or this week's episode Mulligan's is going to be
Speaker 2: the time that I played in a pro am for
Speaker 2: a web dot com event. Okay, lay, I played with
Speaker 2: Adam Long and I brought a recorder with me and
Speaker 2: I interviewed Adam during the round. So we're gonna get
Speaker 2: to hear Adam my conversation along who who. My favorite
Speaker 2: thing about Adam Long was his at the time, his
Speaker 2: Twitter handle, which was a long shot at along And
Speaker 2: so yeah, we're gonna play that. And then the following
Speaker 2: week I'll be back with doctor Greg Steinberg from episode
Speaker 2: four hundred and ninety nine, which was golf is one
Speaker 2: hundred percent mental and one hundred percent physical, so very interesting.
Speaker 2: But next week you and I will be back and
Speaker 2: we'll have Jim Waldron on and Jim and I will
Speaker 2: start the conversation by going over my latest lesson with Jim.
Speaker 2: You'll get to hear one.
Speaker 1: Of that I'm looking forward to. I remember my lessons
Speaker 1: with Jim. They were a trip.
Speaker 2: He always starts with you got a great swing, you're
Speaker 2: doing great, but here's your problem. He builds me up
Speaker 2: really well, and then he goes, yeah, but you're just
Speaker 2: not making any progress at all. So I'm working very hard.
Speaker 2: So we're gonna get my golf lesson with Jim Waldron
Speaker 2: and then the second half of that conversation you'll take
Speaker 2: over and do your thing, and then from that point on,
Speaker 2: it's Golf Smart with Josh Carp. Well.
Speaker 1: I can't wait and thank you again. This has been
Speaker 1: really fun and I'm really looking forward to doing this
Speaker 1: and to you remaining around as founder. As we discussed
Speaker 1: earlier that the ule Golf Smarter founder Fred Green, So
Speaker 1: thank you for having me on and thank you for
Speaker 1: giving me the opportunity to take over the show.
Speaker 2: You very welcome