That's a gimmie

There were 27 golfers on Wednesday.  Closest to the holes were Jason Hunter on #5 and Joe Shwaluk on #9.  Only Joe converted the birdie resulting in a shared deuce pot of $121.88 with Ronnie Susinski.  That's Joe's third or fourth closest to on nine this year.  If he makes a few more we may have to put a plaque in his name on the tee box.

Skins went on six holes which was a season high.  Winners included Jason Neufeld / Jason Gorrell ($56.99 on #1, $112.38 on #3), Scott Maynes / Dale Hunter ($40.63 on #4), Scott Martin / Darcy Kowalchuk ($20.00 on #7), Theoren Hunter / Wes Arnfinson ($95.88 on #8), and Joe Shwaluk / Jason Hunter ($40.63 on #9).

Scott Maynes had a 35 which was the lowest round of the night.  He had one bogey and two birdies.  His group yielded the four lowest scores of the evening with a 37 and two 39's.  Scott moved up a stroke on the ringer board closing in on Brad Benton who currently sits in first place.  Speaking of the ringer board, you have three Wednesdays in August to lock up your final score.

Neuf won $84.63 on Wednesday jumping him to first place on the season money list with $190.39.  In second is Scott Maynes with $149.57 followed by Brad Benton with $142.86.  I have won $27.63 to sit solidly in 28th place.

After Men's Night, whether you golfed well or poorly, the conversation most often turns to putting.  Some guys talk about how they would have broken 40 if it weren't for a three putt.  Others mention that they had a 54 but with several three putts.  Almost everyone reflects on the impact of bad putting.  There are likely two explanations for this.  Either all male golfers in Shoal Lake are bad putters or putting is hard.  Let me make a case for the latter.

Golf magazine recently did an article on putting.  It stated that one of the biggest difference between us and pro golfers is what happens on three foot putts.  Pros convert three-footers at a rate of 99.4%.  Amateurs are often happy to go nine holes without missing a short putt.

Another interesting fact from the article was that pros only convert seven foot putts at a rate of 61%.  That is comparable to the rate at which major league pitchers throw strikes (62%) and the percentage of made NFL field goals that are 57 yards or longer (62%).  For eight foot putts, pros make only 52.8%.  The worst free throw shooter in the NBA made 50% of his shots from the line this past season.

So if you miss a few putts, including some short ones, it's not the end of the world.  However, if you want to feel really bad about your putting, consider this...from 2002-2005 Tiger Woods made 1536 of 1540 putts from three feet or less.  In four years, he only missed four times.

We regular golfers really only have three choices.  We can accept that putting is hard and not get too upset by it.  A second option is that we could putt better...recognizing that even that if we putt like pros we will still miss a lot.  Or, we could play with people who give lots of gimmies.