World's Greatest Golfer Dies

Rest in peace, Kim Jong-il. I'm pretty certain your incredible record eleven holes in one during one round of golf will never be surpassed. Not even Tiger Woods has set out to surpass you, opting instead to set his sights much lower, like breaking Jack Nicklaus's total major victory record.

Information Overload

It's time we brought an end to this so-called Information Age.

I was reading this article this morning, about a groom who stopped his marital proceedings mid-ceremony so he could update his Facebook and Twitter pages.

Are you effing kidding me?

Why do so many human beings feel the need to alert hundreds, if not thousands, of mere acquaintances of the most personal, intimate details of their lives, in real-time nonetheless?

And conversely, why do so many human beings soak this sort of thing up?

In this day and age, we are bombarded with information, from blogs (yes, including this one), yahoo groups, tweets, facebook pages, myspace pages, text messages, and so many other different emerging "news" sources, most of it inconsequential at the end of the day. I don't think we were meant, as a species, to be barraged by all this stuff. But for whatever reason, people are spending inordinate amounts of time transmitting the most random (and often) meaningless information to one another.

The pervasive nature of this information overload - both the giving and the receiving of it - seems to be an addiction of sorts. My uneducated guess is that the ability to tell hundreds of people something about oneself makes one feel important.

But far be it from me to shake my finger at everyone else. Despite the fact I think Tiger Woods's "transgressions" (to use his word) should remain a private affair - for the sake of his family - I'll admit I've checked up on the developing story every day since it broke.

Shame on me for perpetuating this gossipy nonsense that passes for news.

Inane status updates on social networking sites bug me the most. Oh, you're having your third coffee of the morning? Good for you, as Christian Bale would say.

Oh, you don't know what to do with your day, so you decided to tweet about not knowing what to do with your day? That's awesome, thanks for the update.

Oh, you have a hangover because you were out partying last night? Actually, that's pretty cool, which bar did you go to...

I don't know what we can do to reshape the cultural zeitgeist, but I'd like to see us enter a new Age, whatever it is. Like, let's say, a Second Space Age.

Hell, I'd even take another Bronze Age over what we have right now. Okay, just kidding. But seriously, I'd love to see us enter the Think Before You Speak/Text/Tweet/Blog Age.

Drive For Show, Take Lessons For Dough

Amateur golfers everywhere, heed my advice. Do NOT spend hundreds of dollars on a new driver for that extra ten or fifteen yards you'll get off the tee. Chances are you'll only see those extra yards for a very short while. This is all related to the First Use Rule: the first time you try any new golf clubs, you will see dramatic improvements instantly. But these new-found skills will quickly fade away and you'll go back to hitting the ball like you always did. This is all probably distantly related to the Placebo effect.

For the love of god, you don't need a new driver every season. Trust me on this. Instead, take the four or five hundred dollars you were going to spend and put it toward a series of lessons. A set of decent lessons will cost you half that money. You can use the remaining money to pay for balls at the driving range instead, since you'll want to practice what you've learned in your lessons. Or, if you absolutely must have a new club, take that remaining money, get creative, and find that driver you're looking for used at a golf store or online.

Too many people spend all their money on equipment, which most of the time doesn't have any lasting impact on their golf games. Sure, if you're playing with a brassie, a new driver will help your game a lot. What I'm talking about here are the guys who, every March, are stopping in the pro shop to test out new drivers.

There are also golfers who spend hours and hours at the driving range, honestly looking to improve their games, but who for various reasons refuse to take lessons. All they usually end up doing is ingraining bad habits and bad moves into their swings; in effect all their practice is making them worse!

Take lessons. I understand the desire to "do it yourself," to be able proudly boast you're "self-taught." There are professional golfers who are self-taught, but I seriously doubt they never traded tips and advice with their buddies while on-course or at the range.

Ben Hogan was renowned for how much practice he put in and figuring out the golf swing on his own. But at various crisis points in his career, he received some good advice from his fellow touring pros that helped him out in the long run. And I'll bet most of us don't have the time Ben did to spend eight hours a day at the range.

And if you still think you can figure it out on your own, consider this: Tiger Woods takes lessons. He's taken lessons ALL HIS LIFE. If Tiger doesn't feel he's "better than taking a lesson," then you shouldn't feel you are either.

Masters Week Is Upon Us

It's Masters Week, the season's first major tournament and my personal favorite. As with all sporting events, there's an unwritten law that we must try to predict the outcome.

Tiger is the favorite, naturally. He has to be.

As for Phil Mickelson, he was driving the ball better than he ever has before this year, that is until this week's Shell Houston Open where he missed the cut by a long shot. Still though, Lefty always has a shot at winning any time he tees it up. If he gets his driver working again, watch out.

I'd love to see Ernie Els finally win a green jacket. He's been my favorite player ever since David Duval dropped off the radar. The Big Easy has the best golf swing in the game right now, and he gives Sam Snead a run for the best golf swing ever. But he just hasn't played well the last few years, owing to injury and family issues.

Last but not least, you have to like Padraig Harrington's chances. He hasn't played extremely well yet this year, but he did win the last two majors played. Paddy has a chance to become the third player, after Tiger and Ben Hogan, to win three straight major championships. I'd love to see him do it.

Here's some trivia for you: who scored the first of two double eagles at the Masters?

Tiger Woods Is Too Good

As soon as that ball left his putter yesterday evening, there was no doubt Tiger was going to hole that near-sixteen footer on the 18th to win the Arnold Palmer Invitational. Never. A. Doubt.

The guy's just too good. This is his first win since June of last year, when he hobbled his way around Torrey Pines on a BROKEN LEG to earn his third U.S. Open title in an 18-hole playoff and thus claim his 14th major victory overall. All he needs now is four more majors and he'll match Nicklaus's record, one which many people believed was unbreakable.

In the middle of the round yesterday, the broadcast flashed an incredible stat: he'd made every single putt that was six feet or less from the cup.

If you're not a golfer, you might be thinking that's easy. But let me assure you it is not. That is quite a feat, considering how quick and tricky these greens are in PGA tournament golf. It takes a lot of skill, a deft touch, and good solid technique.

But what it takes most of all is mental toughness.

You have to have guts to consistently hole putts like that. Physically-speaking, Woods might be the most impressive golfer the world has ever seen. But when it comes to his his mental game, he's tougher than Nicklaus and rivals even Hogan.

I Feel Better About My Golf Game Now...

...that I've seen how bad Charles Barkley's swing is.

The Golf Channel aired its new reality show, The Haney Project, last night. Hank Haney is considered to be the one of the best professional teachers of the golf game right now, probably due in no small part to the fact that his number one student is a fella by the name of Eldrich Woods. Tiger will one day set a new record for number of Majors won; I have no doubt he will surpass Nicklaus's mark of 18, so long as he stays healthy and maintains his passion for the game.

Anyway, Hank has taken on Charles Barkley, of NBA fame, as his latest Padawan. For those of you that don't know, Barkley is quite a character, in both good and bad ways. During his pro-basketball career, he was caught at least once spitting on sideline hecklers. One of his more famous commercials was when he stared into the camera and said, quite seriously, "I am not a role model."

Maybe he's not a role model--okay, he's definitely not--but that doesn't mean the guy isn't fun to watch. He is notorious for having an atrocious golf swing. It has more planes in it than Philly International, and he has a habit of stopping the club once, twice, sometimes three times on the downswing before he strikes the golf ball.

I remember reading a story awhile back that Tiger called him the day after a pro-am finished. Tiger joked that he was about to congratulate Sir Charles on winning the tournament, but he realized he was holding the newspaper upside-down while looking at the scores. See, even Tiger Woods has a sense of humor.

I don't usually care for celebreality television shows, but I think I'm going to tune in to this one. Barkley doesn't hold anything back, so this show has a good chance of being truly "reality" TV. And even though I've only played a handful of times in the last two years, I am still fanatical about the game of golf.

Fellow Philadelphians take note too! The guy doing the voiceover work for The Haney Project is none other than Preston Elliott, of the Preston & Steve Show on 93.3 WMMR.