It has been an eventful week in the world of golf. The USGA and the R&A announced that they are looking at ways to limited how far the golf ball will go. Naturally, they focused on the ball. The ball is going further, no doubt about that, but what they have failed to recognise that the athletes who play golf are fitter than they have ever been. Coaching is better and the equipment is better. The drivers have a larger sweet spot, the heads are larger and more forgiving , shafts are lighter therefore the club can be swung faster. The game of golf is now all about speed. With speed comes power and with that power the ability to propel the golf ball increases as well. Read a great series of tweets from John Wood, a former caddie and former PGA player Lanny Wadkins. Their suggestions made so much sense. Wood said to reduce the size of the sweet spot ” from a silver dollar to a dime” making it more challenging to hit. If you want to keep hitting it that far,you can, but there’s a huge risk now to swing that hard. Go back to making the driver the hardest club in the bag to hit. Wadkins said to limit how light the shaft can be. Much like what they did in NASCAR by putting weights in the car so that it does not go to fast. Pretty simple , but effective ideas. The governing bodies of golf have never been known for there forward and innovative thinking. Wadkins also said that if they do change the ball, make it spin more so it is more challenging to control.
In the hockey world, players are looking at those in charge who lead teams and organisations and how they manage their self interests. Whether we like to admit it every decision has a certain amount of self interest. These are the people in charge of moving the game forward but with minimal impact on their self interests. The Quebec Major Junior Hockey League is seriously considering banning fighting from their game. Let’s be clear here, they are getting pressure from the provincial government to do so. So it is in their best self interest to do it or the government would. Politicians in hockey is not a good thing. Some leagues, like the Ontario Hockey League have capped fighting, Ie. three fights two game suspension, and the more fights a player has the more suspension time they receive. Fighting has gone down for sure and IMO in three years it will be out of the game. The next question is how will the game be officiated and how the ” rats” in the game will be managed.
Speaking of self interests has anyone read anything on the World Junior Team 2018 investigation? Things have gotten very quiet, which leads me to believe that things are status quo. Even at the recent GM meetings not one reporter asked that question to Commissioner Bettman. The things that make you go Hmmmmmmmmm.
Until next time.
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