The Great Golf Ball Debate

The Great Golf Ball Debate
By Melanie Hauser
Writer, The GolfObserver.com
You can't open a magazine, you can't turn on a golf telecast, you can't sit down with your golfaholic friends without being subjected to endless stories on it or be asked weigh in with your own opinion on it. And technology. And the rules of golf. And . . . well, you get the picture.

But has anyone stopped to consider this:
Tiger would be kicking butt and taking names with a gutta percha or a featherie. Same goes for Vijay. And Retief. And Ernie. And Annika.

And, well, you get the picture.

It's not just about the ball. It's about players who have pushed themselves farther than technology has taken equipment. It's about the endless hours in the weight room, long runs and stretching. About balance in your diet. About a new generation of focus that's often hard to fathom.

Put persimmon drivers in their bags. Ask them to play with forged blades from the ?40s and '50s. Put a vintage putter and an old Wilson staff in their hands or Gene Sarazen's old cleek or mashie.

Guarantee you they'll still dominate.

These players, after all, are the best in the world. Give them enough time with whatever situation is in front of them and whatever club and ball they're using and they're going to make it happen.

Granted, there will be no gutta perchas pirouetting to a stop on a green, but they'll be in birdie range. And they may not turn drives into rocket launches, but, trust us, the longest hitters in the game will still be the longest.

It's all relative, you see. Put a Nike One or a Titleist Pro V1X in the hands of, say, Byron Nelson or Ben Hogan, and they'd still be doing incredible things just at 21st century driving averages.

You can't roll back technology anymore than you can take golf's majors back to a kinder, gentler time when it was, really, all about the golf. We hear the whining about...

Read more...