The Haney Project - Jay Kramer

I was going stir crazy the last couple of weeks! The last two weekends were miserable -- cold and overcast -- so I did not play any golf. This past week was beautiful so Chad Feldheimer and I snuck out of the office on Thursday afternoon to play some golf at Papago Golf Course. We shut off the blackberries and enjoyed the afternoon. We were paired with Cheryl and Bev from Calgary. Cheryl was buying a patio home at McCormick Ranch for the winter and her friend Bev came for the trip and to escape the Canadian winter. Luckily, Chad and I were walking and Cheryl and Bev rode a cart so they were generally able to keep up, especially given how long I stand over the ball.

I shot a 43 on the front 9 but tired on the back 9 and shot a 47 for a 90. I was unhappy about my golf game, but as they say (whoever "they" is) "the worst day on the golf course is better than the best day in the office." Holes 16 through 18 at Papago are similar to the the Bear Trap (Nos. 15-17) at PGA National Resort & Spa in Palm Beach Gardens, Florida, where this week's PGA Honda Classic was played. The 16th hole is a 416 yard uphill par 4, followed by a 232-yard par-3 and the 441-yard par-4 finishing hole. Chad Feldheimer played this stretch in one-over par and finished with a 78 after shooting a 40 on the front 9. I played the last 3 holes in 5 over par on my way to the back 9 score of 47.

Saturday afternoon I had an epiphany (another one) about my golf game. I was flipping channels and came to the final episode of the Hank Haney Project with Rush Limbaugh. I have not watched any of the prior episodes because I am not a Rush Limbaugh fan or a Hank Haney fan. I think a golf pro is a lot like a psychiatrist and should not talk about his clients or former clients. While Hank Haney was probably a well-known golf professional among professional golfers before Tiger Woods, he became a celebrity and has made a boat load of money due to his relationship with Tiger. When asked about Tiger, Haney should have the good sense to simply keep his mouth shut and invoke the golf teacher - student privilege. Rush is the epitome of talk radio. Loud and obnoxious. It does not matter whether the talking head is on the right or the left. In the half hour that I watched (with flashbacks), Rush was much more likeable than I thought. He truly loves golf and was a good student and hard worker (after blustering at first). But I digress. Back to my epiphany!

Even though I am not thrilled with Hank Haney's antics regarding Tiger Woods, he clearly knows his stuff. Rush is an 18 handicap golfer and his technical problems were that he was hitting a lot of balls on the toe of the club and hitting a lot of fat shots or thin shots because his swing plane was too upright. Haney worked with Rush to flatten his swing. It sounded like Hank Haney was talking directly to me because my problems are thin shots and toe shots. Upon hearing Haney's advice, I immediately headed to the Giant to work on my swing. I am not sure why flattening the swing plane solves the "toe problem", but I immediately starting hitting the ball closer to the middle of the club and one or two grooves higher on the club. My swing and swing thoughts seem to change weekly, but I think this is the one (again)!

Through golfnow.com we were able to reserve a tee time on Sunday afternoon at Moon Valley Country Club for $35! I called Digger to join the Gardener and me for the round. The sun is setting at about 6:30 at this time of year so we teed off at about 1:45 and finished at about 6:00 with some daylight to spare. Digger and his son played the first 9 holes with us. With all due respect to the original Cameo, I think that I am going to change Digger's moniker to Cameo West given his propensity for disappearing at the turn. Using my new swing, I played really well for the first 8 holes with 3 pars and 5 bogeys. Number 9 used to be one of my favorite holes at Moon Valley. It is only 383 yards, but there is water on the left that you can reach off the tee that goes all the way to the green and a stream that crosses right in front of the green. I overcompensated and pushed my drive way right. I tried to hit my second shot over the trees and hit some tree limbs and then pull-hooked my third shot into the water and made a 7 for a 44. On the back 9 I had another triple-bogey and a double-bogey but still shot a 44 for an 88. Although I had a few big hooks with my new swing plane, I was really happy with the way I played.

The Gardener was having a miserable front 9, but hit one of the great shots of all time. On the par-5 4th hole, the Gardener was in the greenside bunker in 3 shots. He skulled his explosion shot out of the bunker and the ball was heading right for the window of a house or possibly over the roof top when the ball hit a palm tree square on and bounced back onto the green about 15 feet from the pin. The Gardener made the putt for one of the great up-and-downs of all time (I made up that last part to embellish the story, but it was still an unbelievable shot!). The Gardener shot a 49 on the front 9 but somehow figured out his swing problems and played beautifully on the back 9, shooting a 39 for a total of 88.

Breaking the Barrier!

I think that I may be peaking too early for my journey to St. Andrews! I have played two rounds of golf so far in 2011 and I am playing my best golf ever. I shot an 84 at Papago Golf Course two weeks ago and an 86 at the Gold Course at the Wigwam Golf Resort last weekend. Hopefully, I have turned a corner and I can continue to shoot in the mid-80s and I just did not catch lightning in a bottle for a glimmer in time.

There are a few things that give me hope that this is not just a passing fad (I hope I do not come to regret those words in the future). First, I have played the same Titleist Pro V golf ball for 36 holes, which I am sure is a record for me. I am driving the ball straighter and longer than ever before. It is amazing how much easier it is to play when you are hitting your second shot from the fairway and do not need a driver to reach the green in regulation. Second, I was one over par through the first 7 holes at the Wigwam! (try not to do the math for the remaining 12 holes). I lost 5 shots on two holes because of two lob wedge shots that came up short and landed in the greenside bunkers. I either need to figure out how far I can hit the lob wedge and when I should use it or take it out of my bag forever. The lob wedge used to be my favorite club so I am not willing to give up on it yet.

Chad Feldheimer and I played Papago Golf Course. After my previous experience playing from the black tees, we moved up and played the blue tees. Papago is still a very good test of golf from the blue tees. It is 6,771 yards with a course rating of 72.0 and a slope rating of 125. Chad started out birdie-birdie and it looked like this might be the round that he shoots par or better and loses his "Chad Feldheimer" moniker. But he triple-bogeyed a short par-4 hitting a short iron into the greenside bunker and taking two strokes to get out of the bunker. He shot a 79, but hit the ball much better than his score indicated. I shot an 84 with two double-bogeys and 8 pars. I had a number of makeable birdie putts but did not hole any of them.

Last weekend The Gardener and I played the Gold Course at the Wigwam Golf Resort. We played from the Championship tees that are 6,830 yards with a course rating of 72.3 and a slope rating of 130. In the summer when the temperature is higher and the ground is harder and the ball flies and rolls further, we may try to play the “Monster” tees, which are 7,430 yards with course rating of 74.5 and a slope rating of 135. The Gardener had an off-day so I will not announce his score to my many followers. On the other hand, I was keeping the ball in play and hitting it pretty straight. I was one over par through 7 holes. On the par-4 eighth hole I was in jail and had to chip out into the middle of the fairway. I had 60 yards to the green and was thinking about making a bogey and moving on to the next tee. Against my better judgment, I pulled out my lob wedge and dunked the ball into the greenside bunker and made a 7 and shot a 41 on the front 9. I birdied the par-5 tenth hole and then proceeded to shoot 10 over par on the next eight holes for a 45 on the back 9 and an 86 total.

What Were We Thinking!

I have been hiking with SO and friends almost weekly and walking the golf course. I talked my friend the Gardener into walking the golf course and he bought a pull cart for his clubs. Chad Feldheimer, the young gun, refuses to walk. But the benefit for me is that I put my clubs on Chad's cart and I walk without having to carry my clubs. It is almost like having a caddy!

A few weeks ago, the Gardener and I walked Papago Golf Course, which is Phoenix's best municipal golf course. We usually play from the blue tees, which are 6,800 yards, but for some reason we started playing from the black tees, which are over 7,300 yards and once we realized what we were doing, it was too late so we stayed the course (no pun intended). From the black tees, Papago is a real man's test of golf. There are six par-4s over 440 yards. The par-5s average about 550 yards and three of the par-3s are over 235 yards! The course rating is 75.0 and the slope rating is 130.

We teed off on Sunday afternoon at about noon and finished in less than 4 hours walking. One single playing in a golf cart played through and otherwise we did not run into anyone else on the course or have anyone coming up from behind. The weather was absolutely perfect -- about 75 degrees with sunny skies and no wind. Papago used to be the busiest municipal golf course in Phoenix -- about 100,000 rounds per year! Golfers would park in the parking lot at 4 a.m. in the morning on the weekends in order to get a weekend tee time. The course got so much play that it fell into disrepair. In the mid-2000s the City of Phoenix and the Arizona Golf Foundation (an affiliate of the Arizona Golf Association) jointly undertook renovation of the golf course to restore it to its original luster. The Foundation did a great job on the golf course renovations but ran out of money before it could complete the new clubhouse (after razing the old clubhouse). A double-wide trailer stands as the clubhouse until there is enough money in the City budget to build the new clubhouse. However, in order to pay for the renovations, the City and the operator raised the in-season daily fee rate to $50 plus a cart fee, which out-priced a lot of the muni-golfers. Although Papago is a good as, if not better than, most of the semi-private and resort courses, golfers that are paying $65+ per round are generally not willing to pay that amount for a municipal course unless it is Bethpage Black or Torrey Pines.

Papago is a really well-designed walking course. You walk off of the green and the next tee box is usually within 20 to 30 yards -- unless you are playing from the black tees. We dropped our golf bags at the blue or white tee boxes and then started looking for the black tees. In some cases we needed binoculars to find the black tees. We then trudged back 50 to 90 yards from the front tees to our tee box. Sometimes the beginning of the fairway looked so far away I thought there was no way to reach the fairway, let alone reach the green in regulation. By the time that we got to the 18th hole, which is 464 yards long and about 50 yards back from the white tees, we were dragging and just trying to get to the clubhouse (or double-wide trailer) without too much damage. The Gardener shot an 87 and I shot an 88. With a 75.0 course rating and a 130 slope rating, my differential was 11.3, which is one of my best rounds of the year.

Prelude to the "World Of"

In preparation for "World Of" XXVII, I played golf this weekend with Chad Feldheimer. Usually, Chad waits until I hit my drive on the 18th hole to point out that I have been misaligned the entire round, or my ball is too far back in my stance or that my posture is bad! Today, I actually received a "sort of" playing lesson from Chad in exchange for all of the free legal advice I have been providing to him. Chad is buying a new house. Normally, in Arizona attorneys do not get involved in residential purchases and the seller and buyer just sign the broker's standard form purchase agreement, which is sacrosanct and any changes to the form are looked upon with much disdain. Of course, Chad is using his own purchase agreement and has been in negotiations with the seller for over a month. He was recently wringing his hands as to whether a communication by e-mail was enforceable because the purchase agreement requires fax notices. It is a sign of how bad the Phoenix real estate market is doing that the seller is willing to put up with Chad!

We played at Papago Golf Course. It is one of most well-known courses in Phoenix and I have been raving about the renovation to Chad since I played a few weeks ago. Chad had never played the course and I think he was impressed with the layout. Overseeding season is coming up in Phoenix and the course superintendent at Papago has begun the process by reducing water on the fairways so they were a little browner than a few weeks ago. The course was still in good shape and the layout is really great. The greens need a lot of work and are slow and bumpy. According to the bag boy, the USGA is planning on having some qualifying tournaments at Papago. The course will have to address the green issue before then. Chad was hitting the ball from tee to green as well as I have ever seen him play, but he was really frustrated with the greens. He shot a 78 with a few three-putts in the mix.

After my last few outings, I was not happy with my game. Once again, I tinkered a little bit with my grip and swing plane to try to increase my distance and hit the ball more solidly. I strengthened my grip and held my hands lower at address. Oh, as Chad pointed out, I also used my "big boy" tees which are higher than the old standard tees. My ball flight was much straighter with even a hint of a draw and the ball seemed to bore through the air rather than fly lazily and drop straight down. Even Chad grudgingly complimented me on my ball flight.

I started off par-par and had one double-bogey and one more par on the front 9 for a 43. I was really happy with the way I played, but this was a familiar routine and I have been falling apart on the back 9 recently. I started the back 9 par-par-bogey-par-bogey and was 3 under bogey through the first 5 holes and dreaming about a mid-80s score before the "World Of". I limped home in 6 over bogey for the last 4 holes for a 44 and an 87 total. I was happy with my round, but of course I should have done better! I think that I am ready for my annual golf trip.

On Monday morning, the first weather reports from Panama City, Florida for the "World Of" began to circulate. There had been a lot of rain in the southeast over the weekend, but the weather report was clearing skies during the week and by the following Saturday clear skies with almost no chance of rain and high temperatures in the high-70s and lows in the 60s. We will be recording the Ryder Cup matches for the evening entertainment and the Alabama-Florida football game has been moved to Saturday night for national television so the stars are aligning!