Instruction
Stickney: Short Game Shot Selection Protocol
For beginners and intermediate golfers, the wealth of information about golf can be overwhelming, especially when it comes to hitting short game shots — they seem to forget which one to play under certain circumstances.
It’s not their fault, however, since there are as many shots around the green as there are golf courses, but I’d like to make it a touch simpler with my Short Game Shot Selection Protocol. This is the same routine I follow whenever I have a shot in the grass around the green, and it should be yours too if you’re confused about what shot to play and when.
Whenever you miss a green, you should choose your shot from this list arranged from simplest to most complex.
Putt
Putt with Hybrid
Chip
Pitch
Flop
Safety Flop
[quote_box_center]Flop it anywhere on the green and take your two putt[/quote_box_center]
Sometimes you can choose from several of the shots listed, but it’s your job to figure out which shot works best for you game.
Make sure to follow the same decision-making process each time you will never get confused or choose the incorrect shot!
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Instruction
Clement: Laid-off or perfect fade? Across-the-line or perfect draw?
Some call the image on the left laid off, but if you are hitting a fade, this could be a perfect backswing for it! Same for across the line for a draw! Stop racking your brain with perceived mistakes and simply match backswing to shot shape!
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Instruction
The Wedge Guy: The easiest-to-learn golf basic
My golf learning began with this simple fact – if you don’t have a fundamentally sound hold on the golf club, it is practically impossible for your body to execute a fundamentally sound golf swing. I’m still a big believer that the golf swing is much easier to execute if you begin with the proper hold on the club.
As you might imagine, I come into contact with hundreds of golfers of all skill levels. And it is very rare to see a good player with a bad hold on the golf club. There are some exceptions, for sure, but they are very few and very far between, and they typically have beat so many balls with their poor grip that they’ve found a way to work around it.
The reality of biophysics is that the body moves only in certain ways – and the particulars of the way you hold the golf club can totally prevent a sound swing motion that allows the club to release properly through the impact zone. The wonderful thing is that anyone can learn how to put a fundamentally sound hold on the golf club, and you can practice it anywhere your hands are not otherwise engaged, like watching TV or just sitting and relaxing.
Whether you prefer an overlap, interlock or full-finger (not baseball!) grip on the club, the same fundamentals apply. Here are the major grip faults I see most often, in the order of the frequency:
Mis-aligned hands
By this I mean that the palms of the two hands are not parallel to each other. Too many golfers have a weak left hand and strong right, or vice versa. The easiest way to learn how to hold the club with your palms aligned properly is to grip a plain wooden ruler or yardstick. It forces the hands to align properly and shows you how that feels. If you grip and re-grip a yardstick several times, then grip a club, you’ll see that the learning curve is almost immediate.
The position of the grip in the upper/left hand
I also observe many golfers who have the butt of the grip too far into the heel pad of the upper hand (the left hand for right-handed players). It’s amazing how much easier it is to release the club through the ball if even 1/4-1/2″ of the butt is beyond the left heel pad. Try this yourself to see what I mean. Swing the club freely with just your left hand and notice the difference in its release from when you hold it at the end of the grip, versus gripping down even a half inch.
To help you really understand how this works, go to the range and hit shots with your five-iron gripped down a full inch to make the club the same length as your seven-iron. You will probably see an amazing shot shape difference, and likely not see as much distance loss as you would expect.
Too much lower (right) hand on the club
It seems like almost all golfers of 8-10 handicap or higher have the club too far into the palm of the lower hand, because that feels “good” if you are trying to control the path of the clubhead to the ball. But the golf swing is not an effort to hit at the ball – it is a swing of the club. The proper hold on the club has the grip underneath the pad at the base of the fingers. This will likely feel “weak” to you — like you cannot control the club like that. EXACTLY. You should not be trying to control the club with your lower/master hand.
Gripping too tightly
Nearly all golfers hold the club too tightly, which tenses up the forearms and prevents a proper release of the club through impact. In order for the club to move back and through properly, you must feel that the club is controlled by the last three fingers of the upper hand, and the middle two fingers of the lower hand. If you engage your thumbs and forefingers in “holding” the club, the result will almost always be a grip that is too tight. Try this for yourself. Hold the club in your upper hand only, and squeeze firmly with just the last three fingers, with the forefinger and thumb off the club entirely. You have good control, but your forearms are not tense. Then begin to squeeze down with your thumb and forefinger and observe the tensing of the entire forearm. This is the way we are made, so the key to preventing tenseness in the arms is to hold the club very lightly with the “pinchers” — the thumbs and forefingers.
So, those are what I believe are the four fundamentals of a good grip. Anyone can learn them in their home or office very quickly. There is no easier way to improve your ball striking consistency and add distance than giving more attention to the way you hold the golf club.
More from the Wedge Guy
- The Wedge Guy: Golf mastery begins with your wedge game
- The Wedge Guy: Why golf is 20 times harder than brain surgery
- The Wedge Guy: Musings on the golf ball rollback
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Instruction
Clement: Stop ripping off your swing with this drill!
Not the dreaded headcover under the armpit drill! As if your body is defective and can’t function by itself! Have you seen how incredible the human machine is with all the incredible feats of agility all kinds of athletes are accomplishing? You think your body is so defective (the good Lord is laughing his head off at you) that it needs a headcover tucked under the armpit so you can swing like T-Rex?
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Walter
Feb 4, 2015 at 4:05 pm
Thank you Tom for al your nice articles and videos.
Some are not really for my (swing) level but I still love to read but some give me a great time to/at the practice.
All the best
Tom Stickney
Jan 21, 2015 at 7:57 pm
Thx mark
mark d
Jan 21, 2015 at 5:54 pm
No matter how many times we re-read the great instruction books and see our pro, it’s wonderful to be reminded that a simple progression from putter to hybrid (with practice) to chip to pitch to flop will generally deliver predictable results most often. (Arnie to Jack: “Your worst putt will be about as good as your best pitch.” or something to that effect.)
Thanks, Tom. Wish I lived where you play. Keep ’em coming.
Tom Stickney
Jan 21, 2015 at 1:42 pm
Zra- 19
Tom Stickney
Jan 20, 2015 at 8:31 pm
Thx ss!
SS
Jan 20, 2015 at 7:51 pm
Toe down is the one everybody should be using 90% of the time. It’s the easiest, friendliest one to do to chip it like a putt.
Awesome article.
tom stickney
Jan 20, 2015 at 12:51 pm
Frendy– Promontory is awesome…come play!
Bill Cosby
Jan 20, 2015 at 11:56 am
I gave it a flop cause they said flop in that article
frendy
Jan 20, 2015 at 11:39 am
Promontory looks super nice! I like the architecture.
Tom Stickney
Jan 20, 2015 at 10:42 am
If you look at the first video you’ll see that it is
Zra
Jan 21, 2015 at 3:35 am
I see. A question: whats the loft on your hybrid in video #2? I usually texas wedge’d from that line.
Zra
Jan 20, 2015 at 8:28 am
I thought the protocol was to get the ball to the putting surface and get it rolling as soon as possible?