Brian Manzella
Administrator
I remember I said to myself eight years ago that I would never play in another golf tournament unless I was 100% ready to.
That 100% requires quite a lot.
It would require me to stop being a guinea pig fro my golf swing research. It would require me to play at least 72 holes a week, plus practice another 10 hours or so. I need to lose 50 pounds, get a good sports psychologist, and play often for enough cash to make me nervous.
I don't have time for any of that.
So....
Eight years went by.
There were hurricanes, floods, and FEMA. There was crooked contractors, and crooked fingers. There was a 98% torn left rotator cuff, and and 100% torn right Achilles. There was a few dozen "Tour Stops" and Golf Schools. There was a few sets of clubs, a couple dozen wedges, 127 swing changes, and at least three dozen pairs of golf shoes.
I looked up at the clock it said 48 years.
Whoa.
For a guy who is a competitor of the highest magnitude, not competing at the sport he spends so much time around is kinda like putting me in a Ice Cream parlor and telling me to order a Diet Coke and nothing else—and watch everybody else eat.
So, since I had a odd free Monday off, and the one-day tournament was to be held on a course I played every year from 1984-1991 in the old Louisiana Open, and my old caddy/buddy Todd Nunez lived near the course—I pulled the trigger and sent in my entry fee.
The last tournament I played in Louisiana was in 1996.
My game is sorta-kinda ok-ish these days. I usually shoot about 73-78 at English Turn, with about 3 or 4 birdies, and a couple of doubles.
But, I wanted to play.
So I did.
Todd and his son Jared, who I started in this game, played a practice round with me. I shot 77, doubling the last hole, for my usual second double of the round.
I didn't quote know what to expect when the gun went off and they said, "Playing out of English Turn, Brian Manzella."
It was a really solid, very steered, mini-fade drive down the right side of the fairway. I was sorta surprised it was so good.
The rest of the round was just like every other round I ever played in my life. In fact, my wife, who has been with me for almost 10 years now, and only a handful of tunamints, said "that's what always happens."
Go figure.
I'll give you the highlights. +1 through 5, only bogey was from 115 with a wedge and a flyer lie.
The 6th hole at Les Vieux Chenes is a goofy, drivable par-4. I could just hit my little cut and have a 30 yard pitch shot if I carried it 245 over the hazard.
One little problem.
I was avoiding pitching the ball. Or chipping. Or lobbing. Too nervous for any of that.
Really.
As it was, I was avoiding yipping putts by watching the putter head during the whole stroke. Which worked ONLY on putts of a shortish length. Longer than that, I yipped half of them.
I really wasn't wired for this golf thing you see. I am a footballer, basketballer, frisbee in the gulf water beach diver, out hustle-ya kinda dude.
That's half how I wound up with this website and career.
None of that helps a lick with this stationary ball thingy.
So, I used my 20° hybrid to run the ball over hills big enough to bury a VW in, through 19 strains of common and uncommon Bermuda, and even from 42 yards on a par-5 after two great, albeit wasted shots.
So, I didn't go for the green on #6, but hit that little 20° thing right where I was looking. But three or four yards too short to not be blocked out a few pin oaks.
Double. +3
Three putt number one on #7 from 25 feet. +4.
Turned at 40.
I hit one bad shot, my second at #9, which I parred. Lucky I hit it decent, huh?
Missed 6 foot birdie at #10. Hit a perfectly decent shot from 200 out to #11, but the ball rolled toward the hazard, which is bordered by 1000 Fred Flintstone rocks. My ball was so close to two of them, I couldn't putt it a foot from there.
So there I was, on my knees with a 9-iron, chopping it toward the hole that was only 30 feet away with nothing by closely mown grass in the way.
+5 through 11.
On #12 I hit it in the right bunker, which had enough sand in it to film Ishtar 2, but the bunker wasn't as big as my living room. You have never seen such a lie.
+6 though 12.
I told Todd, "Man, lets just play these next six even and go eat lunch."
Good up and down—with the hybrid—on 13, then a stiff 7-iron and a tap in birdie at #14 puts me 10 out of the lead.
I hit the two aforementioned great shots to 42 yards at the par-5 15th, only to find out that Todd Hamilton was playing on quite a different surface at Royal Troon. Lousy rotten stickin' par.
Missed another 6-foot birdie at 16, and had a two putt par on 17.
In the practice round, I had hit a big drive on the 472 yard, par-4 18th hole, only to fat a six-iron and make 6. Determined to right that wrong, I hit a great drive to nearly the same spot. Easy cut 4-iron to a back center pin.
I hit it on the 7th groove.
That's a little high on the face in case you didn't know.
So, I hit the green, but had 40 feet left up the hill. One yip and one pull later, and I shoot Bruce Smith.
If you think about it, two 3-putts, the double on a hole I could par left handed, and hitting every non-bunker short game shot with a friggin' hybrid, 78 ain't terrible.
But, I learned a lot, it was fun to have my heart beat fast, and I have some fixable things to work on.
My student Derek Sanders won with a 66, so I didn't pitch a shut out.
A couple of answers to questions you might have...
Why does guy who can hit pitches as well as I can, and chip pretty good too, use a hybrid to basically handicap himself by a couple of shots at least?
78.
I'll try to play better next go 'round.
That 100% requires quite a lot.
It would require me to stop being a guinea pig fro my golf swing research. It would require me to play at least 72 holes a week, plus practice another 10 hours or so. I need to lose 50 pounds, get a good sports psychologist, and play often for enough cash to make me nervous.
I don't have time for any of that.
So....
Eight years went by.
There were hurricanes, floods, and FEMA. There was crooked contractors, and crooked fingers. There was a 98% torn left rotator cuff, and and 100% torn right Achilles. There was a few dozen "Tour Stops" and Golf Schools. There was a few sets of clubs, a couple dozen wedges, 127 swing changes, and at least three dozen pairs of golf shoes.
I looked up at the clock it said 48 years.
Whoa.
For a guy who is a competitor of the highest magnitude, not competing at the sport he spends so much time around is kinda like putting me in a Ice Cream parlor and telling me to order a Diet Coke and nothing else—and watch everybody else eat.
So, since I had a odd free Monday off, and the one-day tournament was to be held on a course I played every year from 1984-1991 in the old Louisiana Open, and my old caddy/buddy Todd Nunez lived near the course—I pulled the trigger and sent in my entry fee.
The last tournament I played in Louisiana was in 1996.
My game is sorta-kinda ok-ish these days. I usually shoot about 73-78 at English Turn, with about 3 or 4 birdies, and a couple of doubles.
But, I wanted to play.
So I did.
Todd and his son Jared, who I started in this game, played a practice round with me. I shot 77, doubling the last hole, for my usual second double of the round.
I didn't quote know what to expect when the gun went off and they said, "Playing out of English Turn, Brian Manzella."
It was a really solid, very steered, mini-fade drive down the right side of the fairway. I was sorta surprised it was so good.
The rest of the round was just like every other round I ever played in my life. In fact, my wife, who has been with me for almost 10 years now, and only a handful of tunamints, said "that's what always happens."
Go figure.
I'll give you the highlights. +1 through 5, only bogey was from 115 with a wedge and a flyer lie.
The 6th hole at Les Vieux Chenes is a goofy, drivable par-4. I could just hit my little cut and have a 30 yard pitch shot if I carried it 245 over the hazard.
One little problem.
I was avoiding pitching the ball. Or chipping. Or lobbing. Too nervous for any of that.
Really.
As it was, I was avoiding yipping putts by watching the putter head during the whole stroke. Which worked ONLY on putts of a shortish length. Longer than that, I yipped half of them.
I really wasn't wired for this golf thing you see. I am a footballer, basketballer, frisbee in the gulf water beach diver, out hustle-ya kinda dude.
That's half how I wound up with this website and career.
None of that helps a lick with this stationary ball thingy.
So, I used my 20° hybrid to run the ball over hills big enough to bury a VW in, through 19 strains of common and uncommon Bermuda, and even from 42 yards on a par-5 after two great, albeit wasted shots.
So, I didn't go for the green on #6, but hit that little 20° thing right where I was looking. But three or four yards too short to not be blocked out a few pin oaks.
Double. +3
Three putt number one on #7 from 25 feet. +4.
Turned at 40.
I hit one bad shot, my second at #9, which I parred. Lucky I hit it decent, huh?
Missed 6 foot birdie at #10. Hit a perfectly decent shot from 200 out to #11, but the ball rolled toward the hazard, which is bordered by 1000 Fred Flintstone rocks. My ball was so close to two of them, I couldn't putt it a foot from there.
So there I was, on my knees with a 9-iron, chopping it toward the hole that was only 30 feet away with nothing by closely mown grass in the way.
+5 through 11.
On #12 I hit it in the right bunker, which had enough sand in it to film Ishtar 2, but the bunker wasn't as big as my living room. You have never seen such a lie.
+6 though 12.
I told Todd, "Man, lets just play these next six even and go eat lunch."
Good up and down—with the hybrid—on 13, then a stiff 7-iron and a tap in birdie at #14 puts me 10 out of the lead.
I hit the two aforementioned great shots to 42 yards at the par-5 15th, only to find out that Todd Hamilton was playing on quite a different surface at Royal Troon. Lousy rotten stickin' par.
Missed another 6-foot birdie at 16, and had a two putt par on 17.
In the practice round, I had hit a big drive on the 472 yard, par-4 18th hole, only to fat a six-iron and make 6. Determined to right that wrong, I hit a great drive to nearly the same spot. Easy cut 4-iron to a back center pin.
I hit it on the 7th groove.
That's a little high on the face in case you didn't know.
So, I hit the green, but had 40 feet left up the hill. One yip and one pull later, and I shoot Bruce Smith.
If you think about it, two 3-putts, the double on a hole I could par left handed, and hitting every non-bunker short game shot with a friggin' hybrid, 78 ain't terrible.
But, I learned a lot, it was fun to have my heart beat fast, and I have some fixable things to work on.
My student Derek Sanders won with a 66, so I didn't pitch a shut out.
A couple of answers to questions you might have...
Why does guy who can hit pitches as well as I can, and chip pretty good too, use a hybrid to basically handicap himself by a couple of shots at least?
I didn't like the way I pitched it the last couple of days, and my nerves are full of mothballs.
Why does guy who has a nice solid, smooth putting stroke have to resort to looking at the putter, and yipping long putts because of it?
My eyes dance every which-a-way when I am nervous, and it is a mini-cure.
You see folks, I think that I will teach better because I am going to play some competitive golf again. There are loads of big-gun teachers who play more than I do who haven't posted a score since Buck was a calf. I didn't like being one of 'em.
78.
I'll try to play better next go 'round.
