A "generational talent"
Self delusion is bad. Trying to convince others of your delusion is worse.
When I was 15, I had a choice. I played hockey, golf and squash “competitively,” having been narrowed down to three activities in the previous 7 years from baseball, tennis, badminton, lacrosse, swimming, piano, violin, french, basketball, volleyball, cross country, track, photography, soccer and a very very very brief stint with gymnastics. The choice was “which sport to focus on and try to play in college.” These days, with kids focusing at 9 and 10, some argue it’s too late to focus at 15. Perhaps. But I like Ben and Andrew’s chances to play in college better than a lot of 9 and 10 year old’s that were grinding out golf and hockey while my boys were playing lacrosse, piano, soccer, squash and flag football. We will see.
As you might imagine, growing up in Canada, there was “hockey” and your other winter sport. The reality was, I was “fine” and I was big, but I wasn’t that good relative to my peers. I got cut from the AAA team on day 1 of tryouts and I joined the 9,999 out of 10,000 players that would become beer league players. And then there were two.
In golf, in the summer in Calgary, it is light from 6 am - 10 pm. As a 12 year old, my dad would drop me off at the golf course July 1 when school was finished at 6 am before work, and would play 36 holes, eat 6 hot dogs, drink 10 cokes, hit hundreds of balls, and he would pick me up at 8 pm. Over 2 summers, I played 200 rounds and hit more golf balls than you can imagine, but I didn’t have a coach or a mentor so I developed a very “squash” like swing. It worked, but not all the time so that while I improved from a 33 handicap to a 4 the first summer, I didn’t play competitively and my “4” handicap no doubt included taking putts from 3’ and hitting two mulligans a round. More on this topic later but suffice to say, I was not a “4” and college golf would never be an option. And then there was one. Squash.
I told my dad that I was going to make the junior national team. My dad smiled at said “That’s nice… good luck.” At the time, I was probably the #35 kid in the country as an under 16 and to make the team, I would need to be top 4. It was a lot of wood to chop.
I went about it like a job (although I could have been better on my nutrition) and trained 3 hours a day, 6 days a week for 4 years. I travelled to Australia for 6 weeks as a 16 year old to train and played the World Junior Championships in New Zealand, managing to get through the qualifying rounds only to get smoked in the first round by a kid that was top 16 in the world. But for two more years, I worked and came 2nd at the Canadian Open, 4th at Nationals and ultimately, played at the World Junior Championships as a member of Team Canada in Cairo. Mission accomplished. I continued to improve through university, having my best year as a 22 year old and ultimately went on to play for the United States, representing them at Pan American games in 1999 and World Championships in 2000 before “retiring” to focus on my oil and gas career. I knew I could only be really good at one thing, and my career was my next world championships. It was an easy decision.
I still play hockey but the true gift that came out of years of skating at -20 C with my friends for 3 hours everyday after school on the outdoor community rink was that I coached my boys for 7 years at a time when I was generally not present in mind for the rest of the time. I credit it for much of the relationship I had with my sons and the foundation for the one I have with them now. Thank you hockey.
For squash, I stayed away from drugs, alcohol, girls, I learned to work impossibly hard, have your ego crushed and rebuilt by your performance, and I travelled the world. It is the apolitical meritocrat in me. It definitely had some deficiencies as an approach in the world world, but it showed me what you could accomplish with effort and focus and absolutely powered whatever small success I had in my career.
Which brings me back to golf. Ah, golf! The world’s hardest sport/skill/activity. You are always one swing away from disaster (think Jean van de Velde and Mito Pereira) and one swing thought away from becoming the golfer you always knew you could be: a generational talent, the likes of which the world has never seen. And yet…. it’s an illusion and one that conveniently can be offset by the most unique part of golf- you can cheat yourself and get away with it.
How many people have scooped up a 2’ putt on a big hill they didn’t really want to make, or putt it, miss it and take it again only to make it and say “I’m counting that one.” This is one of my favorite clips on the internet.
There are a lot of ways to be self delusional in golf. Never play for money, tell people you shoot 78 when really it’s an 87 full of taken putts and mulligans and 1 in 20 times, you actually shoot 78, which validates it all in your mind. Ironically, the people you play with either a) know or b) also shoot 87/78 and are happy to let the transgression slide.
But the worst type of golfer is the one that says they are a “great” golfer and wants to convince you that they are, too. They cheat in very subtle ways. They mark and remark their ball 4 times while everyone else putts so that their putt starts 6” closer to the hole and on a better line within 4’. They call every divot an animal hole and take a drop. Casual water is over their feet in every awkward lie. Their ball is NEVER buried in the sand and it’s the quickest you have ever seen them get to their ball. You witness them take 5 practice swings from the native when they never practice in the fairway and grass is flying all over the place as they improve the lie around the ball. And then, there is the “hole in the pocket… I found it!” guy that lags 20 yards behind the playing partners and always finds the ball as everyone else gives up. I’ve played with many of these golfers over the years. I never play they for money because it would force me to call them on it, and I broadly avoid ever playing with them again. That’s easy, I’m an adult. It’s much more difficult for a kid. Which brings me to Ben.
He was paired with a random 40 year old man the other day. He called himself “a generational talent” as an athlete who just didn’t get an opportunity after high school to play at the highest levels but boy, could he play golf, he said. He would say things after Ben made a 10’ birdie putt “I would have made that with my eyes closed.” He would duff a chip, replace it, re-hit it saying it was a practice swing and then say “nice par, goof ball” when the actual score was a 6. But worst of all, every ball in the native was “found.” Never a lost ball, no matter how far out of bounds it looked. “Oh, it must have hit a tree.” I have a solution.
It’s uncomfortable to call someone a cheater. It creates conflict and a “I said, you said” that really isn’t solvable. Golf always comes down to what the player says. But if you have a person in your usual crew that has a “hole in their pocket” and miraculously finds every ball, here’s what you do. When everyone declares their ball on the first hole “I’m playing a Bridgestone 4 with a red dot,” have everyone in the foursome add their own mark. BRW1, blue dot, purple line. Anything that someone without a bag of markers and a serious intent to forge can’t replicate. If that ball doesn’t finish the hole, you got a problem. Think of it as rules that up the stakes and therefore will prevent most people from finding every ball they lose.
It took me until I was 28 to realize that there is a difference between a “0” handicap and a 0. I started counting everything and became the latter. It’s the first lesson I taught Ben as a 14 year old aspiring golfer. Nobody cares it’s your birthday or that you shot 76 when they know you shot 82. But a real score… that’s respect, no matter how many strokes it takes.