CPG Mailbag - May 2019

It's mailbag time.  You guys know the rules, email your questions to fore@clubproguy.com and I will answer the best ones.  As always, I will keep your identity confidential.  Here we go.

Donald writes:

My member/member partner (I'll call him "Gary") boasts a 5 index but shoots a million in every club sponsored tournament. Year in and year out I know going in that we have no chance to compete. This will be our 12th year together and I desperately want to break up with him but don't know how. Help!

I've got no time for vanity handicaps. They are at the bottom of the golfing food chain in my opinion.

This is a serious problem you are facing and luckily you came to the right place. The first thing you need to do is immediately tell Gary that something has come up and you are unable to play this year. It doesn't matter what it is, it could be anything. Tell him your oldest adult daughter just reached a new level in Scientology and you have to attend some sort of ceremony to mark the occasion. The weirder it is, the more believable it will be. Due to your apparent conflict, Gary will be scrambling to find a new partner. Don't worry, this is all part of the plan. Once he has cemented his new partnership and there's no turning back, announce that your daughter has been ex-communicated by the church for heavy recreational drug use and the ceremony is off. But alas, Gary has already committed to another partner, which means you are now free to find a new partner. So far so good.

Now comes the hard part, you MUST win your flight with your new partner. If you do, you are well within your rights to tell Gary that as champions, you are obligated to defend your title next year. I hope you're starting to see where this is going. After two years apart, the bonds will have been broken and you and Gary will be free to go your separate ways.

Clay writes:

CPG, I recently paid over $600 for a new driver and used it for the first time last week in one of those dopey corporate 4-man scrambles. My best client's teenage son asked me midway through the round if he could hit it.  Normally I wouldn't mind but I noticed he had visible ball scuff marks ON TOP of his driver head.  I politely told him no.  Did I do the right thing?

Listen, I understand the conundrum you were in. Making the situation even worse, the kid was your best client's son and you had to make a split second decision. Having said that, you royally screwed up here. Nobody likes *that guy* who thinks he's too good to share his equipment. That's the type of stuff 12 year olds pull. Let's rewind and assume for a moment that you decided not to be a total prick and allowed the kid to hit your driver, one of two scenarios would have played out.  Let's go through them.

Scenario #1 - The kid whales at it, hits a predictable 40 yard slice, comments how pure it feels and hands it back to you. The probability of the situation playing out exactly like this is near 99.9%. The kid's happy, the dad (who happens to be your best client) is happy, your scramble team's 4-under 68 gets you a T-2 finish in "K" flight and you go home with a pleather valuables pouch and an American Family Insurance koozie.  All's well that ends well.

Scenario #2 - The kid takes a mighty lash and pops it straight up in the air and scuffs the top of your club head.

Listen, it would suck, I'm not denying that. But let's take a closer look. If the kid damaged the club, you have the benefit of the father being your best client. If he has any decency or common sense whatsoever, he immediately insists to have the club repaired or purchases you a new one. In addition to that, he feels some deep seeded guilt about it and remembers the situation the next time he is awarding purchase orders at work. In other words...he owes you. And the reward could potentially be way more beneficial than the cost to repair the scuff mark.

Unfortunately, you made the wrong choice and is all your soon to be ex-client and his family were asking around the dinner table that night is what kind of douchebag doesn't let a kid take a harmless swing with a golf club.

Alfonso writes:

Following your lead, I always take a dump in the ladies locker room because it never gets used and I enjoy the privacy. However, last Thursday two women came in as I was in the stall enjoying an episode of SportsCenter on my Iphone. They changed clothes, used the stalls very near me, and all the while had a lengthy discussion about who was more 'bangable', Jon Snow or Jaime Lannister. I was completely frozen. I waited them out and am fairly confident they never knew I was there. Did I make the right call?

A classic scenario. One I've faced many times. Here's the deal. In that situation you have three courses of action but truth be told, only two of them are realistic. You either announce that you are occupying a stall THE INSTANT that you hear women entering, or you gut it out in stone cold silence and pray that they don't see your size 13 Skechers and accompanying white tube socks under the stall door. Immediately announcing your presence is slightly embarrassing to be sure, but at least you're cutting your losses early. You can easily say that the men's locker room was closed or you are a club guest who got disoriented about which locker room was which. No harm, no foul.  

Now, going stealth (as you chose to do) is a super high risk, super high reward play that's not for the faint of heart. If you're able to pull it off, you eliminate any embarrassment whatsoever. However, if you somehow get discovered after these ladies have changed clothes and used the toilet right next to you, the embarrassment could be the least of your worries. In this day and age, the police could get involved.  The good news is that depending how the stall doors are configured, your chances of getting caught are low, but proceed with extreme caution if choosing to go this route. 

The third option, and I hesitate to even call this an option, is to panic and announce your presence several minutes after the women enter but before they exit the locker room. This typically happens involuntarily when guys become overcome with guilt and panic.  They freeze and are unable to announce their presence at the outset and then can't gut it out to the end, so they crack under the pressure at the worst possible moment. These guys end up getting the worst of all worlds.....They A) get caught, B) get branded as a perverted voyeur and last but not least, C) become known as a gutless wimp for surrendering for no reason. All in one attempted bowel movement.

At the end of the day, fortune favors the bold.  You made the right call.

Trevor writes:

I'm a legit 2 handicap and take my game seriously. Our head pro is a decent enough guy but can't play his way out of a wet paper bag. How he ever passed the PAT is a complete mystery. Anyway, every time I'm trying to practice he comes over, folds his arms and watches me hit balls like he's Claude Harmon. Then he'll make some ridiculous comment like "let gravity be your friend".  This guy is killing me! What should I do?

This is a problem as old as golf itself. The dirty little secret in our industry that nobody wants to talk about is that the vast majority of club pros are not very good at golf. Shocked? Don't be, because it's the truth. For every Ryan Vermeer out there, there's a thousand club professionals that are terrified the members are going to find out that they can't break 85 under tournament conditions.

The problem is that people are so often fooled by appearances. You see a clean cut guy behind the counter decked out from head to toe in the latest Travis Mathew gear and you just assume the guy is a baller. You think to yourself......this guy probably had his web.com status locked up but sadly got his girlfriend pregnant and was forced to stay close to home. Um, think again. The reality is that his dream of getting his mortgage license has been put on hold for the last eight years because he hasn't found the gumption to finish his Associates Degree. 

Thanks to Youtube, your pro knows enough about the golf swing to be dangerous. Next time he offers some sage advice I would hand him the club and ask him to demonstrate it so you can get a fuller understanding.  That should allow you to hit balls in peace.