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Published July 05, 2008 11:47 pm - Several years ago, going through what I thought were putting problems, though I was putting like Loren Roberts compared to how I’m putting now, I asked Kelsey Cline for a tip. “I can’t make anything,” I said. How to become the worst putter on Earth Commentary Clay Horning The Norman Transcript Several years ago, going through what I thought were putting problems, though I was putting like Loren Roberts compared to how I’m putting now, I asked Kelsey Cline for a tip.
“I can’t make anything,” I said. It’s funny, because it wasn’t too long after that Cline went to the long putter. But that day, still with the short stick, he told me to putt through the ball in direct proportion to my backswing. If it’s a 10-footer, your stroke is this long. If it’s a 30-footer, this long, and so on. It was an epiphany. All of a sudden, it didn’t matter how long the putt or how big the break. I just got my line, took a few practice swings to figure the length of the stroke and concentrated on something about a foot in front of the ball. When I wasn’t making 40-footers, I was tapping in for par. But that was a long time ago. My downfalll began one summer when I came back from another eight-month sabbatical from golf — you know, football season, basketball season and all the spring sports that keep us so busy — and, having lost my feel for speed, began banging everything 12 feet past the hole. Ever since, I’ve been the worst putter on Earth. If that’s an exaggeration, I’m easily in the top 10. That’s the story of how I arrived at the scorers table today to turn in an 82 after three-putting six times and four-putting once. After 36 holes, I’m 22 over par. Give me two putts on all my three- and four-putts and I’m 9-over par. No, not very good, but no longer an embarrassment to the First Flight. After all of that, my only column idea is this one. I walked around and asked for putting tips. I told everybody to pretend it wasn’t me who needed the help, because not everybody needs to lie down on the couch at $150 an hour. “You need to relax,” said Bobby Florer, Westwood assistant pro. “It’s not life and death.” I’m still trying to figure out the point he was trying to make. “There’s two things in putting: distance and direction,” Westwood head pro David Lisle said. “I ask people what’s more important and they inevitably say direction, but it’s distance.” He’s right about that, but I’m not sure what that does for me from two feet, like what I might need is Cheech Marin telling me to move the change back and forth in my pocket. 
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