George Costanza
A Friendly Liberal
Should they ban the long putter?
There are two kinds of long putters - the belly putter and the long plutter. The belly putter sits into the belly with both hands on the shaft. The long putter anchors on the chest with only one hand on the shaft. (Spare me the gross comments here, ok?)
As you probably know, the Royal & Ancients and the USGA are both "considering" the legality of the long putter and whether or not to ban it. There is no express rule of golf that prohibits it. The argument against it is that it "violates the spirit" of golf by anchoring the shaft to the body. Long putters have been around for many, many decades. It is the recent emergence of the long putter on the professional tour and, especially, the appearance of pros who use a long putter, holding up trophies at the end of tournaments (Ernie Els only yesterday), that has sparked the controversy.
I got the yips with a regular putter and had to go to the long putter to overcome that issue. The long putter works very well for me. Most guys you see using the long putter are using it because they simply cannot use a regular putter - it isn't just that they decided to switch. Personally, I cringe a bit when I use it because I do think it "violates the spirit of the game," even though there is no express rule against it. But, if I couldn't use it, it would be Golf Over for me, so, for that reason, I am in favor of keeping it.
What do you think - and why?
Edit Note: Here is a pretty good discussion of the issue:
http://espn.go.com/golf/britishopen...onship-2012-officials-debate-use-long-putters
There are two kinds of long putters - the belly putter and the long plutter. The belly putter sits into the belly with both hands on the shaft. The long putter anchors on the chest with only one hand on the shaft. (Spare me the gross comments here, ok?)
As you probably know, the Royal & Ancients and the USGA are both "considering" the legality of the long putter and whether or not to ban it. There is no express rule of golf that prohibits it. The argument against it is that it "violates the spirit" of golf by anchoring the shaft to the body. Long putters have been around for many, many decades. It is the recent emergence of the long putter on the professional tour and, especially, the appearance of pros who use a long putter, holding up trophies at the end of tournaments (Ernie Els only yesterday), that has sparked the controversy.
I got the yips with a regular putter and had to go to the long putter to overcome that issue. The long putter works very well for me. Most guys you see using the long putter are using it because they simply cannot use a regular putter - it isn't just that they decided to switch. Personally, I cringe a bit when I use it because I do think it "violates the spirit of the game," even though there is no express rule against it. But, if I couldn't use it, it would be Golf Over for me, so, for that reason, I am in favor of keeping it.
What do you think - and why?
Edit Note: Here is a pretty good discussion of the issue:
http://espn.go.com/golf/britishopen...onship-2012-officials-debate-use-long-putters
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