Zach Johnson, Golf and God

Editor’s note: The following is an excerpt from Whiffling Straits, a golf blog authored by Mike Zimmerman. Read the entire post here.

By Mike Zimmerman
Special to ARMCHAIR GOLF

LET’S START WITH ZACH JOHNSON, who on Sunday won the Crowne Plaza Invitational at Colonial. Walking off the 18th green, he had this to say to CBS’s Peter Kostis:

I feel honored. They say everything’s big in Texas, but I know there’s one thing bigger and that’s my God. And I want to lift this up to Him and give Him the glory, because the peace and the talent that He’s given me I don’t deserve. But I’m very thankful.

I understand that you might not share Johnson’s beliefs, and even that you might not appreciate him proclaiming them after a victory. But I really don’t understand the hostility. Where’s the “tolerance” everybody always says you’re supposed to have?

I think at least part of it comes from a misunderstanding of how guys like Johnson “mix” golf and faith. There’s a scene in The Simpsons where Bart and Todd Flanders—son of the Simpsons’ annoying born-again Christian neighbor Ned—are about to square off in the finals of a miniature golf tournament. Homer spots Ned and his family praying before the match. “Hey, Flanders!” Homer says. “It’s no use praying. I already did the same thing and we can’t both win!” But then Flanders explains that he was actually praying that nobody would get hurt.

And that’s where I imagine a complaint lies. “Why would God care who wins a stupid golf tournament when there is so much suffering going on in the world?”

Another objection, I suspect, is the idea that Johnson thinks God might want him to win more than the other guy. I will acknowledge there are probably well-intending Christian athletes who believe that if they pray hard enough and sincerely enough that balls will bounce their way and victories will result. But I don’t think that Johnson fits that category, and he expressed as much in the press room after the tournament. When asked what it was like to play with good friend Ben Crane in the final round, he replied:

We’ve been good friends for years. Our families are good friends. We are both Christians, so we had a lot in common. Walking with him today [at] Colonial on Sunday was great. It was an honor because we’re so close. I pray for him and he prayed for me. I’m not saying that’s why we play well, but we pray for peace and contentment. I think there is a lot of truth to that.

Years ago I had what you might call a religious conversion: I recommitted my faith in Jesus Christ and made the practice of Christianity a central focus of my life. And an interesting thing happened (actually, a lot of interesting things happened, but only one of them had anything to do with golf): I suddenly started playing the best golf of my life. It wasn’t because I started going to church on Sunday. It wasn’t because God was guiding my shots or altering my swing. And it certainly wasn’t because I was praying to shoot lower scores (the thought never even occurred to me). It was happening because I was at peace: with God, with the world, with myself.

Call it religion if you want, call it spirituality if you prefer. I call it the focus of my life. And that doesn’t change—if I can help it—whether I’m off the course or on it.

And if others can’t appreciate that, then, well ... I’ll just pray that no one gets hurt.

Mike Zimmerman is a writer who lives in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Visit his golf blog, Whiffling Straits.

(Image: Keith Allison/Flickr)

U.S. Open Special Exemptions Started with Ben Hogan

HOW DOES THE USGA determine who gets a special exemption into the U.S. Open? However the USGA championship committee wants to.

Each situation has a different set of circumstances. Tom Watson was granted a special exemption this year based on the strength of his 2009 British Open performance at Turnberry. Plus, old Tom has some compelling history at Pebble Beach, where he snatched the national crown from four-time U.S. Open champion Jack Nicklaus in 1982. (I wish I had a buck for every time I’ve seen Tom’s chip-in for birdie on 17. Jack must still have nightmares 28 years later.)

Watson is a former U.S. Open champion and eight-time major winner, a sentimental favorite who can also contend at the age of 60. That’s an ideal set of circumstances for granting a special exemption.

Awarded a special exemption today, three-time major winner Vijay Singh is a fuzzier choice for me. I’m not saying I’m opposed to it, but the injury-plagued Veej, still an everyday PGA Tour player, certainly caught a break from the USGA after falling out of the top 50 in the world golf rankings. The special exemption will allow Singh to bypass a 36-hole sectional qualifier. Those aren’t fun. And his consecutive majors streak is still alive at 63 and soon to be 64.

Ben Hogan was the first player to be granted a U.S. Open special exemption in 1966. Hogan was 53 and still a good player who had the twitches on the greens. A 36-hole qualifier was out of the question 17 years after a head-on collision with a Greyhound bus banged up Hogan so severely that walking was a minor miracle. In fact, Ben had not played a U.S. Open since 1961 when he teed it up at the Olympic Club in June of ’66. How’d the old warhorse do? He finished 12th.

There were no more U.S. Open special exemptions until 1977. Now they’re doled out on an annual basis.

−The Armchair Golfer

(Image: Steve and Sara Emry/Flickr)

Tom on Tour: Dissecting Ben Curtis

The media fly. Tom drives. The media sleep in hotels. Tom sleeps in his car. The media sit in the media center. Tom walks the course. It’s the PGA Tour, seen and written differently. Following are a few observations about Ben Curtis from Tom’s e-book on the 2010 Shell Houston Open.

By Tom Collins
Special to ARMCHAIR GOLF

DUE TO THE LAYOUT of the course—which is a nice way of saying it’s a long walk to get to 89 percent of the holes here—I wanted to follow a group teeing off of the first hole and simply walk with that group for the duration. When I reviewed the tee sheet and the clock on the wall, the decision was relatively simple.

I didn’t want to deal with the crowds following Phil [Mickelson] and I didn’t want to watch the ridiculously slow pre-shot routine of Michael Allen, so that meant following the group in the middle of these two opposing forces: Will MacKenzie, Chez Reavie, and Ben Curtis. Although I’m familiar with Curtis after his stellar play last week at Bay Hill and his 2003 Open Championship win, I didn’t know anything about MacKenzie or Reavie—and that’s just the way I like it.

Later ...

Ben Curtis has a half-moon cookie swing. That’s the best way to describe it. The backswing and follow through are two different colors of the same baked good. Whereas his backswing is crisp and his wrists set themselves quickly to bring the club back to parallel, his follow through is more of a lazy, sweeping motion. His swing almost slows down as it progresses, and he finishes high, almost to help the ball into the air. Obviously, when his timing is on, he’s REALLY ON. You can’t win an Open Championship, besting the greatest players in the world, without a good swing.

Later ...

Watching each player warm up to tee off of the 8th, I couldn’t help but wonder about the look that’s always plastered on Curtis’ face. As a professional golfer, his eyes and facial expressions make him look like a super-nice guy, perhaps even a bit of a push-over. He always looks like he’s just waking up or squinting like the Godfather. If he were a hitman making contract kills, the look he has on his face right now would be the scariest thing I have ever seen in my life.

And later still ...

Ben Curtis made a par, but I almost fell asleep when I tried to watch him. He takes as much time over his putts as Jeff Maggert does for every shot. Come on Ben, there’s no coffee around here for 1,000 yards.

Tom Collins is a former caddie who is following the PGA Tour in 2010. Learn more about his original e-books at TheReluctantJamBoy.com.

(Image: Cmiked/Flickr)