Entry 25.43

Oof. As I sit here after the first round of the PGA Playing Ability Test (PAT) at the Methodist University Golf Course, I’m worn out. I’m excited. I’m frustrated. I’m proud. I’m bewildered. I’m just a blender full of emotions. And I didn’t even play! I’m hosting the PAT and I’m the PAT Examiner. There’s a lot of work that is done on the backside of one of these events. None of that has to do with how I’m feeling. Marking the course? I’m getting more and more efficient at it every time. The hardest part of marking the golf course is how worn out your hand and forearm get from holding the trigger on the marking wand. Yes, I had to Google it to find out what that thing is actually called. Learn something new every day. Four to five hours straight can be tiring. But I’ve figured out the trick to balancing using the left hand and the right hand. Left hand for the tee box and fairway and right hand for around the greens. The first time I marked the golf course I only used my left hand to hold the trigger and I couldn’t feel the tip of my index finger for three days. For my PGA Golf Management students, hopefully that helps if you ever find yourself marking a golf course someday. But anyway, marking the course wasn’t a big deal. Putting together all the scorecards, rules sheet, pin sheet, placards for the scoreboard, and all the other important paperwork the PGA requires? While this was the largest field I have ever hosted for a PAT, this is also the first time no one dropped out last minute. I only had to reprint one thing and that was totally on me. I forgot to change the date on the scorecard placards. Thankfully, I had only hung two of them before I noticed. Seems like a simple mistake, but I hate wasting stuff. 11x17 card-stock, printer toner, a few staples and time. All for naught. If that was the worst thing that I had to deal with then I’m winning that battle. Double M helped me out again with registration which is huge. I can never thank him enough. Everyone showed up on time and after 16 groups we were only a few minutes behind getting the last group off on time. Out on the golf course to check on pace of play, tell a few groups to find a sense of urgency to get caught up, and give out some words of encouragement. Got to see a stellar bunker shot on #13 and a good birdie on #6. Downhill snapper from 8 feet. Great read, great pace. Then after a couple of hours I’m off to the scoring table. That’s when my day started going downhill…

This is the part where being a teacher and a coach just plain sucks. You put together a Player Development program, encourage participation, and go out with students every week to help them with their games. You provide feedback on their progress week to week. You work with them in one-on-one sessions on the areas you identify together either from being on the course with them, from their weekly scorecards, or from other events they play. You watch them work hard. You track their progress eagerly. Your heart soars when you watch them play well or they tell you about how good things are going. Then one by one they walk into the scoring area. The expressions I see tell me everything I need to know. I’ve worn the same expression. More time than once. I honestly don’t remember how many times I took the PAT. I know it was at least ten. Might have been eleven. Most of those times I wasn’t close. Twice I missed by one stroke. So, yeah. I know what my students were feeling as they shuffled in the door. With every player who walked in the door, my heart continued to sink lower. I didn’t even have to ask how it went. I could see it. A third of the field is from outside our program. It doesn’t matter. I feel for them too. I don’t know any of them. But I do know they are all trying to become PGA Professionals. That’s what my job is all about. Helping create the next generation of PGA Professionals. Yes, I’m tasked with running the golf course. Yes, I teach players who have already passed the PAT or are on the golf teams. But at the end of the day, I’m here to help these students become PGA Professionals. The primary way that I do that is by helping them pass the PAT. When they come in and you know today wasn’t their day that’s when being a coach sucks.

There were bright spots during the scoring process. Two players played well enough to combine their scores with a round from a different event and pass the PAT. If they show up and play tomorrow. That is the catch. They get too carried away celebrating tonight or forget to wake up in the morning and don’t show up to their tee time and poof, that round doesn’t count. Yeah, I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t worried. One player came bouncing in telling me his score was going to brighten my day. I can’t tell you how much I needed that. With every group, I was encouraged. By the time all the groups had come in, in addition to our two potential passers, we had one player miss passing by combining scores by one and another by two. Another had a good score posted ready to combine with tomorrow. Super excited for those kids. We also had quite a few others who are on the edge. A really good score tomorrow will get it done. If score was all that mattered, then I’d say the day was average. I keep track of all the 18-hole stroke play rounds that are played Downback so I can do some statistical analysis. Nothing deep, just surface level analysis with the data I have. Despite what the Red Ryder says (we had a good little debate in our first meeting of the year about it), score is not all that matters in golf. It wins championships, but I don’t value championships above all else.

What I do value is character. And while I didn’t see all the good scores I wanted to today, I did see character. If you had never met any of these kids, I’m almost one hundred percent certain that you would know which ones I have worked with. I only knew things hadn’t gone their way because I know them. But when they came walking in, their heads were held high. Just because they didn’t score well, didn’t mean they didn’t give it their best. The golf course may have beaten them today, but it didn’t win the war. The players I didn’t know or have never worked with? For the most part they looked different. They looked like someone had stolen their clubs or they had lost their favorite ball mark. They openly wore their experience on their faces. Now I’m not saying that showing your emotions is wrong. I’m not saying to shove them down inside and bottle them up. That is the worst thing you can do. I promise. That was my tactic for a great deal of my life. Eventually that came back to bite me. Hard. Once my emotional jar was full, another drop didn’t just have a little spillover. The whole jar dumped out and turned my life upside down. One day I could take on the entire world all by myself. The next I began a coping in an extremely unhealthy manner. The physical pain I was in didn’t help. I might’ve been able to handle one state being off. But like I tell my players, the physical, mental and emotional states all influence each other. One being out of whack can cause waves. Two? That’s like being smacked with a tsunami again and again and again. The third state didn’t stand a chance on remaining stable. Thankfully, I got help.

The lesson? Don’t hide your emotions. So, if you aren’t supposed to bottle them up, what should you do with them? My answer? Manage them. Easy to say. Hard to do. Managing your emotions means that you are in control of them; they are not controlling you. This is a lesson that I teach to all my players. If you can control your emotional state, it gives you an opportunity to control your mental and physical states. For some people, this means talking about them. A lot of people aren’t comfortable about talking about their feelings. I completely get that. It’s something that I work on constantly. It’s much easier for me to either shove them down or let them out. That’s another good option. As long as it is done healthily. Don’t be the guy who gets mad and in letting out your anger you punch a wall thinking cracking the drywall will make you feel better. That’s a good way to find out there’s a 2x4 behind that spot and you break your wrist or hand. My favorite example of letting out your frustration on the golf course is Tyrell Hatton. A choice curse word here and there or my absolute favorite, the club flip (here’s the link if you don’t know which specific club flip I’m talking about: https://youtu.be/FGPx7kGnBlc?si=FSeoLvJIacPOWaPN). It was done in frustration but done playfully in my opinion. My problem with that approach is he crosses the line too. There’s always a line. Flipping off someone in the gallery or snapping a club is across the line. Wyndham Clark crossed that line big time this year in several majors. You see others who are stoic as stoic can be. Patrick Cantlay is one of those players. I promise you though, at some point, he lets the emotions out somehow. You know when Scottie Scheffler is having a really bad day when he lets his emotions out on the golf course. He’s really good at managing his emotions most of the time. There’s a reason he’s number one in the world right now. He manages all three states well.

When my players walk in, I’m prepared. If I work with a player, I don’t just learn their swing. I do my best to learn how they best manage their emotions. As we debriefed the round today, each one got a different approach. For some, we talked about it. For others, I helped them acknowledge them. For others, I just listened as they let them out. For those I don’t know, I looked for clues on how to help them. I want each to walk away from the scoring table feeling heard. When it comes to emotions, that’s the best thing I can do. Feeling heard is a great way to feel grounded. To help level you out. To get your states aligned again. All these players have other things going on in their lives. Let them walk out physically, emotionally and mentally worn down and those other areas of their lives will suffer. It’s just how life works. Struggling with your game? Your studies suffer. Your family dog passes away? Your golf suffers. What happens on the golf course is not separate from the rest of your life and vice versa. So yeah, teaching my players to manage their emotions is really important. I’m not just trying to help them play better golf. I’m trying to help them live better lives. It’s not something I’ve done my entire life. It’s not even natural to me. By nature and nurture, I’m a very compartmentalized person. I keep my work life and home life as separate as I can. Not the best practice to come home and spill all the stuff that you had to deal with on your shift as a State Trooper. You don’t come home from deployment and talk about what you dealt with everyone. But as I’ve gotten older, I’ve learned balance. So, when I see my players walk in, heads held high, I know they are bummed about today, but ready to tackle tomorrow.

When I finally passed the PAT, I came home and like young student excited about a drawing they did, I hung that scoreboard placard on my fridge. I’m extremely proud of it. So much so that my wife had it framed and it now hangs on the wall in our home. It represents far more than two rounds of decent golf. It represents hundreds of hours over years of practice and play. It represents sacrifice and lessons learned. Every PAT I run, I hope every player walks through that door with a smile on their face, eyes bursting with pride with how they played. But it isn’t in the success that I learn who they really are. It’s in the struggles. It’s when things don’t go their way. It sucks knowing that today wasn’t their day. Seeing your players not accomplish their goal is the worst thing as a coach. I take it personally. Because in my eyes, they didn’t fail. I did. I failed to prepare them enough. But when I watch them walk in heads held high in spite of how the day went, I burst with pride. Because I know some day, they will hang their own scoreboard placard on their fridge.