Stop the Insanity!

The nature of the game of golf is changing. In the time that I have been writing and covering golf, the technology controversy has become a full-blown epidemic. Golf club and ball technology, infused with a larger focus on player fitness, have transformed the professional game.

Golfers today, especially those of my generation, have foregone the style of game from the late 20th century of working the ball and mastery of long irons. Instead, young golfers (even those in their 40s, too) believe in pounding the ball off the tee as far as imaginable and then trying to reach the green for a birdie with as short of an iron as possible, regardless of lie. It's a style of play I like to call "whack and chip" — and it's ruining golf.

How? Quite simple, really. It all starts with the major championships because, really, that's all most golf fans care to watch. As a result of new technology allowing even Jay Haas to hit 280-yard drives, those who setup major championship layouts decided that the only way to counter technology was with distance and rough and lots of both.

Augusta National has expanded a little more than 500 yards in the past eight years following Tiger's 1998 obliteration of the legendary course. U.S. Open courses, which were already long and dry, got even longer, and even drier. Now to hold a green in regulation on Sunday is as difficult as it is for Lindsay Lohan to use a knife. The majors have devolved into punishing experiences that innately favor longer hitters.

Over time, it has become a vicious, self-reinforcing cycle. The technology came along that forced added distance and rough to majors. In response, the technology continued to improve. The majors fought back with more gimmicks and tempting the notion of the 7,700-yard course, and so on. Technology continues to improve, not only in response to this new design mantra, but also in an effort to drive up consumer sales for equipment in a game that has seen total rounds played decrease from 2001 highs and level.

In the meantime, regular Tour events have suffered as a result of this ongoing battle between the majors and equipment manufacturers. These week-to-week courses did not get much longer, grow their rough deep and in, or choose to dry out their layouts. The only real defenses have been to hide pin placements in nearly impossible positions in an effort to keep players honest in relation to par. No matter what the course superintendents did, the scores continued to get lower.

That was, it seemed, until this week at Torrey Pines — the site of the 2008 U.S. Open. Torrey Pines has been dramatically lengthened and USGA'd in anticipation of hosting the championship. In the meantime, Torrey Pines remains the host for the Buick Invitational. In essence, the field this week got a slightly dulled-down preview of just what they can expect in two years. And it was ugly.

Holes were playing much too long, including a 231-yard par three! Come on! Pins were in such perilous positions that a 30-footer for birdie was a good shot. Basically, the course played so difficult on the whole that for about an hour stretch on Sunday, not one of the three players in the top 10 among the contenders hit a good shot on the course. Not one.

Okay, we get it — the courses could be made so difficult that it is nearly impossible to make birdies. That's why I watch the U.S. Open, though, as it is the only tournament that really tries to value par. During the rest of the year, I could not care less about how difficult the setup is. But it has been this back and forth war between course designers, players, technology, and the USGA that has driven the professional game into peril. And, quite frankly, I'm getting sick of it.

Something has to give. On the path we are on, courses will eventually be 8,000 yards from the tips. Eventually, the average driver on Tour will hit somewhere near 350 yards. Golf will be reduced from a complete examination of mind and body control to a strongman competition with nicer clothes. Fans will not care for this and flock away from the game to God knows what. This can only mean better ratings for NASCAR, and I refuse to support the Left Turn League.

What can be done? After all, the club companies are after your dollar because you are convinced that if Tiger or Bubba Watson can hit that Nike drive nine million yards, then you might believe you can, too. Technology has improved from club companies so that you, the golfer, will continue to buy new stuff every year in the naïve belief that you will improve on buying equipment alone. As it turns out, though, the average score for a golfer has not improved significantly over the last 25 years.

This means that the USGA has to step in and further regulate technology. The current technology limitations are laughable and have done nothing to slow the current trend. The USGA must go further and set strict guidelines on ball spin rate, launch angle, and a host of key factors in determining just how far the ball can fly. If we can limit distance to a maximum of 320 yards (or thereabouts), then the game will stop suffering. Players will again have to recognize the value of shotmaking and we will see a normalization of the game.

It is only then that this insanity can stop. Par can still mean something without having to play 500-yard par fours, wedging pins only three paces from hazards, and alienating traditional golf fans. The mystique of golf has always been that amateurs have every opportunity to play essentially the same game that the professionals do. Somewhere along the way, that was long, and so have a plethora of amateur golfers along with it. In order to restore the game, that aura must return and technology must be halted.