Menu
Wow. Now this is an interesting swing. Johnson Wagner bends over as much as anyone now playing the Tour (see Keegan Bradley), takes it outside way away from his body, cups the hell out of his left wrist, barely rotates his upper trunk, sets his hands as low as Matt Kuchar, drops his hands down fairly vertically, barely opens his hips at all before impact, and just flushes the ball with a constant draw. If you were looking for someone who exemplified the things I teach, this would not be the guy. I just think swings like this that work are so cool to watch. It’s like: how does he do that? It certainly isn’t any combination of things that I would ever think up.
It certainly pays to be 6”3, 230 lbs. I wouldn’t think a smaller guy could hit it far enough with Wagner’s move, but then again I’ve never seen anyone swing quite like this so who knows? As with all guys who get on a hot streak his rhythm is fabulous, flowing and dynamic. But that’s such a given: do you ever see guys that are killing it and say “ooh, that guy has bad rhythm?” I didn’t think so. As far as the mechanics, I can understand all the backswing stuff, as he is essentially just setting his arms with minimal upper body torque, but I just don’t get the lack of clearing of the hips in the downswing, even if it seems to be a much more upper body powered swing, There is obvious thrust from the right leg moving forward and inward, but the left leg stays almost inert, and without it’s help in rotating the hips the whole leg stays right in front of everything. But this doesn’t seem to matter as he just rolls his forearms and somehow creates a sustained, forward leaning impact. But that’s the beauty of the game. Talent rules, and its fun to watch how they do it.
Join the forum discussion on this post