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Mtwdwrd wrote:
Wayne, I don’t know if you have some underlying insecurity or jealousy that leads you to have to criticize others, but it makes you look small. You can disagree all you want, but your opinion isn’t the golf gospel. Look at how many of your videos are to prove someone else is wrong. There was a thread on you over at golfwrx where a number of others feel the same way. You’re using video of one of the instructors and reading from Mr. Hardy’s book, but the pictures in his book are more accurate to what he is describing than the video. If you think he teaches steepening the shaft in transition, you really don’t know what he teaches. I don’t think your golf swing is a total representation of what you teach either. Spend less time criticizing others and put out your own stuff which I’m sure has merit.
My reply to Mtwdwrd:
That’s an interesting take on criticism, that it implies “some underlying insecurtiy or jealousy”. Criticism is everywhere, and when it is founded upon evidence and is presented in an objective manner it serves to move the subject matter forward in a positive sense. Sure, the golf swing is a subjective matter in that there are innumerable ways to do it and be quite good at it, but there is also a body of evidence (present most apparently in moving pictures, i.e. video) that exists wherein the observer can compare claims made as theory and presented as fact to the actual movements of the players being used as models of such claims. As I said quite clearly, I care little about what Jim Hardy teaches. What I do care about, and find highly offensive, is his inappropriate use of Ben Hogan to sell his theory. If you can watch this video and not find a problem with Hardy’s take on Hogan’s transition action then there isn’t much I can say to you. Your investment into Hardy and his One Plane Swing is too great for you to admit that what he says about Hogan is demonstrably false. In addition, I challenge you to move the arms in the fashion that Hardy describes at length and in detail and not steepen the shaft with the intial move forward.
I once asked Jim about right arm movement in front of quite a few people at the PGA Show in Orlando. Rather than answer the question he took the opportunity to harangue me in an embarrassing fashion (for both of us). He never apologized. If you ask him about it I’m sure he remembers. I can only surmise that since he has no answer to such pointed questions, and since no one else in the “good ‘ol boys” fraternity that is the teaching business (where no one criticizes anyone and everybody pats everyone else on the back no matter how poor the presentation) that his way to avoid answering was to castigate me. I’m OK with that, but since I am not able to converse with him as a peer I will simply use my own forum to do so. You might note that each time I “criticize” a fellow instructor or commentator playing instructor it is always about the substance of what they say, never about personality or presentation (although Chamblee’s overwhelming negativity does merit some scrutiny), and certainly not to pump myself up as the ultimate know-it-all when it comes to the golf swing. I always take pains to point out that I have “preferences” when it comes to what I believe and what I teach, and that there are as many variations present in great players as there are great players. The main reason that I function in this manner is that I still play competitively and that having to keep score (which the vast majority of popular teachers don’t do anymore) is the ultimate humbling agent when it comes to any belief that there is an “only way” to swing the club. Humility is a great attribute in a teacher, and Hardy has dispensed with that character trait in order to sell his ideas. Listening to him ramble on with utmost sincerity about his “discovery” of Hogan’s right arm movement, then calling this falsehood the basis for his one plane swing theory simply irritates me to no end. Finally, I’m not saying you can’t steepen the shaft starting down, I’m just saying that Hogan never did that and that Hardy should be challenged on his assertions.
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