BOMB: You know, it just does my heart good to see Jim Furyk win the Canadian Open. Especially when he stares down bomb-and-gouge poster boy Vijay Singh, who got himself in a little trouble down the stretch with his hit-it-wherever attitude. Anyway, it got me to wondering whether short and straight extends further than Furyk. In fact, would it be possible to put together a Ryder Cup-like team of short hitters that could be competitive? Well, I think I can.

Keeping it to players averaging less than 280 yards off the tee, I can post a lineup of Furyk, Zach Johnson, Scott Verplank, Paul Goydos and Fred Funk—winners all this season. I can also add Jerry Kelly, Tom Pernice Jr., Bernhard Langer, Luke Donald, Tim Clark, Jose Coceres and Nick O’Hern. Combined these 12 players have won more than $20 million this year. And if somehow I could stretch the driving average to 281 yards, I could add K.J. Choi and Steve Stricker to the lineup. But I’ll stick with my 12 peashooters.

There were 31 players averaging under 280. You can have the top 31 guys on the tour’s driving distance list. See if you can come up with a team to beat my guys. And yes, you get Eldrick. But you don’t get Philly Mick.

GOUGE: What, we’re not going to use FedEx Cup points? OK, we both know my team will kick your team in the cash count. I get Tiger (but not Phil who is 32 in driving distance and not Vijay who is 50th) and I pretty quickly get to nearly $24 million with my 12. The Smash Brothers’ lineup looks like this: Tiger, Adam Scott, Charles Howell, Hunter Mahan, Robert Allenby, Nick Watney, Bubba Watson, Anthony Kim, Brett Wetterich, Lucas Glover, Pat Perez and Camilo Villegas. (Of course, you'd beat me with Stricker and Choi on your team.) But here’s the interesting thing: About 60 percent of my money comes from guys who are in the bottom third of the top 31 in driving distance. Only one of the guys in the top 10 in driving distance earns his way on my team (Bubba). Like we’ve always known, driving it far relative to the tour average is not going to guarantee you a living. You know what stat guarantees you a living? The leaders in scoring average tend to make some cash. Our two squads might need a stroke a side to compete with the top 12 in scoring average. Their combined income this year: About $35 million.

GOUGE: Seems every major somebody says something idiotic about technology making great courses obsolete. This time it was Peter Kostis suggesting that Carnoustie was there for the taking when the wind didn't blow and that Carnoustie is not a great test. Begging the wizard's pardon, but Carnoustie ranked the third most difficult course for the year. Sure it's long, and sure its difficult finishing hole is converted from a par 5, but let's just find out how technology made it so easy. How about all those 73s, 74s, and 75s shot by the final groups in those windless, soft conditions (Paul McGinley, Steve Stricker, Chris DiMarco)? Six players averaged 300 yards plus for the week. Guess how many of those six won the tournament? None. Guess how many finished in the top 10? Two. Richard Green averaged less than 270 off the tee and finished with a 64 on Sunday. The beauty of Carnoustie is that it gave you options, and in many of those cases, each option was loaded with danger. That beauty is what we need more of in design, not simply mammoth length. But then you paid a visit last week to a site that better makes the point about how the golf course can beat dreaded technology every time, didn't you?

BOMB: Got that right, Scooter. You don't need the results from Carnoustie to tell you courses aren't being obsoleted by technology, you needed to be with me--in Milwaukee at Brown Deer Park GC, a lovely little gem measuring a whopping 6,759 yards, making it the shortest course of the 55 layouts used on the PGA Tour.

Although the course is within a park complex and fans indulged throughout the week on local favorites such as bratwurst, Culver's frozen custard and several trips to the Miller Lite Oasis, Brown Deer Park was no picnic for the players, producing more rounds over par than under and a stroke average of 70.177 against its par of 70--a higher stroke average in relation to par than courses such as Muirfield Village or Colonial CC. And a higher stroke average than seven courses on tour that measure more than 500 yards longer including 7,457-yard Redstone and 7,411-yard Plantation course at Kapalua. And while Carnoustie may have been hit with a little bad weather Sunday, there was no such problem in the land of the Brewers. It was sunny and warm all four days.

So how did 78-year-old Brown Deer Park survive? By bringing in Pete Dye or Rees Jones or Tom Fazio or some other hot-shot architect to gussie up the joint? Or perhaps it was designed by a master such as Tillinghast or Macdonald and needed no such updating. Not quite, the little course that could is the brainchild of George Hansen, who designed a whopping five course in his lifetime. Hansen's day job was as superintendent of the Milwaukee Parks Department and designed the five courses for the city's parks system. Last week Hansen's smart combination of doglegs and use of a creek that forced players into go-no go decisions off the tee on a number of holes combined with a hearty--but not unmanageable--four-inch rough to keep the numbers from getting stupid. In another era he'd be Old Tom Morris. Joe Ogilvie won and the three others closest to him at the start of the day (Tim Herron, who was leading, Tim Clark and Kenny Perry) shot 72, 71 and 71, each of them over par. These are not choppers, folks. Between them Herron and Perry have won nearly $35 million on the course. Clark is a two-time Presidents Cup player. Brown Deer vs. them should have been a mismatch. It wasn't.

One more time, it's not technology that makes golf courses obsolete. It's a lack of imagination on the part of the architect. You don't need 7,400 yards to test the best. Last week, 6,759 proved more than enough.

GOUGE: It's been buried in a corner of the USGA web site, but aside from a few insiders, many aren't aware that the USGA is strengthening its position in favor of rolling back grooves on clubfaces.

There under the equipment testing section is the latest addition to its report on grooves. Look under the heading "A Study of the Effect of Rough Height on Tour Player Performance Using U- and V-Grooved Irons".

It asserts that increasing the height of the rough is not an effective alternative to rolling back groove parameters. Let's try to be crystal clear what this means: Aggressive U-shaped grooves, which are essentially the standard for most wedges and irons to date, are stone dead, or to paraphrase, they are no more! They've ceased to be! They've expired and gone to meet their maker! They are bereft of life, they rest in peace! Their metabolic processes are now history! They're off their twig! They've kicked the bucket, they've shuffled off their mortal coil, run down the curtain and joined the bleedin' choir invisibile!!

A common complaint from golfers and manufacturers when the USGA announced the proposed rule change was why not simply grow the rough higher? As a matter of fact, the entire point of having a notice and comment period prior to adopting any rule is so the USGA can respond to concerns voiced.

"Some of the comments we received led us to do this research," USGA Technical Director Dick Rugge said. Hearing the complaint, the USGA sought to examine the issue directly by having elite players hit shots from light, medium and long rough and then examine the relative spin performance of each.

You can read the report in its entirety, but the upshot of the USGA's findings is that at-the-limit U-groove designed 5- and 8-irons and sand wedges launch the ball with dramatically more spin than old school V-groove irons, but not even in longish 3-plus inch rough does the spin of a U-groove shot decline to the point of a V-groove shot even in light rough., In short, you can't make rough tough enough to reduce performance of an at-the-limit U-groove, aside from making the rough so difficult it reverts to a hazard.

As our conversation with USGA Technical Director Dick Rugge and his team Thursday afternoon revealed, the intent isn't too make the rough a no-fly zone. "You don't want to get to pitch-out length. That isn't golf. The rough isn't supposed to be a hazard, it's supposed to be an area where you ratchet up the risk of the shot. The rough should have a different kind of challenge. You could just line the fairway with out-of-bounds stakes, but that removes the element of what rough is supposed to be. You can achieve that maximum penalty, but only by ruining the game."

The USGA is making the case that this proposed rule change is targeted to the best players in the world, for whom the correlation between driving accuracy and success has been severely minimized in recent years. You don't have to be a rocket scientist to see that a change in performance from the rough could have a change in playing attitudes, among other things (it might even change the golf ball). But the latest USGA report is as much research and testing as it is tea leaves that the proposed rule will go forward.

BOMB: I'm not totally convinced of everything the USGA suggests, but I do believe that Rugge and his team have answered one of the more prominent complaints about the proposed groove rule. There's no doubt in my mind, however, that driving accuracy is still rewarded and that hitting it wide of the mark is still penalized.

What's also clear, however, is that manufacturers already are working out how to attack the new groove problem. At least three major players are already expected to introduce several new irons in the coming months that will feature grooves built to conform to the proposed standard.

And while they may be slightly dumbed down from what we have in our clubs now, it's just not going to matter to a chop like you. Average golfers out there need to worry a whole lot more about a whole lotta other stuff before they start worrying how much spin they won't be getting on their approach shots from the right rough.

That said, I'll be hoarding all the sharp edged grooves I can find because they just might end up getting grandfathered well past when I'm ready to tee it up in the senior club championship.

GOUGE: Grandfathered? Not in my foursome.

BOMB: Interesting article in last Friday’s USA Today where the paper had Brandt Snedeker play a round of golf at the Plantation Course at Sea Island, Ga., with both his current set and a set of bats and balls from the 1980s. Love the concept and, can’t be shocked at the result (75 with the new stuff to 80 with the old equipment in 15 to 25 mile-per-hour winds). But I have to admit that if I had done this experiment, the test conditions would have been a tad different. For starters, why use Brandt Snedeker? Nice kid, but the 26-year-old admits that the only previous time he had hit a persimmon driver was fooling around with the father’s when he was 8 years old. Further, Snedeker was brought up with the modern swing—a move that simply does not work with the older equipment. Why not Nick Price or Paul Azinger or Corey Pavin? Each still has game and has extensive experience with both types of equipment. Plus, their swings are somewhat of a hybrid between old school and new move. Also, I’m curious about the ball used—the Bridgestone Rextar Pro Model. Was this an old ball lying around or one that was produced just for this test? Finally, what was the element of fitting involved? Snedeker’s current sticks are launch monitor fine-tuned. I doubt the Mizuno Pro 1 persimmon driver he had such trouble with was exactly the right specs for him. And by the way, the score, if done in match play, would have been New Equipment winning 1-up on the final hole.

GOUGE: First things first, applause to Steve Dimeglio and USA Today for even attempting the story. We at Golf Digest did something similar in 1995, testing old vs. new. That test, orchestrated by our old buddy Ed Weathers, showed essentially that the old equipment was a little inferior to the new equipment but that the old ball worked better with the old clubs than the new ball worked with the old clubs. The Rextar Pro Model, for those interested, was introduced at the 1993 PGA Merchandise Show, so it’s not exactly a Haskel ball. Frankly, though, I don’t know what the exercise proves. It’s like wondering whether Barry Bonds could hit Christy Matthewson. Or better how many home runs Home Run Baker might have hit in the live ball era. Or if Chuck Bednarik would have been a better linebacker if he didn’t have to play both ways. It’s a lark, but it’s not a substantive discussion. The game evolves, it’s fields of play change to meet the demands of the best players. Is Snedeker less skilled than say Steve Pate or Keith Fergus were in their eras? Neither more nor less certainly. But different. So what? Those who wish for a return to the past are like the old woman in that classic short story The Monkey’s Paw. What exactly are we trying to return the game to? What we need to do is find ways to adapt. That’s the challenge. The window for innovation is shrinking, for sure. But there are ways to test the best players. We’ll see that this week, for certain. As for me, I’ll not be pining for persimmon and wound balls ever.

BOMB: Well, after spending 8-plus hours with you in a car driving back from Toronto, some of the thoughts are starting to come to the surface. Chief among them is this: Last week saw K.J. Choi using a putter grip about the size of a soda can, Colin Montgomerie using a belly putter and those two plus Brad Bryant all using 60-degrees wedges. We hear lots of people bellyaching that shotmaking is being taken out of the game but they have little problem allowing a putter grip that Choi himself said, “reduces the movement of your wrist.” It’s the golf equivalent of this. And anyone using a belly putter might to grab hold of one of these for comfort, too. And would Choi have made that miracle bunker shot on 17 if it were a 56-degree instead of a 60-degree? Doubt it. I used to be OK with the long putters and the like, but there’s just something not right about these. Of course, watching you three-putt from eight feet the other day, perhaps you’ve changed your position on crutches such as these.

GOUGE: Not at all. More crutches for everyone. Why not set up some netting along the right side of every fairway so those wild heel slices are gently pushed back into play? Why not allow players two or three throws a round (depending on what USGA testing suggests would be most equitable)? Why not let them use some sort of catapult to launch tee shots? I know we harped on the unnecessary clamor over equipment regulation the other day, but sometimes you have to look at technology’s progression objectively. We’re both more than OK with a steady generalized growth over time, but when there are weird affected departures, it’s time to make it just stop, especially when that kind of development is fueled by a desire to compensate for some staggering ineptitude or lack of intestinal fortitude. Bracing the grip end of the club to your gut is not in the best interests of the game and shows an inherent psychological weakness in the individual. Exposing weakness is the whole point of the golf exercise. Holding on to a putter grip about the size of a racing bratwurst is not the stuff of unwavering mental strength. Using a pancake flipper as a greenside chipping club is using technology to overcome a lack of skill. None of us would be the worse for wear without any of these so-called innovations. Or maybe we just need a few more out there. Maybe what everyone needs isn’t a 60-degree wedge. What we need is a 73-degree wedge. Because, after all, a 70-degree just isn’t enough club to let you hit all the shots you need. All I know is I can skull that club across the green, too.

GOUGE: Every so often, we have to remind ourselves that the game has almost nothing to do with titanium, perimeter weighting and the relative cis content (that’s right, cis content, look it up) of the latest multilayer urethane-covered golf balls. Thankfully, we got that opportunity the other day when in a moment of clarity, we found ourselves walking and carrying our own bags and playing a delightful round of golf at an underappreciated Canadian gem just the other side of the Niagara Escarpment. Devil’s Paintbrush, a throwback jersey of a design from the team of Dr. Michael Hurdzan and Dana Fry, provided evidence enough that the gordita-sized intellectual appetites of the best golf R&D technicians and club designers in the world cannot even remotely begin to overcome the challenge presented by a wily architect’s vision, a great piece of property and the assertiveness of a stiff breeze. Opened in 1992, Devil’s Paintbrush is links golf so true you expect caddies with no teeth and an honesty box just inside the gate on the gravel road that leads into the property. But let’s remember that even though it’s only celebrating its 15th birthday, it came to be at a time before titanium drivers and multilayer urethane-covered golf balls, before COR and CT, before drivers with inverted cone face technology, square shapes and high MOI were standard. And while it will never be the kind of course that will challenge the very best players in the world, it will wear out just about everyone else, even if he’s got a bag full of the latest equipment technology. How refreshing. Even though there is ample room to do so, they’ve added no length to the course. Add length to keep up? Please.

BOMB: What made it even more of a revelation is that this little adventure was a side trip from a couple of days spent noodling physics and engineering in golf. John McPhee, professor of systems design engineering at the University of Waterloo, the top engineering school in Canada, guided the two of us high school math and science dropouts through the theories of Isaac Newton, Leonhard Euler and a handful of other eggheads who crap smarter than we are. Those theories and the advanced calculations that grow from them are what has turned equipment design from art to science. Clubs are incredibly smartly designed today, but they don’t make the game easy. Your 95, pardsy, is about all the proof we need of that. And I can tell you that for sure there is no club designer who could concoct any piece of equipment that might make the 13th at Devil’s Paintbrush a can of corn. In fact, instead of carping about the onslaught of equipment technology, maybe it’s time we ask architects to think outside the box or at least cogitate inside the same box in which Hurdzan and Fry operate. It's not about just moving tee boxes and making a course 7,800 yards long. Devil’s Paintbrush was 6,714 yards from the tips, and despite growing up in an era when equipment technology has been developing at supersonic speed, it has not added a single yard to its layout. Does a great course need to be 7,000 yards to be the kind of challenge that will keep you talking long after the round has finished? Hardly. Sure, the wind was a big part of the challenge at Devil’s Paintbrush, but it’s designed that way, and it helped as much as it hurt anyway. Even more impressive, the design was flexible enough to bring to light different but equal difficulties whether you were a bomber or a gouger. So let’s think long and hard before we get wrapped up in arguing about whether we should be rolling back this or that. At its best, whether it be in the U.S. Open or an open field in Canada, the game always wins.

GOUGE: Remember all that talk about tougher course conditions on tour placing a premium on driving accuracy. By my calculations, (a) those course conditions never happened, or (b) consistent driving accuracy still doesn't matter all that much on a week-by-week basis for earning the most money on the PGA Tour. My numbers say the correlation between driving accuracy and success (i.e., money rank) is still around 0.17. For those of you who didn't major in statistics and made it through college without taking any science or math what that means is that, at least from this statistical analysis, hitting it in the fairway impacts a player's earnings potential on a week-in, week-out basis on the PGA Tour only slightly more than whether he chooses the chicken or the fish for lunch.

I point to the chart I ran in the March 9 issue of Golf World. In other words, it doesn't matter if you're exceptionally accurate or exceptionally straight off the tee. Neither seems to predict consistently high finishes on the PGA Tour. In fact, if you take the top 30 players on the PGA Tour in money, their average rank in driving accuracy right now is 88. If you take the top 30 in driving accuracy, the average rank in money is 81. That to me almost eerily suggests a near inverse relationship between accuracy off the tee and making money.

Even if you look at statistics on a tournament-by-tournament basis, you are not enthused that driving it straight is a prerequisite for success. Only seven times in the 21 tournaments with driving accuracy statistics did the winner of the tournament finish in the top 25 percent of the field in driving accuracy. Only five times did the winner finish in the top 10 percent of the field in driving accuracy. Eight times was the winner ranked in the bottom third of the field in driving accuracy. Assuming an average field of 75 players making the cut, the average winner wouldn't have finished in the top 30 in the field in driving accuracy (31 or so, by my figuring). 
Forgetting for a moment how Ben Hogan would be horrified by that sort of laissez-faire approach to course management, let's just remind everyone that the whole structure of the USGA's argument for changing the design stipulations governing grooves is because of this very premise, namely that hitting it in the fairway at a consistently high rate needs to be one of the four cornerstones of achieving a level of excellence in golf (hitting it far off the tee, hitting it to the fairway, hitting it to the target on the green, putting it in the hole). Is it still true that it's better to attack the green/pin from the fairway than from the rough? It may not be, shouldn't it be? If it isn't that big a deal, then let's dispense with rough altogether. Will a change in groove volume have the effect of making it more difficult to attack a pin from the rough? Clearly, there is evidence to suggest that is the case, to say nothing of the fact that if it weren't better grooves would never have been pursued (and achieved) as a design imperative.

It's a hypothetical, of course, but maybe tour conditions are so much on the edge that getting close to a tight pin is equal part skill and equal part luck, regardless of where your starting point might be or what you're holding in your hands when you try to make contact with the ball. If you grew the grass higher would it solve all these "problems," or would it create others? Look at what's happening in the USGA's showcase event, if you're not sure. (I urge those of you who have an interest in this subject to submit your thoughts to the USGA on this rule change.) Maybe the USGA's grooves proposal is the brightest solution ever conceived. Maybe it's the worst idea ever. Or maybe it needs a little more time. But right now the evidence on one tour seems pretty convincing. Whether that's reason enough to render all current golf clubs obsolete is something cooler heads need to consider.

BOMB: There was a line in “Ball Four” that read, “Tell your statistics to shut up.” Applies here. Now, you know me. I’m a big stats guy. But I definitely adhere to the old saw that “Figures can lie and liars can figure.” OK, fine, accuracy isn’t as important as it used to be. My answer to that is, “So what?” I just can’t take it when I hear things such as the “the correlation between accuracy and success is zero” and “guys can hit it anywhere and make birdie” because I’m sorry, it’s just not true.

The top 10 players on last year’s money list—I think we can all agree that would qualify as being successful—were a cumulative 347 UNDER PAR from inside 125 yards when playing from the FAIRWAY and were a cumulative 52 OVER PAR when playing from the same distance from the ROUGH. But it makes no difference, right?

Further, I also don’t necessarily agree that the lack of accuracy has done anything other than make the better players win more often. In the 20 years prior to the launch of the Titleist Pro V1 and the major shift to solid-core, multilayer golf balls, the average accuracy rank of the top money winner on the PGA Tour was 53. Not exactly Calvin Peete or Fred Funk, is it? Granted, it’s been a lot worse since then, but the top dogs have been Tiger Woods (5 times) and Vijay Singh (2 times). Not exactly choppers. Some of the leading money winners in the 20 previous years were Craig Stadler, Hal Sutton, Corey Pavin and Tom Lehman. All fine players but not exactly a Murderers Row of golf.

My point, if I’ve confused you, is that although accuracy is down I don’t think it matters. A good shot is a good shot, whether from rough or fairway. The chart I previously pointed to shows there is indeed a penalty for hitting it in the rough. About a third of all players who have recorded a top-10 finish this year have finished in the top 20 in driving accuracy the week of their top-10 finishes. About a third have been in the bottom 30 in accuracy the week of their top 10s. The rest are in the middle. The average is 31st in accuracy. There is still room at the inn for the Jim Furyk’s and Fred Funk’s. Is driving it straight a requisite for success? No. But it certainly helps. Ask Phil Mickelson if finishing fifth in accuracy at Pebble helped him win that week. Or Zach Johnson, who finished second in accuracy at Augusta and then sixth at the AT&T. Or Fred Funk, who was first in winning in Mexico, or Scott Verplank who was eighth at the Nelson or Paul Goydos who was second at Sony. Or K.J. Choi who was second at Memorial. I’m sure hitting a few fairways mattered to them.

Anyway, enough. Know what really matters? It’s what you think about all this—especially if you have an opinion on the USGA’s proposed groove rule. And you don’t have to tell us. You can tell the USGA’s equipment czar Dick Rugge. At the end of the USGA’s press release on grooves it states: Written comments regarding these proposed changes governing grooves are welcomed and should be sent to the USGA, attention Dick Rugge, P.O. Box 708, Far Hills, NJ  07931, Fax 908-234-0138, e-mail: drugge@usga.org.  Written comments received later than Aug. 1, 2007, will not be considered.

I only ask that you carefully think about the proposal and send a thoughtful comment. In our last meeting with Rugge last week he said that he more than welcomes comments from everyday golfers on the matter. So there you go. It’s like voting. If you don’t vote, don’t complain.

Photo: Justin Sullivan/Getty Images

BOMB: Well, it’s about freaking time we got the redesigned web site up. Least we can do is start the blog thing again.

Lets start with this: Pine Needles last week tipped out at 6,664 yards—that’s 408 yards longer than when it last hosted the U.S. Women’s Open in 2001. OK, sure, the 15th played as a par 5 instead of a 4, but still, that’ a pretty big jump. Consider that across the same time frame, Southern Hills, site of the 2001 Men’s U.S. Open and the upcoming 2007 PGA Championship, will only increase its course length by 158 yards.

I think the reason is this: The women are finally catching up to the men in terms of optimizing their launch conditions and equipment. Evidence? In 2001 Maria Hjorth ranked first in driving distance at the Women’s Open with an average of 247.4 yards. That would have ranked 30th this year as Karin Sjodin led the field at 279.1 yards. More evidence: The top-10 finishers in 2001 averaged 228.1 yards off the tee—or about the length of your tee shots, pardsy. This year the 13 women who finished T-10 or better averaged 250.8 yards.

In short, they may be women but they no longer hit it like girls.

GOUGE: I wish I hit it 228.1. Especially the .1. But here's the thing: Women, men, children and dogs are hitting it farther in 2007 than any of them did in 2001. The ball goes farther and drivers have maximized ballspeed across a greater area of the face. Duhh. Doesn't make it easier (see O-choca's tee ball at No. 17), but the course needed to be longer. Not that it played at its full length for the week. Tees were moved up on the first hole on Sunday. USGA Setup Czar Mike Davis had this to say: “Technology is a part of the reason, but remember that this year the event was held a month later than it was in 2001. We set up the holes one by one without a total course yardage in mind. We simply want the women to play the holes the way designer Donald Ross intended.” Horse. Hockey. Donald Ross wasn't there and John Fought put in several new bunkers. And the USGA can grow grass or not grow grass any way it wants. Facts are facts, and the course was set up for the least common denominator in 2001.Today the number of LPGA players hitting it 250-plus is twice what it was in 2001, so that denominator has shifted upward. But it's not a threat to any championship level golf course. I'd offer this, though: The USGA is only following the lead of the LPGA Tour. In 2001, 27 LPGA tournaments were played at 6,400 yards or less. So far this year, only two events have been that length. Those who want to decry distance maybe should start focusing their anger on the LPGA Tour. Maybe they're progressing faster than their brothers.