One of my favorite golf stories over the past year is the one about the caddie that walked by Sean Foley after Tiger Woods joined him, and quickly lost his number one ranking in the world, and jokingly said, "Way to take Tiger Woods all the way to number two in the world." It's a joke, but it isn't that far off. Since Tiger has joined Foley (and it's unfair to blame the teacher here, but I'm just presenting facts), he hasn't won, and seems to continually struggle with his golf swing (one of the strangest golf shots from Woods that I can remember is that second shot into 13 at the Masters on Sunday ... a complete double-cross when he needed to pull off a big golf shot).
Foley has coached a ton of big names in the game, including Tiger and Hunter Mahan, but one of his most prized students, Sean O'Hair, has decided to split ways with Foley. While I'd love to sit here and look deeper into this, anytime a player leaves his coach, it's because they just want something different.
The Canadian swing coach seemed pretty okay with the breakup, saying ...
"He hasn't been happy with how this year has gone, and he feels he needs to make a change in direction with his instruction," Foley said Tuesday. "We had a good run up until the 2011 season. Sean is a good friend of mine. I love the kid. But this is business. I don't look at it from an emotional standpoint but a rationale standpoint.
"He has to do what's good for his career," Foley said. "He'll have my complete support, and I'll always cheer for him."
It's pretty crazy the last two years O'Hair has had when you look at the numbers. A winner at this here event in 2009, O'Hair had an extremely mediocre 2010 and his 2011 has been dreadful, with five straight missed cuts leading up to this week at Quail Hollow.
So, a swing change was probably the right move, and I applaud Sean (player, not coach) on actually pulling the trigger. It's never easy, but definitely seemed like the right thing to do.
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1 comment:
I don't think a swing change is the answer. O'Hair had a great swing before Foley, and will have a great swing after Foley. What he needs to change is his approach to the game. Many tour players fall into the trap of trying to find a perfect golf swing and it is simply not there. O'Hair needs to watch a guy like Bubba Watson and learn from what he sees...just go play golf and learn how to score again. Simply too much thinking going on in his head, which is the case with Tiger as well.
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