Why we won't see the likes of Freddy Couples again

I often hear that Freddy Couples has the most amazing swing and that we should all try and swing like that. Personally, I am not sure it is possible but not for the reasons you think.

I think it is very difficult to compare modern swings to older swings because of the changes in technology, particularly the changes in shaft technology. The older swings were more ‘lazy’ or 'relaxed' because, I suspect, that type of swing made the most of the shafts of that time. Think back to hickory shafts. If you swing a club like Tiger Woods with a hickory shaft, the ball will go nowhere (if you even make contact). You have to use lazy power and timing to generate the proper torque and whip with shafts like that. The talent you needed back then was timing, not brute force. Brute force, if anything, was a negative.

Photo credit to www.thesandtrap.com

For whatever reason, perhaps to compensate for lack of timing, they started to make the shafts stiffer, allowing a new breed of golfer to emerge. The erratic, power hitter. These guys can get distance without the best timing using pure brute force with the club tech softening the consequences of a mishit. Mishit an old blade and mishit a new modern iron and tell me there is no difference...

So many of the top players today are power hitters who, in my opinion, would not even be able to compete if the old shafts were still mandatory as they simply don’t have the timing to do it. Having flexible shafts was a great equalizer as you did not have to be very strong to load an old shaft. Hence the huge, tall, strong players did not really exist back then. Think about it. It is why Gary Player, Ian Woosnam etc could be competitive (even dominate). You only have to stand Gary Player next to Dustin Johnson to see how the game has changed. Huge respect to Gary Player by the way, ironically, he must be one of the strongest 80 year olds ever!

But would Gary Player win 9 majors in today's power world? Not to say that all tour winners look like Dustin Johnson, they don’t. They do however, (with very few exceptions) all seem to hit the ball a country mile and if you are small in stature and try that, you can do it (while you are young) but it is more difficult to keep going, meaning as you age, your career ends prematurely. To some extent, that is probably what happened to Tiger. He used to hit it so hard it was scary. People used to say he grimaced with every shot. That may not have been far from the truth. Certainly his tempo never looked anything like Couples's… and look what happened.

We won’t see the likes of Freddy again as the shafts, the lengthening of courses etc have eliminated that type of swing (and player).