Harry Hall, etal. is about Harry Hall, the kid that led The Schwab Challenge at Colonial CC for 54 holes, and all Tour players who use an Open Stance. What Harry Hall proved is that a swing doesn’t need to look like Lee Trevino’s in order to benefit from the best set-up platform the game of golf has ever known. On the contrary, all swings are welcomed to benefit.
By now, I am never surprised to see LIV, PGA, and LPGA leaderboards peppered with Open Stance golfers. I expect it… especially on tight tracks. Of course, any normal-width Tour course that plays long is, under that description, a tight golf course. Colonial isn’t long by Tour standards. However, it is tight by any standard.
Harry effectively lost the tournament on the final hole, when his 3 WOOD went in the water left, 340 yards from the tee. Conversely, Scottie Scheffler’s DRIVER wound up short of that hazard earlier, which adds perspective about Harry’s power.
If you watch highlights, you’ll see Harry Hall was consistent, as expected, from tee to green… with a swing reminiscent of Colin Montgomerie – another Rabbit, which is fascinating. However, notwithstanding the final result, we should understand Harry is a 23 year-old rookie. My point is that the Open Stance doesn’t discriminate based on age, ability, experience, or accomplishments. It works for EVERYONE.
Harry Hall, etal.
I cite Adam Schenk as another case-in-point. Adam has copious amounts of speed, and he uses an Open Stance. Folks, I can do this all day and every week. For example, what about the LIV players at Trump DC? Same deal. Watch this….
Harry Hall, etal.
The number of top-ranked players using an Open Stance seems to only grow. Often, my work seems too easy.
It’s a house of cards. Need I say more. I’m sure my readers are rapidly connecting everything in our world upon which we can slap this moniker. But, how does it apply to the Open Stance? That’s as easy to explain as the effect of Gold and Silver on fiat.
The Open Stance is the cure for the profligacy of an industry that mirrors every other under fiat. It will either destroy or become the insurance for every learning transaction hereafter. That must sound pretty bold on that side of my keyboard, but my students know it’s true.
Tour players are proving Open Stance value weekly. My comment section has been completely absent of spam or derision since our founding. NO ONE can, apparently, disagree. Isn’t that interesting?
By the way, I believe Jon Rahm is too close to his ball on his full swing. Spread the news. Whoever suggested crowding his ball fell asleep, I guess. But man, can that guy roll it or what? Wow! Magic.
As far as how the house of cards falls, the walls come down the moment someone breaks from the narrative and utters the “Open Stance Academy” on TV. Otherwise, the timeline extends. But the constant, instructional “fiat-printing” only ends one way. Just as in ancient times, at the end of the bread and circus, people wake up and realize what they allowed from their rulers.
And now, just as in ancient times, we are on the precipice of the same realization regarding truth and justice, money and paper, industry and community. When we look back on golfing history and the folly of clever tips and word-pictures, sales and marketing, fads and fiction, we will come to one understanding with the Open Stance presiding over the landscape….
In the collapse of instruction’s deceit will the golfing world, at last, be freed.
The Open Stance dominates professional golf. Normally, I’d say (A player) dominates professional golf. But, when linked to the number of players winning the vast majority of tournaments over the last decade, I default to the common denominator – The Open Stance.
By the way, have you seen the players the Open Stance is employing right now? Here are a few…
The Open Stance Dominates Professional Golf
The Open Stance Dominates Professional Golf
The Open Stance Dominates Professional Golf
I could have played Rory, Shane, Justin, Kurt, Xander… line em up. It’s not the fade. The fade is incidental – important for consistency, yes – but incidental to the underlying and facilitating Open Stance. The Open Stance dominates professional golf because the players who win most set up open. And, players who set up open are players who understand either physics or history.
Have you noticed that, although Coli-Mo is rollin his rock, he fades at the end of tournaments? It’s because his set-up is not most important to his coach. He’s trying to hit a fade from a closed feet/open shoulder position – NOT good.
I’d say the same for poor Jordan Speith. He has wasted three years of listening to Cameron McCormick tell him his move was the problem when it was his set-up. All he had to do was open his stance. But that was too simple, I guess.
First, McC had Jordan start laying the club off. THEN, Jordan tried to play from an open stance while laying the club off. I think Cameron allowed it so any implosion in ball-striking precision he could blame on the Open Stance instead of his club-contortions. THEN, post-implosion, McC closed his stance back up. Meanwhile, the pressure Jordan’s tee-to-green game put on his putting squeezed his putting confidence.
I swear none of these sponsor-sanctioned coaches have the players best interests in mind. If they really cared about their clients, they’d turn them over to me. But, that’s not gonna happen unless they start hating fame and fortune. LOL.
And, oh my God! Have you seen Bads? Oh, that poor guy just has the most beautiful short game, but absolutely no chance from t-t-g. He hits it DHTAG (Low) on courses requiring the high-soft approach. I root so hard for him being the great human being that he is. But, really now… who is he listening to!? I wish him volumes of luck in his current state.
I want to spend a minute to go over how golf instruction destroyed your putting. As a well-publicized cynic, larger cycles and seminal events predicate all my current thinking. “The farther back you can look, the farther forward you are likely to see.” – Churchill
“Accelerate through the ball.” Do you ever wonder why so many people wave at their ball with huge follow throughs? We shouldn’t be surprised that our distance and club face control is erratic today. The mental and physical tension created by implying such control-is-our-goal is ludicrous.
“Take your wrists out of your stroke.” Again, distracting us from impact by recommending we control another part of our body ruined putting worldwide. Instructors cite green speeds as rationalization for their bad advice and our putting culprit when no material improvement occurs. Contrarily, I proved years ago that a wrist stroke works on greens of ANY speed and is VERY “LINE ACCURATE”. Why? I’ll get to that later.
“You/he got the YIPS”. Often blamed on the use of our wrists, the “YIPS” was and is a malady without causality. The YIPS are essentially the PTSD of putting and are nothing more than the brain trying to do something that doesn’t make sense to our soul. Trying to control what is natural is our cause. Further, we allowed instructors throughout modern history to make us doubt our natural instincts under the premise that we can’t do it on our own. LIES!
“Your follow through should be as long as your back swing.” Feeding off the “Acceleration” theme, follow through ideas like this one put golfers squarely in their own heads. Unfortunately, instructors convinced us, once again, that if we could control our bodies (distracting us from truth) we could improve our putting. I’ll get to the truth in a second.
The truth is this. The less we move, the more precise we will be. For example, there is a reason those little three-foot slap-ins at the end of a hole work so well without reading a green. Heel-shafted small-headed putters were the standard seventy years ago. Do you ever wonder if that was just a coincidence?
Do you ever wonder why MOI, rubber inserts and fast greens are all the rage today? All of those technological “Improvements” make putting on fast greens an absolute nightmare for the average golfer. Your golf ball EXPLODES off your cushy putter face today. And here is the thing… that was always the plan.
Every golf and instructional technology is designed to BREAK YOUR GAME INTO A THOUSAND PIECES and make you a prisoner of your own mind. Do you NOT feel overloaded with tips and advice about how to move by not moving and the personalities advising you!? Well, at least instruction charlatans are making a good living and getting famous on your account, huh?
How Golf Instruction Destroyed Your Putting
There is only one truth in putting…. Our maximum club head speed should be AT contact – not before, not after. In fact, all other instructions are part and parcel of our only putting truth. Without advocating movement, I will tell you that once you become aware of your peak speed, your putting stroke and results will migrate toward your own ideal and free you of your mind forever.
You and I are responsible for terrible things like Hank Haney. If we are to redeem our spirits and souls, we must stop the madness, exit the instructional merry-go-round, and get back to basics. Set-up, Swing, Strike, and Learn. Fortunately, we have some time.
How much improvement can one day with OSA create? For Adamo… this much. You’re seeing his longest ten shots per club.
Driver – November 8
Driver – November 9
3 Wood – November 8
3 Wood – November 9
Day One was Evaluation Day. Day Two was Lesson Day. Adamo has a 4 Handicap with a good short game. His goal is to lower his HCP to 0. I am confident he will… and then from the back tees, as well.
Adamo flew from Canada to see me in Florida for a rain and wind shortened OSA School. We had two days instead of three to connect intention with improvement. He is very athletic and made changes quickly. We worked eight hours each day discussing all things from concept to execution.
We distilled his learning into a couple key points, and I wrote up a complete summary for his continued, self-driven achievement. He received his swing and practice videos in the form of a movie. I also sent his complete FlightScope and evaluation data so that no one will ever know more than he does about his game.
Adamo would have to tell you about his growth in knowledge. He said he wanted to leave with all the information I had in my head. He’s highly intelligent, but ‘everything’ would leave little mind-space for our athletic pursuit. I don’t want to wreck perfectly good brains, so I covered his inquiries only. Good stuff.
They said “Open Stance”! It’s a Miracle! Roger Maltby, or another President’s Cup commentator, announced how encouraged he was that one of the players on the US side utilized an Open Stance in a successful bunker shot (Max Homa). He said, ‘He was set up open, which is nice to see.’ I couldn’t believe my ears! They finally okayed its use. WHAT IS THE WORLD COMING TO!? I’ll tell you what it means…. They’re all coming home, that’s what.
It was only a matter of time. Though my goal was never to introduce nomenclature or word-smithery, efficiency of language alone requires the easiest possible way to say something. For the better part of a decade, NO ONE uttered the words “Open Stance” on network television. It really started to bother me – not because what they were saying was incorrect, but rather because their terminology was so inefficient, especially considering an existing term, which commentators refused to use, already existed.
Hopefully, we are collectively past the verbose phase of golf commentary. After all, using “Open” as a set-up description applies both to right and left-handed golfers. “Open” describes a set-up and, therefore, takes far less time to say than “aiming left” or “aiming right”.
Inevitably, the commentator has to remind the viewer that the ultimate target is still the desired destination. And, their expanded description assumes they don’t stumble over their words trying to remind themselves of each golfer’s dexterity before they speak. No, no, no… it’s too much work.
Better to use the same efficiency philosophy upon which The Open Stance Academy was founded. However, The Open Stance Academy does not own the words Open Stance. At least, I’d never make that claim. My dad taught me using that term. I teach my students using that term. It’s easier. The only distinction I draw between the term and the promoter is their knowledge about the golf swing and the secret in the Open Stance.
They Said “Open Stance”! It’s a Miracle!
Homa Bunker Shot 5:14
Yours truly is the World’s foremost proprietor of Open Stance learning. I am the original. I am the only. Furthermore, those thinking they have the knowledge to purvey themselves as a like guru is provably deficient. However, if you believe I’m wrong, I’d be happy to debate you and any other intellect you’d like to bring with you in a public forum at a time or place of your choosing. Thanks to advances in recording devices and social media, I doubt anyone will step to the plate. But, here’s to hoping someone does.
Why do we love new ideas like “The Open Stance”? Certainly, novelty attracts people. New ideas are food for our brains, to, I suppose. Do we enjoy considering the pros and cons, sloppiness or precision within each kernel? Whatever our attraction to new or different ways of thinking, we love expressing our own interpretive understanding once we agree.
I might contend that we love them for the same reason we love stories of buried treasure. The Atoche Motherlode, Chocolate Mountain, Grand Canyon, Raiders of the Lost Ark, and more stoke our imaginations with possibility and adventure. How something lost to the mist of time can once again bring riches to the adventurous… it’s exciting.
I might also contend we love them like we love new shoes. Minolo Blahniks, Jimmy Choos, Air Jordans, Allen Edmonds et al provide us opportunity to show off. We certainly express the relationship of the shoe to our body or style differently than anyone else – even if we are wearing the same shoe. Hence, when we recognize and purchase quality shoes, employing them is its own reward.
Or, is our love of new ideas more like our fondness for vacation? Time away from everyday reality happens in many different forms and locations even though, and I assume, percentages of budgets are equally affected. We accumulate adventurous or romantic (treasured) stories to retell friends and family. Ultimately, our vacations are interpreted to be totally unique to us like a Ferragamo to a foot. However, we are all left with memories.
Come to think of it, the Open Stance is an idea much like the others. First, we can polish off a treasure lost in time and join golf’s greats of the past while we pursue our own present. Putting ourselves in the shoes of Vardon, Young Tom Morris, Francis Ouimet, and Bobby Jones can transport us to a more innocent time in our history that technology can never touch.
Second, we can try it on to see how it makes us feel and look. Maybe we’re stagnating and need a stylistic change. We sense we need new colors and new material to adorn our stodgy swings. And, granted, maybe the Open Stance is not the most comfortable platform, but who cares… look how good we look in it!
And third, the Open Stance is portable. Success arrives at home or away. Therefore, whether we’re at St. Andrews, Royal Melbourne, or an out-of-state muni, memories leave us with unique stories of adventure wherever we choose to land.
The Psychology of Open Stance golfers is different, to say the least, from all others – but in a good way. For those just joining the conversation, this blog/website is home to enlightened reasoning. We are the ambassadors of golf instruction’s ending if you agree with my logic.
My Cambridge-based psychologist friend/student assured me years ago that my perceptions and diagnoses of her anonymous cases are “very insightful”. Therefore, I ask you all give me some rope here. My intended point is to discriminate. Furthermore, I believe discrimination is due to make a YUGE comeback in years to come. It is VERY necessary. Discriminating ideas feeds critical thinking – ALSO due for a comeback.
Psychology of Open Stance Golfers
Every human endeavor has a psychological component. Psychology is a part of every process because it follows Intention and precedes Mathematics on the curve of knowable truth. Although I cannot locate my graph at present, it is in my book, The Open Stance and Three Short Game Lessons. I extrapolated the graph included in Stephen Arroyo’s Person to Person Astrology. Do not think psychology and astrology are mutually exclusive. They are very different but cooperative disciplines within any complete process of discovery.
Psychology is the terminus of generalized explanation of esoteric processes beginning at our inexplicable Novel and Lyric. Psychology pulls from Anthropological research, and acts as a bridge to measured explanations of human differences found in individuals’ Astrological charting. Each more knowable truth either proves or disproves less-knowable truths. By this measure I will attempt to explain the psychology of Open Stance golfers.
Employing an Open Stance means we trust our ability to discriminate messaging between public sources of information. Open Stance golfers are un-“sellable”. No one can paw at or romance them into buying anything. They are self-contained, self-driven units. They believe, intrinsically, that we have all the intelligence and adaptability needed to make new ideas work. By the way, they also know the difference between an idea and a suggestion.
Ideas present to us a blank canvas. Suggestion seeks to bias our decision-making like my Velvet Elvis paint-by-numbers kit. Bias, in our ball-striking process, means manipulate. Open Stance golfers are beyond manipulation by suggestion. We like to make sense of WHY to do something before we invest our time. When we pursue our individual “WHY”, we seek to test our entire inquisition of Who, What, When Where, and How. Our pursuit is more akin to intellectual honesty than chasing suggestions.
Then what may we infer about our psychology? I will separate us from first person to make it less urgent. I do not want to cause a fuss, after all. When doing what they’re told no longer appeals, they solve problems themselves. But, not without help. Consider the following facets of their process of improvement.
Their help has to be open to individual interpretation and innovation. Each example must be unique per individual. Otherwise, empowerment runs into resistance. Therefore, they look toward their subconscious or unconscious mind for answers. As a result, Open Stance golfers source information closer to the beginning of their universal adaptive process than numbers or even psychology can measure or record.
Open Stance scholars gathered here are never told how to move and are never given drills. Movement options must cooperate with their preceding intent and motivational need. Common to all human endeavors is the neutralizing nature of foundation, framework, and order. One cannot exist without the other. In building their own golf swings, Open Stance golfers only require set-up, mental and physical adaptation, application of motion, and feedback. They make incremental change rooted in one set-up philosophy.
Each expression of athletic adaptation occurs within a constant control group of foundation, framework, and order. Open Stance golfers are logical and focused on achieving understanding rather than just ‘difference’. Therefore, they judge their results from a mental, physical, and psychological point of view. OS golfers use psychology to endure the struggle of lasting change. They master their minds. Conversely, those who chase fixes seek to ease the psychology of change. They are subject to their minds.
The following is Open Stance key benefits II. Congrats to Billy Horschel, Open Stance student, on his Memorial Victory.
Our trailing elbow must drop into position in front of our body to keep our club face from closing, which creates lag as well as a predictable distance and maximum resistance between body and clubhead to repeat precise impact.
Moving to our forward heel is warranted to keep our clubface from closing down. Our hips move laterally a fraction longer – inhibiting excess rotation on the front knee and hip through an accelerated impact.
Flattening our backswing plane expresses itself at impact by triggering a ‘covering’ instinct whereby we retain our spine angle through the shot. Vertical shoulder rotation increases our probability to accelerate through the ball in a strong hitting position while retaining our ability to path our club as needed.
Our body moves further from the target line through impact. Therefore, our leading arm remains extends. Moving further from our ball in-swing provides room to position our trailing elbow. We experience lack of tension from the ground through impact because our toes are not grabbing for balance.
Having room to place the trailing elbow structure knowing that we will repeat precisely, we fashion a full turn and equally precise release point into our downswing to reach our ball, lean our shaft, center our impact, and spin our ball.
Vertical shoulder rotation born of spatial and structural elements in Open Stance eliminates any hint of shanking. Only carelessness at address could foil the plan – like a ball position too far back in your stance.
The following is a list of Open Stance key benefits.
Setting up Open means you’ve steepened your impact. Thus, flattening your swing is necessary to moderate your impact. When flattening your swing, you reduce the probability of impingement in the back-swing and the through-swing.
You have created shaft lean simply by setting up Open. The target line measures but the swing plane defines shaft lean. The shaft lean created creates an angle of attack that creates ground interaction that serves to absorb shock and capture momentum created athletically.
We eliminate excess rotation on our leading leg in the downswing, which minimizes injury in our ankles, knees, and hips. And, although the trailing hip does normally absorb slightly more pivot, it is under controlled swing conditions.
Open Stance Key Arguments
We gain ability to hit thirty-three percent more shots than a standard ball-flight tree would indicate. Setting up closed eliminates the 1, 2, and 3 ball flights. The Open Stance golfer has all nine original and three more past the 7, 8, and 9 ball flights.
Open Stance golfers can hit the ball much higher, and thus further, than golfers setting up square or closed. This has to do with a more neutral grip adaptation/ opened club face to hit our ball at our target.
We can clear our left side faster in the downswing. Golfers who want to eliminate hooks clear their lower body sooner in the downswing. Clearing insures separation of upper and lower components, flatter plane, lag and vertical shoulder rotation due to a more complete backswing and smoother transition
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