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 Thursday, May 3, 2001
Playing partner's teaching has made Joe Durant quite chipper
By Marc Connolly
ABC Sports Online
Somewhere every Saturday morning in America, hackers with 10 and 15-plus handicaps strategize over partnerships for various mini-tournaments at their local clubs. And nothing stirs more suburban guru sessions at the 19th Hole than a scramble, where it's essential to find a playing partner who complements your game since you'll each be hitting shots from the spot in the best position.
The classic side-propositioning conversation usually starts like this: "With your long game and my short game ..."
Or vice versa.
|  | | Joe Durant currently ranks 1st in ball striking, and 2nd in both driving accuracy and total birdies on the PGA Tour. |
That's what Joe Durant and Scott Smith used to joke about as well. Except they were speaking of tournaments like the U.S. Open instead of the Nabnasset Lake CC Members-only. Durant, the struggling no-name on the PGA Tour, and short-game specialist Smith, his former college golfing comrade and friend of 15 years who serves as the Director of Rec. at their home course -- Steelwood Golf Club in Loxley, Ala.
Winless over the past two seasons despite finishing among the top 10 in driving accuracy for the third consecutive year (79.6 percent) and in the top 5 in greens in regulation for the second straight season (72.3 percent), Durant knew he needed an overhaul. He knew he couldn't break into the Top 50 (he was 76th in 2000) on the money list without drastically improving his short game. So last winter, he finally turned to his friend at Steelwood for a complete makeover.
"I've played with him several hundreds of times over the years and I've always had a tremendous amount of respect for his short game. In fact, it's one of the best I've ever seen -- Tour player or not," said Durant, while practicing in the Big Easy for this weekend's Compaq Classic of New Orleans (ABC, Sat., 4 p.m. ET, Sun., 3 p.m. ET). "He has always been so consistent too, never streaky. I admired that and wanted to pick his brain to see if I could better my play."
Initially, Smith thought he'd spend as much time on the putting green with him than anywhere else. But after he realized how strong of a putter his friend was inside of five feet, he concentrated solely on his chipping after pouring over his last few seasons on the Tour. He found that the five-footers weren't the problem. It was setting up the five-footers from the fairway.
"I saw that if he missed a green or didn't hit a par-5 in two, he'd rarely chip it within five feet," said Smith, a former standout on various mini-tours. "I came to the conclusion that he had a one-dimensional short game. He was an arms and shoulders chipper. That's great when you have a good lie, but when you have to carry a bunker out of a bad lie, he didn't have a lot of control, and he couldn't put it in that five-foot range.
"So I gave him three or four different ways to loft the ball. It all revolves around setting the club. By setting the club and holding it, the ball comes off the club the same way each time. That gave him the consistency."
It also gave him an added element to his Pro V1s that had been as foreign to him as tournament victories -- spin.
Durant was impressed after only a few sessions, and showed vast improvement.
"He got me to focus on technique like never before," said the 37-year-old from Pensacola, Fla. "I've realized since then that I don't feel like I have to hit the ball great to be competitive, whereas before my game depended on it."
Before heading out to Tuscon in mid-January to start the 2001 season, Durant and Smith set a game-plan.
"We felt like he could shoot one shot better a round -- at least -- due to this," said Smith. "And we looked at what a four shot difference would have meant over a tournament last year. We realized he would have made a lot of money."
If you don't believe such a small total could have made such a difference, you don't know golf. It's a sport where each missed putt or missed fairway could mean the difference between missing the cut or being in contention for a TV pairing on Sunday.
"If you watch the way he hits the golf ball, he has underachieved up to this point in his career," deadpanned Smith, sounding more like his coach (officially he's not) than his friend. "You just don't hit it as well as he does and not do great things. He was No. 1 in ball striking last year, yet finished 76th on the money list.
"What does that tell you?"
It told Durant that 2001 could be a special year with a newfound chipping technique and a confidence that wasn't always present in his game. Yet no one could have predicted the assault Durant has put on the Tour thus far. Just four months into the season, he has already won two tournaments -- the Bob Hope Chrysler Classic in mid-February and the Genuity Championship at Doral two weeks later. He is currently third on the money list ($2,111,722) behind Tiger Woods and Vijay Singh.
His souped up short-game can be seen in the numbers, as well, as Durant is among the Tour's leaders in both birdies (2nd with 187) and par-5 performance (16th). His second-place finish behind Hal Sutton at the Shell Houston Open two weeks ago proved this as much as anything this season.
"The first three days of the tournament I didn't play particularly well, but my short game carried me through. That never used to happen," said Durant, although poor putting caught up to him on the final day.
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Ryder Cup Standings
(through 4/29/01)
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Pos.
|
Name
|
Points
|
|
1. |
Tiger Woods
|
2,227.500
|
|
2.
|
Phil Mickelson
|
1,093.125
|
|
3.
|
David Duval
|
640.000
|
|
4.
|
Mark Calcavecchia
|
635.375
|
|
5. |
Davis Love III
|
619.500
|
|
6.
|
Hal Sutton
|
613.000
|
|
7.
|
Joe Durant
|
505.000
|
|
8.
|
Jim Furyk
|
502.875
|
|
9. |
Tom Lehman
|
468.750
|
|
10.
|
Brad Faxon
|
406.500
|
|
11.
|
Loren Roberts
|
383.000
|
|
12.
|
Steve Lowery
|
360.000
|
|
13. |
Scott Verplank
|
358.500
|
|
14.
|
John Huston
|
357.500
|
|
15.
|
Kirk Triplett
|
331.666
|
|
16.
|
Scott Hoch
|
300.000
|
|
17. |
Chris DiMarco
|
299.000
|
|
18.
|
Rocco Mediate
|
290.000
|
|
19.
|
Stewart Cink
|
286.625
|
|
20.
|
David Toms
|
285.000
|
|
21. |
Justin Leonard
|
278.750
|
|
22.
|
Frank Lickliter
|
263.625
|
|
23.
|
Steve Flesch
|
257.250
|
|
24.
|
Franklin Langham
|
247.500
|
|
T25. |
Notah Begay III
|
225.000
|
|
|
Dennis Paulson
|
225.000
|
Though making this year's Ryder Cup squad was something Durant had on his goal list he made last December, it wasn't something he believed he'd follow through on.
"I put it on paper, but it was right next to buying an island," joked Durant.
"The Ryder Cup would was his pie-in-the-sky goal," added Smith.
But Ryder Cup captain Curtis Strange has noticed.
"A player who has been a wonderful surprise has been Joe Durant," said Strange this week. "He has come on strong."
Holding the seventh spot on the Ryder Cup rankings (505 points), his inclusion on the team is all of a sudden something that's not only a realistic feat and his new No. 1 goal, but one that is expected to happen.
"He hasn't made the team yet, but it looks like he's going to make the team on points," said Strange. "You talk about surprises, yes, he's a surprise, but he's certainly playing well enough."
After playing in a star-studded field this week that includes every big-name on tour except Tiger, Durant is going to treat himself with a week off.
"I need a little bit of a break," he said. "This tournament is so close to home so I'm excited to play, but I have to catch my breath a bit."
While the ever-present sponsors, network personnel, national writers and casual golf fans are just climbing aboard the Joe Durant bandwagon, his trusty friend and swing doctor has a message for everyone.
"He's no flash in the pan," said Smith. "Not when you hit the ball the way he does. In fact, it wouldn't surprise me if he won this week. He has got the ability to be a fixture to be on the Ryder Cup team for the next 12-14 years. That's the type of player he has become.
"He's done everything he needs to raise his game to the next level."
Marc Connolly is a senior writer for ABC Sports Online.
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