Is golf a sport?

[WilliamPitt]

Poll question: Is golf a sport?

I grew up across the street from a ragged, beat-down public golf course outrside of Boston. My best friend was the son of the pro, the pro being this huge guy with a hand like a granite slate who looked almost eerily like Ted Williams, who raised six kids under incredibly tight financial circumstances (he used to have to move his family down into the maintenance building every winter because the heat was cheap), who tolerated my presence in his clubhouse by putting me to work. At age eight I was behind the snack bar, by twelve I was working the grounds crew, and I worked there every year until I was eighteen.

I also played golf for free every day, which was nice. When the 'Golf Boom' came in the 90s, we were able to make the course a lot nicer. The course was an 86 acre postage stamp that was all hills and water; you needed to be part billy goat to play without a golf cart. My friend went to Mississippi State and majored in Pro Golf Management - yeah, they have that - and is now the pro at a phattt course down in Connecticut.

I played every day with Andrew, who was always great, and his two brothers and three sisters, who grew up with the game and were all scratch or nearly scratch players, and I played with their dad who was an ace, and with all the regulars. Friday Night Florida Style was always a lot of fun. I got pretty good.

All that time on the course makes me boo the people who say golf isn't a sport. It is, and it is damned hard. It takes a lifetime to get good at it; there is a reason they call the really really good players Masters. Moving a small, irrationally erratic ball down 400 yards of grass, trees, sand, water, hills, divots, and wind using tools that are totally, totally inappropriate for the job in order to drop it into a hole about the size of your fist, and doing it in three shots on a regular basis, is hard as hell.

So yeah, it's a sport. What say you?

[DaveinMD]

1. its not a sport

its a skill.

[babylonsister]

2. You convinced me!

Actually, I never heard there were people who didn't consider it a sport.

[WilliamPitt]

5. Four of them, so far

[medeak]

3. a sport indeed!

walking 18 holes alone is an endeavor.

[Ravenseye]

28. By Your Definition then....

would trout fishing be a sport? Say you go out with a buddy to go trout fishing for a day. The one who catches the least number of fish buys the beer later. Did you just participate in a sport?

I don't understand the need to classify every kind of competitive activty as a sport, whether or not there is physical activity involved.

Semantics Schemantics.

[ThorsHammer]

30. Off-topic, but your signature line is hilarious

[Ravenseye]

31. thanks

it pretty much sums it all up.

[MrSlayer]

4. No. It's a game.

No one is defending the hole, no one gets hit, you need minimal physical conditioning to play and you basically compete against yourself. It certainly takes skill and is hard to master but I don't consider golfers to be athletes. I don't consider race car drivers to be athletes either but the fact that you can die doing it makes it a sport. I guess it all depends on one's perspective.

[htuttle]

7. You know, if golf had goalies, it'd be a lot more interesting

[Ravenseye]

29. You Ever Play Full Contact Golf?

Lets just say I played it a couple of times and I doubt I ever will again. It makes golf, which I normally consider a game, a sport.

You play with teams. Basic golf rules apply, hit the ball, put it in the hole in the fewest strokes. Team with the fewest strokes on the hole wins the hole.

But it's full contact. The hole starts with clean uninterfered drives, once the balls are hit though you're off. The only thing you can't do is swing the club at a person and make contact with the club end. That'd be way too dangerous. But you can tackle people, but can't physically block shots with your ball. You can't lay on the ground in front of the ball on the green for instance.

It's incredibly grueling.

[WilliamPitt]

9. That's the thing

Bad golfers compete against themselves, or against another player. Good golfers compete against the course itself, always a formidable adversary. Either way, there is always an opponent.

[medeak]

11. minimal physical conditioning?

Have you ever watched a PGA tournament in person?

Those guys have more weight training than tennis for certain

[MrSlayer]

14. Yeah, but you don't have to be in great shape to golf.

Old people golf all the time and wasn't there a crippled guy on tour? Walking after your ball doesn't require great conditioning. Tennis, while also not a sport in my opinion, is far more physically demanding.

[medeak]

19. Whaa? I'm talking PGA here

not the seniors playing on Saturdays.

I know a lot of old people who lob the tennis ball around as well and I wouldn't compare them to Agassi.

[MrSlayer]

21. I know what you are talking.

It still doesn't seem all that grueling to me. You hit the ball, you find it, you hit it again. They aren't physically exerting themselves. I've already granted that it takes great concentration and discipline but so does throwing darts, horseshoes and bowling, golf is a great game of skill but isn't a sport.

[medeak]

22. obviously

you haven't seen pga tournaments in person.

Thought basketball players were whiners until watching game in front row.

[BlueEyedSon]

6. It's a GAME.

Takes a lifetime to get good a billiards too.

Maybe "speed golf" is the sportsy version....

[kcwayne]

8. Most people in this country are not athletic enough to play

For those not convinced, just go walk 5 miles with a 20 pound bag on your back four days in a row, stopping to bend over and touch the ground every 150 yards doing a simulated golf swing. If you are in shape, it won't faze you. Most people cannot, and will be sore, unable to move gracefully, and unable to perform precision moves with their body.

There is no question that basketball is a sport. But going out in your driveway and playing horse is not the same thing as competing for real. It takes skill to make shots in horse, but it is not a sport. In the same way, playing golf three or four times a year riding in a cart pounding beers is not a sport. But playing competitively, with the training discipline to be able to perform in adverse conditions under pressure elevates the skill to a sport, because it takes physical training, mental discipline, and a lot of practice to be able to do it.

[Emboldened Chimp]

10. I liken golf to billiards...it's more skill than sport

I think in order for something to be defined a sport, there needs to be a reasonable degree of physical exertion. A game you can play by riding around in a cart is not physically challenging.

[dave123williams]

12. "A nice walk, spoiled."

That's what Mark Twain thought of it, anyway.

[MikeG]

13. You bet your ass its a sport.

[bigwillq]

15. It's a sport

One that I have never played. It just doesn't interest me.

[GOPisEvil]

16. I play golf, and I consider it an athletic activity.

Sports have defense and offense, set plays, etc...

I say this not to diminish golf, as I said I play, but it's an activity, not a sport.

[Ravenseye]

25. (nt - wrong response location)

[ThorsHammer]

17. Sport

It takes a ridiculous amount of skill, and some athletic ability. I wouldn't necessarily call golfers athletic, but do think it's a sport. I don't consider car racing, horse racing, poker, etc sports.

[VelmaD]

18. My father, brother and nephew would disown me...

if I didn't vote that golf is a sport. I played when I was a kid too Will. And given that I was very athletic it always annoyed me that I was good at a lot of other sports but was never a really good golfer. *pout*

Don't ever let my dad know you golf...him and my brother will take you out to the course I grew up on and play you for whatever is in your pockets. :)

[medeak]

20. Robin Williams put it best......

f*ck pool...f*ck croquet..

http://www.manbottle.com/video/Robin_Williams_on_Golf.htm

[ProfessorGAC]

23. It's A Sport

The number of players who were not good athletes, overall, and were not in good solid shape, who were successful players, over the entire history of the game, is relatively small in number.

The most athletic and best conditioned players, for their time, have almost always been the most successful. For every Craig Stadler, there's a Bobby Jones, Gary Player, Jack Nicklaus, or Tom Weiskopf. Notice how when Vijay got serious about conditioning, not just ball striking, he became #1 in the world. Notice how when Phil Mickelson got into shape, he finally won a major.

The pattern is clear. Just as softball is not major league baseball, one cannot compare the weekend player with the beer gut to the world class players. At one level it's a game. At the next, it's a sport.
The Professor

[kick-ass-bob]

24. Is bowling a sport or a game? Pool(billiards)?

I would have to say you should group all three of those together - not quite a "sport" but more than a "game".

Lets call them "gorts."

[Ravenseye]

26. Game

I classify athletic endeavors into three categories generally.

Games, Sports, and Racing.

Games are things like Golf, Billiards, Cards, Boardgames etc. Things that take skill to do well and can take a lifetime to master. They can be done against opponents, but it's in general a single individual competeing against themselves, the game itself, or an opponent indirectly for score, distance, what have you. They also take little phyiscal training. Primarily though games are about how well you can do, versus how well your opponent does though you aren't actively trying to prevent them from scoring or making distance. It CAN happen. You can play defensively in billiards particularly by ball placement, but it's passive defense, never active defense.

Racing are things like track and field events, rowing, nascar. Things that take endurance and physical stamina and strength to finish, but you are racing for time across distance.

Sports are in general team sports where one uses their athletic prowess against another directly, or teams against each other. In general these games are about scoreing 'points' against an opposition trying to score their own points AND prevent yours from being scored ala Basketball, Baseball, Hockey, Football, Rugby etc. Tennis is an example of an individual sport.

[cruadin]

27. I like your definitions of the different categories of competition.

I voted that golf is not a sport---
(I acknowledge that is an incredibly demanding activity that requires the development of a very specific skill set)---
but you managed to explain why I voted that way better than I could have.

[DrGonzoLives]

32. To quote Jed Bartlett

"Golf isn't a sport. Don't get me wrong, golf is great, but let's not confuse it with things that men do."

Chess is hard, takes a lifetime to get good at, and has Masters. Hell, they have Grand Masters. Is chess a sport?

[Awsi Dooger]

33. There is no credible argument to deny golf is a sport

The comparisons to chess, etc. are laughable, virtually prototype ignorance. Elements, anyone? I have played Pebble Beach and St. Andrews with the wind blowing 30+ mph. Do chess players have to aim at a square 2 or 3 removed to get the piece to settle where they want it to, or even come remotely close? Golf is played at such a surreal level by touring pros that non-golfing simpletons who watch that actually believe it's like chess, simply aim and fire and the cooperative ball will do anything you pre-plan.

Golf is actually enhanced as a pure sport by the necessity of a club, in fact varied clubs of all length, loft, shape and composition, as opposed to merely using a hand to toss an object. Is something as basic as throwing a javelin considered a sport while golf with all its mental and physical variables is dismissed as something lesser? Give me a break.

Likewise, the notion that golfers can compete at any age and don't suffer the same age-induced decline as athletes in other sports is ridiculous. The prime years are mid-20s to late-30s, not much different than team sports. It's extremely rare for someone to improve and win majors into his/her 40s, as Vijay Singh managed last year. You lose strength and nerve with age, which is what has spawned the need for huge, forgiving titanium drivers and long putters. I live in Las Vegas and have wagered on one-on-one golf matchups for more than a decade. Taking the players in their early 30s prime to defeat the 40+ crew is an ongoing successful strategy for myself and my sports betting friends.

Several posters suggest defense is required to qualify as a sport. May I ask, what is the defense in the 100 meter dash? The finish line? Is the 110 meter hurdles a sport and the 100 meter dash not a sport, because of the inclusion of the "defense" of the hurdles. I suppose Gail Devers is an athlete when competing in the hurdles, but was merely a skilled competitor when she won her two gold medals in the 100 meter dash.

If defense were required, you would have to denounce almost every Olympic event as not a sport. The game of swimming. The skill of cross country skiing. Oh, of course, silly me. In those sports you are competing side by side with someone else and depending on speed and strength. So, by that criteria, I guess distance putting would qualify as a sport. Just get two brutes alongside one another, each with a three foot tube extending a thousand or more yards, and see which goof can whack it the furthest. That would be infinitely more demanding than the current sport of golf. I guess the long distance driving competition in Mesquite, Nevada every year is the only variance of golf that qualifies as a sport, and not some holiday trashsport filler for ESPN to show during the Christmas holidays.