The setting was New Orleans, but it could have been the Borscht Belt when Keith Mitchell and Brandt Snedeker took to the podium on Tuesday ahead of this week’s Zurich Classic.
Partnering in a team event at TPC Louisiana in Avondale, the two veteran tour pros and close friends paired up for what amounted to a slapstick routine, grinning as they teased each other about their games and answered questions.
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The gist of their joke is that Mitchell can’t putt and Snedeker can’t keep a putt on the ground with his driver.
“This week we’re close enough to not hurt each other,” Snedeker said. “We can’t hurt each other’s feelings.”
But things are only funny until someone three-jacks, so when Snedeker was asked about the serious subject of grain, the conversation took a more serious turn.
Ah, yes, grains. From Florida to Louisiana and beyond, legions of Southern swing golfers are blamed for every lip out and bad lag putt. Or so you think, watching the televised coverage of PGA Tour events.
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“Was it the grain that got him, Johnny?” (Or Bones. Or Dottie.) This phrase is used so often that it can be the basis of a drinking game.
But how much influence do grains really have?
Ask some superintendents and they’ll tell you the impact has been overstated. There is an argument that the breeding of grass varieties has been so successful that the mowing of the grass, especially in elite events, is so severe that grain is virtually non-existent. Rather, it resides more in the player’s mind than on the putting surface.
Snedeker certainly thought about it a lot. Like his friend Mitchell, he grew up in Tennessee. Unlike Mitchell, he honed his unique pop stroke on the grabby Bermuda grass, becoming one of the greatest putters of his generation.
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So how does Snedeker combat grain?
“I think it’s very difficult to quantify grain,” Snedeker said. There’s no formula for it, no metric that tells you how many inches of break you should add per foot of putt as the grain stretches from side to side.
“I need to get more feel for it,” Snedeker said. And developing a feel for it takes time and practice, Snedeker continued: “You get out on the green and you get used to the green.” “That means if your putt is pretty straight and you see the grain going to the right, hey, let’s play this inside left, because the grain might pull it a little bit.”
The bottom line is that no matter how experienced or skilled you are, putting on the board can give you a headache. There are days when you feel that way. Some days it doesn’t.
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“If you miss a little bit, you’re going to hit a lot of right-edge or left-edge putts and you’re going to go crazy,” Snedeker said.
To save sanity and score, Snedeker doesn’t get too granular, at least when it comes to affecting the breaks. He finds it more productive to focus on pacing.
“The biggest culprit has to do with grain, down grain,” he says. “In-the-grain is going to be very slow. Down-grain is going to be very fast. Those are things to really pay attention to.”
And if all else fails, go back to destroying your partner. “We’re not shy about pointing the finger at each other here,” Snedeker said. “So I think when you have a partner who’s someone you’re comfortable with, it creates a need and allows you to have fun with how bad your opponent shot that day.”
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Mitchell agreed.
“I hope he doesn’t putt like I do, I hope I don’t drive like he does, and we’ll be in good shape,” he said.
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