How Golf Could be Better

Golf sucks, and it’s boring, and I’m not at all sorry to be the one to tell you that.

If by some inconceivable chance you’re one of the people who finds watching golf exciting, you’re weird, and I hate to tell you that everybody you know thinks that you’re weird. “He likes golf!” they whisper behind your back, laughing at you.

Many sports writers recently struggled with a way to dress up the US Ryder Cup victory, and settled on “US Finally Reclaims Ryder Cup.” But about 90% of those headlines started out as “Guys you Never Heard Of Win Trophy You Don’t Care About in Sport You Don’t Watch.”

The other 10% started out “Why I Love Golf Again” but the stories were never finished because their families, out of love, held an intervention and got treatment for the affected person.

Some people love golf because it’s a struggle of man against ball. Listen, not disappointing your wife by finishing in ten seconds is a struggle of man against ball. Golf is more a struggle of caddy against hanging himself out of boredom.

But, being the helpful guy I am, I’ll offer some suggestions for how we can improve golf.

Make it a Biathalon
How about this: throw a couple of rifles in the old golf bag, and between holes you have to hit a target at five hundred yards? Then, when your opponent tees off, you can try to shoot his ball out of the air to give him a five-stroke penalty. People might actually watch that, plus the errant shot would be great for ratings.

Dinosaurs and Pirates on Every Green
There’s a reason Putt-Putt is so popular, and it’s not because the fat guy behind the counter sells beer to minors. Okay, that’s about half of it, but the other half is because people love trying to knock the ball between Abraham Lincoln’s legs.

More Bob Barker
Everybody loves Bob Barker, even if his presence does sometimes unfortunately lead to more Drew Carey.

Catapults
I haven’t yet figured out what we’d do with them, but don’t we all agree that at least one sport should involve catapults? Maybe we could shoot the clubs out of them, or the golfers who don’t make the cut, or the rejects that fill the galleries. But it’d certainly dress up the game.

Exploding Balls
Not every one, but imagine if, before the game began, they knew that one ball in 50 was explosive. Every time they wound up, you’d be hanging on the edge of your seat to see if this was the one that blew up. Every golfer would hesitate just a little, knowing that the next tee shot might send him hurtling forty feet backwards.

And send golf ratings hurtling to the moon!