{"id":15555365,"date":"2024-12-30T16:37:17","date_gmt":"2024-12-30T21:37:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/golf.com\/?post_type=article&p=15555365"},"modified":"2024-12-30T16:37:26","modified_gmt":"2024-12-30T21:37:26","slug":"hovland-mayo-coach-scheffler-hand-golf-makeover","status":"publish","type":"article","link":"https:\/\/golf.com\/news\/hovland-mayo-coach-scheffler-hand-golf-makeover\/","title":{"rendered":"Hovland’s coaching change, Scheffler’s setback, golf’s surprising makeover | Monday Finish"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Welcome back to the Monday Finish, where after a lengthy offseason (Four months long! Unless you include the FedEx Fall, the Presidents Cup, the Hero, the Grant Thornton, the PNC Championship, the Showdown…) we’re finally back, gang. PGA Tour season has arrived. To the news!<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

First, a quick request: If you like the Monday Finish, subscribe HERE<\/a> to get it in your email inbox! It’s free. And it would make me happy. <\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

GOLF STUFF I LIKE<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Golf’s image makeover.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

As we’ve arrived at the end of 2024 I’ve read plenty about how, big-picture, this was a bad year for professional golf. While I don’t think that’s true on a micro level \u2014\u00a0there was so much good stuff, like Scottie Scheffler<\/strong>‘s entire season<\/a>, Xander Schauffele<\/strong>‘s major breakthrough<\/a>, Lydia Ko<\/strong>‘s fairy tale<\/a>, Nelly Korda<\/strong>‘s dominance<\/a>, Bryson DeChambeau<\/strong>‘s star rise<\/a> \u2014\u00a0I understand the point. Ratings are stagnant at best, golf fans are somewhere between “annoyed by” and “apathetic to” the ongoing division between LIV Golf and the PGA Tour, and the divide continues to distract and detract from the on-course action with no clear end in sight. Not good.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But let’s set that aside for a moment and consider a completely different narrative, one largely removed from the professional golf sliver of the game. Golf, on the whole, has completely remade its image. People like golf now. Before, they didn’t. Seriously.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

New research<\/a> from the National Golf Foundation (NGF) sheds light on this phenomenon thanks to a “Perceptions of Golf” study (here<\/a>) it has conducted several times over the past decade. The findings? A clear decline in Americans describing golf negatively. In 2013 a whopping 57 percent of respondents described golf negatively. The NGF’s research found common descriptors like boring, stale, pretentious, intimidating.<\/em> Anybody who has spent time around golf is familiar with this country-club stigma and the sense that the game is too exclusive and unwelcoming\u00a0and, even if you do<\/em> decide to play, too slow.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But the NGF’s data shows that that perception was already changing before the Covid golf boom. In 2019 47 percent used negative descriptors. By 2022? Just 37 percent. And in 2024 that number dipped to 31 percent. That’s a massive swing, cutting the negativity in half. That’s huge for golf. It’s huge for people who love golf. And it’s a sign that something<\/em> has worked \u2014\u00a0even if it’s not clear exactly what that something is. It can sound a bit like a USGA focus-group fever dream but the NGF highlights words like fun, exciting, engaging <\/em>and cool<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n
\n \"People
\n The NGF says people are feeling good about golf. That has me feeling good about golf.<\/span>\n \n NGF<\/span>\n <\/figcaption>\n <\/figure>\n\n <\/div>\n\n\n

Over that same time period, there has been a “massive” increase in golf participation, which means 15 percent of Americans now play on- or off-course golf (think TopGolf, etc. for “off-course”), up from 10 percent. But that’s still a tiny sliver of the population, which means that non-golfers must be feeling much better about the game, too. Specifically, that 26 percent shift in negativity translates to 70-80 million people feeling better about golf. It may not solve the PGA Tour-LIV divide. But as someone who likes golf and wants other people to feel the same way? More people like golf now. That’s golf stuff I like.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

(Full NGF article here<\/a>.)<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n

\n
<\/div>\n <\/div>\n\n\n\n

WINNERS<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Who won the week?<\/em> <\/p>\n\n\n\n

According to the OWGR, there were no official events that took place last week. I’m very confident this is the only week of the year that’s true. So there are no tournament winners. But hopefully some of you turned out winners thanks to new golf clubs<\/a> under the tree and the promise of a new golf season on the horizon. Next week we’ll get back to the real thing. Winners. Losers. Everything in between. For now? We’re all winners.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

If you like the Monday Finish, subscribe for free HERE<\/a> to get it in your email inbox!<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n