PGA LPGA Tour Caddies Talk Off the Record

     This past fall when Steve Williams was shooting off his mouth about his former employer Tiger Woods he broke the golden rule about putting himself as the main story instead of his former boss, it was seen as taboo by pretty much everyone in the game. Golf Magazine in its January 2012 edition asked caddies their opinions on a wide variety of subjects from PGA professionals cheating to doing the deed with female members of the gallery.

   In the case of anonymous caddies spilling the beans on their bosses or other PGA and LPGA bosses, they had plenty of interesting things to say including things we expected such as pay and whose bag they would really like to carry.

     Remember when Jack Nicklaus, Gary Player and others said that golfers are all full of integrity and are honest enough to call rules infractions on themselves and this includes times when no one could possibly know but the player might not recognize today’s Tour player.

 A whopping 54% of current professional caddies have witnessed at least one incident with another two percent saying no comment. The most common offenses are players who mis mark their golf balls on the greens by a couple of inches. A difference of two inches on a putt less than two feet can be huge and one commenter said that some players do this. Another offense is using the club wedge where a player takes a three iron into the rough to knock the ground down behind their ball and then the player hits a nine iron out. Can you imagine Jack Nicklaus doing that? Another wild card infraction for players is to take drops that are justified in their minds but are not legal. I always thought that PGA Tour rules officials were around to make sure the hanky panky was taken care of but it looks like this is not the case.

   One thing that is obvious and confirmed in this poll are which course has the toughest greens to read? We have always heard that Augusta’s greens are very tough to read as they are to be studied rather than read.

     A total of 14% of caddies said the greens are collectively the toughest on the PGA Tour. While the percentages may seem low, they are double the total of 8% that the second closest course tallied at four different Tour stops.

   Caddies on the PGA Tour said if they could pick one player to caddie for for one tournament it would be for Tiger Woods at the Masters. The total of 46% was far and above the ten percent that Phil Mickelson also tallied at the same tournament.

     As for which player-caddie relationship do you admire most, Mickelson and Jim (Bones) Makay finished number one as they earned nearly fifty (46%)of the total. Jim Furyk and Mike (Fluff) Cowan finished second at 12%.

   As for the defection of caddie Joe Lacava from Dustin Johnson’s bag, 48% of caddies would have done the same. “ I’m in my 60’s with grandkids. If you caddie for Tiger, you’ll play fewer events and make the same money so I’d chose him,” said one anonymous poll participant.

   As for the teaser of players doing the deed with female members in the gallery, the caddies said 52% of the caddies have been either propositioned or went one step further and had a relationship with an admiring fan. While this story may be heresy, caddies say LPGA players sometimes mix business with pleasure and it has left a smile on the faces of more than one card carrying bag puller.