We see here the mistake of importing into golf the well-known phenomena of billiards, but one would have thought that the experience of the billiard-table would have been sufficient to show the fallacy of this statement. The billiard player uses drag to enable him to play his ball fast and accurately, and there is no doubt that by means of this drag he does obtain very considerable accuracy, but directly the ball has ceased to "skate" he knows that that is the time when the drag has entirely departed from it, and that the momentum has conquered the friction caused by the back-spin; in other words, the drag having accomplished its work has gone out of business, and all the run that is on the ball is derived from the remains of the momentum imparted to it.
I cannot say too emphatically that in my opinion this idea of putting with drag, or with any club having a loft more than that which barely enables one to see the face of it when it is properly soled, is dangerous and calculated to produce bad putting on the part of anyone who attempts it, even as it did in the case of James Braid himself.
There is one remark which James Braid makes about stymies which I should like to refer to here. Braid says: "Given complete confidence, the successful negotiation of a stymie is a much less difficult matter than it is imagined to be, though in the nature of things it can never be very easy." I must say that I differ entirely from Braid in this respect. I maintain that in the nature of things most ordinary stymies, when played in the manner which I advocate, are very easy. The difficulty of the stymie, provided one's club is properly built—and later on I shall refer to the construction of the mashie—is much exaggerated. Eight of ten stymies should present no more difficulty than an ordinary put. The only time a stymie should present a difficulty to the golfer is when the intervening ball is much nearer to the hole than to the ball which is stymied, so that the force required to get over the obstacle is so much that the player, after landing on the far side of the stymie, has too much power in his ball to give it a chance to settle in the hole, but even such a stymie as this may, if the ground be suitable, be overcome by lofting one's ball so as to drop on the hither side of the stymie, bound over it on its first bound, and continue on its way to the hole. This, probably, is one of the most difficult ways of negotiating a stymie; but as showing that it is eminently a matter of practical golf, I may say that I was illustrating the shot one day to a man who had practically just started golf. I showed him how to obtain the shot, and he did it at his first attempt. I advised him not to try again that day.
Braid continues:
I need not say that the pitching method is only practicable—and then it is generally the only shot that is practicable—when both balls are near the hole, and are so situated in relation to each other and to the hole that the ball can reach the latter as the result of such a stroke as enabled it to clear the opponent's ball.
Braid is, I think, referring to a clean pitch into the hole, although the photograph leaves this open to doubt. The pitching method is practicable when one is stymied in almost any position on the green, provided always, as I have said, that one has any chance whatever of pulling up in time to get into the hole after having got over the stymie. Let me give an example:—Supposing my ball were fifteen yards from the hole, that the green was absolutely level, and that I had a stymie ten inches or ten feet in front of me. I should not hesitate for a moment to use the shot which I have described as the best stymie stroke in the game. The ball in front of me, so far from being an obstruction, or in any way whatever putting me off, would, if anything, serve as a good line to the hole. I am aware that to many golfers who do not know this stroke, and comparatively few do, this will sound like exaggeration. I am prepared at any time to demonstrate the practical nature of what I am writing to any one of my readers who cannot obtain the results which I get with this stroke.
At the time that I introduced this stroke there was much controversy about it, and it was claimed that it was not a new stroke, but that it was exactly the same as the stroke played by all golfers when stymied. This, however, is quite an error. Speaking of the stymie shot, James Braid says
... it is just an ordinary chip up, with a clean and quick rise, the fact being remembered that the green must not be damaged. To spare the latter the swing back should be low down and near to the surface, which will check the tendency to dig. The thing that will ensure the success of the shot, so far as the quick and clean rise is concerned—and often enough success depends entirely upon that—is the follow-through. Generally, if the club is taken through easily and cleanly, all will be well.
It is obvious from this description that the stroke in Braid's mind is totally different from my stymie stroke. With the stroke as I play it, it is an absolute impossibility to "dig" into the green. One has no need to have any anxiety whatever about the green, for as the club travels parallel with the surface of the green all the time, it is obvious that no damage can ensue. If there is any deflection whatever from the straight line, it would be at the moment of impact, but even here it stands to reason that there is practically no deflection whatever; for even in a stroke played, relatively speaking, so slowly as is this shot, any alteration of the line of the stroke after it has once been decided upon, is quite improbable, but the dominant idea in the player's mind must be to insert the front edge of his mashie between the ball and the grass, and above everything to keep his follow-through as straight and as low along the surface of the green as was his swing back. It is this straight and low follow-through which gives the ball its "quick and clean rise," as Braid calls it. Curiously enough, the follow-through which Braid shows for his stymie shot, wherein the head of the club is raised from the green, will not give anything like so quick a rise or such delicacy of touch as will the stroke played in the manner which I have described, and, above everything, with the very low follow-through insisted upon by me.