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Most Naturally Talented Golfer Ever?

TC said:
Did you finally leave the Rickie camp?
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No. I'm just being funny. Rickie is still my go to guy, except I'm just not a fan boy where Rickie is the greatest golfer ever. No he's not. He is actually in terrible form right now and doesn't deserve to be on the Ryder Cup team.
 
JRod said:
Watching Kyle Stanley putt is LOL.
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Yeah. I agree with this. I don't know how he made so many putts when he was on fire.
 
d_in_la said:
This is great Tadashi. How about Lee Trevino? That guy has massive game.
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Trevino was my 1st thought. The story of how he learned the game as a kid is pretty cool. One hell of a ball striker that guy was.

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If you're talking raw talent, I'm going with Bubba. There has never been a player with the imagination he has and can pull off the shots he can. For someone who is self taught and still is with a major win, it's pretty amazing.


Tapaway!
 
JT723 said:
Y.E. Yang.

He didn't even pick up a club until he was 19, and learned how to swing a club by watching other members on the range. Then, He took down arguably the greatest player to ever play golf in his prime at the PGA at Hazeltine. Yeah, that's raw talent.
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That's a pretty good one. And it means I still have a chance, lol!
 
Sam Snead gets my vote. Won five events his first year as a pro in 1937 and made the cut at the 1971 US Open at age 61.
I wonder if Tiger will be making the cut at the US Open in 2031!
 
Picking just one is tough, Jack, Snead, Jones, and Tiger would all be great choices.
 
Lucas Calloway. Gets my vote.
 
blugold said:
Lucas Calloway. Gets my vote.
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Seconded. Also because he is the freaking man and it is a tie between him and his bro as to who is my favorite person ever to play golf with.
 
I think someone earlier said Babe Zaharias. I would have to agree.
 
TC and One-T votes hey? Hmmmmmmm
 
Can we define naturally talented? A lot of golfers listed got their skills from their coaches.
 
Tadashi70 said:
Can we define naturally talented? A lot of golfers listed got their skills from their coaches.
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I dunno. I think we're looking for some sort of golf savant. By that measure, Moe and Bubba.

I don't know that you can get skills from a coach, I don't think having one would certainly disqualify someone. You could have coached the bejeebers out of me 30 years ago, and I'm pretty sure it wouldn't have helped me make it big in golf. No way to quantify exactly what's taught vs instinctive and tweaked, either. Earlier Hogan was brought up as a compulsive practicer and analyzer, which was certainly true, but without his talent could any of us build a virtually flawless swing from the ground up? And make it work?

It's just one of those bones we all love to chew. It's like Orr vs Richard vs Howe.
 
I gotta go with Snead, by a mile. His peers all felt that way and so did many generations afterwards who saw him on a driving range.

After that, I would say Moe Norman, but having an autistic brother myself I wouldn't call it talent as much as awareness. The first day I showed my brother how to shoot a free throw he made 100 straight in a row, he was 8. He didn't know it was supposed to be hard.

Of current golfers I would have to say Tiger and Daly.

Tiger because he is the only guy with enough natural talent to have mastered 3 different swing methods and win with all of them. Hogan did it once and everybody goes nuts about his "resolve" and so forth, so one day it will be seen for what an amazing accomplishment it has been.

Daly because it is a cool mystery to think what he could have been.
 
This one is so hard to even try to answer with the changes in the way the game is approached. You can't argue with Tigers natural ability at such a young age. I think he would have dominated regardless of era. Snead is a good choice but it took him a long long time to acquire all those wins. But I think my choice would be Bobby Jones. It's amazing what he did all as an amateur before his 30 birthday while working.
 
Tiger has plenty of raw talent. We saw that in 97, he was being molded and shaped far before that win though.

Self taught guys is what I think of as natural talents. So you have to go to the age before coaches and Pros. Hogan, Snead, Nelson era or before.

Larry Mize comes to mind as well. I heard he didn't even pick up the game until after college?
 
Walter Hagen
 
Suppose I have to add Lee Trevino as he is the only person that Hogan ever sat and watched hit Balls
 
Tom Morris Jr.
 
I think some of the early guys like Vardon, Snead, Trevino, Chi Chi, they all had an enormous amount of talent, they worked hard to harness it and mold it into something memorable. There are so many talented guys out there it's unbelievable.
 
Moe. Or Seve. Not Tiger, Tiger's one of the greatest ever, and has heaps of talent, but a lot of people with a small amount of talent could be at the top if they would go trough the training, pressure, and machinery that Tiger went trough, and still goes trough since he was an infant. But Moe Norman and Seve had a talent that could not be matched. Something from the inside. When Seve tried to get better mechanically and by training, his game went from excellent and superb to terrible. It took a long time for him trust his natural instincts, and just play.
 
I'm still not sure I get the 'time before coaches' statements. There were coaches and their were golf pros in the past. Hell, Harvey Penick was teaching guys in 1923.

I guess I think everybody that can play golf at that high of a level has a TON of natural talent. Maybe some more than others, but I don't think it's a measurable thing.
 
Castor Hades said:
Moe. Or Seve. Not Tiger, Tiger's one of the greatest ever, and has heaps of talent, but a lot of people with a small amount of talent could be at the top if they would go trough the training, pressure, and machinery that Tiger went trough, and still goes trough since he was an infant. But Moe Norman and Seve had a talent that could not be matched. Something from the inside. When Seve tried to get better mechanically and by training, his game went from excellent and superb to terrible. It took a long time for him trust his natural instincts, and just play.
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Seve was definately talented, he was one of the most creative golfers out there.
 
I skimmed the first and last but has anyone said Bubba? He says he has never had a lesson and this guy has some serious game. I am not too familiar with the history of the game (been playing 4 years) so I am going to stick with what I know.
 
Hawk said:
I'm still not sure I get the 'time before coaches' statements. There were coaches and their were golf pros in the past. Hell, Harvey Penick was teaching guys in 1923.

I guess I think everybody that can play golf at that high of a level has a TON of natural talent. Maybe some more than others, but I don't think it's a measurable thing.
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Well according to the special recently ran on Snead Hogan Nelson, Snead said back in those days you learned on your own. Pros were a luxary and touring pros helped each other all three were self taught and Nelson was the one who told Hogan to weaken his grip.

And a lot of the guys mentality from that era was "if you can't beat me you can't teach me"
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