When Adam Scott won the 2013 Masters the hope was that the dam had broken. Scott had struggled to win his first major and his rainy Masters win was supposed to be vindication for his four bogey finish that cost him the 2012 Open Championship. But he is still stuck with that lone major win.
Brian Wacker of Golf Digest offers us an in depth look at Scott’s career since his playoff win at Augusta. Much in Scott’s life has changed. He’s now married and the father of two, has had multiple coaches, caddies and changed his putting among other things and he found his new instructor on YouTube. No, really.
Watching Scott win his green jacket was wonderful and that gave us what I think is one of the greatest Masters images of all time.
From Wacker’s article:
This spring marks five years since he won at Augusta National. When we sat down with him recently, Scott insisted that it doesn’t feel like it has was a long time ago, but plenty has occurred between then and now to make you believe otherwise. In 2013, he wasn’t yet a father of two, or even married. Steve Williams, off now driving a race car somewhere in New Zealand, was toting his golf bag, and it was still legal to use a broomstick putter anchored to the body.
“I didn’t swing the club my best last year,” Scott told Golf World. “Lots of reasons. Not in my normal environment. I was coaching myself. Last season wasn’t a productive one. I gave up a lot, but that was my choice. But it’s hard not to be frustrated.”
Not all of Scott’s problems are with his swing. It seems his motivation had waned.
“I feel like after the PGA Championship, I kind of checked out after Byron was born,” Scott said. “I wish I could’ve checked out a bit more, to be honest, and not played at all, rather than just show up and make up numbers for the year. But it’s hard to do that.
In trying to figure out where to go from here, Scott has begun to venture down an unusual path. Instead of addressing whatever issues were cropping up in his swing on his own—he split from instructor Butch Harmon in 2009 and has been through a couple of coaches since—he has turned to George Gankas. Better known as “ggswingtips” in the social-media world (though his handle has since changed given a disagreement with his business partner), Gankas is a 47-year-old Southern Californian who’s developed a cult following of sorts with a series of instructional videos shared through Instagram and Twitter. Gankas’ YouTube channel has gotten more than 3 million view and has 20,000 subscribers, and his Instagram account (@georgegankasgolf) has more than 93,000 followers.
Scott watched several of Gankas’ videos recently, and liked what he saw so he gave the instructor a call. The two started working together this year with Scott taking a couple of lessons from Gankas during tour stops at Riviera and Bay Hill. Yes, you read that correctly, the owner of one of the most majestic swings in the game, a green jacket, 14 PGA Tour titles and 28 other trophies from around the world hired a guy because he liked his YouTube videos.
For the life of me I have a difficult time understanding why players voluntarily walk away from Butch Harmon. No one gets results like Butch and the lame excuses like “I just needed a change” or “it was time for some fresh eyes” doesn’t make much sense.
Props to Wacker for a nice piece on one of the truly nice and kind gentleman in the game but with all that talent Adam may need to spend more time with someone like Bob Rotella than a swing guru.
Click here for Wacker’s article.
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