I am still going through my historical postings with a mind to re-posting the more relevant topics and here is one about the reason I believe the Golf Channel died.

It may not actually be, as I just checked and there’s a programming schedule that includes pre-event shows, live events, endless re-playing of live events and very little original content other than “School of Golf.”

I myself stopped watching the channel close to ten years ago when the programming seriously deteriorated, but I can remember back in 1997 probably until 2006, a good ten year run where you could watch the old Classic era events replayed and shows with lots of great instructional guests in addition to the Bobby Jones instructional shows.

It’s my personal opinion that someone at TGC realized at some point that the Classic golf instruction and vintage tour events did not mirror the Modern Golf Swing nonsense now being pushed and so were removed from viewing.

Much of what disappeared was its own programming so one can’t say the content disappeared because someone took back the rights to it, other than perhaps the Bobby Jones series.

In the below example from a December 2017 post which I’ve edited (the video was posted to YouTube in January 2012), I can provide examples of how Golf Channel content has for years offered zero value for the learning golfer.

First, let’s talk about impact position.

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For an optimal impact position you want, in no special order:

• Head over trailing side, a right-biased position and spine angle,
• Weight transferred fully to the leading foot and side,
• Left shoulder higher than the right, instead of level or near-level
• Trailing arm going into extension and not jammed against the hip,
• Low trailing heel at impact

Aside from the very last point, which is the only thing I’ve seen espoused as proper on television and in magazines, every other single point of my observations has either been lost in Modern Golf Swing philosophy, as in ignored or not taught, or has been contradicted by modern convention.

If you’ve watched the golf instruction and the close-to-useless swing analysis during tournaments, you’ve no doubt heard a good deal about standing with a vertical spine position (“centered,” they’d call it) or even leaning left (Stack & Tilt & other models of the same ilk),

If you’ve watched the same, you’ll have heard that you want level or near-level shoulders both at address and at impact as you “turn through the ball,” which is exactly the way to get the low-skilled player to swing left and over-the-top, and yet look at the above diagram and the two legends of the Classic Era below:

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Now…

Want a psychedelic trip??

Watch Nick Faldo try to describe the shoulders at impact below, talking about keeping a “high right shoulder” which would mean level or near-level shoulders:

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Do yourself a favor and watch the entire clip if you want to see how crazy it all is.

Sir Nick sure talks a good game about level shoulders and turning through the shot, and Michael Breed is there of course to agree that a low right shoulder is bad, yet look at Faldo’s impact position in ’94, when he’d already won 5 of his eventual 6 total majors, and in his prime:

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Pretty much exactly what the doctor ordered, isn’t it?  Right-biased head and spine angle, much higher left than right shoulder, low trailing heel, weight firmly into the left side and foot…

Even worse, here’s a still shot of his impact position in the actual clip where he talks about a high right shoulder:

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So, learning golfers, I absolutely recommend television instruction.

Keep on listening to that Modern Golf Swing rubbish if you want to struggle with your swing, that is – and it’s provably rubbish – you can see that the guys pushing it don’t even do what they tell others to do!

Time and time again, I’ve seen people on TV telling others how to swing in a way that they themselves never have swung… and never will.

That makes it rubbish.