Going to very lightly fact-check a comment by Ethan referencing Steph’s half-court shot: “that motion is this squat and up vertically and forward. Whatever that motion is not like anything you’re doing with a golf swing.”
The golf swing is basically a squat (backswing) up vertically (using ground forces to push legs into the ground) and forward (rotation and weight shift forward).
There’s been a ton of research into biomechanics of the golf swing in the past decade and though people largely think it’s a hands/arms/feel game, the largest gains in skill come from distance and that is all kinetic chain (transferring power from the ground to the feet through the legs to the torso and all the way to the arms/hands) and ground forces (pushing into the ground and the ground pushes back). The hands and arms are just along for the ride.
https://youtu.be/FsrWNtztGak check out current world #1 Scottie Scheffler and you can clearly see the squat jump and forward.
So that may be a reason why pitchers and shooters are drawn to golf. Kinetic chain movements where ground forces are very important culminating in an extremely precise moment of execution.
quick comment- Bomani and John are good because I think they take a wider look at sports and america than just who's the punter for Tampa Bay. Good insight from both. I want to butress a comment from John. I was in England visiting friends and we were walking through a long grassy park by the river in England with tons of people and there were many kids kicking soccer balls, they had little goals and almost every kid was engaged in a soccer like activity. My friend said- "would America ever become a world power in soccer and I said look around , until it came close to this no. We will have some stars but no depth."
On the overlap of golf and football fandom - here’s an idea.
Football is on the surface largely about physically dominating your opponent. But anyone who watches regularly knows there’s so much to the mental aspect of the game. You really need to win both physicality and mentally.
Golf gets stereotyped the opposite way. But same thing. There’s the mental aspect of having a consistent swing and concentrating on a putt. But there’s the physical aspect of crushing a drive or digging a divot on a 3 iron shot.
I think there’s something to Jordan and Curry being some of the best ever in terms of their physical and mental gifts and also being fanatical golfers.
Anyway, I think even for casual buddies (guy buddies especially) golfing for fun, it’s a lot more fun when you win because you’re physically and mentally beating your opponents. Compared to say rec league basketball where it’s mainly about skill or who is tallest/fastest but short of clutch free throws, I don’t think anyone considers mental toughness being part of it.
I might be in the minority, but I think this House of Strauss had some very banal takes (mainly due to Ethan).
Steph Curry isn't going to be a pro golfer because he's practiced a fraction of what top college players have. Football is discussed on the golf course because it's the most popular sport and shared interest.
There's a more interesting discussion to be had on US soccer youth development. I think the main answer is soccer culture being very Anglo and emphasising toughness and athleticism and not incorporating the more technical elements which are traditionally more predominant in Latin soccer culture.
Brett Favre built the Packers from the ground up and made it to the Super Bowl twice in a tougher era for QBs when the NFC featured comically loaded Cowboys and Niners teams and later the Greatest Show on Turf. He had some pretty good weapons at times, but nothing compared to Rodgers. While there were immediately players questioning Rodgers aloof leadership, Favre recruited Reggie White and mostly had John Madden and everyone drooling over everything he ever did.
While we can criticize a lot of that in retrospect, by no objective standard can it be stated that Rodgers passed Favre. The median fan happiness and approval rating of the team for Brett's tenure was higher.
NFL players are grossly under compensated across the board, regardless of position. I understand the 16 game season/55 roster spots vs. 162/25 man rosters or 82 games vs. 15 roster spots but you can't tell me, that with all the money the NFL is making, that NFL players have the lowest median salaries of the four major sports.
Heck, the NHL has a higher average salary of 3.5m while the NFL's is only $860,00. And don't get me started on the non-guaranteed contracts. I'd love to see a breakdown of the discrepancy between what NFL owners take home in comparison to the players vs all the other major American team sports.
You need to work on your math skills. One of the things is people really overestimate the difference in revenue due to fewer games.
Sure the NFL seems super dominant, and its TV numbers contract reflect that. But in total revenue it is only double the NHL.
Is that the perception the sports media gives you on the strength of the relative leagues? No. because the sports media cares about what gets the absolute highest rating for a segment, not the relative strength.
It also leads to all the idiocy about shrinking the NBA season.
Anyway the NHL makes ~$8.15 million/player before any costs. The NFL makes ~$3.5 million/player.
So over double. To match the NHL average there would literally not be any other money for anything else.
Meanwhile the top NFL quarterbacks make ~$50 million/year, the top NHL players make ~12 million/year.
So the NFL both has less than half the money per player, and A LOT more spent on their stars. It is pretty simple math.
Going to very lightly fact-check a comment by Ethan referencing Steph’s half-court shot: “that motion is this squat and up vertically and forward. Whatever that motion is not like anything you’re doing with a golf swing.”
The golf swing is basically a squat (backswing) up vertically (using ground forces to push legs into the ground) and forward (rotation and weight shift forward).
There’s been a ton of research into biomechanics of the golf swing in the past decade and though people largely think it’s a hands/arms/feel game, the largest gains in skill come from distance and that is all kinetic chain (transferring power from the ground to the feet through the legs to the torso and all the way to the arms/hands) and ground forces (pushing into the ground and the ground pushes back). The hands and arms are just along for the ride.
https://youtu.be/FsrWNtztGak check out current world #1 Scottie Scheffler and you can clearly see the squat jump and forward.
So that may be a reason why pitchers and shooters are drawn to golf. Kinetic chain movements where ground forces are very important culminating in an extremely precise moment of execution.
More resources for golf biomechanics:
Titleist Performance Institute https://www.instagram.com/mytpi/?hl=en
Baseball:
Athletic Motion Golf https://www.instagram.com/athletic_motion_golf/?hl=en
That was painful to listen to
quick comment- Bomani and John are good because I think they take a wider look at sports and america than just who's the punter for Tampa Bay. Good insight from both. I want to butress a comment from John. I was in England visiting friends and we were walking through a long grassy park by the river in England with tons of people and there were many kids kicking soccer balls, they had little goals and almost every kid was engaged in a soccer like activity. My friend said- "would America ever become a world power in soccer and I said look around , until it came close to this no. We will have some stars but no depth."
On the overlap of golf and football fandom - here’s an idea.
Football is on the surface largely about physically dominating your opponent. But anyone who watches regularly knows there’s so much to the mental aspect of the game. You really need to win both physicality and mentally.
Golf gets stereotyped the opposite way. But same thing. There’s the mental aspect of having a consistent swing and concentrating on a putt. But there’s the physical aspect of crushing a drive or digging a divot on a 3 iron shot.
I think there’s something to Jordan and Curry being some of the best ever in terms of their physical and mental gifts and also being fanatical golfers.
Anyway, I think even for casual buddies (guy buddies especially) golfing for fun, it’s a lot more fun when you win because you’re physically and mentally beating your opponents. Compared to say rec league basketball where it’s mainly about skill or who is tallest/fastest but short of clutch free throws, I don’t think anyone considers mental toughness being part of it.
I might be in the minority, but I think this House of Strauss had some very banal takes (mainly due to Ethan).
Steph Curry isn't going to be a pro golfer because he's practiced a fraction of what top college players have. Football is discussed on the golf course because it's the most popular sport and shared interest.
There's a more interesting discussion to be had on US soccer youth development. I think the main answer is soccer culture being very Anglo and emphasising toughness and athleticism and not incorporating the more technical elements which are traditionally more predominant in Latin soccer culture.
Brett Favre built the Packers from the ground up and made it to the Super Bowl twice in a tougher era for QBs when the NFC featured comically loaded Cowboys and Niners teams and later the Greatest Show on Turf. He had some pretty good weapons at times, but nothing compared to Rodgers. While there were immediately players questioning Rodgers aloof leadership, Favre recruited Reggie White and mostly had John Madden and everyone drooling over everything he ever did.
While we can criticize a lot of that in retrospect, by no objective standard can it be stated that Rodgers passed Favre. The median fan happiness and approval rating of the team for Brett's tenure was higher.
NFL players are grossly under compensated across the board, regardless of position. I understand the 16 game season/55 roster spots vs. 162/25 man rosters or 82 games vs. 15 roster spots but you can't tell me, that with all the money the NFL is making, that NFL players have the lowest median salaries of the four major sports.
Heck, the NHL has a higher average salary of 3.5m while the NFL's is only $860,00. And don't get me started on the non-guaranteed contracts. I'd love to see a breakdown of the discrepancy between what NFL owners take home in comparison to the players vs all the other major American team sports.
You need to work on your math skills. One of the things is people really overestimate the difference in revenue due to fewer games.
Sure the NFL seems super dominant, and its TV numbers contract reflect that. But in total revenue it is only double the NHL.
Is that the perception the sports media gives you on the strength of the relative leagues? No. because the sports media cares about what gets the absolute highest rating for a segment, not the relative strength.
It also leads to all the idiocy about shrinking the NBA season.
Anyway the NHL makes ~$8.15 million/player before any costs. The NFL makes ~$3.5 million/player.
So over double. To match the NHL average there would literally not be any other money for anything else.
Meanwhile the top NFL quarterbacks make ~$50 million/year, the top NHL players make ~12 million/year.
So the NFL both has less than half the money per player, and A LOT more spent on their stars. It is pretty simple math.