Post
by Duke of Hazards » Mon Feb 12, 2018 12:46 pm
I wrote a rebuttal, but then re-read your post. Yes, it is very difficult. No, it's not impossible. I don't think anyone said that it is. I would qualify your statement and say that is is extremely difficult to win multiple times. Odds are that any of these super talented dudes are going to peak at the right time, possibly while others are having a slump, and pull off a win.
Ted Potter Jr is an extremely good golfer by any standard measure, but he'll likely retire with just a few PGA Tour wins. Same as all the other Ted Potters.
I really don't know for sure what separates the 'elites' from the Teds. I used to think that it was a mental edge, toughness, what have you, or that they were accustomed to winning and had fostered some sort of destiny/belief system in their ego from a young age.
A brief glance at Ted Potter Jr.'s wikipedia doesn't bear all of this out. He has the same story as anyone else on the PGA Tour, dad is a pro at at golf course, Ted picked up the game at an early age, dominated all through childhood and high school. So the guy won a lot at golf before he even jumped to the pros. Was it his talent or his mental edge that got him there? Both? Is Dustin Johnson just that much better? How much is talent and how much is mental? I've seen most of these dudes crumble on the Sunday back 9 (DJ included), so I think a lot of the time it is just sheer talent. Are Tiger (and Nicklaus, and Michael Jordan and Roger Federer) etc just once in a generation phenomenons then?
Focus seems to be a thing, I think. The ability to maintain it, intensely and specifically, without fail, for a long duration of time. The capacity to perform for an extended period, in (as hackeyed as it sounds) 'the zone', without slipping out of it due to mental exhaustion. Maybe that's the 'mental' aspect that only few possess. Brain stamina.
Bluto did it