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At the start of 2019, GGP introduced a new department. My colleague John Hopkins suggested it, and the concept was for a writer to create each week an essay that dealt with golf-related subjects in ways that were insightful and fun. Smart and succinct, too. After birthing that very good idea, Hopkins christened it The Divot. He offered no reason for selecting that appellation, and no one asked him for one. It just seemed to fit.
Upon publication of today’s issue, we now have produced 48 Divots. There have been odes to hats and sand, and tomes on T-shirts and club drinks as well as kilties and alligators. But one thing we have never given you, dear Divotees, is a dissertation on divots themselves. Until now.
The history of the word is hazy, but most etymologists agree its roots are Scottish and likely go back to the mid-1500s. It appears that divot initially referred to a piece of sod that was cut out of the ground and then arrayed on the roof of a house to keep out rain, sleet and sun. Soon after, the word came to be used to describe the piece of turf a golfer produced while hitting a shot. Which means that divots have been a part of the game from the very beginning.
In golf, divots can be both good and bad. Those that are shallow and slender often are indicative of a good shot. But those made by bad swings can be as deep as gorges and so sharply and mind-bogglingly angled as to be nearly perpendicular to the preferred line to the hole.
Divots also have a way of revealing a lot about an individual’s golf DNA. In addition to giving a sense of one’s skills and handicap index, they can tell whether a golfer is a digger or a sweeper, or has a habit of coming over the top. PGA professionals rely on divots when they analyze their students’ swings, and they help club fitters figure out if lies and lofts are right.
In addition, divots have been endowed with some wonderful nicknames, and not all of those are complimentary. Bacon strips, beaver pelts and pork chops are but a few. Toupees and rugs as well. Some players call them dead cats. But as much as that term makes me chortle at the thought of a practice ground littered with ugly chunks of turf, it is not one I can use at home, given how warmly my wife and daughters feel about felines.
I have now discovered that divots are fun to write about, too.
John Steinbreder