@@koreydeiter9808 I wouldn't say as important. It is boring to watch open courses, boring to play, damaging to the body and just... bad. Watching Isaac carve the woods is INFINITELY more interesting than Barela throwing 600ft on an open ball golf fairway.
Until we have courses designed with pro play in mind, I think we just need to do what it takes so that we're not seeing 3-day scores of -36+ (or minus, technically).
@@ClarkPotter part of the scoring issue is the par assigned to the hole. If par was adjusted we would not see the -36 and so on. There is a lot of info on this from some of the best course designers. If you have a fairly open 1100' par 5 and pros, on average, are throwing 500'+, then the par needs to be 4 not 5. After playing this sporting for almost 40 years, I see this as the biggest mistake in design. I remember when you had artificial ob and mandos, that was poor course design. Now it's the "pro level" course norm. I respect Big Jerm's opinion. He has earned it.
@samdoss1736 I hear what you're saying. In my opinion making artificial OB on EVERY single hole does not speed up the pace of play. In some cases it would. But in general it's overkill. I love island holes even if it's just a made up island. But I want to see more scrambling from where it lies. Rollers out of the woods to get out and shit like that.
Look at how puny pro disc golfers, especially female, look. Pro disc golfers should have the physiques of pro soccer players, or sturdier. Most of these players are friggin' twigs. Maybe we'll be regarded as a real sport when our elite athletes LOOK like elite athletes. Right now, they're indistinguishable from pro billiards players. I think 3/4 accuracy and 1/4 distance would be good.
@@ClarkPotter He is not saying either/or. Disc golf should be MORE about accuracy than distance, and I 100% agree. There should be more complicated lines/harder shots than just pure distance. I agree that distance is absolutely required but I think it's way more focus on distance today than hard/complicated lines/accuracy imo.
Having designed and installed over 20 DGCs, which receive 1/3rd of all the rounds played in NZ, I can tell you that the best design strategy is always to Reward and Encourage players, and never to Punish or Discourage them. This is what makes disc golfers return again and again, and this applies to all levels of golfer. We define two types of courses: Community Courses and Destination courses, and we define them very specifically. Most importantly, installing Destination Courses before you have a bunch of Community Courses actually damages both the game and the sport, by losing the ones who do give it a go, and reject it because of bad course design.
I saved up, and quit my job in 2019 to tour for a full year. I played everything except Ledgestone and Worlds. Man. I have to tell you Jerm nailed this take. When I played that year, we also had San Francisco and let me tell you, even with a cart on a golf course it was basically DLGO minus 30ft of elevation. I can attest to my body being beaten up just in that one year. Tons of hills, some really ROUGH roughs and tons of artificial OB. I have yet to play in Europe, but plan on it someday. Those courses are just all so top notch and getting better every year!
The reason there's more longer, open courses is because the DGPT sold us out. DGPT needs spectators that pay money and they can't fit enough people in our classic woodsy courses. I'm surprised nobody is saying this.
I worked for the DGPT a couple years ago. What you said here is exactly correct. They are losing money handover fist and the only way to subsidize it is to charge more money per ticket or make courses more open where more people can watch. The problem is, they’ve done both of those. Now courses are boring to watch and too expensive to go to. It is the absolute perfect equation they put together themselves, that when added up, is destroying the disc golf spectator experience altogether.
I can't disagree, but do want to note that a major part of the growth of any sport is to have a major spectator following. Problem with our sport is that you can't just build a big seating stadium around it. The point of the DGPT specifically is to grow spectator quality of the sport. I agree that most courses should not be built for a spectator experience, but a few on tour that are is not a problem to me. It allows an experience to view the game, played by the best in the world, from a perspective most of us will never get to. No one in my local courses is blasting a 600' bomb on a line. The focus of the sport as a whole should not be this I agree, but the the Pro Tour focusing on a spectator experience is not a problem. And I agree the tickets are pricey, but the cheaper they are, the more people try to get them and they'll hit a capacity and people who wanted to won't be able to go anyways. I feel for the poor guys playing, but pushing the limits of the human body has always been a part of elite sports. Having other quality hype, reward, and coverage of other events where the older guys, or those not smashing 700 footers can shine would certainly help with the issue as a whole.
GMC and Maple Hill are my favorite courses to watch. I also got a chance to play both of them. It was surreal to play iconic courses I've seen on Jomez. I feel like those courses don't just reward the bombers. Matty O's run last year was magical.
Maple Hill is excellent. I love how they have 5 core layouts for different skill levels. I don’t have the arm to play 9 on Gold, but the White tee was perfect for me. Really fun shot.
Yes I agree, those courses are special. I also miss the Delavega course (not the golf course variant). My view is: to be a classic disc golf champion, you should have won at Delavega during your career.
I think it's still because of the fact that overseas, in Europe, they look at and treat disc golf as a legitimate, real SPORT, and they aren't trying so hard to BE ball golf. In America, there is too much of a negative stigma with disc golf and the TYPE of people who play it, the majority of the population (not just the disc golf population, but the population in general) doesn't take it seriously and still only sees it and treats it as a "hippie, stoner" hobby so the nuances that European disc golf has that makes it so beautiful and fun to play and watch just aren't here necessarily. Europe also has more dedicated disc golf courses, that is what we need here. I know it's easier said than done, but people/organizations/companies need to start building disc golf specific courses instead of working around ball golf courses, public park courses, etc etc. That's just my opinion.
I've got no idea where you live but I'm from Wisconsin, I've and hour away from 8 courses that could easily be on the Pro Tour, half of them are free to play, but the parks departments maintain them very well. In two weeks I'm going to Sandy Point in Lac du Flambeau, Wisconsin to stay at a literal *disc golf resort*, as I've done for almost 10 years with two of my friends. I've also played in and around Portland, Oregon - Pier Park and Hornug's Hideout are immaculate courses that would be great to watch pros attack, one more open and one very demanding wooded course. The USA has the best disc golf courses in the world. The fact of the matter is that the PDGA is fucking up. There should never been repeated courses/events on the Pro Tour from year-to-year. I've also played in and around Portland, Oregon - Pier Park and Hornug's Hideout. I've also played in and around Portland, Oregon - Pier Park and Hornug's Hideout.
@puffherb so, just because you live in an area with good courses and a good community that cares about the sport at, what seems to be, a pretty high level, then that translates to everywhere and it's just "pdga bad"? No. I'm from Texas btw, not that it even matters in this discussion. I know the US has some amazing courses. I am mainly talking about the way the people (players and non players alike) approach the game in general and as a whole over here vs in Europe. When was the last time a US player won words and was invited to the equivalent of the white house? Met with very very influential leaders? Became an icon for their entire country, not only to the disc golf community? Never. The perception, in my opinion, is what needs to change. People overseas see disc golf as a legitimate career option, and are even told it is a legitimate career option, whereas over here, it is still viewed as being played by only hippies, stoners, and drunks. The same level of professionalism isn't shown towards our sport from outside investors, sponsors, and other influential people to really make it a "mainstream sport" so to speak. Are there things that the DGPT and PDGA could be doing better, DEFINITELY. But just saying it is all their fault is a bit disingenuous and not really trying to get the thought ball rolling to maybe bring about some change for the better. It is 2024 for crying out loud, the technology is out there to be able to boost a signal high enough to have better, cleaner woods coverage. That is just one example I can think of of something they could look more into. I know there's more to it than just simply buying a signal booster and flipping it on, especially from a business standpoint, but I digress. Regardless of how much money the DGPT and PDGA are bringing in right now, they still rely HEAVILY on the local clubs, local groups, etc to talk to the cities about having permission to do "this" or "that" to some courses, the decision isn't 100% theirs and, because of the perception of the sport right now to the general masses, most cities, towns, municipalities, etc don't see a reason to invest THEIR resources into something like disc golf that won't generate THEM any revenue either. My point was simply, we need to change the stereotype perception of the average American Disc Golfer if we really want the kind of change that everyone keeps complaining about, pros and amateurs alike. Our local disc golf communities seem SOOOO GREAT to all of us that know the people involved, play with people involved in things on a regular to semi-regular basis, and thus can really skew any judgment towards a situation like this. I'm trying to look at it from a outsider perspective. Someone who maybe hasn't ever thrown or seen a disc golf disc, as someone learning about the pro tour, etc etc etc. That's all 😊. At the end of the day though, this is both just our opinions lol.
@@JIMWESTDG If you focus on stereotypes you're going to be the kind of white knight, hyper-vigilant dickhead that makes every sport less attractive. Name a sport and I'll show you "hippies" within it, hell, I'll show you far worse, the NFL is good for paying millions of dollars to complete degenerates. The reason disc golf isn't taken seriously is because it doesn't generate enough money, plain and simple. It doesn't generate enough money because disc golf isn't easy to play, has a high cost of entry to get properly sorted and there's no "right" way to play. This "hippie" bullshit you're talking about is something that might have been relevant 10 years ago but that is the last thing keeping the sport from growing. I'd say what is keeping the sport from growing are the top players themselves, they're really a bunch of unmarketable, brain-dead morons - they're not drugged out losers, they're just idiots. The only professional disc golfer that does commentary about the sport and doesn't sound like a complete simpleton is Nate Sexton.
Where do you live that there's a stigma around disc golf? Yeah, it kinda has the prestige level short of bowling atm, but "stigma" is going a bit far, don't you think?
@@JIMWESTDGRead your second comment and I see where you're coming from. Remember that disc golf courses and players are rising at ~14% annually, iirc. Look at the (albeit early) exponential takeoff of prize funds, too. The sport doubles in popularity every 5 years. I think we're just early on the curve is all. It's the sort of discussion you're prompting that drives the growth engine here, tho, so thanks for that.
everyone needs to stop saying its divisive. show me proof its “divisive” its not. its 90%+ players and fans that want wooded courses to be the norm not the exception.
This is why Idlewild is one of the best courses on tour, despite being one of the shortest courses they play all year. It has a great mix of every single shot required by disc golfers.
For me, it doesn't have to be woods golf, as long as there are strategic trees. Some of those European courses weren't necessarily woods courses, but the holes were always interesting, because they are always thoughtful how they use the trees that are there. A hole can be interesting, even with just a few trees. What I don't like are those wide open golf holes like #1 on Emporia. That's boring.
It’s a fact of life Jerm, sports get tougher and more demanding and the young guns take over for the old guard. I personally like seeing all the new talent coming on.
hopefully big jerm can be the voice for us when he retires. i think he'd due well on the pdga board addressing these issues. all you gotta do is run jerm, we'll vote for you.
The expense of traveling to Europe should be a part of this discussion. It's just a fact. This fact underscores the attraction that Americans feel towards these exotic European events. So now, let's look again at the dozens of amazing courses in the US that just happen to be off the beaten track. These courses aren't considered for Q series or Elite series because they are located in the boondocks. However: the time and expense of traveling to a remote Montana venue or a remote Idaho venue may not be as severe as traveling to Europe. The time and expense might be commensurate. So we Americans may, in fact, have the solution at our fingertips. Getting away from the tradition of a DGLO or Ledgestone might lead us to a new and exciting path of disc golf in America. Thinking outside the box should be what disc golfers are good at. Let's use this skill to elevate our amazing sport.
I agree, I'd love to see some courses in other, more remote places, but don't take away events like DGLO. I know, you're going to jump down my throat. I want to say this: Kensington Toboggan is not the only course there. The Amateurs play the neighbor courses like Black Locust. Why not pivot and move DGLO there? Plenty of woods. Plenty of opportunities for shot shaping and not just the big distance shots. And yes, I've been to both places, caddying for my husband.
As a European fan I would of course love more opportunities to see the stars, 99% of whom are from the U.S. 'cause the sport is still in its infancy. But also I would absolutely LOVE to get to come over one day and see one of the legendary courses. The added attraction of travelling (or not being able to, which ever angle you want to look at it from) is definitely a factor.
@njohnson005 C.R.E.A.M. What you seem to fail to recognize is that the cost of travel to Europe is offset by the amount of $ they make at the events and that type of money is just impossible to make at these courses in "the boondocks" here in The States that you're refering to.
As someone who plays and watches both golf and disc golf I want technical, narrow and challenging courses to be the main features of pro tour events. A mix of open and long and short and technical leaning towards more short and technical would be the best move for disc golf. If camera angles and videography are the issue then we need to sit down and create a solution to that specific problem instead of taking the easy way out and sticking it on long open courses for filming ease. A few of those are fine but not everything should be about throw 550 knock a putt down that gets old after 3rounds.
Regarding those 900’ wooded par 4s, this is where the psychology of par kicks in. Would Jerm have a problem if they were par 5s and a few players would have their risky/perfect play rewarded with an eagle? In terms of total strokes, nothing changes. The only variable is the mindset of the player throwing the hole.
The more I watch tourneys, and listen to players via podcasts, I notice how fragile the professional disc golf ego is. Every hole should just be labeled par threes, and scores just recorded as totals instead of relative to par.
Courses are becoming too open it’s boring to watch woods disc golfing for sure is the best. I’ve stopped watching last year just because I’m tired of seeing players throw shots in open fields. The only tournaments I watch is Great Lakes at toboggan because it’s a course that has that old school challenging woods play with the distance.
Very much the argument that Lance Armstrong had: If you want to be competitive, you have to hurt yourself and everyone else. Telling a pro that they don't have to throw that hard if they don't want to (bu you do if you want to win) is ridiculous.
Absolutely spot on. Traditional golf has made the same mistake. Distance has become the greatest thing you need to play golf and it was never set up that way. It should be based on accuracy and ability to shoot different types of shots.
Krokhol also was the most fun to watch. Ivy, and the rest of the golf courses played on tour is painful to watch on screen. Maybe in person it feels cool, but watching onlinne is brutal. I hated Ivy and found myslef watching in 2x speed just to get through it.
The parallels of U.S. Disc Golf and the U.S. Gravel Cycling scene are similar. You have to have the right combination of Strength, Strategy and Luck to win.
Agreed, wooded courses are more fun to play and watch! I may be biased as my max distence is 400 but hitting a tight line in the woods is so much more rewarding vs throwing to a landing zone.
The Regulator in Burlington, NC is a brand new course that is almost all woods. Even though It’s one of the longest courses out there, it was designed with FPO specifically in mind so it’s way more technical than distance friendly. The USWDGC was played there in 2023 and I talked to several FPO players that raved about the course and how it’s the way disc golf should be played. Specifically, Hailey King told me it’s her favorite course she’s ever played a tournament on and she wishes that the women’s championship would be held there every year.
I`d like to see more courses similar to BRP in Michigan being played on tour. Super technical, tough and challenging but at the end of the day fun for all who played it. They have the ability to design more courses in existence to meet the goals of everyone without killing the players.
I was taught, when my dad had the keys to the baskets at Eldorado park in Long Beach. 3 short, 3 medium and 3 long front and back. Keeps things fair for everyone
As a (an?) S&C trainer, I'm a huge proponent of protecting an athlete's body with gym-work. Disc golf is absolutely a hugely strenuous activity particularly off the tee. On the bomber courses, the shots off the tee can be considered near max-effort lifts, similar to max-effort jumping, many, many times a day. I don't believe the answer is necessarily to decrease the length of the holes - why not go the other way? Take disc golf with the seriousness it deserves, and create a training culture like what exists with any other professional sport. With strength and conditioning, among other things (proper nutrition and adequate sleep being some other major factors), the boundaries as to what people consider the current limits of hole-distance, as well as player longevity, are there to be pushed. I think the importance of having both massive courses AND beautifully wooded courses on the pro tour can't be overstated. Discounting one at the cost of the other detracts elements of the sport for no great gain, and only cost. And the arguement against long-bombing courses because many holes require a certain distance threshold to achieve a birdie is like suggesting the NBA should lower the height of the basketball rings to 8ft because I can't jump but MJ/Lebron can fly. Let's play the same height ring, and have courses the same insane distances, even if only to appreciate just how great the ATHLETES are that can achieve such feats.
I agree that tee shots are strenuous and can be considered near max-effort lifts. But full power shots being treated as near max effort lifts would dictate full power shots being performed *less* often, no? Pro disc golfers put in five or six rounds a week on these long courses. Fifteen full power shots per round times five rounds is 75 reps a week. Starting Strength programs 120 (near max effort) reps a week. So pro disc golfers are already over 1/2 of a complete strength program number of max efforts on the course alone. Adding a complete strength training program reps onto their course reps would be over 60% more reps than a complete strength program--a herculean feat, without even accounting for the travel requirements and the almost complete absence of recovery that specifically renders this regimen impossible. I'd argue that pro disc golfers are already more than aware of the importance of gym work, nutrition, and sleep. In fact I wouldn't be surprised if they were *better* at juggling these requirements into their schedule than many other pro athletes. Due to having less money, pro disc golfers have to take into account efficiency and opportunity cost when investing, while richer pro athletes and the systems around them can better afford to indiscriminately spam performance enhancers. For example an nba player with a personal chef and furnished flight itineraries can more easily implement a 3x/week workout program or 1x/day meditation session than a pro disc golfer who has to drive his van to the next course and ration out a stash of beef jerky, dried fruit, and crackers.
@@SildarHazelshade Money is definitely a big consideration. I'd hope that athlete sponsors would be happy to include a S&C requirement / component that they'd pay for as part of the contract, but I don't know how likely or possible this is. From a S&C standpoint, 5 rounds is likely is the minimum for what pro disc golfers do week in, week out. I'm not sure what "starting strength program" means exactly, but even according that, it's still a starting strength program. Athletes should be able to handle a signficantly higher load than a starter strength program. Think about NBA athletes again. They'll do 6-7 days a week of intense S&C in the gym, plus 4-5 days of on court team training, then between 4-5 days of their own skills training. How many max effort jumps, sprints, etc. do you think they'd do? I'd wager at least as much, but highly likely significantly more than pro disc golf athletes. again, your point about money is well received - although that needs to be a discussion between the athlete and the business they play for. My point is that disc golfers don't undergo a mind-bending amount of stress on their bodies MORE than other athletic professions - it'd probably be roughly comparable, and those other professions also add a SERIOUS amount of gym-work in addition to the demands of their training and playing. I'm sure there are a number of players taking their S&C seriously, but it isn't a widespread culture in the sport. It's been widely recognised that high-quality S&C significantly reduces injury risk in nearly any population, and the professional disc golf population is primed for it.
I like when there is a good mix of shots in a tournament. All distance in open fields is boring, but so is all woods, especially with places like Nevin and other tightly wooded courses where there just seems to be so much more luck involved. I do concede that it's all easier said than done considering that what some people criticize, others will argue to the contrary. Overall, I think as long as concerns/criticisms/thoughts which the vast majority of players and viewers have a consesus towards are being heard and work is done to address it, then things are headed in the right direction. I don't expect any course to be perfect, but I do expect that their be iterative improvements. For example, I would hope that hole ?14? (the one with the ridiculously difficult birdie with the steep green with a high chance of roll away) at Ivy would be redesigned to be more interesting, at least from the perspective of having it be an honest challenge rather than a roll of the dice. But then again, I'm not certain my opinion about the hole is something that is widely agreed upon. Perhaps it's worth polling players and viewers to determine.
With a combo of forehands and backhands, at say 50-60 throws per round, for 3-4 rounds, its getting similar to starting the same pitcher back to back days. Especially for these guys that wanna birdie everything that have baseball-ish exit velo and speed. Injuries and surgeries will be more common, not like they arent already.
Bring a winter series and glow tournaments. Let’s see what the pros really got in the woods at night in the winter. Maine style. Quit your sniveling just play get paid and have fun.
I totally understand what you're talking about, but I would have to say that the nature of sports is the same. The more popular the sport becomes the more challenging the game becomes and then the more technical and difficult the courses become.
Funny thing about DGLO is that Michigan is mostly flat and the best courses in Michigan are beautifully wooded with only gentle slopes. Maybe MVP (also based in Michigan) would do a better job with course choices here and it could become the MGLO.
Come down to Ingleside, TX and play our Live Oak Gold Course. Very technical course. Par 65, but not a big bomber course, except for maybe two or three holes. Uli has made his way down here years ago, Ezra A. won a B-Tier down here the year he started his tour life. Awesome course next to the beach.
I agree that wooded disc golf is fun, but as a spectator, I don’t think anything is as fun as seeing bombers bomb. Especially in person. On tv I kind of get that shot shaping might be more fun to watch, but man it’s so awesome to see someone throw 500+, especially if it’s on a hole you play all the time and have never dreamed of getting to in 1 shot lol
The hole that Jerm described at New London sounds like the perfect disc golf hole. Challenged on distance, challenged on a long narrow fairway, and challenged on angle control from the beginning of the flight to the end of the flight. Not to mention the specific landing zones that course made the players hit. Jerms question sums it up best when he asked how many challenging aspects are we expected to overcome before it's enough? My thoughts are, you're the top athletes in the sport and many more young committed, and talented athletes are coming up, you should be expected to overcome any and all challenges that is presented to you. We should have courses that challenge the top players in the sport and not design courses catering to the middle or bottom end of the division. With that said, distance should be a component tested but not the only aspect tested. Wide open, massive hyzer shots over and over get boring. All shot angles should be tested as well as controling the disc angles further down the fairway. Maybe the sport isn't at the right place to put that much stress and challenge on yhe athletes but hopefully sometime in the future it will be. On a side topic, i wonder what implementing the bunker rule more would do with play style? You land OB, you have to throw from previous lie without a penalty stroke. That would put a premium on accuracy, make huge pushing shots more risky, but there would still be a benefit if you could pull the big shot off. I feel like that could open up more strategic plays based on different skill sets, and seeing different players attacking the course differently.
Quick question about training regimen for pros… Pro baseball pitchers throw 80-100 pitches per game, full send almost every throw, and get a 3 to 5-day break to rest their arm. Do we know if any DGPT players approach their training regimen like baseball pitchers or other pro athletes do so that they can sustain themselves longer? I know that not every throw in disc golf is full-send. But if we want the sport to grow, should we expect that kind of training regimen from our pros? This would need to come with medical and training staff like other professional sports which would increases costs, and players can’t afford that, so the DGPT or sponsors or someone else would have to pick up that cost. It just seems like if the pros want to be pros and grow the sport, then they need to have this level of commitment as well as the support to go with it. I look forward to the replies. Happy throwing everyone!
I would love to see a course where some world-class players go “lets take every shot in our bag, and try to make it as hard as possible to choose between 2-4 of them (ie, power putter turnover vs smooth midrange turnover vs fairway driver forehand), and make 18 holes of “gosh this shot is tricky, do I throw X or Y? Do I get aggressive or safe? When do I want to throw far and when do I need to be smooth?” Ideally, there would be 3-6 holes where you’re really needing to go for a lot of distance, 6-9 more where more power is advantageous but not essential (ie tighter green that favors a midrange over a fairway to get less fade but not short enough to make the mid an obvious choice) and then the final 6-9 are purely about throwing different shapes. The aggression on this final set of holes is more “how close do you want to get to that tree” than “how much distance can you bite off” because the hole is only 325’ but it’s 100’ hard right after the aforementioned tree. I absolutely love throwing hard and having an advantage with distance, as that is the strength of my game going against other ams (especially clubbing down to negate fade and skip when others are worried about it) but I totally understand the pros wanting to throw 500’+ less often to protect their bodies. Spectator stuff gets tricky tho and idk anything about that
I can’t speak for europe but in the US, it’s all about monetizing the small number of fans for every dollar they can. You want the cheapest ticket to watch a round? It’s like $30. I fully understand many people can easily afford that, but it’s a little too much for someone only casually interested in the sport.
Bro literally every GA ticket for a live round is under 30$. DGN is also less than 30$ a month. No shit Europe Isn't as concerned about making money right now because they have no stakes in it. The Pro Tour owns all the events we're watching so the only company at risk here is a US company. Obviously they will be more focused on making money because they have to survive.
This is so true that jerm is bringing up, I would hate to see like half the field injured and not be able to play. Also about ob everyware is very boring to watch when somone have a bad break and just get penelty for it, natural ob should be a factor as well. Last but not least, as a european and actually having "ymer" as my home cours, its an honor that you hilight it with the nr 1 course in the world man 😍, and also bringing up about our commitment to the sport 🙂 we will welcome you guys and girls from the states next year as well 😊😁
There needs to be a more space in between events. Especially majors. A week off before and after majors I think would be a great start for touring pros.
Agreed. Emporia bores the hell out of me. It opens with that dull-as-bricks 1000’ hole and doesn’t get much better from there (except for the island hole).
I agree with Jerm… the PDGA Tour could (should?) be more like NASCAR… not every track is a Super-Speedway. Short, challenging courses with tight landing zones can be VERY interesting to watch… short-technical courses are cool. Add in smaller baskets that brings accurate putting into the mix and THAT would make for a different, exciting challenge.
Yes however, people complain about birdie or die courses, yet Jerm is complaining about courses being punishing, I stand by the statement that distance is a skill, learn it.
I love what’s happening! Post coverage is alright, but to me live coverage is super fun! And if they gotta switch it up then whatever. And also when I’m watching pros nowadays I know I would get absolutely smoked! Which is rad too.
Mostly agree. I want distance to be an important skill set for players to have. But it doesn’t need to be tested hole after hole after hole, tournament after tournament. I think about a tournament like Portland Open, which has awesome holes. But at the same time, if we already have four or five 450-500 foot par 3’s, do we also need like 6 long par 4’s and 4 long par 5’s? Probably not. I like that winning on tour requires elite distance, but you don’t need to test that once skill over and over and over again
Here's the problem with Jerm's line of thinking... I don't disagree with any particular point exactly, there's alot of decent points he makes taken at face value... however if we take the sport back to the call it "300ft par 3 days" which would save bodies and reduce injuries and be 'more fun to play' which he always seems to hark back to, there is no more spectacle aspect of pro disc golf. Every course you play that is even a hard course for a random casual that's 300fters all course has its local guys and local tournaments who can shoot that course to absurdly low scores. Is every random good player at your local course now pro tour caliber? Should they all be on tour? Of course not, but that's where the sport had to go in difficulty, in distance, all that in order to create a reason for there to be and continue to be a pro tour to begin with. The casual who can shoot under par on their local course isn't on the PGA tour, and shouldn't be on the PDGA tour either. If there's too much a sense of "when I play that course I'm cashing this tournament" / "I can do this and beat half this field" you've lost the reason the tour should exist at all and the pro field would literally be like 10+ million people instead of a few hundred. That's not viable and that wouldn't capture viewership or sponsors. Does every course have to be a bomber golf course or Northwood black to challenge these guys? No...but if you want to challenge a field of athletes who possess such skills, the only thing you can do is smaller gaps, more distance, more obstacles, shapes that discs don't fly and more punishment. And if you listen to alot of the pros making content thats what they want too, they critique hole design that's too luck based very harshly and always want a "pure" line to the basket. They want to reduce the luck factor to the lowest possible amount which basically means if you're off fairway or throw one bad shot, you might as well give up. I don't necessarily agree with that, since I believe some holes are meant to be survived instead of scored on, but that's what they want. Jerm also wants consistently to be able to save holes when you do something bad (forget his feelings on the European Open Beast Island hole which he wants to ruin players' rounds), be that with various OB rules or drop zones inside C2, which is not the general consensus among tour players it would seem, and if you ask me the punishment should be high with no easy drop zones ever, and nothing inside 100ft on general principle because these players are so good. Maybe that's different for FPO but MPO absolutely because the 'putting range' for these guys is stupid. It's very hard to balance this for the midfield or bottom tier pro player without making things too easy and almost boringly casual to watch for the top tier, but generally you should steer in pro sports for the upper third / upper quartile, not the people barely cashing. But if you think people are showing up to watch AB or Simon or Eagle etc and aren't thinking about the spectacle of disc golf, you are just wrong. I think the quarter mile par 5s can be a bit much, and having entire courses with nothing but bombs can get taxing to play I have no doubt, but the goal should be to find the balance in course design and for the creators of the tour to be able to balance those against each other to help players which to me the Silver Series and "off tour" stops honestly accomplished really well...and then realistically personal responsibility on the players' side to give your body the rest it needs and maybe not practice as much as you possibly can fit in or not play every event even though financially that may be less viable, that will aid your career in the long run. Most of what these tour veterans are looking for in European courses is not having played them a million times over and over, which when you look at the American side that's all they do, play the same 20-25 courses over and over with small changes and I can see how that gets fairly boring over the years and you look at guys like McBeth who seem to relish in getting outside of that routine, and I think alot of the tour veterans should try to follow in those steps.
i think its good that distance is one part of the challange that those who play discgolf at the highest tier need to handle, but i feel watching the same shot over and over bombed around makes the sport monotom, and repeateable. I feel people who play at highest lvl, should master the challanges the different courses, if its a placement shot for first, and then a secound bomb or challange to get to a bucket for a pair 4. If you always gonna have edge of throwing far, yeah its great,, but its not what i feel atleast is good to look at, i like to see the different utility and scrambles that a course design makes for the players. And im happy for the players if they find courses that is challenging and fun to, not just seeing players complain about the repeateable golf course ghost, where u dont get penetalized of not having controll of the shot, as long as u can bomb far, u will always have a edge. Its all a part of mastering different shot shapes and navigating the terrain and obstacles. And playing as team with what you see and imagination of what your prefeered shot should be to reach the basket. And thats atleast what makes the discgolf fun to watch for me, and to play. To have a satisfaction of mastering the shot shape and get rewarded if you did what you planned and executed it perfect. Not only watching how someone repeatedly outdrived you by 80-100 feet on a totally open field, where u have no big need to show controll of your drive. Its kind of like the difference between a dragrace and a formula 1 driver. both great and fun to experience,, and its something that needs different types of skill to manage and be the best in. But now in discgolf, the dragracer would benefit the most since most of the driving isnt about driving skill anymore, but raw american Horsepower. And you see this in many of the sports and interessts in US, compared in Europe as an example. Its alot of history and different tought of what you aim for and honor and whats traditionally praised in the population and accepted to be manly and social acceptable as a man to do as a sport.
Injuries and “getting the body beat up” lands on the athletes. Keeping the body healthy via proper functional resistance training. Proper off season recovery and rehabilitation. Constant body mechanics work. Injury prevention is 100% achievable. First thing is these players NEED to start learning a proper warm-up and cooldown during rounds. Before anyone call me out on this. I am a strength and conditioning coach and a movement specialist.
You bring up great points! It made me think of the following: (Tiger Woods’ fused back has entered the chat 💬) (Tommy John’s arm/elbow has entered the chat 💬 ) (Tua’s brain 🧠 has entered the 💬 ) I personally believe they did the work and prep to prevent in state of the art ways. (Lebron James also enters the chat 💬 to offset my take/point the above). Meaning it’s complicated. I don’t have the answers. But can see the bind and dissonance here. I liked what Jerm said that you need to play 6-7 rounds a week to really get dialed in at a course to take it down. Which is more than ball golf…and you throw more disc golf pitches ⚾️ than your baseball ⚾️ counterparts. With days of rest in between….they get a rest advantage vs 6-7 days of “pitching”. I wish I had an answer too. It’s an economics and actuarial exercise.
Ive said multiple times, put back more tight wooded courses on tour and guys like Marwede and Pres would win much more often. It's tough to balance, but with proctor winning tournaments at two tight woodsy courses, it's showing that technicality is still very much required to win certain events, but with courses like dglo you're missing out on such vital shot shapes that test all players abilities, and so players with big backhand abilities like AB, Simon, Calvin, Isaac, and Gannon win constantly. Id say Gannon and Simon definitely have some woods skill too, but not to the effect guys like Casey white and Joey Anderson have.
Oh yeah, I love disc golf, and I recently took a road trip to play many the great courses in the US. However what I learned was to stay away from the pro courses. Just not really fun, not enough trees, not enough fun shot shapes, too many bomber holes. Occasionally sure. But it was rare that I wanted that type of course.
Seeing the guys bomb it is fun to watch, but woods golf will always be inherently more interesting. Create more artifical gaps on the more open courses rather than just having a 500ft requirement for distance. Jerm has a great point in that the tour season is long and the longer courses get the more players will get injured or sit out events.
The argument that wood = bad coverage is wrong. Speaking as one knowing the specific equipment used by the DGN and working fot a company that actually make equipment that solves that problem. The problem with quality coverage streams in woods is not hard to solve by DGN if they want to...
I have filmed in wooded courses like Brewster and Northwood which were both impossible to get any reception. Doesn't mean that they can't get good reception but its not cheap and easy
the TOUR should maybe just show Live coverage for the Final Round of each event for the next couple of years to save $$ so they can purchase the type of gear they need to broadcast LIVE on wooded courses the way they would like . I love designing courses. I really like city park type courses that have most of the features that they look for. I just laid out a course here in my town that is 6,000 feet in length and is very challenging for even MA1 players and local MPO players as well as for MA4 players to. The longest hole ( 18 ) is 625 feet Par 4 for MPO + MA1 + MA2...and it's Par 5 for MA3 + MA4 players. that's the longest hole, and Hole #3 is the shortest hole at 225 feet. It has a nice mix of making people try different shot shapes
That simply isn't true no matter what way you look at it. A 900 foot hole not only allows for more challenges like mandos or guardian trees, it also gives you a longer fairway which means there is more chance to go out of the fairway. Look at scoring distributions for the roughly 300ft holes on tour. With few exceptions, they are extremely skewed to birdies.
I believe this game should be more similar to golf as far as teeing off. A tee pad in golf means you set the ball up onto a tee so you can get more distance on your drive. A disc golf tee pad means you can get a running start to get more distance on your drive. After the tee pad, I believe every shot should be taken standing at your mark instead of getting to run up again, just like you cannot tee up your golf ball for each shot. This will eliminate most foot faults which most aren't enforced anyway. The step putt should also be eliminated no matter what circle your lie is in.
good, we need the older elite players to be weeded out and phased out of the pro tour. they just cant hang any more with the new ability and talent of the young guys. the old guys just need to swallow their pride and move over to Masters division if they cant hang with the pro tour anymore.
It isn't about being older. The older guys know what they're into. It's about what challenges are being provided. Bomber courses are stupid and are only popular because technical courses can't be filmed as well. Naturally aging players will bow out, but this is about something altogether different.
if the only option i had was pro tour courses i wouldn't even play DG anymore. give me a 5-6K ' wooded course with a little elevation change and NO 10' elevated baskets and i am a happy camper.
Par 4s and 5s are great, but it is poor design if it is just distance that makes them difficult. Accuracy, control, disc knowledge, shaping shots and precise power should be the what raises the difficulty, imo.
Isn't this why most athletes in other sports retire before 40? It doesn't make any sense to make courses less demanding to accommodate the older/fragile players... There's a reason only a few can do what the winners do. If you want purses to grow to millions, you have to keep raising the challenge. If you want top earners to make 100k per year, then sure make the courses easier and sustain the career of the player, but the sport will plateau in growth; if you want to earn ball golf money, then courses will have to challenge and filter out the weak. This is like an older NBA player saying games should be shorter cuz the 40 year olds are getting injured after fatigue. MP40 Jerm.
I don't think Jerm wants courses easier. He just wants less emphasis on having insanely long holes for the majority of the course and a bit more focus on more technical holes that aren't as long. You get a challenge with less physical strain on the body.
It seems some pros in discgolf don't understand that they are supposed to be athletes. If you want to prevent injuries and maximize your potential you need to train 6 days a week. The mentality in discgolf is what is causing injuries. Young guys who are ridiculously explosive and no one stepping in to teach them how to take care of their bodies. Simon Lizotte would not be a 70mph thrower only today if someone guided him to be a strong athlete. He burned out his body early. Knee and elbow shot. 10mph gone. Get your shit together and create proper training programs and a culture of athleticism. Don't build courses for senior citizens. In ballgolf you can tee off ckoser to the hole if you can't handle it. So step up or move down to the smaller leauges. Don't hold the real athletes back.
Maybe have more events that are played over multiple courses in an area, instead of 4 rounds at one course. That would break up some of the monotony for the viewers, and it would give players different challenges on different days. It could be a showcase of the courses a city has. It doesn't have to be every event, but the locations where there are enough tournament-level courses within a reasonable distance would at least shake things up. Maybe have more tournaments that have different rules, like pairs or team events. Have competitions between major disc sponsors and their stable of players. Have more crossover with the women's tour. Make a concerted effort to add more courses to the rotation so that your schedule isn't always the same. In regular golf, the only major that is played at the same course is the Masters. There are a few other regular tour stops, but there are a lot of events that change courses, especially the other majors. Plenty of ideas to liven up the tour for the players, give them more options so that they feel like they can skip a tournament or two they wouldn't have and not be "penalized" in the rankings or point standings. The US has plenty of different terrain options for whatever kind of course you want to make, and a lot already exist like the ones Jerm was talking about. As an aside, I just got done watching the tournament at Toboggan. I enjoyed watching the players have to play shots out of the rough and in the trees. It felt a lot more like the kind of disc golf us normies play. It was a stark contrast to the Worlds, where there was so much OB on every hole.
I think DGLO should be a 3 day tourney. Being a local to Michigan and playing Toboggan course once/twice a year. I can't imagine doing that 4 days straight and not have your body wear out in some area.
Good points!! But name me one sport where things don't go this way. There is always this maximising of distance and players pay the price for this... We really have enough bomber courses on golf courses out there, its kinda boring. But it does not have to be this way, especially in disc golf. You can create short holes and be creative, fit it into nature perfectly where ever you want and still demand every ounce of playing skills you got. Make a course right at the cost of the sea where it's windy from all directions. Boom, you got links golf and that is a completely different game that forces you to adapt to those conditions. There is skill that uses less power but more precision, course management and shot shaping. Make it technical and creative, that is what spectators want to see. To see the players come up with ideas to solve a problem is so much fun to watch. This is why it is so great disc golf is huge in europe and it already has enriched the game, us players will want that at home thats for sure
I like having the occasional bomber hole on an otherwise precision-based course, but 900 foot par 4's and 1200 foot par 5's on wide open courses aren't that fun to watch. Jerm can sometimes be a bit of a whiner, but he's 100% right in this case. I'd also love to see big events every other week or even every 3rd week with smaller events in-between. Do it like the tennis tour: everyone schedules around majors and the best players play a few events between majors, but certainly not every week. It allows for some smaller names to win more often, too, if they don't have to beat Gannon and Calvin and AB at every event.
I do enjoy the fun courses more, but my thoughts on the toll that playing US courses takes on the body are simple. He mentions you have to get out there and practice the courses over and over. The damage comes from the practice rounds. They are throwing multiple rounds of multiple shots off every tee. This will never happen, but the solution is for the pro tour to limit the amount of time each player can spend on the course practicing and/or limit their practice rounds. No one is going to care if the players are a tiny bit less dialed in and they will all have had the same practice time so it would be fair. This should apply to any course on the pro tour regardless of design.
As European, i find watcing the US roller after roller courses very dull. I think discs are meant to fly, not roll on the ground. Yes, the rollers have their place in for example scramble game, but not as a majority of teeshots…
As a player not on tour and also an avid viewer, it is my opinion that if I have to pay a pretty decent amount of money to see Disc Golf live, I’m gonna get over that pretty quick, I would rather see post production, wooded courses with accuracy and touch, but with that said, I’m also a big fan of stick golf andwhen Disc Golf emulates that and do actually have to place a shot to make a decision on which way to attack a pin well that is also very impressive to watch so I guess what I’m getting at is having one group producing most of the Disc Golf that I am watching seems to be growing pains
Agree with 100% of this. Disc golf is not golf and we don't want it to be. Shorter wooded courses are more fun in every way. And even though I'll never play long, open tour courses anyway, I don't want to see these pros have to stop doing what they love.
as far as injuries are concerned, athletic training in disc golf needs to catch up to the demands of the sport. Every other professional player has an entire team dedicated to maintaining their tool and disc golf needs to embrace athletic training in a big way
Bro the new coal hollow park in East Peoria its literally a quarter mile walk from 5 to 6 at a 50 degree incline . You're soo gassed out and then a 50.degeee incline climbing back up from 15 to 16 its soo hard
caliber and motherlode are sweeet eruo style courses which had an a tier this year called the High Country Open. Paul the owner wants a dgpt stop. Itsin Sandpoint ID right after the portrlan d swing
Disc golf is growing in all the awesome ways you could ever possibly want The only down side is all the complaining that comes with the changes Chill out Let’s just work towards implementing work towards making it cool,fair and all the other metrics There is a reason these conversations arise…. Because people a lot op people are playing and obsessed with it Looking at the necessity of changes and improvement,should only be perceived as something that arises with growth Also,if you’ve been playing for less than 5 years……definitely chill,you don’t really understand the scope of what has happened only recently As far as courses…… Disc golf has so many opportunities to make different competitive courses It’s not as simple as “Krohkol “ I personally don’t care if the sport is on TV and people make money from it However,that is what’s happening and to accommodate all the requirements is very difficult
Hot take. I don't think every hole should be "easily" birdie-able. If we started making a lot of holes softer and we start seeing multiple multiple players every tournament shooting -15 to -18, I would be less interested in watching it. I love seeing a player stand out with an incredible shot and having 2-3 others not hit that incredible shot and aren't rewarded. An insane par through the woods with 3 bogies on the card is better to watch than 4 gimme birdies by a card. If people aren't grasping how difficult the course really is, do an Am practice round with the pros to showcase how hard it really is. I would love to see a 4 day tournament finish around -10, not -40.
Agree with this comment! Birdies should be very hard to come by in a pro event. That alone would make disc golf more interesting to watch. That is why people love the “Simon Line” so much! Risking it all for a chance at a big reward!
@@Billyraye_ Mentally a birdie does far more for confidence than a par or bogie. It would make disc golf very boring to play or watch if there was no pars.
Sounds like a lot of disc golfers are having a mid-life crisis, and “grow the sport” is backfiring in their faces. Love watching it! The difficulty is not enough until they start crying on the course. I wanna see C1 OB with a 45ft drop zone.
Love Toboggan - should every course be like that no, it films way differently than ball golf courses so clumping it in with them is misleading. What’s awesome about disc golf is variety of courses and we keep having videos like this calling for all courses to be one style. Our selling point on these events is the uniqueness of the courses. Have Toboggan let us see the pros play hills, usdgc landing zones with OB, MVP in the woods, etc.
The best course designs for both ball golf and disc golf have a variety of holes that challenge many aspects of your game in one round. Long tee shots, short tee shots, wooded holes, open holes, tough greens, easier greens, holes that favor left to right shots and others that favor right to left shots. The courses where only the furthest throwers can compete is getting a little stale on tour. As much as I love watching those huge drives, I know that the extreme length of these courses on tour is probably why I feel like I watch the 8 furthest throwing players trade spots in the final group of every single tournament I watch. What I am not a fan of is everyone trying to promote disc golf so much and in ways that negatively affect the sport. I am an avid bass fisherman and the sport of tournament bass fishing is ruining the sport in my opinion. Won't go into the details, but the desire to grow sports in the name of getting more people to know and love the sport has consequences. Mainly because it is usually about getting the tournament side of the sport more revenue. Sure, the motives are good at first. More money in the sport means more courses being designed in more areas. The courses get better because they have the funds to design the features they want vs. finding the perfect natural layouts. Then suddenly one day we are all paying $10 to play the course down the road. Perhaps we'll be making tee times as well. And then $10 per round becomes $20, and the next thing we have is ball golf which while awesome and fun to play, is CRAZY expensive and it's hard to schedule tee times without being a week out. My 6 cents anyway.
The tour sux. Can't watch it anymore. Any ball golf course or dglo so boring. What happened to the tour going to Dela in Santa Cruz the world's best and most fun course. We're going the wrong way at 100mph
I forget which course, but one of the west coast ball golf courses is solid. It’s because the designer didn’t follow the ball golf course-he used the spaces between with some key mandos. As a result, it plays kind of like a wooded course, but was great for spectators.
@erakfishfishfish you said it all. Great for cash grab spectators. Not great golf. That's Portland. We need real disc golf course, not temp ball golf layouts with 1500 ft holes. These tournaments and viewing is a scam. It shouldn't be built around how many passes they can sell or cell phone service. What a joke.There should be 200 foot holes that are wooded and tight with natural ob. There should be a range of par 3s and a few bombers. But the ball golf holes are just a distance contest and endurance fest. It's not the disc golf I fell in love with or like to watch or play.
@@JackpotMike77it’s really a lose lose situation. When pros DO play amazing and wooded courses with little cell service, EVERYONE complains. There’s no way to win
@wakimura303 why does it have to be live. When they did in the past jomez filmed it, we had awesome footage of what we needed and it was great. The live screws everything up and it's slow and not exciting anyways
Im nowhere near good at disc golf. But i see these courses and would love to play them but I'd be double bogey if not more on all these holes because I have nowhere near the arm to get the distance. But I enjoy watching the pick lines thru the wooded areas cause that's something I can do. Big lines get boring to me I guess cause I can't throw them.
This is all thanks to Jeff Spring. He has turned the increased money from disc golf into better payouts, but I think that there is still an excess of greed that exists within the US Disc Golf tour. 5 years ago I went to Beaver State Fling and only had to pay to get into the park. Now every tour event charges for every spectator to watch.
I had a similar experience with the 2018 Canadian Open. It was at Hillcrest Farm on Prince Edward Island; a denesly wooded course through rolling hills. You could wander fairly freely around the course and even mingle with the players - same in 2019, a great battle between Nate Sexton, Paul McBeth, Thomas Gilbert and Simon with the added bonus of a hurricane on Saturday. It was great. Recently I went to the Discmania Open (also on PEI) and was herded around by DGPT police, the views weren't great and the players didn't seem all that happy to be there. it convinced me never to go to another DGPT event.
I have a few comments. 1) Jerm doesn't like that every shot is driver at DGLO, but he likes Krokhol, even though Krokhol is one of the longest courses the pros played this year. 2) Courses have to evolve or else people will also merk them. We're starting to see it at the beast in finland. What used to be really hard is now much easier because the players have adapted. 3) Disc golf wants to be treated like a real sport with pay, live events, tickets, etc, but not with difficulty of courses, physical exercise/staying in shape, or acting professionally. I think it should choose one and then get on with it. Complaining about every course, or acting like DGLO represents every course on tour, is a bad look for the sport. Some courses are built differently and that's fine. 4) The same people winning is not a good argument against a certain course design. It appears that Gannon and Isaac (and Rick, AB, Calvin) are just better than the other pros at disc golf, and that's why they're winning. I can't think of a course design that Jerm would win a pro tour event on, and he complained about DGLO being a rhbh course when there are many rhfh shots on the course (13 in particular) Anyway, those are my thoughts
The rate of open courses to wooded courses is too skewed to the favor of open courses imo. Sure you can have also these open courses, but we should have several more courses like Beast, Idlewild or Northwood imo.
@@samuelsiltala119 Sounds good to me! In my opinion, people complain more about the wooded courses (except new london) than anything. Northwood black gets a lot of hate, and so does idlewild. I love them, but the pros love to hate them
The thing is that disc golf has experienced a big boom in popularity over the last several years, which is good for the sport and good for us as fans, and as such, tournaments and the courses they play on need to be able to accommodate fans for spectating. Tightly wooded courses are just not suited to allowing spectating. I like the park style courses that still have ample trees and other obstacles available to create challenging shots, but also have plenty of space for viewing. Pickard Park where they play the Des Moines challenge at comes to mind. It has challenging shots but still a lot of space for spectators.
@@Thisnameisnottakenjk I agree partly but the thing is that the wooded courses are where basically frisbeegolf started, they are the roots of frisbeegolf. It is a different challenge to throw in the woods, requires more accuracy than open courses. It is a balance, a well diversified tour should have a good ratio of wooded and open courses. It shouldn't be just about maximizing the profits and big crowds if it means the competitiveness is more one sided and less diverse.
Many courses are just so damn boring to watch in us. Especially all those ball golf courses. To me the magic of disc golf is really not in the long shots. European disc golf tournaments are nowadays much more fun to watch. Have been playing and watching disc golf for 25 years now so i feel i know also what im talking about.Totally agree with Jerm about everything,
Watching golfers shape shots is far more interesting than watching them throw standard shots as hard as they can.
This though. Like cool we get it you can throw far but being able to make technical shot is equally as important and not showcased
Infinitely more interesting
@@koreydeiter9808 I wouldn't say as important. It is boring to watch open courses, boring to play, damaging to the body and just... bad. Watching Isaac carve the woods is INFINITELY more interesting than Barela throwing 600ft on an open ball golf fairway.
@@robertkluttz8313….? I’m saying they’re both important and I 10/10 agree watching that shit is a nightmare. Technical courses are where it’s at
I like watching anything I can't do myself. Which includes 'standard' 600' bombs.
Not a fan of TOO MUCH artificial OB. Some is ok but I'd rather see someone not take a stroke and play the scramble from where it lies.
Until we have courses designed with pro play in mind, I think we just need to do what it takes so that we're not seeing 3-day scores of -36+ (or minus, technically).
@@ClarkPotter part of the scoring issue is the par assigned to the hole. If par was adjusted we would not see the -36 and so on. There is a lot of info on this from some of the best course designers. If you have a fairly open 1100' par 5 and pros, on average, are throwing 500'+, then the par needs to be 4 not 5. After playing this sporting for almost 40 years, I see this as the biggest mistake in design. I remember when you had artificial ob and mandos, that was poor course design. Now it's the "pro level" course norm. I respect Big Jerm's opinion. He has earned it.
I think the OB rules are to help speed up pace of play so people are searching for discs, stuck in the rough for too long, etc.
It’s also about pace of play which I don’t agree with but that’s the reason
@samdoss1736 I hear what you're saying. In my opinion making artificial OB on EVERY single hole does not speed up the pace of play. In some cases it would. But in general it's overkill. I love island holes even if it's just a made up island. But I want to see more scrambling from where it lies. Rollers out of the woods to get out and shit like that.
Disc golf should be more about accuracy than distance.
It's not either/or.
Look at how puny pro disc golfers, especially female, look. Pro disc golfers should have the physiques of pro soccer players, or sturdier. Most of these players are friggin' twigs.
Maybe we'll be regarded as a real sport when our elite athletes LOOK like elite athletes.
Right now, they're indistinguishable from pro billiards players.
I think 3/4 accuracy and 1/4 distance would be good.
agree, great shots dont get rewarded as much when they can make 50footers easily now. make the baskets tiny
Should be about both.
@@ClarkPotter He is not saying either/or. Disc golf should be MORE about accuracy than distance, and I 100% agree. There should be more complicated lines/harder shots than just pure distance. I agree that distance is absolutely required but I think it's way more focus on distance today than hard/complicated lines/accuracy imo.
Having designed and installed over 20 DGCs, which receive 1/3rd of all the rounds played in NZ, I can tell you that the best design strategy is always to Reward and Encourage players, and never to Punish or Discourage them.
This is what makes disc golfers return again and again, and this applies to all levels of golfer.
We define two types of courses: Community Courses and Destination courses, and we define them very specifically.
Most importantly, installing Destination Courses before you have a bunch of Community Courses actually damages both the game and the sport, by losing the ones who do give it a go, and reject it because of bad course design.
I saved up, and quit my job in 2019 to tour for a full year. I played everything except Ledgestone and Worlds. Man. I have to tell you Jerm nailed this take. When I played that year, we also had San Francisco and let me tell you, even with a cart on a golf course it was basically DLGO minus 30ft of elevation. I can attest to my body being beaten up just in that one year. Tons of hills, some really ROUGH roughs and tons of artificial OB. I have yet to play in Europe, but plan on it someday. Those courses are just all so top notch and getting better every year!
The reason there's more longer, open courses is because the DGPT sold us out. DGPT needs spectators that pay money and they can't fit enough people in our classic woodsy courses. I'm surprised nobody is saying this.
You are so correct. The courses have become a joke. My local is far better than most tour courses.
Jerm said that in this video
I worked for the DGPT a couple years ago. What you said here is exactly correct. They are losing money handover fist and the only way to subsidize it is to charge more money per ticket or make courses more open where more people can watch. The problem is, they’ve done both of those. Now courses are boring to watch and too expensive to go to. It is the absolute perfect equation they put together themselves, that when added up, is destroying the disc golf spectator experience altogether.
I can't disagree, but do want to note that a major part of the growth of any sport is to have a major spectator following. Problem with our sport is that you can't just build a big seating stadium around it. The point of the DGPT specifically is to grow spectator quality of the sport. I agree that most courses should not be built for a spectator experience, but a few on tour that are is not a problem to me. It allows an experience to view the game, played by the best in the world, from a perspective most of us will never get to. No one in my local courses is blasting a 600' bomb on a line. The focus of the sport as a whole should not be this I agree, but the the Pro Tour focusing on a spectator experience is not a problem. And I agree the tickets are pricey, but the cheaper they are, the more people try to get them and they'll hit a capacity and people who wanted to won't be able to go anyways. I feel for the poor guys playing, but pushing the limits of the human body has always been a part of elite sports. Having other quality hype, reward, and coverage of other events where the older guys, or those not smashing 700 footers can shine would certainly help with the issue as a whole.
GMC and Maple Hill are my favorite courses to watch. I also got a chance to play both of them. It was surreal to play iconic courses I've seen on Jomez. I feel like those courses don't just reward the bombers. Matty O's run last year was magical.
I like Maple Hill... I like Hornets Nest too...
Maple my home course. There's no place better imo. Just the feeling u get being on the property is memorable.
Maple Hill is excellent. I love how they have 5 core layouts for different skill levels. I don’t have the arm to play 9 on Gold, but the White tee was perfect for me. Really fun shot.
Yes I agree, those courses are special. I also miss the Delavega course (not the golf course variant). My view is: to be a classic disc golf champion, you should have won at Delavega during your career.
Maple Hill is just magical. It's disc golf Mecca. Everyone who loves this game should play there at least once.
I think it's still because of the fact that overseas, in Europe, they look at and treat disc golf as a legitimate, real SPORT, and they aren't trying so hard to BE ball golf. In America, there is too much of a negative stigma with disc golf and the TYPE of people who play it, the majority of the population (not just the disc golf population, but the population in general) doesn't take it seriously and still only sees it and treats it as a "hippie, stoner" hobby so the nuances that European disc golf has that makes it so beautiful and fun to play and watch just aren't here necessarily. Europe also has more dedicated disc golf courses, that is what we need here. I know it's easier said than done, but people/organizations/companies need to start building disc golf specific courses instead of working around ball golf courses, public park courses, etc etc.
That's just my opinion.
I've got no idea where you live but I'm from Wisconsin, I've and hour away from 8 courses that could easily be on the Pro Tour, half of them are free to play, but the parks departments maintain them very well. In two weeks I'm going to Sandy Point in Lac du Flambeau, Wisconsin to stay at a literal *disc golf resort*, as I've done for almost 10 years with two of my friends. I've also played in and around Portland, Oregon - Pier Park and Hornug's Hideout are immaculate courses that would be great to watch pros attack, one more open and one very demanding wooded course.
The USA has the best disc golf courses in the world.
The fact of the matter is that the PDGA is fucking up. There should never been repeated courses/events on the Pro Tour from year-to-year. I've also played in and around Portland, Oregon - Pier Park and Hornug's Hideout. I've also played in and around Portland, Oregon - Pier Park and Hornug's Hideout.
@puffherb so, just because you live in an area with good courses and a good community that cares about the sport at, what seems to be, a pretty high level, then that translates to everywhere and it's just "pdga bad"?
No. I'm from Texas btw, not that it even matters in this discussion. I know the US has some amazing courses. I am mainly talking about the way the people (players and non players alike) approach the game in general and as a whole over here vs in Europe. When was the last time a US player won words and was invited to the equivalent of the white house? Met with very very influential leaders? Became an icon for their entire country, not only to the disc golf community? Never.
The perception, in my opinion, is what needs to change. People overseas see disc golf as a legitimate career option, and are even told it is a legitimate career option, whereas over here, it is still viewed as being played by only hippies, stoners, and drunks. The same level of professionalism isn't shown towards our sport from outside investors, sponsors, and other influential people to really make it a "mainstream sport" so to speak.
Are there things that the DGPT and PDGA could be doing better, DEFINITELY. But just saying it is all their fault is a bit disingenuous and not really trying to get the thought ball rolling to maybe bring about some change for the better.
It is 2024 for crying out loud, the technology is out there to be able to boost a signal high enough to have better, cleaner woods coverage. That is just one example I can think of of something they could look more into. I know there's more to it than just simply buying a signal booster and flipping it on, especially from a business standpoint, but I digress. Regardless of how much money the DGPT and PDGA are bringing in right now, they still rely HEAVILY on the local clubs, local groups, etc to talk to the cities about having permission to do "this" or "that" to some courses, the decision isn't 100% theirs and, because of the perception of the sport right now to the general masses, most cities, towns, municipalities, etc don't see a reason to invest THEIR resources into something like disc golf that won't generate THEM any revenue either.
My point was simply, we need to change the stereotype perception of the average American Disc Golfer if we really want the kind of change that everyone keeps complaining about, pros and amateurs alike.
Our local disc golf communities seem SOOOO GREAT to all of us that know the people involved, play with people involved in things on a regular to semi-regular basis, and thus can really skew any judgment towards a situation like this. I'm trying to look at it from a outsider perspective. Someone who maybe hasn't ever thrown or seen a disc golf disc, as someone learning about the pro tour, etc etc etc.
That's all 😊. At the end of the day though, this is both just our opinions lol.
@@JIMWESTDG If you focus on stereotypes you're going to be the kind of white knight, hyper-vigilant dickhead that makes every sport less attractive. Name a sport and I'll show you "hippies" within it, hell, I'll show you far worse, the NFL is good for paying millions of dollars to complete degenerates.
The reason disc golf isn't taken seriously is because it doesn't generate enough money, plain and simple. It doesn't generate enough money because disc golf isn't easy to play, has a high cost of entry to get properly sorted and there's no "right" way to play. This "hippie" bullshit you're talking about is something that might have been relevant 10 years ago but that is the last thing keeping the sport from growing.
I'd say what is keeping the sport from growing are the top players themselves, they're really a bunch of unmarketable, brain-dead morons - they're not drugged out losers, they're just idiots. The only professional disc golfer that does commentary about the sport and doesn't sound like a complete simpleton is Nate Sexton.
Where do you live that there's a stigma around disc golf? Yeah, it kinda has the prestige level short of bowling atm, but "stigma" is going a bit far, don't you think?
@@JIMWESTDGRead your second comment and I see where you're coming from. Remember that disc golf courses and players are rising at ~14% annually, iirc. Look at the (albeit early) exponential takeoff of prize funds, too. The sport doubles in popularity every 5 years. I think we're just early on the curve is all.
It's the sort of discussion you're prompting that drives the growth engine here, tho, so thanks for that.
everyone needs to stop saying its divisive. show me proof its “divisive” its not. its 90%+ players and fans that want wooded courses to be the norm not the exception.
Field courses drawn with OB lines everywhere is literally the worst kind of disc golf. It's so awful.
This is why Idlewild is one of the best courses on tour, despite being one of the shortest courses they play all year. It has a great mix of every single shot required by disc golfers.
For me, it doesn't have to be woods golf, as long as there are strategic trees. Some of those European courses weren't necessarily woods courses, but the holes were always interesting, because they are always thoughtful how they use the trees that are there. A hole can be interesting, even with just a few trees. What I don't like are those wide open golf holes like #1 on Emporia. That's boring.
It’s a fact of life Jerm, sports get tougher and more demanding and the young guns take over for the old guard. I personally like seeing all the new talent coming on.
I love seeing the new talent also. But watching Isaac carve the woods is infinitely more interesting than watching Barela bomb on an open course.
hopefully big jerm can be the voice for us when he retires. i think he'd due well on the pdga board addressing these issues. all you gotta do is run jerm, we'll vote for you.
The expense of traveling to Europe should be a part of this discussion. It's just a fact. This fact underscores the attraction that Americans feel towards these exotic European events. So now, let's look again at the dozens of amazing courses in the US that just happen to be off the beaten track. These courses aren't considered for Q series or Elite series because they are located in the boondocks. However: the time and expense of traveling to a remote Montana venue or a remote Idaho venue may not be as severe as traveling to Europe. The time and expense might be commensurate. So we Americans may, in fact, have the solution at our fingertips. Getting away from the tradition of a DGLO or Ledgestone might lead us to a new and exciting path of disc golf in America. Thinking outside the box should be what disc golfers are good at. Let's use this skill to elevate our amazing sport.
I agree, I'd love to see some courses in other, more remote places, but don't take away events like DGLO.
I know, you're going to jump down my throat. I want to say this: Kensington Toboggan is not the only course there. The Amateurs play the neighbor courses like Black Locust. Why not pivot and move DGLO there? Plenty of woods. Plenty of opportunities for shot shaping and not just the big distance shots. And yes, I've been to both places, caddying for my husband.
As a European fan I would of course love more opportunities to see the stars, 99% of whom are from the U.S. 'cause the sport is still in its infancy. But also I would absolutely LOVE to get to come over one day and see one of the legendary courses. The added attraction of travelling (or not being able to, which ever angle you want to look at it from) is definitely a factor.
@njohnson005 C.R.E.A.M. What you seem to fail to recognize is that the cost of travel to Europe is offset by the amount of $ they make at the events and that type of money is just impossible to make at these courses in "the boondocks" here in The States that you're refering to.
I agree with all of this. It needs to be brought up and talked about more.
As someone who plays and watches both golf and disc golf I want technical, narrow and challenging courses to be the main features of pro tour events. A mix of open and long and short and technical leaning towards more short and technical would be the best move for disc golf. If camera angles and videography are the issue then we need to sit down and create a solution to that specific problem instead of taking the easy way out and sticking it on long open courses for filming ease. A few of those are fine but not everything should be about throw 550 knock a putt down that gets old after 3rounds.
Regarding those 900’ wooded par 4s, this is where the psychology of par kicks in. Would Jerm have a problem if they were par 5s and a few players would have their risky/perfect play rewarded with an eagle? In terms of total strokes, nothing changes. The only variable is the mindset of the player throwing the hole.
The more I watch tourneys, and listen to players via podcasts, I notice how fragile the professional disc golf ego is. Every hole should just be labeled par threes, and scores just recorded as totals instead of relative to par.
@@pbgamble no terrible idea
@@pbgamble If it's the total number of shots that's your score, what purpose would pars serve in such a system?
Courses are becoming too open it’s boring to watch woods disc golfing for sure is the best. I’ve stopped watching last year just because I’m tired of seeing players throw shots in open fields. The only tournaments I watch is Great Lakes at toboggan because it’s a course that has that old school challenging woods play with the distance.
Very much the argument that Lance Armstrong had: If you want to be competitive, you have to hurt yourself and everyone else. Telling a pro that they don't have to throw that hard if they don't want to (bu you do if you want to win) is ridiculous.
Absolutely spot on. Traditional golf has made the same mistake. Distance has become the greatest thing you need to play golf and it was never set up that way. It should be based on accuracy and ability to shoot different types of shots.
Krokhol also was the most fun to watch. Ivy, and the rest of the golf courses played on tour is painful to watch on screen. Maybe in person it feels cool, but watching onlinne is brutal. I hated Ivy and found myslef watching in 2x speed just to get through it.
Ivy was terrible
Paul's course should have been the 3-day one. Agreed. I'd rather see a 6-day event over 3 courses with 2 rounds played at each.
The parallels of U.S. Disc Golf and the U.S. Gravel Cycling scene are similar. You have to have the right combination of Strength, Strategy and Luck to win.
Agreed, wooded courses are more fun to play and watch! I may be biased as my max distence is 400 but hitting a tight line in the woods is so much more rewarding vs throwing to a landing zone.
The Regulator in Burlington, NC is a brand new course that is almost all woods. Even though It’s one of the longest courses out there, it was designed with FPO specifically in mind so it’s way more technical than distance friendly. The USWDGC was played there in 2023 and I talked to several FPO players that raved about the course and how it’s the way disc golf should be played. Specifically, Hailey King told me it’s her favorite course she’s ever played a tournament on and she wishes that the women’s championship would be held there every year.
Agree! We don't even need heavily wooded every time, just tough landing zones.
I`d like to see more courses similar to BRP in Michigan being played on tour. Super technical, tough and challenging but at the end of the day fun for all who played it. They have the ability to design more courses in existence to meet the goals of everyone without killing the players.
I was taught, when my dad had the keys to the baskets at Eldorado park in Long Beach. 3 short, 3 medium and 3 long front and back. Keeps things fair for everyone
The gym and technique keep things fair, but I like that philosophy.
As a (an?) S&C trainer, I'm a huge proponent of protecting an athlete's body with gym-work. Disc golf is absolutely a hugely strenuous activity particularly off the tee. On the bomber courses, the shots off the tee can be considered near max-effort lifts, similar to max-effort jumping, many, many times a day.
I don't believe the answer is necessarily to decrease the length of the holes - why not go the other way? Take disc golf with the seriousness it deserves, and create a training culture like what exists with any other professional sport.
With strength and conditioning, among other things (proper nutrition and adequate sleep being some other major factors), the boundaries as to what people consider the current limits of hole-distance, as well as player longevity, are there to be pushed.
I think the importance of having both massive courses AND beautifully wooded courses on the pro tour can't be overstated. Discounting one at the cost of the other detracts elements of the sport for no great gain, and only cost.
And the arguement against long-bombing courses because many holes require a certain distance threshold to achieve a birdie is like suggesting the NBA should lower the height of the basketball rings to 8ft because I can't jump but MJ/Lebron can fly. Let's play the same height ring, and have courses the same insane distances, even if only to appreciate just how great the ATHLETES are that can achieve such feats.
I agree that tee shots are strenuous and can be considered near max-effort lifts.
But full power shots being treated as near max effort lifts would dictate full power shots being performed *less* often, no? Pro disc golfers put in five or six rounds a week on these long courses. Fifteen full power shots per round times five rounds is 75 reps a week. Starting Strength programs 120 (near max effort) reps a week. So pro disc golfers are already over 1/2 of a complete strength program number of max efforts on the course alone. Adding a complete strength training program reps onto their course reps would be over 60% more reps than a complete strength program--a herculean feat, without even accounting for the travel requirements and the almost complete absence of recovery that specifically renders this regimen impossible.
I'd argue that pro disc golfers are already more than aware of the importance of gym work, nutrition, and sleep. In fact I wouldn't be surprised if they were *better* at juggling these requirements into their schedule than many other pro athletes. Due to having less money, pro disc golfers have to take into account efficiency and opportunity cost when investing, while richer pro athletes and the systems around them can better afford to indiscriminately spam performance enhancers. For example an nba player with a personal chef and furnished flight itineraries can more easily implement a 3x/week workout program or 1x/day meditation session than a pro disc golfer who has to drive his van to the next course and ration out a stash of beef jerky, dried fruit, and crackers.
@@SildarHazelshade Money is definitely a big consideration. I'd hope that athlete sponsors would be happy to include a S&C requirement / component that they'd pay for as part of the contract, but I don't know how likely or possible this is.
From a S&C standpoint, 5 rounds is likely is the minimum for what pro disc golfers do week in, week out. I'm not sure what "starting strength program" means exactly, but even according that, it's still a starting strength program. Athletes should be able to handle a signficantly higher load than a starter strength program.
Think about NBA athletes again. They'll do 6-7 days a week of intense S&C in the gym, plus 4-5 days of on court team training, then between 4-5 days of their own skills training. How many max effort jumps, sprints, etc. do you think they'd do? I'd wager at least as much, but highly likely significantly more than pro disc golf athletes.
again, your point about money is well received - although that needs to be a discussion between the athlete and the business they play for.
My point is that disc golfers don't undergo a mind-bending amount of stress on their bodies MORE than other athletic professions - it'd probably be roughly comparable, and those other professions also add a SERIOUS amount of gym-work in addition to the demands of their training and playing.
I'm sure there are a number of players taking their S&C seriously, but it isn't a widespread culture in the sport. It's been widely recognised that high-quality S&C significantly reduces injury risk in nearly any population, and the professional disc golf population is primed for it.
I like when there is a good mix of shots in a tournament. All distance in open fields is boring, but so is all woods, especially with places like Nevin and other tightly wooded courses where there just seems to be so much more luck involved.
I do concede that it's all easier said than done considering that what some people criticize, others will argue to the contrary. Overall, I think as long as concerns/criticisms/thoughts which the vast majority of players and viewers have a consesus towards are being heard and work is done to address it, then things are headed in the right direction. I don't expect any course to be perfect, but I do expect that their be iterative improvements. For example, I would hope that hole ?14? (the one with the ridiculously difficult birdie with the steep green with a high chance of roll away) at Ivy would be redesigned to be more interesting, at least from the perspective of having it be an honest challenge rather than a roll of the dice. But then again, I'm not certain my opinion about the hole is something that is widely agreed upon. Perhaps it's worth polling players and viewers to determine.
With a combo of forehands and backhands, at say 50-60 throws per round, for 3-4 rounds, its getting similar to starting the same pitcher back to back days. Especially for these guys that wanna birdie everything that have baseball-ish exit velo and speed. Injuries and surgeries will be more common, not like they arent already.
Big forehand guys are the most screwed. I wonder if we'll start seeing more people throwing backhands with their off hand in the future.
Bring a winter series and glow tournaments. Let’s see what the pros really got in the woods at night in the winter. Maine style. Quit your sniveling just play get paid and have fun.
Yes! Glow would be awesome for the publicity at the very least.
How would you even film it?
I totally understand what you're talking about, but I would have to say that the nature of sports is the same. The more popular the sport becomes the more challenging the game becomes and then the more technical and difficult the courses become.
Funny thing about DGLO is that Michigan is mostly flat and the best courses in Michigan are beautifully wooded with only gentle slopes. Maybe MVP (also based in Michigan) would do a better job with course choices here and it could become the MGLO.
Come down to Ingleside, TX and play our Live Oak Gold Course. Very technical course. Par 65, but not a big bomber course, except for maybe two or three holes. Uli has made his way down here years ago, Ezra A. won a B-Tier down here the year he started his tour life. Awesome course next to the beach.
We need more courses that don’t rely on wind to be challenging
I agree that wooded disc golf is fun, but as a spectator, I don’t think anything is as fun as seeing bombers bomb. Especially in person. On tv I kind of get that shot shaping might be more fun to watch, but man it’s so awesome to see someone throw 500+, especially if it’s on a hole you play all the time and have never dreamed of getting to in 1 shot lol
The hole that Jerm described at New London sounds like the perfect disc golf hole. Challenged on distance, challenged on a long narrow fairway, and challenged on angle control from the beginning of the flight to the end of the flight. Not to mention the specific landing zones that course made the players hit.
Jerms question sums it up best when he asked how many challenging aspects are we expected to overcome before it's enough? My thoughts are, you're the top athletes in the sport and many more young committed, and talented athletes are coming up, you should be expected to overcome any and all challenges that is presented to you. We should have courses that challenge the top players in the sport and not design courses catering to the middle or bottom end of the division.
With that said, distance should be a component tested but not the only aspect tested. Wide open, massive hyzer shots over and over get boring. All shot angles should be tested as well as controling the disc angles further down the fairway. Maybe the sport isn't at the right place to put that much stress and challenge on yhe athletes but hopefully sometime in the future it will be.
On a side topic, i wonder what implementing the bunker rule more would do with play style? You land OB, you have to throw from previous lie without a penalty stroke. That would put a premium on accuracy, make huge pushing shots more risky, but there would still be a benefit if you could pull the big shot off. I feel like that could open up more strategic plays based on different skill sets, and seeing different players attacking the course differently.
Quick question about training regimen for pros… Pro baseball pitchers throw 80-100 pitches per game, full send almost every throw, and get a 3 to 5-day break to rest their arm. Do we know if any DGPT players approach their training regimen like baseball pitchers or other pro athletes do so that they can sustain themselves longer? I know that not every throw in disc golf is full-send. But if we want the sport to grow, should we expect that kind of training regimen from our pros? This would need to come with medical and training staff like other professional sports which would increases costs, and players can’t afford that, so the DGPT or sponsors or someone else would have to pick up that cost. It just seems like if the pros want to be pros and grow the sport, then they need to have this level of commitment as well as the support to go with it. I look forward to the replies. Happy throwing everyone!
I would love to see a course where some world-class players go “lets take every shot in our bag, and try to make it as hard as possible to choose between 2-4 of them (ie, power putter turnover vs smooth midrange turnover vs fairway driver forehand), and make 18 holes of “gosh this shot is tricky, do I throw X or Y? Do I get aggressive or safe? When do I want to throw far and when do I need to be smooth?”
Ideally, there would be 3-6 holes where you’re really needing to go for a lot of distance, 6-9 more where more power is advantageous but not essential (ie tighter green that favors a midrange over a fairway to get less fade but not short enough to make the mid an obvious choice) and then the final 6-9 are purely about throwing different shapes. The aggression on this final set of holes is more “how close do you want to get to that tree” than “how much distance can you bite off” because the hole is only 325’ but it’s 100’ hard right after the aforementioned tree.
I absolutely love throwing hard and having an advantage with distance, as that is the strength of my game going against other ams (especially clubbing down to negate fade and skip when others are worried about it) but I totally understand the pros wanting to throw 500’+ less often to protect their bodies. Spectator stuff gets tricky tho and idk anything about that
I can’t speak for europe but in the US, it’s all about monetizing the small number of fans for every dollar they can. You want the cheapest ticket to watch a round? It’s like $30. I fully understand many people can easily afford that, but it’s a little too much for someone only casually interested in the sport.
I agree, US is all about making buck as soon as you can, Europe culturally is more about investment in the growth of the sport
Yea…its part of the marketing scheme: “Grow the sport”.
Bro literally every GA ticket for a live round is under 30$. DGN is also less than 30$ a month. No shit Europe Isn't as concerned about making money right now because they have no stakes in it. The Pro Tour owns all the events we're watching so the only company at risk here is a US company. Obviously they will be more focused on making money because they have to survive.
Totally agree. Disc golf should be about shot shape and not throwing 500ft or more for an easy par at worst.
This is so true that jerm is bringing up, I would hate to see like half the field injured and not be able to play.
Also about ob everyware is very boring to watch when somone have a bad break and just get penelty for it, natural ob should be a factor as well.
Last but not least, as a european and actually having "ymer" as my home cours, its an honor that you hilight it with the nr 1 course in the world man 😍, and also bringing up about our commitment to the sport 🙂 we will welcome you guys and girls from the states next year as well 😊😁
There needs to be a more space in between events. Especially majors. A week off before and after majors I think would be a great start for touring pros.
Watching wooded course is more interesting
Agreed. Emporia bores the hell out of me. It opens with that dull-as-bricks 1000’ hole and doesn’t get much better from there (except for the island hole).
Dude, the SECOND Brodie starts talking, my brain shuts off.
If it's not a wooded course..... I don't bother playing it, or watching it
I agree with Jerm… the PDGA Tour could (should?) be more like NASCAR… not every track is a Super-Speedway. Short, challenging courses with tight landing zones can be VERY interesting to watch… short-technical courses are cool. Add in smaller baskets that brings accurate putting into the mix and THAT would make for a different, exciting challenge.
Yes however, people complain about birdie or die courses, yet Jerm is complaining about courses being punishing, I stand by the statement that distance is a skill, learn it.
I love what’s happening! Post coverage is alright, but to me live coverage is super fun! And if they gotta switch it up then whatever. And also when I’m watching pros nowadays I know I would get absolutely smoked! Which is rad too.
Mostly agree. I want distance to be an important skill set for players to have. But it doesn’t need to be tested hole after hole after hole, tournament after tournament. I think about a tournament like Portland Open, which has awesome holes. But at the same time, if we already have four or five 450-500 foot par 3’s, do we also need like 6 long par 4’s and 4 long par 5’s? Probably not. I like that winning on tour requires elite distance, but you don’t need to test that once skill over and over and over again
Here's the problem with Jerm's line of thinking... I don't disagree with any particular point exactly, there's alot of decent points he makes taken at face value... however if we take the sport back to the call it "300ft par 3 days" which would save bodies and reduce injuries and be 'more fun to play' which he always seems to hark back to, there is no more spectacle aspect of pro disc golf. Every course you play that is even a hard course for a random casual that's 300fters all course has its local guys and local tournaments who can shoot that course to absurdly low scores. Is every random good player at your local course now pro tour caliber? Should they all be on tour? Of course not, but that's where the sport had to go in difficulty, in distance, all that in order to create a reason for there to be and continue to be a pro tour to begin with. The casual who can shoot under par on their local course isn't on the PGA tour, and shouldn't be on the PDGA tour either. If there's too much a sense of "when I play that course I'm cashing this tournament" / "I can do this and beat half this field" you've lost the reason the tour should exist at all and the pro field would literally be like 10+ million people instead of a few hundred. That's not viable and that wouldn't capture viewership or sponsors.
Does every course have to be a bomber golf course or Northwood black to challenge these guys? No...but if you want to challenge a field of athletes who possess such skills, the only thing you can do is smaller gaps, more distance, more obstacles, shapes that discs don't fly and more punishment. And if you listen to alot of the pros making content thats what they want too, they critique hole design that's too luck based very harshly and always want a "pure" line to the basket. They want to reduce the luck factor to the lowest possible amount which basically means if you're off fairway or throw one bad shot, you might as well give up. I don't necessarily agree with that, since I believe some holes are meant to be survived instead of scored on, but that's what they want. Jerm also wants consistently to be able to save holes when you do something bad (forget his feelings on the European Open Beast Island hole which he wants to ruin players' rounds), be that with various OB rules or drop zones inside C2, which is not the general consensus among tour players it would seem, and if you ask me the punishment should be high with no easy drop zones ever, and nothing inside 100ft on general principle because these players are so good. Maybe that's different for FPO but MPO absolutely because the 'putting range' for these guys is stupid. It's very hard to balance this for the midfield or bottom tier pro player without making things too easy and almost boringly casual to watch for the top tier, but generally you should steer in pro sports for the upper third / upper quartile, not the people barely cashing.
But if you think people are showing up to watch AB or Simon or Eagle etc and aren't thinking about the spectacle of disc golf, you are just wrong. I think the quarter mile par 5s can be a bit much, and having entire courses with nothing but bombs can get taxing to play I have no doubt, but the goal should be to find the balance in course design and for the creators of the tour to be able to balance those against each other to help players which to me the Silver Series and "off tour" stops honestly accomplished really well...and then realistically personal responsibility on the players' side to give your body the rest it needs and maybe not practice as much as you possibly can fit in or not play every event even though financially that may be less viable, that will aid your career in the long run. Most of what these tour veterans are looking for in European courses is not having played them a million times over and over, which when you look at the American side that's all they do, play the same 20-25 courses over and over with small changes and I can see how that gets fairly boring over the years and you look at guys like McBeth who seem to relish in getting outside of that routine, and I think alot of the tour veterans should try to follow in those steps.
wildruns, if you are ever in CO and want to play a mellow wooded course, you are welcome @Gandhi's Path
Good video dude 👍
Appreciate it
i think its good that distance is one part of the challange that those who play discgolf at the highest tier need to handle, but i feel watching the same shot over and over bombed around makes the sport monotom, and repeateable. I feel people who play at highest lvl, should master the challanges the different courses, if its a placement shot for first, and then a secound bomb or challange to get to a bucket for a pair 4. If you always gonna have edge of throwing far, yeah its great,, but its not what i feel atleast is good to look at, i like to see the different utility and scrambles that a course design makes for the players. And im happy for the players if they find courses that is challenging and fun to, not just seeing players complain about the repeateable golf course ghost, where u dont get penetalized of not having controll of the shot, as long as u can bomb far, u will always have a edge. Its all a part of mastering different shot shapes and navigating the terrain and obstacles. And playing as team with what you see and imagination of what your prefeered shot should be to reach the basket. And thats atleast what makes the discgolf fun to watch for me, and to play. To have a satisfaction of mastering the shot shape and get rewarded if you did what you planned and executed it perfect. Not only watching how someone repeatedly outdrived you by 80-100 feet on a totally open field, where u have no big need to show controll of your drive. Its kind of like the difference between a dragrace and a formula 1 driver. both great and fun to experience,, and its something that needs different types of skill to manage and be the best in. But now in discgolf, the dragracer would benefit the most since most of the driving isnt about driving skill anymore, but raw american Horsepower. And you see this in many of the sports and interessts in US, compared in Europe as an example. Its alot of history and different tought of what you aim for and honor and whats traditionally praised in the population and accepted to be manly and social acceptable as a man to do as a sport.
There are so many courses available to play.
SO many. The "we can't get connection" argument seems bunk to me. If you have a place that can't be filmed, find someplace else!
Injuries and “getting the body beat up” lands on the athletes. Keeping the body healthy via proper functional resistance training. Proper off season recovery and rehabilitation. Constant body mechanics work. Injury prevention is 100% achievable. First thing is these players NEED to start learning a proper warm-up and cooldown during rounds.
Before anyone call me out on this. I am a strength and conditioning coach and a movement specialist.
You bring up great points! It made me think of the following:
(Tiger Woods’ fused back has entered the chat 💬)
(Tommy John’s arm/elbow has entered the chat 💬 )
(Tua’s brain 🧠 has entered the 💬 )
I personally believe they did the work and prep to prevent in state of the art ways.
(Lebron James also enters the chat 💬 to offset my take/point the above).
Meaning it’s complicated. I don’t have the answers. But can see the bind and dissonance here.
I liked what Jerm said that you need to play 6-7 rounds a week to really get dialed in at a course to take it down. Which is more than ball golf…and you throw more disc golf pitches ⚾️ than your baseball ⚾️ counterparts. With days of rest in between….they get a rest advantage vs 6-7 days of “pitching”.
I wish I had an answer too. It’s an economics and actuarial exercise.
Ive said multiple times, put back more tight wooded courses on tour and guys like Marwede and Pres would win much more often. It's tough to balance, but with proctor winning tournaments at two tight woodsy courses, it's showing that technicality is still very much required to win certain events, but with courses like dglo you're missing out on such vital shot shapes that test all players abilities, and so players with big backhand abilities like AB, Simon, Calvin, Isaac, and Gannon win constantly. Id say Gannon and Simon definitely have some woods skill too, but not to the effect guys like Casey white and Joey Anderson have.
Oh yeah, I love disc golf, and I recently took a road trip to play many the great courses in the US. However what I learned was to stay away from the pro courses. Just not really fun, not enough trees, not enough fun shot shapes, too many bomber holes. Occasionally sure. But it was rare that I wanted that type of
course.
Totally agree Jerm
Bigger basket with smaller chains would make disc golf more about putting then drives and would help make holes more difficult without 1300 ft par 5s
So happy to live in New England
Seeing the guys bomb it is fun to watch, but woods golf will always be inherently more interesting. Create more artifical gaps on the more open courses rather than just having a 500ft requirement for distance. Jerm has a great point in that the tour season is long and the longer courses get the more players will get injured or sit out events.
I live in the central/northeastern part of Pennsylvania and a majority of courses I've gone to are at state parks.
The argument that wood = bad coverage is wrong. Speaking as one knowing the specific equipment used by the DGN and working fot a company that actually make equipment that solves that problem.
The problem with quality coverage streams in woods is not hard to solve by DGN if they want to...
the connection problem is such a garbage argument. so many solutions to this.
I have filmed in wooded courses like Brewster and Northwood which were both impossible to get any reception. Doesn't mean that they can't get good reception but its not cheap and easy
the TOUR should maybe just show Live coverage for the Final Round of each event for the next couple of years to save $$ so they can purchase the type of gear they need to broadcast LIVE on wooded courses the way they would like . I love designing courses. I really like city park type courses that have most of the features that they look for. I just laid out a course here in my town that is 6,000 feet in length and is very challenging for even MA1 players and local MPO players as well as for MA4 players to. The longest hole ( 18 ) is 625 feet Par 4 for MPO + MA1 + MA2...and it's Par 5 for MA3 + MA4 players. that's the longest hole, and Hole #3 is the shortest hole at 225 feet. It has a nice mix of making people try different shot shapes
A 250 ft hole can be challenging if you have Mando's, guarding trees, low ceilings... A lot more fun than 900 ft holes.
That simply isn't true no matter what way you look at it. A 900 foot hole not only allows for more challenges like mandos or guardian trees, it also gives you a longer fairway which means there is more chance to go out of the fairway. Look at scoring distributions for the roughly 300ft holes on tour. With few exceptions, they are extremely skewed to birdies.
The pro tour is fixated on spectators at the course rather than viewers at home. What fueled the Covid surge? Viewers at home.
I don't mind some longer holes on a course. But the majority of the course should be 250 to 350 ft par 3 holes.
I believe this game should be more similar to golf as far as teeing off. A tee pad in golf means you set the ball up onto a tee so you can get more distance on your drive. A disc golf tee pad means you can get a running start to get more distance on your drive. After the tee pad, I believe every shot should be taken standing at your mark instead of getting to run up again, just like you cannot tee up your golf ball for each shot. This will eliminate most foot faults which most aren't enforced anyway. The step putt should also be eliminated no matter what circle your lie is in.
I totally see this. The course designs now are taking out older elite players.
good, we need the older elite players to be weeded out and phased out of the pro tour. they just cant hang any more with the new ability and talent of the young guys. the old guys just need to swallow their pride and move over to Masters division if they cant hang with the pro tour anymore.
@@orion7741 Tell that to Ohn Scoggins
Skill issue
It isn't about being older. The older guys know what they're into. It's about what challenges are being provided. Bomber courses are stupid and are only popular because technical courses can't be filmed as well. Naturally aging players will bow out, but this is about something altogether different.
if the only option i had was pro tour courses i wouldn't even play DG anymore. give me a 5-6K ' wooded course with a little elevation change and NO 10' elevated baskets and i am a happy camper.
Par 4s and 5s are great, but it is poor design if it is just distance that makes them difficult. Accuracy, control, disc knowledge, shaping shots and precise power should be the what raises the difficulty, imo.
Isn't this why most athletes in other sports retire before 40? It doesn't make any sense to make courses less demanding to accommodate the older/fragile players... There's a reason only a few can do what the winners do. If you want purses to grow to millions, you have to keep raising the challenge. If you want top earners to make 100k per year, then sure make the courses easier and sustain the career of the player, but the sport will plateau in growth; if you want to earn ball golf money, then courses will have to challenge and filter out the weak. This is like an older NBA player saying games should be shorter cuz the 40 year olds are getting injured after fatigue. MP40 Jerm.
I don't think Jerm wants courses easier. He just wants less emphasis on having insanely long holes for the majority of the course and a bit more focus on more technical holes that aren't as long. You get a challenge with less physical strain on the body.
It seems some pros in discgolf don't understand that they are supposed to be athletes. If you want to prevent injuries and maximize your potential you need to train 6 days a week.
The mentality in discgolf is what is causing injuries. Young guys who are ridiculously explosive and no one stepping in to teach them how to take care of their bodies. Simon Lizotte would not be a 70mph thrower only today if someone guided him to be a strong athlete. He burned out his body early. Knee and elbow shot. 10mph gone.
Get your shit together and create proper training programs and a culture of athleticism. Don't build courses for senior citizens.
In ballgolf you can tee off ckoser to the hole if you can't handle it. So step up or move down to the smaller leauges. Don't hold the real athletes back.
Maybe have more events that are played over multiple courses in an area, instead of 4 rounds at one course. That would break up some of the monotony for the viewers, and it would give players different challenges on different days. It could be a showcase of the courses a city has. It doesn't have to be every event, but the locations where there are enough tournament-level courses within a reasonable distance would at least shake things up. Maybe have more tournaments that have different rules, like pairs or team events. Have competitions between major disc sponsors and their stable of players. Have more crossover with the women's tour. Make a concerted effort to add more courses to the rotation so that your schedule isn't always the same. In regular golf, the only major that is played at the same course is the Masters. There are a few other regular tour stops, but there are a lot of events that change courses, especially the other majors. Plenty of ideas to liven up the tour for the players, give them more options so that they feel like they can skip a tournament or two they wouldn't have and not be "penalized" in the rankings or point standings. The US has plenty of different terrain options for whatever kind of course you want to make, and a lot already exist like the ones Jerm was talking about.
As an aside, I just got done watching the tournament at Toboggan. I enjoyed watching the players have to play shots out of the rough and in the trees. It felt a lot more like the kind of disc golf us normies play. It was a stark contrast to the Worlds, where there was so much OB on every hole.
I think DGLO should be a 3 day tourney. Being a local to Michigan and playing Toboggan course once/twice a year. I can't imagine doing that 4 days straight and not have your body wear out in some area.
I’d love to see a Bald Mountain combo if it is 4 days.
The Kansas City Wide Open is here for you.
Good points!! But name me one sport where things don't go this way. There is always this maximising of distance and players pay the price for this... We really have enough bomber courses on golf courses out there, its kinda boring. But it does not have to be this way, especially in disc golf. You can create short holes and be creative, fit it into nature perfectly where ever you want and still demand every ounce of playing skills you got. Make a course right at the cost of the sea where it's windy from all directions. Boom, you got links golf and that is a completely different game that forces you to adapt to those conditions. There is skill that uses less power but more precision, course management and shot shaping. Make it technical and creative, that is what spectators want to see. To see the players come up with ideas to solve a problem is so much fun to watch.
This is why it is so great disc golf is huge in europe and it already has enriched the game, us players will want that at home thats for sure
This is what Simon has been saying, more short, technical courses on tour.
I like having the occasional bomber hole on an otherwise precision-based course, but 900 foot par 4's and 1200 foot par 5's on wide open courses aren't that fun to watch. Jerm can sometimes be a bit of a whiner, but he's 100% right in this case.
I'd also love to see big events every other week or even every 3rd week with smaller events in-between. Do it like the tennis tour: everyone schedules around majors and the best players play a few events between majors, but certainly not every week. It allows for some smaller names to win more often, too, if they don't have to beat Gannon and Calvin and AB at every event.
I do enjoy the fun courses more, but my thoughts on the toll that playing US courses takes on the body are simple. He mentions you have to get out there and practice the courses over and over. The damage comes from the practice rounds. They are throwing multiple rounds of multiple shots off every tee. This will never happen, but the solution is for the pro tour to limit the amount of time each player can spend on the course practicing and/or limit their practice rounds. No one is going to care if the players are a tiny bit less dialed in and they will all have had the same practice time so it would be fair. This should apply to any course on the pro tour regardless of design.
As European, i find watcing the US roller after roller courses very dull. I think discs are meant to fly, not roll on the ground. Yes, the rollers have their place in for example scramble game, but not as a majority of teeshots…
Land restriction in the USA ??? Try Europe
As a player not on tour and also an avid viewer, it is my opinion that if I have to pay a pretty decent amount of money to see Disc Golf live, I’m gonna get over that pretty quick, I would rather see post production, wooded courses with accuracy and touch, but with that said, I’m also a big fan of stick golf andwhen Disc Golf emulates that and do actually have to place a shot to make a decision on which way to attack a pin well that is also very impressive to watch so I guess what I’m getting at is having one group producing most of the Disc Golf that I am watching seems to be growing pains
Agree with 100% of this. Disc golf is not golf and we don't want it to be. Shorter wooded courses are more fun in every way. And even though I'll never play long, open tour courses anyway, I don't want to see these pros have to stop doing what they love.
as far as injuries are concerned, athletic training in disc golf needs to catch up to the demands of the sport. Every other professional player has an entire team dedicated to maintaining their tool and disc golf needs to embrace athletic training in a big way
Bro the new coal hollow park in East Peoria its literally a quarter mile walk from 5 to 6 at a 50 degree incline . You're soo gassed out and then a 50.degeee incline climbing back up from 15 to 16 its soo hard
The best disc golf in the US is the northeast, we need a mid Atlantic elite series.
Western Carolina/Southern Applalacian would like a word.
Bullshit. KC area will put you to shame.
caliber and motherlode are sweeet eruo style courses which had an a tier this year called the High Country Open. Paul the owner wants a dgpt stop. Itsin Sandpoint ID right after the portrlan d swing
Who decides which courses are on the pro tour?
Disc golf is growing in all the awesome ways you could ever possibly want
The only down side is all the complaining that comes with the changes
Chill out
Let’s just work towards implementing work towards making it cool,fair and all the other metrics
There is a reason these conversations arise….
Because people a lot op people are playing and obsessed with it
Looking at the necessity of changes and improvement,should only be perceived as something that arises with growth
Also,if you’ve been playing for less than 5 years……definitely chill,you don’t really understand the scope of what has happened only recently
As far as courses…… Disc golf has so many opportunities to make different competitive courses
It’s not as simple as “Krohkol “
I personally don’t care if the sport is on TV and people make money from it
However,that is what’s happening and to accommodate all the requirements is very difficult
Hot take. I don't think every hole should be "easily" birdie-able. If we started making a lot of holes softer and we start seeing multiple multiple players every tournament shooting -15 to -18, I would be less interested in watching it. I love seeing a player stand out with an incredible shot and having 2-3 others not hit that incredible shot and aren't rewarded. An insane par through the woods with 3 bogies on the card is better to watch than 4 gimme birdies by a card. If people aren't grasping how difficult the course really is, do an Am practice round with the pros to showcase how hard it really is. I would love to see a 4 day tournament finish around -10, not -40.
Agree with this comment! Birdies should be very hard to come by in a pro event. That alone would make disc golf more interesting to watch. That is why people love the “Simon Line” so much! Risking it all for a chance at a big reward!
@@conradyoder6897why does a 3 mean more if the par is 3, 4, 5, 100......3 is 3
@@Billyraye_ with that approach why have pars at all?
@@conradyoder6897 agreed. Par doesnt matter. If 56 is -25 or is +5 if thats the best score; that score wins
@@Billyraye_ Mentally a birdie does far more for confidence than a par or bogie. It would make disc golf very boring to play or watch if there was no pars.
Jeff spring with his God complex and greed are already ruining American disc golf. Money money 🤑🤑🤑
Sounds like a lot of disc golfers are having a mid-life crisis, and “grow the sport” is backfiring in their faces. Love watching it! The difficulty is not enough until they start crying on the course. I wanna see C1 OB with a 45ft drop zone.
Love Toboggan - should every course be like that no, it films way differently than ball golf courses so clumping it in with them is misleading. What’s awesome about disc golf is variety of courses and we keep having videos like this calling for all courses to be one style. Our selling point on these events is the uniqueness of the courses. Have Toboggan let us see the pros play hills, usdgc landing zones with OB, MVP in the woods, etc.
The best course designs for both ball golf and disc golf have a variety of holes that challenge many aspects of your game in one round. Long tee shots, short tee shots, wooded holes, open holes, tough greens, easier greens, holes that favor left to right shots and others that favor right to left shots. The courses where only the furthest throwers can compete is getting a little stale on tour. As much as I love watching those huge drives, I know that the extreme length of these courses on tour is probably why I feel like I watch the 8 furthest throwing players trade spots in the final group of every single tournament I watch. What I am not a fan of is everyone trying to promote disc golf so much and in ways that negatively affect the sport. I am an avid bass fisherman and the sport of tournament bass fishing is ruining the sport in my opinion. Won't go into the details, but the desire to grow sports in the name of getting more people to know and love the sport has consequences. Mainly because it is usually about getting the tournament side of the sport more revenue. Sure, the motives are good at first. More money in the sport means more courses being designed in more areas. The courses get better because they have the funds to design the features they want vs. finding the perfect natural layouts. Then suddenly one day we are all paying $10 to play the course down the road. Perhaps we'll be making tee times as well. And then $10 per round becomes $20, and the next thing we have is ball golf which while awesome and fun to play, is CRAZY expensive and it's hard to schedule tee times without being a week out. My 6 cents anyway.
The tour sux. Can't watch it anymore. Any ball golf course or dglo so boring. What happened to the tour going to Dela in Santa Cruz the world's best and most fun course. We're going the wrong way at 100mph
I forget which course, but one of the west coast ball golf courses is solid. It’s because the designer didn’t follow the ball golf course-he used the spaces between with some key mandos. As a result, it plays kind of like a wooded course, but was great for spectators.
@erakfishfishfish you said it all. Great for cash grab spectators. Not great golf. That's Portland. We need real disc golf course, not temp ball golf layouts with 1500 ft holes. These tournaments and viewing is a scam. It shouldn't be built around how many passes they can sell or cell phone service. What a joke.There should be 200 foot holes that are wooded and tight with natural ob. There should be a range of par 3s and a few bombers. But the ball golf holes are just a distance contest and endurance fest. It's not the disc golf I fell in love with or like to watch or play.
@@JackpotMike77it’s really a lose lose situation. When pros DO play amazing and wooded courses with little cell service, EVERYONE complains. There’s no way to win
There is no way to sustain a tour or professional disc golf without people watching it, so given your opinion, it’s a lose lose.
@wakimura303 why does it have to be live. When they did in the past jomez filmed it, we had awesome footage of what we needed and it was great. The live screws everything up and it's slow and not exciting anyways
Im nowhere near good at disc golf. But i see these courses and would love to play them but I'd be double bogey if not more on all these holes because I have nowhere near the arm to get the distance. But I enjoy watching the pick lines thru the wooded areas cause that's something I can do. Big lines get boring to me I guess cause I can't throw them.
This is all thanks to Jeff Spring. He has turned the increased money from disc golf into better payouts, but I think that there is still an excess of greed that exists within the US Disc Golf tour. 5 years ago I went to Beaver State Fling and only had to pay to get into the park. Now every tour event charges for every spectator to watch.
I had a similar experience with the 2018 Canadian Open. It was at Hillcrest Farm on Prince Edward Island; a denesly wooded course through rolling hills. You could wander fairly freely around the course and even mingle with the players - same in 2019, a great battle between Nate Sexton, Paul McBeth, Thomas Gilbert and Simon with the added bonus of a hurricane on Saturday. It was great. Recently I went to the Discmania Open (also on PEI) and was herded around by DGPT police, the views weren't great and the players didn't seem all that happy to be there. it convinced me never to go to another DGPT event.
@@richardchapman8855 silver series are where it's at now, trust me.
I have a few comments.
1) Jerm doesn't like that every shot is driver at DGLO, but he likes Krokhol, even though Krokhol is one of the longest courses the pros played this year.
2) Courses have to evolve or else people will also merk them. We're starting to see it at the beast in finland. What used to be really hard is now much easier because the players have adapted.
3) Disc golf wants to be treated like a real sport with pay, live events, tickets, etc, but not with difficulty of courses, physical exercise/staying in shape, or acting professionally. I think it should choose one and then get on with it. Complaining about every course, or acting like DGLO represents every course on tour, is a bad look for the sport. Some courses are built differently and that's fine.
4) The same people winning is not a good argument against a certain course design. It appears that Gannon and Isaac (and Rick, AB, Calvin) are just better than the other pros at disc golf, and that's why they're winning. I can't think of a course design that Jerm would win a pro tour event on, and he complained about DGLO being a rhbh course when there are many rhfh shots on the course (13 in particular)
Anyway, those are my thoughts
The rate of open courses to wooded courses is too skewed to the favor of open courses imo. Sure you can have also these open courses, but we should have several more courses like Beast, Idlewild or Northwood imo.
@@samuelsiltala119 Sounds good to me! In my opinion, people complain more about the wooded courses (except new london) than anything. Northwood black gets a lot of hate, and so does idlewild. I love them, but the pros love to hate them
#3 exactly. Act like a professional athlete.
The thing is that disc golf has experienced a big boom in popularity over the last several years, which is good for the sport and good for us as fans, and as such, tournaments and the courses they play on need to be able to accommodate fans for spectating. Tightly wooded courses are just not suited to allowing spectating. I like the park style courses that still have ample trees and other obstacles available to create challenging shots, but also have plenty of space for viewing. Pickard Park where they play the Des Moines challenge at comes to mind. It has challenging shots but still a lot of space for spectators.
@@Thisnameisnottakenjk I agree partly but the thing is that the wooded courses are where basically frisbeegolf started, they are the roots of frisbeegolf. It is a different challenge to throw in the woods, requires more accuracy than open courses. It is a balance, a well diversified tour should have a good ratio of wooded and open courses. It shouldn't be just about maximizing the profits and big crowds if it means the competitiveness is more one sided and less diverse.
Fewer 700+ holes and more trickier to throw shots, and maybe less white lines and stakes for ob
Many courses are just so damn boring to watch in us. Especially all those ball golf courses. To me the magic of disc golf is really not in the long shots. European disc golf tournaments are nowadays much more fun to watch. Have been playing and watching disc golf for 25 years now so i feel i know also what im talking about.Totally agree with Jerm about everything,
agreed