Golf Time Machine: What I'd Go Back And Change From The Sport's History

See this as a beginning of a spirited debate rather than a definitive list. This is based on my own preferences and my own version of history and not the biggest and most unjust moments in the game. In a perfect world you would change thousands of things but here’s 10 to get us going.

1 The clothing conundrum

Most of us would like to the ball rolled back but, first, I’d like golfing fashion and dress codes to be taken back to the 70s. What the hell happened after that?

Up until just a few years ago we seem locked into an all-grey vortex which was made worse by white belts, stretchy trousers and the ever-present baseball cap. Yes, golf is a sport and we need athletic clothing to help us along the way, but you can still look OK.

Pretty much every French golfer or any Scandinavian on their holidays seem to manage it so it is possible. Things are moving forward and the ladies’ game is thankfully light years ahead of where it was, but why this has taken so long to happen is anyone’s guess?

2 More Seve, please

I’d just like to have enjoyed more. Walking round with Seve in the 80s was a thing of genuine beauty on every level. Forty years later he’s still hit the most memorable shots that I’ve ever witnessed in person; a 4-iron off the cart path at Wentworth’s 15th, an up-and-down at the ’85 Open at Royal St George’s or even a regular tee shot launched down the 18th at Woburn. They are all seared into my brain.

When the victorious 1987 Ryder Cup team returned to Heathrow late on the Monday night the welcome he received was other worldly. And rightly so.

Some think his legacy is slightly overblown, others just acknowledge someone exceptionally special and the kind of talent and charisma that will live on for years to come.

3 just knock it in

Yes, that one. I once interviewed Sanders and it remains the best chat I’ve ever had with a golfer. It began and ended, an hour later, with a joke.

‘Have you got time for one more?’ he would ask as I lapped it all up.

If I could give anyone a Mulligan, it would be his par effort at the 1970 Open Championship. To do it at the Old Course and to beat Jack Nicklaus just added to it.

I asked the obvious question of how long he would go without thinking about it and he giggled and replied ‘Oh, sometimes as long as an hour.’

He spoke of hitmen, not getting on the plane that would kill Tony Lema but also of his brilliant golf. In 1966 he had top 10s in all four Majors and claimed that he could have easily won them all.

He was only 74 yards away after his tee shot, so maybe he’d like the second shot again? Either way he would have made a fantastic Open Champion.

4 The ultimate Mulligan

On a similar theme I’d give Tom Watson a Mulligan at Turnberry in 2009. I’m not sure he’d want the approach shot back – an 8-iron from 187 yards – given where it landed but I’d happily let him take two from the back of the green to make it six Claret Jugs.

I’m not convinced that I’m even that big a fan of Watson’s but the prospect of a 59-year-old winning The Open was too good to miss out on. And to do it 32 years after The Duel In The Sun is plain ridiculous.

At the time there was talk that Stewart Cink would make a worthy Open champion. He certainly played his way to the title but he’s only had one Major top 10 since.

5 Just make a six

Like Sanders, we have another absolute charmer who was almost too nice to win a Major: Jean van de Velde. What bugs me here is that we all forget that he had played his way into a five-shot lead around the most brutal Major set-up in recent years and that he still had three of those shots to spare standing on the 72nd tee.

Then he was on the wrong end of one of the worst pieces of misfortune with the bounce off the grandstand and then the bounce off the wall housing the Barry Burn. Fair enough the drive and approach shot were poor but it could have gone anywhere else and he surely would have won.

6 Pick it up

The 2015 Solheim Cup was marred by some pathetic behaviour by Suzann Pettersen which she would love to relive again. This was the 18-inch (if that) putt which Europe claimed hadn’t been given and led to them claiming the hole and taking a 10-6 lead.

The only thing stopping a third straight win was something to wind the visitors up and Juli Inkster’s side came to fighting in the singles, winning seven of the last eight matches for a 14.5-13.5 victory.

‘I’ve never felt more gutted and truly sad about what went down Sunday on the 17th..’ she would write soon after.

It denied Carin Koch a victory she likely deserved but thankfully Pettersen got to sign off a brilliant Solheim career with what happened at Gleneagles.

7 15 Majors - what went wrong?

My wish here would be a simple one – for Woods to have enjoyed a relatively injury-free career. It’s bizarre to think that Bernhard Langer, who suffered with a bad back for much of his early career, is still winning at the age of 67 but Woods, who danced through his early years, has since been blighted by injuries and a near-death car crash.

In a perfect world we’d have been able to watch Woods, now 49, still compete and likely get close or overtake Nicklaus. He’s won a Major on one leg and a Masters with a fused back.

8 The ultimate comeback

While we’re on devastating injuries what Ben Hogan did, following his car crash in 1949, was utterly incredible. The American may well have died had he not thrown himself across his wife Valerie but the then 36-year-old would suffer a double fracture of the pelvis, a fractured collarbone, a broken left ankle, chipped rib and near-fatal blood clots.

In the next four seasons he would win six of the nine Majors that he played in with a worst finish of seventh.

In 1953 he would win the Masters, US Open and Open, the only time that he would play in the game’s oldest Major. But, due to timings at Carnoustie, he would miss the PGA so we wouldn’t get the chance of him completing the Grand Slam. Bizarrely he wouldn’t win another Major.

9 Years of USGA dross

The US Open has become a stellar Major in recent years but, for a certain generation, the set-up was unfathomably dull. The Opens of the 80s and 90s were horrific viewing in that, if a player missed a fairway, they would simply be lumping it up the fairway to leave a wedge or a bunker shot. Around the greens was equally as bad with one shot necessary to flop/flub a recovery somewhere around the hole. It was hot, sweaty and packed full of cargo pants and, even worse more often than not, we just got served up more of the same at the PGA Championship.

If we are allowed to turn back time then we’d do something different with the PGA, moving it around the world and starting on the Melbourne Sand Belt.

10 Just one Green Jacket

Once upon a time Greg Norman was a World No.1 golfer, a position he held for well over 300 weeks. During that period he finished 2-2-5-3 at Augusta National, before being reeled in by Nick Faldo in 1996 when he had a six-shot lead with one round to play.

He was undone by Larry Mize’s wedge and his own weakness in finishing off Major tournaments despite racking up the victories around the world. He’s 70 now which is almost unthinkable and two Majors is a terrible reflection of his talents.

I’d love to see Rory win at Augusta, of course we all would, but there’s nobody more deserving there than the Aussie. Better still it would mean that the last few Champions Dinners would have been a lot spicier.