#127 - Brian Mogg: Golf Digest’s Top 100 Teachers in America - Behind the Golf Brand Podcast with Paul Liberatore

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Today we play golf.

Speaker 2 (00:02):
Let me show you how we do it in the pros.

Speaker 3 (00:05):
Welcome to Behind the Golf Brand podcast I never
missed with the Seven Iron , aconversation with some of the
most interesting innovators andentrepreneurs behind the
biggest names in golf. My

Speaker 4 (00:16):
Friends were the golf clubs. I lived on the golf
course, I lived on the drivingrein

Speaker 3 (00:19):
From Pro Talk . You should learn something from
each and every single round youplay to fun from on and off the
green. Why

Speaker 5 (00:26):
Would you play golf if you don't play it for money?

Speaker 3 (00:27):
Just let me put the ball in a hole. This is Behind
the Golf Brand podcast withPaul Libert tore .

Speaker 6 (00:34):
What's up guys?
Welcome to the Behind the GolfBrand podcast. This week I have
a good friend Brian Moog ,world famous golf instructor,
instructor to many, many, manytour players and I'm super
excited to have him on theshow, talk about his life, his
career, how he got to where heis at, what he's doing now, and
it's time to take you into hisworld. So welcome to the show.

Speaker 7 (00:56):
Hey , thanks so much for having me on.

Speaker 6 (00:59):
So where are you located right now?

Speaker 7 (01:01):
Well , I'm in Orlando, Florida at the moment.
Uh, spend about half our yearin Orlando and half our year
near Seattle. Wife and I arefrom the area. Oh really ? Our
son lives out there. I've gotAcademy of Chambers Bay and
tons of family and friendsthroughout the , throughout the
year. So we definitely get asmuch get out there as much as
we can and then somehow it justseems to work when the

(01:21):
weather's good in Florida,we're here and the weather's
good out near Seattle. We'rethere. So that's uh ,

Speaker 6 (01:26):
So when you go back to Seattle,

Speaker 7 (01:29):
Oh , like summer?
Yeah, late May, early Junewe'll probably head back out to
Seattle and we just got back ,uh, earliest November to
Orlando and you know, it worksout pretty good. But I've got
other academies so there's alot of moving around and all
that. But , um, lot traveling.
You know, Seattle's fantasticfrom the, when the weather's
great out there.

Speaker 6 (01:46):
You grew up there, didn't you?

Speaker 7 (01:47):
Tacoma Washington.
So I'm from there. My wife'sfrom there. Our son has a job
out there. He worked forRussell Wilson for quite a
while out in Seattle. And uh ,

Speaker 6 (01:55):
Who , what ,

Speaker 7 (01:56):
Uh , that's a cool part of the story. He , uh,
after he graduated fromcollege, he got a job with NBC
Sports and he was on the fieldfor Sunday night football with
Michelle Tafoya and kind of didSunday night football bus, you
know, we're huge Seahawk fans.
And after he did that for aboutfour or five years, I think
they won four Emmys as a team.
I don't know where Russellcalled him and said, I've seen
some of the work you do. Iwants you to come out here and

(02:17):
do it just for me. So he waspart of Russell's brand. We're
talking about brand . So he waspart of Russell's brand team
and for almost six years, youknow, they really did a great
job and Russell had the visionto put people around him and
empower them to help him withbranding and commercials and
endorsements and kind ofnon-football related stuff. And
that's cool . And the processbecame great friends with

(02:39):
Russell and we're , you know,friends with a lot of Seahawk
players and just fantasticfriends out there.

Speaker 6 (02:44):
I feel like Seahawk players , Seahawk fans are like
diehard fans. I don't thinkpeople realize how diehard
Seahawk fans are.

Speaker 7 (02:51):
Like , you snoop around our house here, you'll
find tons of jerseys and 12flags and I think I , yeah ,

Speaker 6 (02:57):
I see

Speaker 7 (02:58):
I've been to three , I think I've been to three
games so far this year already.
Really ? And they've won everygame. So I need to , I guess I
need to keep going.

Speaker 6 (03:04):
I like to see how , I remember they used to be so
terrible back in the eightiesand stuff and then yeah , like
then they finally like turnedit around and it's kind of
crappy . They traded Russellaway though.

Speaker 7 (03:13):
Yeah. There, there's a lot of story behind that
story, but I need to get yousome of my buddies on the show
with you because they are someof the biggest Jermaine K wide
receiver had had the catch inthe Super Bowl .

Speaker 6 (03:25):
I remember . I remember him.

Speaker 7 (03:26):
Awesome . He's one of our close, he was one of our
close friends. He and BrianWalters . They are like the
biggest golf nuts you've everseen. I've really

Speaker 6 (03:33):
Do

Speaker 7 (03:33):
You do remember ?
All right . Do you remember theSeahawk playoff game against
Minnesota? It was six belowabout seven, eight years ago

Speaker 6 (03:39):
Ring . I do remember that. Yeah. Yeah, yeah .

Speaker 7 (03:42):
Blair Walsh missed a field goal at the short
distance at the very end of thegame in Seattle One . Well
after the game, I got a pictureon my phone. I'm in the locker
room with Jermaine . It was sixbelow and uh, we're in the
locker room, edge of the lockerroom doing golf tips and drills
with Jermaine. He brought somewith him . You know , they're
waiting for Russell , RussellDow's interview stuff. But I
met Jermaine that year , Idon't know how many times at

(04:03):
games we're doing drills and,and swing stuff after the game
in the locker room or outsidethe stadium waiting for the
buses to leave. And I mean,Brian , he's

Speaker 6 (04:12):
Like, you know that you're like the go-to guy to
give him the edge he needs.
Have you given him likeinstructions too outside of
that? Like I bet you're pickinga lot of players instruction,
huh? Like NFL players.

Speaker 7 (04:22):
We just , we just had Michael Vick , one of our
golf schools. Uh, in fact whenI played with Briston out in
the Pebble Beach event hererecently, Fred McGriff and Matt
La Porter were two of my theybaseball guys. I remember

Speaker 6 (04:31):
Griff , I remember him. Dude, that's old school
that's , he played for likeToronto. Wait , who did he play
for?

Speaker 7 (04:36):
He played for San Diego and Atlanta mostly, but
Atlanta.

Speaker 6 (04:39):
That's right.
Atlanta.

Speaker 7 (04:40):
But he just got on the Hall of Fame. And you know,
one of the cool things from agolf instruction standpoint got
to meet so many athletes andjust be involved with helping
their golfers golf games out.
And all of a sudden you'rebuddies with guys that you
could, you know, as a , as afan you're drooling watching
'em on tv. Next thing you knowthey're asking you for help
with their golf game.

Speaker 6 (04:58):
And there's like normal people.

Speaker 7 (05:00):
They're all , they're all normal people. They
may be driven a little morejust 'cause they're elite
athletes, but you know, theyjust, you know, Michael Vick
texted me yesterday and justsaid, man, everything we worked
on the school's going great. Acouple more ways. I can get
shots lower here, but these twodrills you gave me, I gotta
keep doing one with my putter,one with my wedge. And it's
just like he's all fired up afew weeks after golf school to
keep knocking. He's an eighthandicap. He wants to get down

(05:21):
to a two or three.

Speaker 6 (05:23):
That's awesome. Um, so like, I, like I know the
guys from True Links wear andthey're all from that same
area, like tr uh, like theTacoma area. I know they do a
lot of stuff in like , you knowthose guys,

Speaker 7 (05:36):
I know a little bit of them . Ryan Moore's from
kind of my hometown out thereand Ryan. Yeah. Is that the one
company? I think Ryan'sinvolved with the shoes, but
yeah,

Speaker 6 (05:42):
Ryan and, and his brother Jason.

Speaker 7 (05:45):
It's just a funny area in the context that, you
know, I've been all over thecountry. I've been all over the
world. It might be the mostpassionate golf place in the
world, meaning it could be 42and rainy outside and the golf
course is full. And , uh, mylesson schedule might be fuller
out in Chambers Bay than it isin perfect weather in Florida.
It's just people are reallygolf nuts, serious, passionate

(06:07):
golfers out in the Northwest,which is not the perception
around the country. And there'sbeen a lot of elite tour
players that have come out ofthat area. And Andrew Putnam's
on a on nice run the lastseveral years. Ryan Morris had
a great career. One of mystudents, Joe Highsmith, you
don't probably know the name,but it'll be a rookie on tour
this year. He finished 18th onKorn Ferry. You're gonna hear a
lot about Joe. This is one ofthe most talented golfers I've
ever come across with. Andthey're all from Tacoma,

(06:29):
Washington. I mean, of allplaces. Why is there so many
players from there? And it'sjust been a fun to be a small
part of that.

Speaker 6 (06:35):
It's weird too, like I'm like , I'm an outsider,
right? And like I went, I wasat the Waste Management one
year and the guys from TruLinks were like, Ryan was
playing in the ProAm day. Andso I was texting somebody on
his , I can't remember what ,on his team, they're like, Hey,
do you want to come walk withus in the ropes? And I'm like,
I , I was like wearing suit andI was wearing like, oh my

(06:55):
boss's crap. I was not planningon doing that, but I was like
walking and the , I was walkingand it was him and Ches Revy
and I went to high school withChaz , like, and his dad was
like my boss, like my veryfirst boss. His dad was an
airline pilot. And when I gotoutta college, I went and
worked for the airlines andlike, his dad was like one of
my bosses. It was crazy. Heactually told me to quit my
job, so he told me to do , hetold me to quit my job and

(07:15):
become a pilot, which I did.
Um, so it's like, and Iremember him telling me all
this stuff, like, oh yeah, Chemade it the masters , you know,
as a , a ProAm. And I was like,what, what's , that's crazy.
But um, it was so weird likewalking it. But it was
interesting because I , um,Jordan Spieth was behind us and
I think his caddy is from thesame area too, right?

Speaker 7 (07:37):
Mic Michael Greer is from the area. Yeah.

Speaker 6 (07:39):
And they all freaking know each other. Like
they all like , like it was ,it was like the smallest world.
I was like, dude, I had noidea.

Speaker 7 (07:45):
Yeah , I had one of my, one of my friends kid was
in eighth grade and Michael washis, I wanna say science
teacher is what he taught mathor science.

Speaker 6 (07:51):
Seriously. Oh, that's the , that's right.
Isn't , wasn't teacher. Andthen he was like , wasn't he
like instructing like part-timeor something?

Speaker 7 (07:58):
No , Jordan . Jordan Jordan played in the 2011 US
Junior, which was about 30, 40minutes from Tacoma. And
somehow he got hooked up withMichael as his caddy and he won
the tournament. So in 2013,Jordan did one year at
University of Texas, went toTurn Pro and he got his team
together and basically said,all right , we need to get you
a full-time caddy, you know,who , who , who do you wanna
look at? And he goes, you know,when I won the US Junior, I had

(08:21):
this guy who was a high schoolteacher, junior high teacher.
He was the best caddy I've everhad. So they approached
Michael, Michael acceptedwhatever the offer is and you
know, whatever it's been now10, 12 years later, you

Speaker 6 (08:33):
Know , a lot of wins.

Speaker 7 (08:34):
They've , they've been a phenomenal team with a
lot of wins and I'm sure a lotof money as well. But they've
been at one of the, one of thetrue kind of partners in the
game of golf from a playercaddy standpoint the last 10
years. I

Speaker 6 (08:44):
Didn't know that. It was just cool. Like how it's
like you were saying , a smallworld and it's like from that
same region and likeeverybody's knew each other.
They're like, oh yeah, we, wetalked together, blah, blah,
blah . Like , I'm like, whatthe heck? I mean , I don't know
. I think what you see on tv,there's like a huge backstory
behind that, you know , and alot of these guys came up
together. Yeah . Um , or knoweach other, some other way. So

(09:04):
you grew up in Seattle, likewere you always good at golf or
like, how'd you get into golf?
I

Speaker 7 (09:09):
I , I did all the other things. Um , played
sports and was good and all of'em and all that. And my funny
story is, is I think I was ineighth grade, it was summer
baseball and I'm , uh, at theplate and we were facing a guy
that was an equivalent ofthrowing a hundred miles an
hour back then he just longhair and threw gas and all
that. And you know, the curveball was just starting to
happen at that time. And as Ikind of took my stance and kind

(09:31):
of wagged got ready , Ihappened to cheat and looked
down at the catcher who flasheda two sign. I was like, oh, the
curve ball's coming. Well thatwas like a free gift. And over
the next three or four pitchesI cheated each time, saw the
catcher flash the sign and knewit was coming. This guy was
throwing either gas or nastycurve balls. Well , about the
fourth or fifth pitch herecomes the curve ball . So I'm

(09:52):
gonna All right , stay in thebox, stay in the box, stay in
the box. Well somehow betweenthe single being sent to the
pitch of the pitcher threw highcheese and about took my head
off as I was trying to stay onthe plate. And that was the
year I got into golf. And Isaid, you know what? I think
I'm gonna , I'm gonna go aftergolf. And the funny part of the
story was the very first goal Idid at Chambers Bay, I don't
know , 20 10, 20 11, somewherein that range. That picture was

(10:16):
in the first golf school. Hedid shut up and I started
laughing at him 'cause I said,you're the reason I'm here
today. And he hadn't , I'dnever shared that story. But
that led to getting into golfand, you know, did well in
junior golf. I was first team aJGL American the first time
A-J-A-G-A had their, theirlisting. And , uh, 1979. And
then , uh, that led to gettinga scholarship to Ohio State.

(10:38):
Went back to school there,eventually got be all American
turned pro. And uh, two and ahalf years later I was on the
PGA tour . It's crazy.

Speaker 6 (10:48):
Yeah . So like, did your , did your, like, did your
dad play golf or like your mom,like , like did , how did you
just choose golf?

Speaker 7 (10:54):
They , they did a little bit, nah , a little bit.
But in that eighth gradesummer, got a birthday present.
My summer's, birthday's in Julyand it was a little gift card
for a series of lessons with aguy, a local pro in the Tacoma
area and went out and saw Glenmom , great guy. And, you know,
worked with him for a long,long time. And it was the
coolest thing if Glen said, dothis, the ball did what it was

(11:15):
supposed to do. And if Glensaid, do that, it worked. And
it was just the mostfascinating thing that, how,
how good he was, how right hewas. And the results were
there. And I kind of went onthe acceleration

Speaker 6 (11:28):
Approach . You like fell , love it . Like once you
actually saw it, right? Whenyou saw it working and you
actually hitting the ballpretty far, you're like , oh
wait a minute, this is actuallypretty fun.

Speaker 7 (11:36):
It's , it's , it's ironic for what I'm doing now.
But back then it was just like,okay, hey, this guy's telling
me to do this. Listen to whathe's saying. It works. And you
know, my parents really didn'tplay, but they were certainly
supportive and gave us allgreat opportunities to pursue
our dreams. And next thing youknow, I'm back at Ohio State
and next thing I know, I'm, Iplayed the Asian tour for a
couple years and then I got myPGA tour card and I did that

(11:59):
for, I did professionally golffor nine years, kind of all
over the world and all, youknow, three years on the PGA
tour.

Speaker 6 (12:06):
So how'd you, why'd you choose Ohio State? Like how
did they find you?

Speaker 7 (12:11):
Well,

Speaker 6 (12:11):
I was Did you win that tournament?

Speaker 7 (12:13):
Well, I was first team junior All American that
year. So I didn't wintechnically any tournaments.
But I , you know, I got to thequarterfinals of us junior and
top 10 finishes and it seemslike every junior event I
played, so coaches came out andsaw me play. And you know ,
it's still funny because backthen from a recruiting
standpoint, the phone wouldring and , you know, all right

(12:34):
, it's Ohio State coach callingfirst. You couldn't believe it.
And then it was the Texascoaches calling and North
Carolina coaches calling. So II , I had some really nice
choices to make and I , I lookback and wonder, 'cause Texas
was probably my next option,but I visited University of
North Carolina, you know,university of Miami , uh,
university of , what

Speaker 6 (12:51):
Was

Speaker 7 (12:51):
That? This was 1979.
Wow. So at the time I choseOhio State, you know, hey , big
tradition, Jack Nicholas , allthose kind of things. They had
some really good players there.
Joey Sindelar at the time, JohnCook, which you'll hear about
later in the story. Uh, JohnCook was the reigning us
amateur champion there . Andum, I played the Ohio State

(13:13):
course before. It's phenomenal.
The facilities were phenomenal.
And I thought, you know what,John Cook will be a senior my
freshman year. What better wayto learn from the best player
in collegiate, amateur golf tobe around John for year . Joey
Ciara was the year behind him.
So I was gonna get two yearswith Joey, and I just felt like
that was the best place for meto pursue my dreams. And um,

(13:33):
unfortunately two days beforeschool started was the final of
the US amateur. And John, Johnwent to defend his title and
lost a Marco . Om well, Johnturned pro the next day. So all
this great plans kinda went outthe windows John left school.
But what the cool thing thathappened is late in that
spring, Ohio State had won thencaa, the first Northern school

(13:56):
and long, long time to have wonthe national title. So I came
in, we were defendingchampions, and with John having
left, I got to mostly playFifth Man for most of the year.
But if John was there, Icertainly wouldn't have done
that. So yeah,

Speaker 6 (14:08):
You got a lot , you got a lot of reps, right, right
. You gotta play.

Speaker 7 (14:12):
And then we hosted the NCAA that year. So we were
defending champions on our homegolf course, and we were
three-way tied for the leaguegoing into the final round. And
it was Ohio State. Columbus isjust nuts for sports and to
have Oh yeah . ncaa. ncaa . Andit was the first year the
NCAA's ever televised. I was inthe next to last group playing
with Bob T and I mean, it wasone more nervous situations I

(14:32):
ever felt myself in.

Speaker 6 (14:35):
So How'd you do?

Speaker 7 (14:37):
I'll say I, and we did not have a good final
round. We , uh, we uh, weallowed Oklahoma State to win

Speaker 6 (14:46):
It's golf. It's ba like baseball. It's , that's
how it goes sometimes. Um ,that's

Speaker 7 (14:51):
Great. Great learning opportunity.

Speaker 6 (14:53):
Well, so Ohio State man, like, that's like a
tradition of like every sport.
I mean

Speaker 7 (14:58):
The, now now it's the Ohio State.

Speaker 6 (15:00):
Oh yeah, yeah . I know . I went, I went to
Purdue. Oh , cool . So like,you guys kicked our like every
freaking year in football, likeevery year. And there'd be a
ton of people there from Ohio,like half the field's , Ohio
State fans. And then, but wegot , but then the years I was
there is when Drew Brees like,oh wow , he was a freshman and

(15:20):
then he started and we startedwinning. And I was like, holy
crap, this is what it's to beoutta college. You started
winning stuff. Like it wasawesome. Um, I, I don't have
any problems with Ohio State.
My of my good friends, OhioState guy. And , uh, he always
goes back every year to gofootball games, even still from
Arizona. Um, but what happenedthis weekend?

Speaker 7 (15:42):
I mean, nothing you can say is that Well, I , the
only thing, the

Speaker 6 (15:45):
Only game that matters all season pretty much,
right?

Speaker 7 (15:48):
. Yeah. The only thing that matters and,
you know, give a , give a shoutout . But the Michigan
quarterback just had moreexperience than the Ohio State
quarterback. Yeah . And hedidn't, he didn't make a
mistake. And unfortunately theOhio State guy threw an
interception in the firstquarter. That was probably a
difference in the game. And I'dlike to see a ,

Speaker 6 (16:06):
I love , I love watching Big 10 football
though, man. Like honestly, Iwould rather watch Big 10
football than

Speaker 7 (16:10):
Anything. Well get get ready. 'cause it's next
year, it's no longer, it'sstill the Big 10, but it's not
really the big 10. I , I happento see the schedules come out
next year and it's just, itdoesn't even look right
anymore.

Speaker 6 (16:20):
Like, what is it?

Speaker 7 (16:21):
Well, I just happen to look at Washington schedule
for 2024 and they open withNorthwestern at home, then they
go at Rutgers, come back toMichigan at home, then they go
at Iowa and it just, it's thisback and forth homing away the
whole year. And then they're ,

Speaker 6 (16:36):
It's changed so much, man, the last five years,
10 years. Like before it usedto be like, this is the PAC 12
or the PAC 10 or whatever itwas, and this is the big 10.
Everyone had their conferenceand like you were loyal to your
conference. Yeah . And then thebowl game would be like, that
conference was this conference,the two best teams or whatever.
And now it's just like, I don'teven , I don't even know who's
in what conference anymore tobe quite honest. Like

Speaker 7 (16:56):
Yeah . The , the problem's gonna eventually be
though that, you know, you'vegot Ohio State, Michigan 11 and
oh , you've got Georgia andother teams, SEC 11 and oh ,
when you have the Texas andOklahomas coming into the SEC ,
you've now got Washington,Oregon, U-S-C-U-C-A going into
the , in the Big 10. Nobody'sgonna go 11 and oh or 12 and oh
anymore . You just, there'sjust too much competition gonna

(17:16):
happen. So you go, you go 10and two in your conference
right now, that might be likethe winning team 'cause there's
just too much talent and depthgoing on across the board. But
I don't know , we'll see.

Speaker 6 (17:29):
That's crazy. So, okay, so you graduated from the
Ohio State, correct ? I wannamake sure I say that correctly.
Yes. Um , I went to, I went tothe Purdue University, which is
a lot smaller. Um, and whathappened then?

Speaker 7 (17:46):
Um, one of the first things I did , uh, Joey
Sindelar , who's been a friendforever now, Joey came outta
college, didn't get his tourcard and he went and played the
Asian tour. So one of Joey'srecommendation was go play the
Asian tour. I didn't know whatthat meant. I'd never really
been outta the country. But ,uh, I graduated in January the

(18:07):
next year, went and played 10weeks in Asia and it was
phenomenal. Um , like

Speaker 6 (18:12):
Where do you play in Asia on the , on the Asia tour

Speaker 7 (18:14):
Back , back then there was 10 countries in 10 or
11 weeks. So we started in thePhilippines and we went to Hong
Kong, still remember the wholething. And we went to Malaysia
and then we went to Thailand,then India. It

Speaker 6 (18:25):
Was like awesome , right? Like they'd be

Speaker 7 (18:27):
23 years old . Yeah, each country's different. Each
experience was different, eachfood was different. Each golf
course was different. But youknow, in hindsight got to play
with some of just the cool guysof the world. I mean, in
hindsight, I played severalrounds with Vij back then, who
was just this tall, skinny kidfrom Fiji hitting a big hook.
Well that's not the Vij we knowVij , we know today. He was
buffed out and basically playeda power cut shot his whole life

(18:50):
and you know, hall of famegolfer, which back then you
never thought, well that'sgonna happen. And to play golf
with a bunch of the, theAustralians of the world, Ian
Baker Finch's, Roger Davis',you know, he went from college
right into that environment andto kind of , to not maybe do
the mini tour stuff as much toget kind of national,
international experience wasjust fantastic learning, you

(19:10):
know, just to be exposed to somany different things .

Speaker 6 (19:12):
The talent level too. The international talent
level, right?

Speaker 7 (19:15):
International, I mean, you just , you you just
didn't appreciate how much, youknow, stereotype, Asian golfer
got the ball in the hole. Maybeit wasn't with an American look
and swing, but chipping,putting wedging, managing their
game, managing how they shottheir score was just so
positive and such a fantasticlearning experience. And you
know, if you remember TM Chenwho almost won the 85 US Open,

(19:37):
I mean he was a guy that wasplaying full-time back then
over in Asia. And last eventwas always in Japan. You get to
play with, you know, some ofthe top Japanese golfers. Five
or six years later I got pairedwith SE one year in Japan. And
so there are things that youjust didn't always get to do on
the US tour. And I'm almost sayin hindsight was a little more
fun playing the Asian tour justbecause, I mean, Hong Kong,

(19:59):
it's a cool city and you're outwalking around at night and
seeing all the different sitesand people and all that. And
when you would go out todinner, it'd be like you'd grab
three Americans, maybe oneCanadian, a British, a Mexican
guy, two Asian guys, eight ofyou or 10 of you'd be at some
restaurant all hanging outtogether. There was no money
list, there was no hierarchy ofwho's doing good or bad. It's
just, you're just out guyshaving , it's like being

Speaker 6 (20:20):
In college again, right? It just like everyone's
doing the same thing trying togo to the next level. And
you're not in that, you're in acompetitive environment, but
you're not. Right, right . Likeit's equals like not, oh ,

Speaker 7 (20:30):
The PGA tours got such a hierarchy to it that,
you know, as a rookie, Ididn't, I didn't have the Gus
to go up to Tom Watson say,kind of take you out to dinner
and pick your brain Asia , youjust went out and you were
friends with everybody. Sothere was a little different
context of all that.

Speaker 6 (20:44):
So you did a year of that. So you did or in that for
sure out you went

Speaker 7 (20:47):
Two , two years. I did two years of an Asian tour
and at the end of the secondyear I got my, I went to Q
School and got my tour cardfinished six at the finals of Q
School and 23 or four yearsold, I'm starting to play on
the PGA tour.

Speaker 6 (21:00):
What year was that?

Speaker 7 (21:02):
1986. What

Speaker 6 (21:04):
Was your first tournament?

Speaker 7 (21:06):
Bob Hope . Now it's called the Amex in Palm
Springs. But first, first holeI made 2030 footer for birdie.
So I braided my first hole onthe tour. Shot 69, my opening
round and shot and ended upshooting 11 under par for the
week. Finished about 40th, butI think I hey it's,

Speaker 6 (21:22):
That's the ,

Speaker 7 (21:22):
I I tied Freddy, I think I beat Greg Norman by
one. Lanny Watkins was rightthere. I mean I look back and
you know, later on and said ,wow, pretty good start for your
first week right outta the box.

Speaker 6 (21:33):
And you again , people's radars too. I'm like,
Hey, who's this guy? Right?
You're not like beeping thepack.

Speaker 7 (21:38):
I got bombard, I pulled into Phoenix in the
parking lot the next week andman just pulled in and you
could see about 25 caddies go .
That's mog . He played goodlast week and I'm driving the
car in the park and 25 guys arerunning at me all wanting to
get a bag that week.

Speaker 6 (21:51):
Such a different, is it a diff It was a different
time, wasn't it, than it isnow.

Speaker 7 (21:56):
Well , I mean, a hundred percent yes. It was
just , it was so muchmore lower scale back then than
it is today.

Speaker 6 (22:04):
And the money, right? The but the pots, the
the , the money is like crazyhigh compared to what it was
back then.

Speaker 7 (22:11):
Well I , I got two grand for my 40th place finish
that . I don't , I don't knowwhat's that gonna be worth
today. Probably 25 grand orsomething like that.

Speaker 6 (22:19):
So then what, what did you, did you play this the
tour the whole season then?
That whole first week .

Speaker 7 (22:25):
So I played , played the tour the whole year and
first month was not bad. Iplayed get the Bob Hope and a
couple weeks later at TroyPines I was in the next to last
group playing with Zinger and ,uh, zinger Birdie, the ninth
hole. And I was three behindhim with nine to play and

Speaker 6 (22:40):
Got a chance,

Speaker 7 (22:41):
Had a chance, was a little out of my element.
Didn't shut 38 or nine on theback nine. So I finished about
20th, but phenomenal learning.
And back then you didn't havelike a Korn Ferry tour where
you could, you could learn asyou go kind of on the, on the
road traveling and week to weekto week to week. And I
basically burned myself out,played too much, didn't know
how to use my time very welland really didn't have a very

(23:03):
good year.

Speaker 6 (23:04):
It's stressful, isn't it too? 'cause you're
trying to like, I mean, wereyou, when you're on the , when
you're back then, I don't knowhow , I know it's different
now, but like did you have topay your entries or does , did
you have , like how did thatwork back then? I have no idea.
Back ,

Speaker 7 (23:16):
Back then there was a hundred dollars entry fee for
the tour. You know , to play anevent, you had to show up,
write a check, enter, you know, give you a goodie bag, et
cetera. Today you don't have anentry fee anymore. Champions
tour does, but um , regulartour, there's no entry fee at
all.

Speaker 6 (23:30):
So then, and then how'd you get around? You fly
over or did you have to drive alot? 'cause you weren't making
all that much money?

Speaker 7 (23:35):
Well , you , you

Speaker 6 (23:36):
Whatever. Some ,

Speaker 7 (23:37):
Some weeks you flew, some weeks you drive. You , you
try to draw a balance between,you gotta make the cut, you
know? Thankfully I had othersponsors that were helping
things out behind the scenes.
But every week is different. Imean, you , you somewhat have
to balance that, wow , it's toofar to drive and I need to fly
so I'm not exhausted. But youknow, sometimes it's just too
expensive to fly.

Speaker 6 (23:57):
Yeah , I can't afford it. I'm always driving .
Right. So then , um, when,like, how, how many years did
you play on the tour? What

Speaker 7 (24:04):
Year? So I lost, I lost my card that first year
and just missed getting itback. So I went back and did
the Asian tour thing the nextyear and, and I think I
finished 25th or something, theAsian tour came back, went to Q
School that next fall andRequalified for the PGA tour.
So now I'm back on the touragain. I think I've learned all

(24:25):
my mistakes, learned all thethings I didn't do very well.
I'm ready to rock and roll. AndI started out, missed every cut
for the first three months andwasn't very close and took some
time off, didn't get into sometournaments, made a whole lot
of change, et cetera , etcetera. A longer story than
this. But I came back andfinished second the very next
week.

Speaker 6 (24:44):
What did you change?

Speaker 7 (24:45):
? Everything . Sure . Everything.

Speaker 6 (24:48):
Oh that much you did that much .

Speaker 7 (24:51):
It was a lot of , a lot of change went on and uh ,
you know, not just the only onthe golf side because when you
talk about stress, so much ofthe stress and playing the tour
is self-induced stress. I mean,humbly said, golf is just a
game. It is a game of get theball from point A to point B,
but all of a sudden when you'remaking it life and death and
all of a sudden this is biggerthan that, the smallest flaw on

(25:13):
your technique, it's crazyexposed. And the separation on
tour, even as we watch it moreso today, the separation is
much more physical, much moremental than it's physical.
Everybody on tour, even backthen, still a really good
player. I mean they're almostgreat today, but back then
everybody was still a reallygood player. And the separation
is much more on how peoplethink than how it is in their

(25:34):
technical side. And that wasreally what I was fighting the
most was more the , the mentalside of putting self-induced
stress, pressure and golf issuch a big thing. And there's
just so many things that havehelped me tremendously now as a
teacher from the mistakes Imade not understanding it 24,
5, 6, 7 years old, perspectiveon what's important, what's not

(25:57):
important, what should I befocused on, what , what works,
what doesn't work. And I , uh,I would love to have had a
conversation with myself todayBack, back then. Yeah.

Speaker 6 (26:06):
You needed , you needed you back then, right?
Yeah . Somebody like you to belike, look dude, this is how it
is. You know,

Speaker 7 (26:12):
There really were, there was very little coaching
going on back then. It just,nobody's really a coach back in
the day. And it wasn't, youknow, one of my mentors, Ken
still Kenny played on the RyderCup team one , three times on
tour. He is from Tacoma,Washington. And I don't know
how many phone calls I woreKenny's ear out, just trying to
get as much advice as I couldjust 'cause Kenny had been
there, you know, long timebefore.

Speaker 6 (26:34):
'cause nobody understands, right? You can't,
like there's no , you don'thave an equal that'd be like,
they would understand whatyou're going through unless
like you just don't. No, Imean, unless

Speaker 7 (26:44):
You know, it's, it's so, so easy to say, well just ,
just let the puck go. Come on,just relax and hit it . I mean,
whatever. Yeah. Yeah.
Intellectually that's thecorrect answer. But it's hard
to just let it go, you know,Hey, if I can, if I can do this
with my hand or if I can thinkthis thought, I can help it go
in better. And it's a very fineline to draw between how much

(27:06):
thought is too much thought,how much is getting in your way
versus being productive. AndI've learned so much in the
whatever, 30 years since I'vebeen off the tour, that I ,
it's something that's reallymade it easy-ish to help other
students and other youngerplayers going through their
careers trying to get them offthe ground just because I know
exactly what they're feeling. Iknow what the, I know what kind

(27:28):
of the danger signs are and ,and really some of the ways you
have to fix 'em .

Speaker 6 (27:32):
I mean, which you've , which you've done amazing in
your teaching career. All thepeople you've helped and what
they've done. I mean, it justshows you that like had you had
you, who knows what would'vehappened, right? Something that
, that kind of skill level andunderstanding and technical
skill too.

Speaker 7 (27:49):
Well I'm very fortunate that my background in
becoming a top teacher wasrooted in playing. It's really
not maybe the typicalbackground . You

Speaker 6 (27:58):
Earned it. Yeah. You earned your stripes, right? Yes
. It wasn't like you juststarted teaching at some plays
and that was it.

Speaker 7 (28:02):
Right. And you know , I was very fortunate. I had
some fantastic mentors over theyear and David Ledbetter and
Mike Adams have probably beenmy two biggest mentors that
have allowed me to kind oflearn underneath them and kind
shaped my philosophy and what Ithink is really important. But
to have that thedifficult training from kind of
getting beat up on the PGA tourto what works, what should

(28:23):
work, what are the keys, andblend that with some really
good technical informationthat's just been a very
valuable bonus enhancer for mycareer teaching wise .

Speaker 6 (28:34):
So then when you came back and won it or got in
second, you're like, oh wait aminute, this is what I was
missing. So then how long didyou continue playing on tour
after that? And how'd you do?

Speaker 7 (28:45):
Um, you know, I finished out that year and, and
at the very end of the yearjust missed keeping my tour
cards . So , uh, same thing.
Had to go back to Q School ,um, didn't qualify again. Oh
yeah, yeah. Q School is that wecould do, you could do an year
long topic on Q School . That'show crazy this is. Um,

Speaker 6 (29:05):
Is it the same now or is it different now?

Speaker 7 (29:07):
Well, up until right at the moment, it's been
different for about the last 10years and there really has not
been a Q School to get on thetour, but , uh, in about two
weeks the Korn Ferry tour hasthe finals of Q School , but
the top five finishers gettheir PGA tour card for next
year. So I have two Korn Ferrystudents that, you know, one
had a very solid year, justmissed getting his card. One
guy, really good player,they're in the finals. Well, if

(29:30):
they don't finish top five, itdoesn't really matter. They're,
they're playing Korn Ferry nextyear, but if they go top five,
they're going directly to thePGA tour.

Speaker 6 (29:38):
That's awesome.

Speaker 7 (29:39):
So Mike, to kind of finish where you were going
with the question, threeconsecutive years either lost
by one or lost in a playoffinto the finals of Q School ,
therefore, I mean it's, it's,it's

Speaker 6 (29:52):
That one . They're all over again. But ,

Speaker 7 (29:54):
But imagine a plumber having to go to Plumber
Q School and you know, X amountof people try and only this
percentage get through it .
That's, that's what Q Schoolis, you know, typically two,
three , 4,000 people send theirentry fee in and try and out of
it used to be about 25 to 50people would get their tour
card. Now it's much more of aregret qualifying through the
KO freight tour. But there is asystem where you now they've

(30:16):
gone back to a little bit ofpotential to play the PGA tour.
And after I did three straightyears of either missing by one
stroke or, or in a playoff,Ledbetter called me and said,
Hey, would you ever want toconsider teaching with me? Love
to have you on on our team. Youknow, and deep down, I didn't
wanna do that. I wanted to keepplaying. I'm so close, I'm so
close. But yeah , it was justkind of from a family

(30:38):
standpoint and a let me get mylife balance . Let me see what
David suggested. How

Speaker 6 (30:44):
Old were you? Like 30 at that time then

Speaker 7 (30:47):
I'm gonna say 31.

Speaker 6 (30:50):
And it's like you had a , you had a , you
probably started in your familyand you're kind of like ,

Speaker 7 (30:53):
I think number child number two is on the way, if I
remember about

Speaker 6 (30:56):
That timeframe . And it was just , yeah , I know
it's the age too. It's like,it's time to grow up, right ?
Like we're like, I had thatconversation too myself. Oh , I
was, I was 30, I went to lawschool, you know, I was like,
all right , I gotta get a job.
Like

Speaker 7 (31:08):
Yep , yep .

Speaker 6 (31:09):
So it's like, yeah, I know, I get it. And

Speaker 7 (31:12):
It was , it was a very difficult first year
because you had to be a gopher,which means you got there at
five 30 or six and did all therange stuff to get ready for
all the teachers and David todo their things. And then you
had to wait throughout thewhole day and then clean
everything up again. And inbetween you were training and
taking notes and going throughall kind of training stuff. But
you know, for a year to twoyears in hindsight it was like

(31:33):
kind of like watching BillGates on a computer. I mean
David was the man and David'sability to diagnose golf swings
and use and you know, kind ofearly technology, just really
TV's computers back then was,was brilliant to watch and feel
very privileged to kind oflearned underneath someone that
was so good at what he did. Andit's mostly the foundation
where I'm at today is watchinghow David analyzed golf swings

(31:56):
and showed us here's what'sgoing on, here's why it's
happening. And that's to me,what's made David one of your
lead all-time teachers, hisability to , to teach the why
not, hey, your head's moving,hey, you're coming over the
top. Ah , that's easy foreverybody to see, but why is
that happening? And really thebiggest benefit I had from
David being my coach for a verylong time while on tour and

(32:16):
then working four underneathhim for about 10 more years.
I'm really good at diagnosingwhy things happen, you know?
And that's if you don't, if youdon't fix the root of the
problem, you're just puttingband-aids on it. So you always
want to get to the root of whyis this happening? And you
know, you'll always get resultsmight not happen
instantaneously, but if you nipaway at the root cause of your
problems, you're gonna become abetter golfer.

Speaker 6 (32:39):
Yeah. You're , you're, you're finding a
solution to the root core, nota peripheral like, oh I can fix
this by doing this other thing.
It's like, no, like what's theproblem?

Speaker 7 (32:49):
Yep .

Speaker 6 (32:51):
So then in other words, like he was mentoring
you, right? Like you were menbeing mentored for Yeah.

Speaker 7 (32:57):
But

Speaker 6 (32:58):
In that way by seeing it osmosis .

Speaker 7 (33:01):
Yeah , he was, but I mean he was running the
business at the same timecourse . So a lot of it was all
kind of like life wasgoing really fast and you're
sitting there watching David ona computer or TV screen
dissecting golf swings. And bythe end of year two I was
helping him with his golfschools . I think by year three
I was running his golf schoolswith him. And that's when it
really got good because guyswere paying a lot of money.
David was at just the top ofeveryone's list back then. And

(33:25):
I'm in the video room takingnotes for each student
watching. I said, it's likewatching Bill Gates on a
computer, watch Dave dissect aswing and you know, having no
clue, you're

Speaker 6 (33:33):
Learn , you're trying to see the same things
now it's

Speaker 7 (33:35):
In front of you.
Yeah. All of a sudden he'sopening my eyes to, okay, wow,
that club face is really open.
I didn't even know what thatmeant. Or Wow, it's really off
plane or you know, you'rereasoning your head's moving
'cause your grip is in yourpalm.

Speaker 6 (33:46):
It's not just words not right , just words . It's
like, like you see. Yeah.

Speaker 7 (33:49):
So it really was a challenging but fun time to
kind of get, you know, in themiddle of him running a
business, we're all learningand becoming better teachers.
And that first year Davidhired, I wanna say maybe six to
eight to 10 teachers to put inplaces . He put his academies
in all the place. And you know,of the six people in Orlando, I

(34:10):
wanna say four of four of us,six became top a hundred
teachers within, I don't know,not not that much time. And
that's just, David did a greatjob picking people and you
know, guys were really good atwhat they did and you know,
still friends today with it.

Speaker 6 (34:23):
So then if you always lived in Orlando, then
outside of that or

Speaker 7 (34:28):
Moving around , so in the late, in the late
eighties trying to play thetour from Tacoma , Washington
was not much of an option. Imean there were no nonstop
flights like you know, Seattlebecause of Microsoft and
Amazon, all the big companiesthere. You can kind of go
nonstop anywhere in the USpretty much now. But back then
I remember Microsoft

Speaker 6 (34:43):
Wasn't even anything. There was nothing
there . No ,

Speaker 7 (34:45):
No, I missed the cut when you're in Boston, I was
just so frustrated, so mad .
I'm like, I'm going home. WellI couldn't get out Friday
night, so I had to fly outSaturday morning and the next
week was in Milwaukee. Well Ihad to leave Saturday morning
and to get to Milwaukee to playa practice and I had to leave
Monday morning and it was like$1,800 to go from Boston to
Seattle to Milwaukee just to behome for, I don't know, a day

(35:09):
and a half . And with Ledbetterkind of being my coach in
Orlando, we also had multiplefriends in Orlando, a lot of ,
lot Ohio State friends. Youknow what, we're getting an
apartment in Orlando. So 32years later or something, you
know, our kids were born inOrlando and, and I like Orlando
. Our , our , yeah , all ourroots are in here and it's been
fantastic.

Speaker 6 (35:29):
There's a lot of really good schools there too.
Like golf schools, like a lotyours .

Speaker 7 (35:38):
There are a lot of schools . There are a lot of
schools here.

Speaker 6 (35:41):
Um, so then like when did, like how long did you
work for Ledbetter than 10years?

Speaker 7 (35:47):
So I worked for David W right , right at 10
years. And in 2002 I had anopportunity to spin off and
start my own academy at acourse five minutes from my
house at a Nicholas facility.
And that turned out to be abrilliant move as well. Um , I
stayed there for just under 10years and then I left that

(36:09):
private club to join theWaldorf Astoria , which is a
five star resort kind of rightin the,

Speaker 6 (36:15):
I've

Speaker 7 (36:15):
Been there edger in the heart .

Speaker 6 (36:16):
I

Speaker 7 (36:17):
Believe it . Nice.
It's Phenomen , it's reallynice five star resort right in
on Disney.

Speaker 6 (36:20):
Really nice. Like that's like really nice. I went
, they had a, I was at a thinglike Fuji Kura had a thing at
the Range, like during PGA showor it was the back part of the
range or something. I don'tknow where it was, was private.
I had drive down like some liketree road forever and then I'm
like, it was at the end, that'sall I remember. It was a long
walk. Yeah ,

Speaker 7 (36:40):
That wouldn't, that wouldn't be the Waldorf. But
there's a couple of places Ican think it might've been. But
you know, PG shows in Orlandoin late January, so they do all
kinds of extra things. I

Speaker 6 (36:48):
Could've sworn it was at Waldorf, I could sworn I
might , I don't know . Iremember walking down a path to
go this , it wast even aranger. I don't even know what
it was. It was something, itwas um, so then you've been to
, you've been there this wholetime then? Is that?

Speaker 7 (37:00):
I've been, I've been there for 11 , 12 years now at
the Waldorf and one of my kindof add-on things in 2009, ye
Yang was one of my students andYe beat Tiger in the PGA kind
of the first guy to ever takeTiger down from Yeah,

Speaker 6 (37:14):
I thought you were , I remember that

Speaker 7 (37:16):
Being behind him and you know, won a major, I think
first Asian male to ever won amajor. And you know, a lot of
opportunities kind of spun offof that because uh , that, that
accelerated the Chambers Bayhaving an academy of Chambers
Bay. We were already talkingbefore then , but that kind of
accelerated that. Uh, I nowhave an academy in Honolulu and

(37:37):
then I've had one in Korea foralmost at the same time. So
there's a , there's a lot offun going on. So how many ,

Speaker 6 (37:44):
How many you have right now?

Speaker 7 (37:45):
There's five Toronto , Toronto's the other one. Um ,
I've been spending a lot oftime in Toronto for the last 25
years. Um, made some, some ofmy best friends in life were up
in Canada and uh, one of myreally good friends , uh, did
very, very well. And he builthis own private club just north
of Toronto. And thankfully ,uh, he continues to have me up
there every year, becomefriends with all the members.

(38:07):
And I kind of Toronto and northof Ontario was just one of the
most prettiest places in thesummer of all time.

Speaker 6 (38:17):
That's pretty up there. Yeah , I've been , I've
been there before. Um, myfamily lives in, I think that
town, like just east ofToronto. Uh , it's a big city.
I can't think of the name ofit.

Speaker 7 (38:26):
Um , east of Toronto now it's going up the river.
Not many people live

Speaker 6 (38:31):
Or not east, it's west. I like to , it's like

Speaker 7 (38:34):
West is back towards Buffalo. Well, east is
technically towards Buffalo.
It's kind of hooked down aroundthe corner.

Speaker 6 (38:40):
Crap. Yeah, I can't remember the name of it . I was
just there for a wedding like acouple years ago.

Speaker 7 (38:44):
West , west , west is technically London and then
Hamilton is west, which iswhere

Speaker 6 (38:50):
Hamilton, that's where they live. They live in
Hamilton. Is that west?

Speaker 7 (38:54):
Technically it's West. Uh , that's where the
Canadian open will be thisyear. Hamilton Country Club .
Oh really?

Speaker 6 (38:59):
I

Speaker 7 (38:59):
Didn't know that.
That might be my favoritecourse in , in Canada. It's,
it's usually the top five.
Yeah, well it's just toughthere . Old school, everything
a golf course should be forbeing a challenge and , and fun
at the same time.

Speaker 6 (39:14):
So you have, and are you traveling around all the
academies or how does thatwork?

Speaker 7 (39:20):
Travel to a lot of academies. I do a lot of
outings for companies. I've gotseveral tour students, so there
ends up being a lot of travel.
I mean more heavily in thesummer than anything else, but

Speaker 6 (39:30):
It's slowing down right now 'cause of winter or
not really. 'cause all the iesare are taking off

Speaker 7 (39:34):
Now , but now , now it goes the other way. So now
these people you've seen allthroughout the summertime are
going it's 30 degrees andstarting to snow. It's like ,
I'm going to Florida, you know,where's Brian gonna be? I gotta
go find him wherever he is at.
And kind of , it makes forbeing in good weather for most
of the year for what I'm doing.

Speaker 6 (39:50):
So like when, like, I guess what's, what's the
biggest way for people to likefind you? Like do they just
like, mostly just tour playerswant to go with you? I know
you're not a Champions tourtoo, right? You do that. Yeah,
I've ,

Speaker 7 (40:04):
I've played nine championship events over the
last maybe six years or so, butI would love to do more of it
status wise . I've gotta , I'vegotta do my hard work to get
into the events. Um, but youknow, at Moog Academy, that's
my social media stuff. I'mdoing videos every day. Uh , my
son now kind of, he does, he'sdoing other fun stuff. He's not
working for us anymore, butI've hired him to do all my

(40:26):
social media. I'd love makingvideos and giving kind of free
content out and watch watchingpeople enjoy their game that
way. My email'sbrian@mogacademy.com . Reach
out, plug in the schedule. I'lltry to , I'll try to make a
spot for you . It's ,

Speaker 6 (40:40):
Yeah , you're busy though. You're a busy man. Like
you got a lot going on. You'veall like, I mean, how many tour
players are you helping rightnow, would you say?

Speaker 7 (40:48):
Well , my cool statement is since 2001 I've
had 30 wins by students on theP-G-R-L-P-G tour. That kind of
includes Korn Ferry and , andChampions Tour. But I've had 30
wins and two majors bystudents. So when you ask how
many professionals I'mteaching, there's a lot.
Technically it's, it's the oneguy who's gonna be on the PGA
tour in January and a couple ofguys on Korn Ferry, but

(41:11):
there's, I don't know ,couldn't even tell how many
more there are playing variousmini tours are going overseas
or trying to go through QSchool and you know, some of
'em are gonna make it. I alsohave a ton of kids in college
right now that are elite D oneplayers. I mean one , one kid's
at Duke, couple big 10 players, uh, west Coast players. I
mean , I've got one kid thatslipped through the cracks, he

(41:31):
kind of went in the transferportal of his first year,
really good player. And noone's, no one's signed him yet.
They need to, they need to signhim .

Speaker 6 (41:37):
Really. So

Speaker 7 (41:38):
That's , that's, that's

Speaker 6 (41:39):
The hard part, right? They get signed or let
people see you?

Speaker 7 (41:42):
Well, one of the dirty secrets that's gone on is
Covid really wrecked havoc, atleast in the golf world from a
standpoint that the , um, thescholarships all got extended.
So if you're on a , you know,hypothetically if you're, if
you're gonna be finished in2021, that scholarship or that
spot on the team got extendedto 2022. So now the coaches are

(42:03):
trying to recruit incomingkids. Well at the same time
having to extend kids on theprogram, you know, and one of
the tough challenges is bothfinancially and emotionally is
, is , you know , you don'twant more than about eight,
nine, maybe 10 kids on theteam. So you've gotta balance
all these things out. So a lotof kids, not just a couple of
my students, but a lot of kidshave gone through some really
tough stuff because there's noroom, you know, scholarships

(42:24):
are promised now they've gottaextend 'em on all that. And ,
uh, I think next year is thefirst year you'll kind of have
non covid impact on co

Speaker 6 (42:34):
Be cleaned up. Yeah, certainly . It's certainly

Speaker 7 (42:36):
Like be cleaned up.
It's nobody's fault. It's just,that's just the byproduct of
what happened from all of that.
So

Speaker 6 (42:42):
All the delays,

Speaker 7 (42:43):
All the delays really, I don't know that it
happened in the other sports,but golf, it's really

Speaker 6 (42:48):
Hurt with,

Speaker 7 (42:49):
I had one very elite junior player that I think
could have played at and hewas, he was recruited by the
Stanfords and some of the topfive programs out there, but he
finally ran into a wall thatthe schools just didn't have
room to be adding players. Andhe, he , he's not a deal school
. So what

Speaker 6 (43:05):
Do they do in that situation? Like, do they have
to go to junior college or theyjust, what do they , what do
they do ? I have no idea. What

Speaker 7 (43:10):
Do players do ? This , this particular kid took, you
know, a lower offer. It's stilla D one school, but his talent
level is much higher than wherehe is at. And you know, it is
what it is. It's , you know, heis nothing you can do about it.
And you know, so often when youhear on the p PGA tour just
play better. I mean that's,that's the antidote here is,
you know, whether it's this kidor somebody else, you play
better, you know, your otherteams will find , find you

(43:33):
other opportunities will, will, will happen. So this kid will
be fine. He is , he's a stud,he's gonna be a bigger stud and
, uh, just has to work throughall the

Speaker 6 (43:44):
Processes. How , how did Ye Yang find you? Was that
from your school at ChambersBay or no ?

Speaker 7 (43:50):
No . Um, there's a LPJ player, me and Kim Kimmy ,
uh, Kimmy's about five one. Andwe worked from , I don't know ,
maybe 2002 through about 2008.
And Kimmy hit the ball at bestabout two 20 off the tee. She
had a heart that was justginormous. She would take down,
you know, golfers hitting theball. Uh , uh, she won the

(44:12):
biggest ladies tournament atthe time. I don't remember what
year it was. Oh five maybe ,uh, largest. It was $2 million
purse for the ladies. And she'spaired with Laura Davies the
first two days. And Laura wastruly out hitting her by a
hundred yards. And Kimmy wouldtake her five wood or seven
wood or nine wood and hit it tofive or 10 feet repeatedly. And
by late, late on Friday'sround, Lord Davies finally just
threw her hands up there. Howare you doing this? How are

(44:34):
you? I'm having a wedge. Thegreen . I can't get my wedge
inside your five wood Kimmywould win the tournament. And I
don't know , that was maybe herfourth or fifth win when we
worked together. And in 2008,her caddy, Jason basically got
hired away by Ye to come ontothe PGA tour as a rookie. And

(44:55):
two months into the season, Iget a phone call from Jason
that said, Ye's, never had anAmerican coach. He's never
really had a coach at all. Youknow, we'd be interested in
meeting with him. And at thetime, joke means little bit in
cran . I didn't have that. Andye's, English wasn't very good
either. And over the next yearand a half, it was some of the
best coaching I've ever donebecause we couldn't communicate

(45:16):
verbiage wise . Uh, he had anagent that was awesome and when
he was around, he was great attranslating. But basically if I
said, you know, hey, do do thiswith the club, I would have to
mimic doing it. And then, youknow, alright , your turn, you
do it, you know, show himvideo. No, Joah means good. No
joah , no joah , joah . Soyou'd learn these little words

(45:37):
and then you'd mimic doing it.
And in 2008, ye he made about400,000 for the year. And if I
remember right, he made about20 cuts out of about 28 events.
I made a lot of cuts. Amazing .
But he never really had , neverreally had to get finished .
Well, he

Speaker 6 (45:52):
Didn't get , he didn't get the money though,
right? He made the cut, but hedidn't quite

Speaker 7 (45:56):
Make the money . He stood super, super erected with
a very strong grip, rolled itinside with a shut face. So in
the middle of his rookie yearon tour, with his permission,
we changed his grip to aneutral grip. We got his
posture into more athleticposture. We got his swing plane
for him, which felt much moreupright. His clubface from
close to square , he's

Speaker 6 (46:13):
Like , what the hell is this ?

Speaker 7 (46:14):
And, and he, he truly worked his butt off. He
really did a phenomenal job ofmaking changes. And I felt bad
because, you know, I , he can'tcommunicate what he's feeling.
I can't communicate what I'mtrying to see happen. And you
know, I went out to a lot oftournaments that year and you
know, he is finishing 36th and44th and 29th, you know,
probably did okay financiallyto break even or something, but

(46:36):
you know, it looks like he'sgoing nowhere. Well, he went
back to Q School on the finalwhole Q School. He made a six
foot putter. We're not havingthis conversation right now. So
I met him out on the West coastin early January. We had one
week at Toy Pines where we kindof kept doing things. Next week
we're up at Pebble Beach onMonday on the practice day. And
we had one of those epiphany, Ifound it moments , uh, his

(46:58):
caddy and I and and Hawaii wereall standing there and we all
kinda looked at each other,like, all this work we've been
doing for almost a year, justclicked in like everything. You
could just see all the work

Speaker 6 (47:08):
He had done , all the pieces went dinging, ding ,
ding , like fell into place .
It dinging , ding , ding , ding. Yeah , yeah . Like a puzzle .
It's all like, all collectedright there. You're like,
that's right.

Speaker 7 (47:16):
So he finished about 20th that week, went down the
next week and finished 20th atLA or wherever. It was

Speaker 6 (47:23):
A lot to go down that much like in two weeks to
like go from 40 to 20,

Speaker 7 (47:27):
You know ? Well he had , he had something like
back-to-back 20th placefinishes, nothing crazy special
but not bad. So the next weekwas , uh, Honda PJ National.
And late Tuesday afternoon,same thing. It's the caddy, the
player caddy y and me we'rewalking around the back nine
and I remember having thisweird vibe like it's clicking
everything we've been workingon. It's, it's there. And if I

(47:47):
said, Hey, six iron, you know,back right pin hit the fade, he
did it. Driver low , drop theleft side. He did it. It was
just kind of this like, wow,he's not a rookie in the ,
because he was like 35 yearsold. He , he was, he is a
veteran international player.
But I said, all these changesare kicking in . He's gonna go
win when the next four or fiveevents. Meaning like, you know,

(48:08):
right before the masters orsomething. Well after Friday he
took the lead. After Saturdayhe had a one shot lead. This is
a cool story. I love it. Iagree . I , I had come back to
Orlando by then and I debatedabout driving back down Sunday
morning to be with him for thefinal round. And I thought, you
know what, we've put everythingin place. We don't need to make

(48:28):
this bigger than it is . Let'sjust trust him to do what's
right. So he is final round teetime, twelve forty five, twelve
thirty five. My phone rings andI look down, it says Y Ynk .
And I'm thinking like, there'sgotta be a mistake here . Oh

Speaker 6 (48:44):
Crap, he's calling.
He is not good .

Speaker 7 (48:47):
And and it was, it was his agent Michael, on the
phone. He goes, he goes, if ,if you've been to PJ National,
it's got a driving range that'swho knows 500 yards wide by 400
yards long. I mean, it's justthis phenomenal huge field. And
his exact words were why he isso nervous he couldn't sleep at
all last night and he can't hitthe ball, he can't find the
range right now. You gotanything for him, you know? And

(49:10):
as a coach, it was like theultimate on the spot moment.
Like, what are you gonna say?
What, what, what can you say?
And , and Michael was good'cause he could translate
everything. And I said, I said,Michael, he's on the tee . He
goes, I know he just left theputting green. Hand me the
phone. He said, call Brian saidif he's got any last minute
help for me. So I gave him ananswer. And as I hung up the
phone, I remember the , Iremember going, that was the

(49:32):
stupidest thing you could havetold him that was so dumb. So
all you can do is watch theinternet until it came on live
on, on NBC. Well, he birdiethree of the first five holes,
goes to a four shot lead fromone to a four shot lead. And he
finally comes to the 18th holewith a two, two and a half foot
putt to win the tournament byone and makes it, and he runs
around the green high fivingall the fans was cool. And then

(49:53):
Roger Mamby walks up and sticksa mic in his face and says,
your first win in America, how,how did this happen? I was so
nervous last night I couldn'tsleep. I got to the range this
morning and I couldn't evenfind the range. I couldn't even
make contact. I was just sonervous. So I'm walking on the
first tee , I called my coachBrian Mogg and rem he , he
reminded me to walk, talk,think, swing at the same

(50:16):
cadence. So I got on the firsthole and I just tried to walk
and move in a smooth fashion. Iburning three of the first five
holes. I can't believe I've wonthe tournament. And I literally
was standing up watching itlive the interview, and I, I I
virtually fell down becausefour hours before this I'm
going, well , this is thestupidest answer I've ever
given anybody. And four hourslater you are blabbing it on

(50:38):
national tv. What a brilliantanswer it was. And it's, it's
been a good testimony for me.
Just because when you arenervous, don't speed up, don't
slow down. It's not just yourgolf swing, walk , talk , think
, swing at the same flow. Andhere he is, he wins the golf
tournament. So that was,

Speaker 6 (50:51):
It's like to remember all those things,
right? Instead of thinking allthe million , like, like you
said earlier, like all thethings you to think about, it's
like, just think about thatthing only like , right .

Speaker 7 (51:02):
So that, that was early in 2009 when that
happened and he continued toplay solid golf. And I went up
for the PGA at , uh, Hazeltonthat year and it was the same
weird vibe we're going down. Iwas there for the Tuesday and
Wednesday practice rounds. He'sjust striping. And on Tuesday.

(51:22):
And uh, funny story, I'll giveyou the , I'll give you the
answer first before I tell youwhat happened. But , uh, uh, as
I'm leaving late Wednesday, Ibumped into Brandel Chamblee in
the parking lot right next tothe golf channel trailer. And
Brandel said, Hey, you know,who's your pick this week?
Who's playing? Well , I said ,well, I just got off the course
with ye he's playing about asgood as I've ever seen him play
it . He'd be somebody that'sprobably gonna finish in the

(51:43):
top 10 or top 20 this week.
Brando would later go on tosay, I said he was gonna win. I
didn't say that. I just said heis gonna finish top, he's
playing that good. So he goesinto a production meeting and
Frank Nello walks in the doorand he goes, MOG just predicted
why he is gonna come close towinning the tournament this
week . Well, 40 minutes beforethat we're on the 16th hole and

(52:04):
you have to walk down this pathfrom 15 down a hill out to 16,
which is one of the more iconicholes in all the , in the whole
us . It's par four , I don'tremember the name of the lake,
but you kinda walk into thelake, you then tee off back
away from the lake over ariver, and then your second
shot goes back out to apeninsula in the lake. So it's
typically a three wood , sixiron type hole , but the wind's

(52:24):
how long it can be a driver ifit's down when it's a , you
know, it's a wedge orsomething, but why is striped
it for Tuesday and Wednesdaypractice rounds. It's late in
the day. It's 4 30, 5 o'clockand not below happens to just
come out of nowhere and walkdown the path with me. You
know, how you doing? How's, whyyou doing man ? He's doing
great. Everything's good. Youknow, looking forward to a good
week with him. Why ? He gets upon the tee with his three,

(52:45):
there's plenty of practicerunning with kj and he cold
tops at 20, 30 yards in frontof the tee . And he
turned around to look at me.
And as a coach, he kind ofcringing like, what was that?
He looked at me and juststarted busting out laughing.
'cause we knew, how's

Speaker 6 (52:57):
You tell your kid's good at something? Oh yeah, my
kid's really good at that. Andthen they , and you're like ,
uh, I didn't say that.

Speaker 7 (53:03):
So we're kinda laughing about it. Well,
unbeknownst this is where Naogoes in there and Brandon goes,
mark says why he is gonna comeclose to winning this week. And
Na goes, I just watched him topit 30 yards off the tee. But
story , the story he playedvery well. He was in the final
group with Tiger the lastround. Very nervous. He never,
never even met Tiger at thatpoint. And then he , he , he ,

(53:25):
he took him down and one, onesmall. If you want more story
here,

Speaker 6 (53:29):
I love the story.
No, keep it up. This isawesome.

Speaker 7 (53:31):
I love this flip bar . No , I could do him for hours
with stories . So anyway ,

Speaker 6 (53:33):
I want take you to a bar

Speaker 7 (53:35):
on , on Wednesday. Uh, I'm in the
locker room and I just, youknow, I , for whatever reason I
happened to read all the, youknow, the PGA tour or PG
America puts up all the, Idon't know ,

Speaker 6 (53:47):
Standings.

Speaker 7 (53:48):
No , but they'll put up like, okay, the T marker's
gonna be up on number three, orthe tees are gonna be here.
They just put up some rules,some whole information. And I
just happened to read that onthe 14th hole. They were gonna
move the tee up on the weekend.
The 14th hole's about a 3 80, 390 uphill power four. So in the
practice round late Wednesdayafternoon, right, right before

(54:08):
the, the novel story I justtold , uh, we come to the 13th
hole and y and KJ hit theirthree woods or whatever from
the back tee to laid up shoreof the bunker. And I said, Hey
guys, if you didn't see thememo, they're gonna move the
tee up on the weekend. Whydon't we hit one from this tee
over here? And I remember theylasered it was three 30 and why
he got up there and just nukeda driver kind of landed into

(54:30):
the front of the green at onehop went up over the back where
the gallery would be and up ina nasty down slope position. We
didn't think anything about it.
So flash forward to Sunday ,uh, ye and tiger are now tied
coming to 14. Um , nobody'sreally even close for , for
third place. I don't think so.
It's , it's a two man game.

(54:51):
Well , we get up on 14 and ye Ijust watching him swing it . He
didn't rip a driver like he didin the practice run . We
thought he had to rip it todrive the green. He smoothed
it, hit a nice shot and itcaught an UPS slope . About 10
yard story of the green betweenkind of a UPS slope in the
bunker on the right center,just off the green. And uh, I
think Tiger hit it in thebunker. Why he holds little pit

(55:14):
shot

Speaker 6 (55:16):
Shut off .

Speaker 7 (55:17):
No, I mean, in , in hindsight I'd like to think if
I hadn't caught the memo andall that, we wouldn't have done
that and he wouldn't have madetwo and potentially wouldn't
have won the tournament. Butwhy he dunks his little 15 to
20 yard little pitch shop upthe slope. Uh, tiger was clutch
and made about a 10 footer forbirdie . So it was a one shot
lead and it stayed one shotthrough the next four holes and

(55:40):
they came to the 18th hole,really good par four dog leg
left. Tiger drove it farenough, right that he was very
far from the hole. And while hehad this four hybrid in his bag
and from TV camera, it lookedlike he headed over this tree
right in front of it . Reallywasn't quite that dramatic. But
tiger missed the green just offthe left edge, one down. Why he

(56:01):
hits this hybrid over thesetrees to about five feet. I
mean, just truly one of thegreat shots in the history of
major championship golf.

Speaker 6 (56:08):
The shots in your mind that you remember for the
rest of your life, like you cansee that shot

Speaker 7 (56:12):
Well mean . And so Tiger basically has to chip in
now and he doesn't do it. Whyhe makes the pot , why he wins
by three. And if you rememberwhy he walked behind the green,
had a big tailor made bag andhe he held it up over his head.
Very iconic thing he did afterhe won that. Remember I
remember that first Asian maleto win a to win a major and to
have a small piece of the helpgoing into what made that

(56:35):
happen, Ms . Miss probably beenthe highlight of my teaching
career.

Speaker 6 (56:39):
You feel like you've taught a lot of pe Like how
many lessons have you given alot, right?

Speaker 7 (56:43):
People have tried to, I I I wouldn't know 'cause
I I don't really, I helppeople, I don't add up lessons
and all that you want , youwanna hear another cool story
to go along with this ? Well ,

Speaker 6 (56:51):
Yeah, I wanna hear a lot of cool stories.

Speaker 7 (56:54):
All right . So , um, that about, oh man, I could
tell long stories right now,but I don't care.

Speaker 6 (57:01):
Whatever.

Speaker 7 (57:01):
All right , so we , we got about two or three more
tournaments after the PGA backthen, and then it went into the
FedEx playoffs and uh, we'restanding at , at Boston, which
I think was the second playoffthing. And uh, I said to, I
said something to away and Isays , well, you do know you're
gonna play Tiger in singles onSunday in the President's Cup.

(57:23):
How do you know that? Becausethat was the week after the ,
the FedEx thing. And he , Isaid, well, Mike, we're
happened to play him in singlesin finals in Montreal last
year. I said two years ago,you're probably gonna get Tiger
on Sundays. You better be readyfor his, his energy, you know,
six, seven weeks from now.
Okay. Okay. So FedEx playoffsgo on. Um , I don't remember
how, why he did, but he know hefinished 10th on the money list

(57:44):
or points list or whatever itprobably was by the end of the
year. And sure enough, Sundaynight , um, why he had gotten
hot. I think he won threepoints going into Sunday, yet
the US was up three and a halfpoints going into Sunday. So if
you're Fred Couples, wherewould you put Tiger? One
through 12 with a three and ahalf point lead. Where would

(58:05):
you , where would you plugTiger in?

Speaker 6 (58:07):
Exactly what you said. He is probably gonna be
played like right against him.

Speaker 7 (58:12):
Well, no , but, but Greg Norman, the captain's
gotta turn his lineup in.
Where's, where's Greg gonna putye , where's Fred gonna put
Tiger?

Speaker 6 (58:20):
I have no idea.

Speaker 7 (58:22):
Well, common sense would be you'd put Tiger maybe
one or two or 12, you frontload him and oh yeah. Get this
thing over with or maybe puthim at the back end as a
reserve if you need to . Clutchpoint. Well, if you're Greg
Norman, where are you gonna putye? He's got you three . He's ,
he's gotten you about threepoints so far, so

Speaker 6 (58:42):
Probably have

Speaker 7 (58:43):
Somewhere in the front.

Speaker 6 (58:44):
Yeah,

Speaker 7 (58:45):
Well you're not gonna put him in the back
'cause it might be over bythen, so you're gonna try not .
Oh ,

Speaker 6 (58:48):
That's true, that's true.

Speaker 7 (58:49):
True. So you're probably gonna put him
somewhere near the , say thefront front part of the , the
lineup. Well, guess what,coincidentally happened?

Speaker 6 (58:58):
They way up

Speaker 7 (58:59):
Paired . They both June number eight.

Speaker 6 (59:02):
Oh my God.

Speaker 7 (59:03):
How , how did that happen? What are the odds of
that happening? And there Icould , the story's actually
. Are you like ,are

Speaker 6 (59:08):
You like psychic or something?

Speaker 7 (59:10):
Or what

Speaker 6 (59:11):
Are you psychic .

Speaker 7 (59:13):
That was , that was an easy call that, that was
gonna somehow actually happen.
Tiger wanted a piece of weightto get even. And , and there's
there's a funny part , there'sa funny part to the whole
story. You

Speaker 6 (59:22):
Just knew. You just knew, huh? You knew regardless
what was gonna happen. You'relike,

Speaker 7 (59:26):
He's one . They were , they were both on the putting
green getting ready to go. AndI know Tiger didn't want to go
first to the t he wanted ye togo first to hear the huge USA
and Tiger chance and whywouldn't want to go. So they're
both on the putting green.
Nobody's going over to thefirst tee until like literally
at the last second and uh, geton the first hole. And you
know, Tiger's energy is just, Imean it's inspiring to watch

(59:48):
just 'cause that's the theultimate competitor we all
know. Yeah , yeah . I mean itwas cool and uh , and I've been
friends with Tiger for a longtime. He's awesome. He's
fantastic. One-on-one and, andall that. But you know, I'm
feeling awkward 'cause youknow, my guys happen to beat
him in in the summertime andnow they're competing again.
But we get on the first holeand Tiger Snap hooks at par
five makes power y hits on thegreen in two, two putts. He's

(01:00:11):
one up, they tie number two.
And uh , and I probably shouldhave said when I got to the
range that morning, you couldtell why his gas tank was
empty. We're leaving for Creathat night, which is where I
wanna finish the story with.
Uh, we're going to crea as ateam after this is over. So
third Hawaii knocks it down themiddle of four 80 par four
Doglegged left through the bigredwoods. Tiger blocks it to

(01:00:32):
the right and I happen to be onthe right. I go over and look
at his ball, the lie's okay.
But he is 215, 220 yards fromthe green. Not a ugly lie in
the rough , but not great. Wellhe's, he's either got a punch
under some trees to about 60yards from the green, or I'm
not seeing you can do a lot ofmaneuver the ball. Well, I get
behind him, gall's all aroundhim. Somehow he hits a five

(01:00:55):
iron sky high , 20, 30 yards,right? And hooks it all the way
back and gets it on the green.
I mean, it was a shot like onlyhe can hit that shot like no
one else was strong enough andgood enough and tall enough to
hit the shot and it was jawdropping. Impressive. Well why
he hits it to the same 30 feetthe tiger was, and three buts
match went even. And then Tigereventually won the match, maybe

(01:01:16):
three and two. The match isover. We now go the San F it
was out in San Francisco. We goout to the San Francisco
airport, we're now gonna get on, uh, airline to fly to Seoul
all night flight when you flythat direction. So we wake up
at 4:30 AM Tuesday morning inSeoul. And you know, we had

(01:01:37):
business class seats , whichwas fantastic. We all got some
sleep. He he brought histrainer . Yeah, he brought his
trainer, he brought his, his um, uh, his caddy. Great guy and,
and me , uh, there's , there'sa few other people. He had wife
and three kids at the time. Imean, we're all there, the
agents there, et cetera. Whenwe went to get our bags, I've

(01:01:57):
never had this happen before,but we had a private carousel
just for ourselves. I don'tknow how that worked out, but
it did. And it's, it's nowquarter to five in the morning.
You know, you're , you'rebleary-eyed, not feeling good
and all that. And I see why youwalk over to a suitcase and
take out a sport coat. I seethe agent walk over to a long
box about this big with someclasp on it and a lock on it

(01:02:23):
unclass everything and pullsthe Wanamaker trophy out. PJ
let , oh my God , PPGA let himbring it to Korea. Now it's now
like 10 to five and we come outof the carousel and go around
like a corner. And I don't knowwhat it was like to say when
the Beatles came to America,but it had to be the
equivalent. We came around thiscorner at five to five in the

(01:02:44):
morning. I know what I feltlike. I'm sure he felt the same
way. He just got done playingsome high level golf. There
was, I don't know, 20 or 30,like good morning Korea type
cameras and anchormen andpeople waiting to interview,
you know, the, the heroreturning home for the first
time. And we walked out. Ifyou've ever been to, you've

(01:03:04):
ever been to Seoul, the airportis a literally 50 miles from
downtown Seoul. It's one of thetoughest places in the world
for a traffic standpoint. Well,Hawaii , his family jumped in a
car, we all got cars and we hadfor the whole week it was just
crazy treatment because theyhad special lanes just for us
with the police escort, like

Speaker 6 (01:03:25):
Presidential, like

Speaker 7 (01:03:27):
Yeah , presidential lane. So where , where it would
take you like an hour to go 15miles. I mean, it took us five
minutes and we stayed at the ,we stayed at the ,

Speaker 6 (01:03:36):
I get used to this,

Speaker 7 (01:03:37):
We stayed at the Palace Hotel and just every day
was a treat as he played atournament over there and you
know, it was just the heroreturned home to his home
country. I mean that's , and to, you know, just to see that up
close to watch how he handled.
He one point , uh, we had abreakfast one morning, he
called the whole team back tohis room and it's probably the
nicest whole term I've everbeen in my life. He pulled the

(01:03:59):
Warner make a trophy out andsays, I wanna take a picture
with each one of you guys. So Istill have that picture framed
holding that up with him and,and you know, knowing how to
small ,

Speaker 6 (01:04:08):
It's so cool . It's like, like you're a trusted
member, right? Like he tr like,like you're in his, his, I
don't know if I say it like his

Speaker 7 (01:04:17):
His camp camp his camp.

Speaker 6 (01:04:19):
Yeah. Like you're in his world, like you're like
family, right, right . Likeyou're in that, you pass the
barrier and it's like, youknow, you've been there for him
to help him get to that level.
Like it's crazy. Like, it's notlike you're just there to
watch. You're like , oh, I knowsomebody. It's like, no, you're
part of that, right? Is thatthe best part about being a
coach is when you see yourplayers like Excel and you're

(01:04:41):
like, you feel like you help bepart of that.

Speaker 7 (01:04:44):
I mean, broad answer, yes. It's fantastic
when something you havepersonally seen works and
you're able to share it withsomebody and then they can do
the same thing and see that itworks also. So that's, that's
probably one of the morerewarding elements of it. And
it , again, it sounds cool totell a guy winning into major
and cool stories, but I mean,it happens that , you know,
Mrs. Smith at the clubchampionship with an 18

(01:05:04):
handicap and shooting a greatscore. I mean, it really
doesn't matter, you know, thethe glamor of, of who the
student is as much as you'rejust trying to help people get
better. And whether that's atthe 20 handicap level or at the
tour level, it's, it's very,very fun from a people
standpoint just to have a rolein someone's life to be that
kind of moment of encouragementor moment of knowing the right

(01:05:25):
thing to help them with.

Speaker 6 (01:05:27):
Now you have a course on , uh, performance
golf, right ?

Speaker 7 (01:05:31):
A lot of'em . Yes .

Speaker 6 (01:05:32):
You have a lot of 'em . How did you like get to
know them and how'd you startoff with them perform ? Didn't
your son do some content too? Icould have sworn I saw like
some videos and I saw it's

Speaker 7 (01:05:42):
My nephew,

Speaker 6 (01:05:42):
I your son, it's somebody the same last name as
you. But I was like, who's this?

Speaker 7 (01:05:45):
And same first and last name. It's my brother's
son. Yeah.

Speaker 6 (01:05:48):
I was like , I'm assuming he's your son, but I
don't wanna say that. Yeah ,

Speaker 7 (01:05:50):
Yeah , he's my nephew. No , he's lefty. So he
is gotten really good atdemonstrating , demonstrating
things. Right . But , uh, youknow, Brookson performance golf
reached out to me in 2018 orsomething and for some reason
I'm really good on camera doingvideo tips and whatnot. I think
I was the second coach theycontacted and we put together a
whole training program withsome really in depth kind of

(01:06:12):
meet to the golf swing and andgolf in general. Yeah . And
it's encompasses all parts ofthe game. And we've done so
many videos now that uh ,there's gotta be 500 to a
thousand video on there of , ofI don't a hundred courses with,
you know , different contentand all that Brookson
performance golf doingunbelievable job of Yeah ,
they're amazing getting thatout there . They really are

(01:06:33):
some of the best in the worldat what they do. And I've just
had a whole lot of fun gettingto know them, being a part of
their team and watching whatthey do to create magic and,
and also help help golfers getbetter.

Speaker 6 (01:06:44):
Yeah. That's how , and that's how we met. And like
I , they, it blows my mind liketheir , their content's
amazing. Their products arelike really, really, really
good.

Speaker 7 (01:06:52):
I was , I was with them at , i I was with 'em at
Pebble. I've seen some of thenew products coming. I , they
blew me away. Oh

Speaker 6 (01:06:58):
Really ?

Speaker 7 (01:06:58):
I've got some of their guys are doing some
things. I

Speaker 6 (01:07:01):
Have the straightaway and I have the
Straight Stick and I have theEZ three and I have the launch
deck. That's what I got. Right. There's

Speaker 7 (01:07:08):
More , there's more coming.

Speaker 6 (01:07:09):
That's what I heard . There's a driver I saw on
their website, but then Brixtonsaid they sold out already. So
then I was like, oh, I wannaget that. I wanna check it out.
I love stuff like that. It , Ilove, I geek out on that stuff.
So , um, there's

Speaker 7 (01:07:19):
More geek stuff coming.

Speaker 6 (01:07:21):
Yeah, I could imagine. And like, yeah, I mean
I honestly, I always tellpeople like, if you want really
good instruction then just goto performance golf. Like just,
just just get it right. Andthey're , and the products
work, so they do, I dunno ,they just do. Um, so then what
did , so is that your son? I'massuming so like what kind of
That's your nephew?

Speaker 7 (01:07:42):
Yeah , brother son .

Speaker 6 (01:07:45):
That's same name is you.

Speaker 7 (01:07:46):
He's called little Brian in the family, but he is
like six three. So that's justwhat he is been from early on.
Yeah .

Speaker 6 (01:07:53):
Maybe they named the map for you. 'cause they're
like so impressed with you.
They're like, oh yeah,

Speaker 7 (01:07:57):
My brother's kinda my best friend, so

Speaker 6 (01:07:59):
That's kind of cool.
Yeah . Um, so, okay, so you ,where if people wanna find you,
they can find you , um, on yourwebsite,

Speaker 7 (01:08:09):
Website moog moog academy.com . My email's
brian@moogacademy.com and uh ,Instagram virtually every day .
And Twitter some , uh, at MoogAcademy I'll have a kind , a
free video tip and I love doingthat and got some good stuff
out there.

Speaker 6 (01:08:23):
You have a lot of videos, like , you have videos
from like old school , likegolf.com videos from like 10,
15 years ago. Like I've seenthose, like Yeah,

Speaker 7 (01:08:31):
Did a , I did a ton of stuff on Golf Channel early
on, so I know there's a lot outthere too that's probably on
YouTube and other placeseverywhere been so much for the
years . I ,

Speaker 6 (01:08:39):
You know , you like to teach it .

Speaker 7 (01:08:41):
I just like to do it. I, I had some, I had an
epiphany happen my very firstyear. This will be good advice
for people to considering doingthings like this. But , uh, one
of the early years in the golfchannel kind of mid to late
nineties, I got asked to to ,to come on live. Kelly Tillman
and I hers her , her first liveshow and my first time on were
, were both our first liveshows and back in the day I
used to have a , you know, wehad a fax machine, I don't know

(01:09:04):
how many mornings I'd walk inand there's a fax from Richard,
my buddy from Edmonton,Edmonton, Alberta. And Richard
was going, Hey, so-and-so wason golf channel this night. He
mentioned this, I don'tunderstand it and I'd have to
write a quick note out and faxit back to Richard. Richard was
a very left brain person, so Ihad to always make it as simple
as I could. And I figured outwhen you're doing live TV and

(01:09:25):
or like what we're doing rightnow, anything kind of
communication wise . Yeah , I'mjust talk , I'm just talking to
Richard Edmmonton make it soRichard gets it. Richard gets
it. If Richard gets it,everybody's gonna get it. Make
it simple for Richard.

Speaker 6 (01:09:38):
Yeah. It's like you have, somebody told me once, he
is like, we do some trainingvideos for something. And I was
like, well how do you do that?
And he is like, imagine thedumbest person in the world and
then go two levels lower thanthat . And I ask you to
explain it . Like, and I'mlike, really? He is like, just
trust me. Just an like, becauseand then it's nothing against
people. I'm like, really? It's, he is like, yeah, just trust
me. Like don't assume anything.

(01:09:59):
Just Mm-Hmm . explain it so they can
understand it.

Speaker 7 (01:10:02):
I just, I'm just, anytime I do anything
media-wise, I'm just talking toRichard in Edmonton.

Speaker 6 (01:10:06):
You're faxing Richard in Edmonton.

Speaker 7 (01:10:09):
Well maybe faxing is dating myself, but I'm just
talking. No ,

Speaker 6 (01:10:12):
You're not having fax machines. My parents didn't
have a fax machine. You bunchof 'em . Um, anyways, well
thank you so much for being onthe show. I really appreciate
it. You guys have to check outBrian's stuff. Like I said,
he's everywhere. Um, and he'shelped a lot, a lot, a lot of
players, normal players, tourplayers. You wanna go visit him

(01:10:33):
, you can visit him at hisschools too. Or you can watch
his videos on performance golfor on wherever. So thank you
for being on the show and Iwill see you guys in the next
video.

Speaker 3 (01:10:43):
Thanks for listening to another episode of Behind
the Golf Brand podcast. You'regonna beat me golf , stay
connected on and off the showby visiting golfers
authority.com. Don't forget tolike, subscribe and leave a
comment. Golf is always morefun when you win. Stay out of
the beach and see you on thegreen.

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#127 - Brian Mogg: Golf Digest’s Top 100 Teachers in America

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.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}#127 - Brian Mogg: Golf Digest’s Top 100 Teachers in America