There was a moment early in the Atlanta Drive-Los Angeles Golf Club TGL match Monday afternoon, on the sixth hole, when both teams were in the greenside bunker lying 2. L.A.’s Tommy Fleetwood played first, but his ball never left the bunker. Atlanta, now with a shot in hand and its ball in virtually the same position as L.A., opted to “throw” the strategic lodestar of the new indoor simulator league: “The Hammer.” Billy Horschel laid it theatrically in the sand over L.A.’s ball.
“I’m happy they threw it there,” said L.A.’s Sahith Theegala.
“One hundred percent,” echoed teammate Justin Rose, and they quickly declined the hammer.
They were right—it was an abysmal use of the gimmick/tool. It’s clear that when it comes to the players, the announcers and the fans, a good dose of hammer education is in order. But before I explain how Atlanta screwed up, you might want some background on what I’m actually talking about. In four bullet points, here’s the whole concept of the hammer in TGL:
1. It’s not an actual hammer, but a small flag.
2. If the opposing team “accepts” the hammer when thrown, the hole doubles in value, with the winner of the hole earning two points. If the opposing team “declines,” it instantly loses the hole, and the single point that comes with a normal lost hole. If a team throws the hammer before a hole begins, it can’t be declined, and the hole is worth two points.
3. Crucially, there is no penalty for throwing a hammer and then halving the hole (I think there should be, but that’s a different discussion) except that you lose one of your hammers.
4. In a recent and very smart rule change, TGL officials have now given both teams three hammers per 15-hole match. Prior to the change, the hammer would just go back and forth between teams when it was thrown, but the team in the lead quickly figured out that there was no good reason to EVER use it, so it became a non-factor.
Let’s return now to Atlanta’s hammer throw on No. 6. Since the team was about to hit its third shot from the bunker, while L.A. was on the verge of hitting its fourth, Atlanta’s chances of winning the hole were extremely good. The odds weren’t quite 100 percent, but it was overwhelmingly likely, which was why L.A. was absolutely never going to accept the hammer and risk losing double points. Why give up two points on such long odds when you can decline and only lose the one point you were about to lose anyway? It doesn’t take a brilliant tactical mind to understand that, so when Atlanta threw the hammer, all it actually managed was to win a single point that was already in the bag—and lose one of its three hammers in the process.
It was terrible strategy, even more so because they had done almost the exact same thing two holes earlier—one shot ahead of L.A., both teams in the bunker, hammer thrown, hammer declined. And both times, Rose made it crystal clear that his opponents had screwed up.
“They didn’t get anything out of that other than what the hole would have been,” he told his L.A. teammates, with no small degree of satisfaction.
Here’s that important rule down into simpler language: If you’re already going to win the hole, don’t throw the hammer! And with that mantra established, we move on to the more important question: When should you throw the hammer?
The answer is, there are plenty of good times, but as a shorthand rule, think of the hammer by a different term: “The Temptress.” A temptress is most effective when her target thinks there’s a chance of success, and the hammer is the same.
Yes, that sounds a little weird, but hear me out. First, let’s isolate the two match situations when the hammer should be used.
1. When you have a real possibility of earning two points—that, after all, is the hammer multiplier and the entire point of its existence.
2. When it can be used to secure you one point (a hole win) that is far from certain.
The crucial secret is, those two scenarios always happen at the same time. In both cases, you must use temptation to get the opponents to take a risk. To deploy the hammer effectively, the opposing team must always believe it still has a chance to tie the hole. There are no exceptions here, because if the other team doesn’t believe it, its members will happily decline as L.A. did twice against Atlanta. That hole was clearly out of their hands; they couldn’t be tempted. Your job, as hammer thrower, is to identify those moments when the outcome of the hole is still in doubt but your team has a better than 50 percent chance of winning, such that if the opponent declines the hammer, you get a free point that was up in the air, and if they take the bait and accept, you have a shot at two points with almost no negative risk.
Despite the Atlanta Drive twice making poor decisions on when to use The Hammer, the team correctly employed it to force overtime against Los Angeles Golf Club in their Monday match.
Megan Briggs/TGL
To illustrate what I mean, let’s look at an example from later in that same match when L.A. should have used a hammer, but did not. It was the 10th hole, a par 5, and Rose had a 15-foot eagle putt to win the hole for L.A, who were up 3-2 in the match at that moment. Rose missed, but the birdie was conceded, leaving Horschel a tricky downhill nine-foot birdie putt to tie the hole.
It was at that moment when L.A. needed to throw the hammer. (They could have also thrown it before Rose’s eagle putt.) Why? Because it would give them a chance to either win two points or turn one point into a certainty, with no risk. Here’s every possible outcome of that situation:
No hammer, Horschel makes: No points.
No hammer, Horschel misses: 1 point for L.A.
Hammer, Atlanta declines and concedes the hole: 1 point for L.A.
Hammer, Horschel accepts and makes: No points.
Hammer, Horschel accepts and misses: 2 points for L.A.
As you see, any situation where Horschel makes the putt results in the same outcome, hammer or no hammer—zero points exchanged. By throwing it, though, you put the fear into Atlanta, and if the team declines and accepts the lost hole, you get a free point that you wouldn’t have had if Horschel made the putt. That’s a good prize, because he could have easily made it—statistics show that PGA Tour players make about 45 percent of nine-foot putts. But if they accept, Horschel is more likely than not to miss, which would yield the precious two points.
As described above, this was an ideal situation for L.A. where it was likely to win the hole, but not certain. The team had a chance to ask a difficult question of its opponents, and that’s where the real profit is derived when it comes to the hammer—when you have both the odds and the weapon called “temptation” on your side. Think about it from Atlanta’s point of view: It’s late in the match, they’re trailing and there’s a massive incentive for Horschel to try to avoid going down 4-2. And once you get him to accept the hammer, you’ve hooked your fish.
As it happened, Horschel missed the putt, but with no hammer thrown, L.A. earned just a single point for the hole. Had it led 5-2 instead of 4-2, L.A. would have gone on to win the match. Instead, Atlanta wisely used its last hammer pre-hole late in the match to earn two points, tied the match on 15 with a miracle birdie chip from Thomas and won the sudden-death chip-off. Bad hammer strategy cost L.A. a victory and first place in the league.
(By the way, for all Rose’s correct analysis of Atlanta’s early hammer misuse on this hole Theegala actually proposed it, but was rebuffed by his teammate: “I think we should keep them,” Rose said. And how did saving the last hammer play out? They never used it. That’s another sub-lesson of all this: Two points now is worth the same as two points later, and there’s no good reason to save your hammers for some perfect future situation that may never come.)
This has admittedly been a lot of words on hammer strategy, but it’s actually very simple to understand. If you’re trailing late in the match and desperate, sure, use it pre-hole to try to steal two points. Otherwise, find the moment when you have a minor edge on a hole but your opponents have good reason to take a risk. The TGL hammer doesn’t quite work as a blunt instrument, but it’s a wicked temptress.
This article was originally published on golfdigest.com
