Flapjaw Jim tilted back his bullet-shaped head on his scrawny neck and took a long pull on his beer. He cleared his throat importantly and addressed the crowded 19th hole bar:
”You shoulda seen the putt I sank on the last hole. A lotta guys choke on those downhill snakes; they're afraid of hittin' "em too far past the hole. But that"s for losers. I always RAM those downhill ten-footers. I don't give "em a chance to break. I just give "em a good rap right into the back of the hole. Of course, that takes nerve, which some guys ain't got!”
He snickered and gave Downtown Brown the elbow. The bar crowd groaned.
What causes the Choke?
Bald, built like a rassler gone to fat, Downtown Brown grandly waved his Popeye forearms and puffed on his cigar. “Fear!” he pronounced, “it's fear that causes all these amateurs to choke. It's all in the mind. You gotta have confidence that when you lay the lumber on that pill it is gonna eat up some by-God real estate!”
He turned to his elongated partner who seemed to be made entirely of angles and bones. “Like that drive I cut the corner with on the fifth hole, right, Flappy? Did that screamer break their backs or what? When is the last time you saw me choke on a clutch shot like that, huh?”
Flapjaw Jim leaned his tall frame back on the bar in casual disdain and inhaled another Bud. “Never, old buddy. That affliction strikes only the faint-hearted, never the bold and brave. Remember when poor old Dumbrowski went chicken at Pebble Beach last year on that 550-yard last hole? All he needed was a lousy eagle. But he took the gas and wimped out. Made a birdie and lost by one shot. Pure case of nervous apoplexy.”
An incredulous gasp from the Bartender.
He screwed up his face in his best imitation of a Jackie Gleason drunk and exploded, "Yeah, I seen it. Dumbrowski took the gas and went choke city!”
"Yep,” Flapjaw continued, “on that short little par five. Oh, he hit a pretty fair country drive, all right, and managed to scrape it on the green in two with a 7-iron, but he wimped out on the putt and left it three inches short. Had to settle for a bird!”
Bartender's eyes pop out!.
He pulled his apron up over his stupendous gut and sneaked down a double vodka. "What a loser. I woulda jumped ALL OVER that putt. I RAM those babies right in the hole.”
Meanwhile, sitting at the end of the bar enduring once again the play by play recounting of their shame at losing to the two loudmouths, Ernie and Slim quietly nursed their beers.
Ernie's forehead looked like 50 miles of bad road. His haunted eyes held the fatalistic expression of a man whose ruined life held him in the crushing grip of doom. What was the use of living? Why go on when all that lay before him was humiliation and self loathing.
Flapjaw slid off his stool and walked over to Ernie and said, “Of course, I ain't saying you and Slim ever choke. That's not why we clean your clock every Sunday. You just gotta learn to move your left hip smartly at the hole, pull down with your left hand, keep your head rock steady, and delay the hit until the moment of truth, then hit the hell out of the ball, like me and old Downtown Brown do.
He grinned at the crowd. They laughed half-heartedly, not really comfortable with what they saw as a bad turn in what would normally be good-natured ribbing.
Picking On the Wrong Guy!
With his husky frame and the broad, sloping shoulders of an athlete, Ernie was not a small man. He could have easily picked Flapjaw up and tossed him out the door. But being mild mannered by nature he simply stood up and shoved his tough, athlete's face within inches of his tormentor's face. Flapjaw's chin dropped and he stepped back. Ernie then used his chest to march Flapjaw back against the wall.
Then the mild-mannered golfer walked away, leaving Flapjaw frozen against the wall, his face gone white.
As he went out the door, Ernie heard Flapjaw call out half-heartededly: “He didn't scare me none.” Jeering laughter followed that disclaimer.
At home that evening, Ernie pondered his latest golf book, a 400-page tome entitled:
The Five Crucial Moves You Must Make to Wallop the Ball Into Eternity!
