Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, May 21, 1995 TAG: 9505230018
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: B-9 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: PAUL HARBER THE BOSTON GLOBE
DATELINE: LENGTH: Long
``It is more important to be decisive than to be correct when preparing to play any golf shot, particularly a putt.''
Tom Kite was the first PGA Tour player to respond to Rotella's rap. Many others have followed. Pat Bradley, before she won three majors in an LPGA season, Brad Faxon, while he was learning to handle his driving woes, Nick Price, before he had his record year, and, most recently, John Daly, are just a few who listen to what the University of Virginia professor has to say.
How did the son of a first-generation Italian-American barber from Rutland, Vt., become the guru of golfdom?
``In about 1977, someone from Golf Digest read something I wrote. It was not about golf, but instead about performance,'' said Rotella, 45. ``They asked me to come to Orlando, Fla., to speak during a meeting of their teaching staff that included Bob Toski, Jim Fleck, Sam Snead, Cary Middlecoff and Paul Runyan, some great names in golf whom I'd certainly heard of. They asked if I would come and give a 90-minute presentation about the role of the mind in golf.''
About a week before the meeting, the magazine's executives called Rotella three times with disturbing news.
``They were mentally preparing me for Sam Snead,'' Rotella said. ``They told me he would probably boo me and rip my talk to shreds. Great, I thought. This should be interesting.''
Rotella gave his talk and as soon as he finished, Snead raised his hand. ``I figured he was going to lay into me,'' Rotella said. Instead, Snead stood and said, ``listen to what this guy is saying. This guy knows what he is talking about.''
``He just started telling real-life experiences from his own life about when he was thinking great and when he wasn't thinking great and how it affected his performance.'' Rotella said. Then all the other pros - Middlecoff, Fleck and Toski - began talking about it. It was a wonderful day.''
``Patience is a cardinal virtue in golf. To improve, a golfer must learn how to wait for practice and good thinking to bear fruit.''
About two years later, Peter Kostis was working with Toski's students.
``Peter asked me to do a three-day seminar for five golfers who he felt were in good shape mechanically, but he couldn't understand why they weren't winning,'' Kostis said.
One of the students was Kite, who had been in an 18-month slump. Kite won the week after the seminar. He birdied four of the five finishing holes and knocked in a 40-footer for birdie on the last hole to beat Jack Nicklaus. A couple of weeks later, Kite won again. ``Another guy in the group was Gary Koch. He won twice in about six weeks,'' Rotella said.
After that Rotella was sought out. Word of mouth is the best endorsement in professional golf.
Another of Rotella's early students was South Africa's Denis Watson.
``He was on the tour about seven years and wasn't doing too well,'' Rotella said. ``He had won about $30,000 and needed to win about $50,000 in the last seven weeks of the season to keep his tour card.''
Watson spent two days at the Rotella home and won the next week. Two weeks later he won again. He spent another day with the Rotellas and won the Las Vegas Open. In seven weeks, he won more than $500,000 and retained his playing card.
``If a golfer chooses to compete, he must choose to believe that he can win. Winners and losers in life are completely self-determined, but only the winners are willing to admit it.''
Rotella grew up in a large family. His father, Guido, worked as a barber all his life.
``His father died when he was 11. He had six younger sisters and a baby brother, so he worked constantly,'' Rotella said. ``He always wanted to get a higher education, but he wasn't able to because he took care of his family. So, he always wanted us to get an education.''
Guido Rotella would find out that his children enjoyed sports and used it as a motivational tool.
``I liked sports as a youngster, and there was the school's eligibility rules and then there were Mr. Rotella's eligibility rules. That was how it worked,'' Rotella said.
His father was head of the school board at his parochial high school. ``Father was very clear. He said, `You have this much ability and I expect you to work up to your ability.' Family pride was just huge growing up,'' Rotella said.
Bob Rotella was an excellent basketball player in high school and had dreams of becoming a coach. He enjoyed motivating youngsters. During his summers, he caddied at Rutland (Vt.) Country Club and carried a bag for the legendary Bobby Locke, whose wife was from that part of Vermont.
He attended Castleton (Vt.) State College and played for the basketball and lacrosse teams. After graduation, he got a chance to coach and earn a master's degree at the University of Connecticut.
His plan was to become a psychologist and work with mentally challenged youngsters. ``But the very last class I took was a sports psychology class and it was like a world opening up for me,'' Rotella said. ``I can remember going home to my wife [Darlene] and telling her that I was changing my career at that stage.''
He went to the University of Virginia in 1976 and has been there ever since.
``A golfer must train his swing and then trust it.''
Rotella does not use a couch. He doesn't analyze players, either.
``I'm a teacher,'' Rotella said. ``I coach people's heads, their minds and emotions. If I'm in a tournament, I don't analyze my own game. I don't think about it.''
He believes there is too much disagreement in golf over the fundamentals and the semantics.
``One of the challenges in golf is deciding who is going to be your teacher,'' Rotella said. ``There is too much information on how to swing. Not only too much information, but too much contradictory information.''
He relates it to fundamentals in other sports.
``When I was a youngster, my father bought me a book on the fundamentals of shooting a basketball by Bill Sharman. It had to come out in 1959 or so,'' he said. ``No one is arguing how to shoot a basketball. The fundamentals haven't changed.'' But in golf, it seems to change with every new issue of the latest magazine.
``People change their swings every year, some every month,'' Rotella said. ``Others every time they play with their well-meaning buddies, they get a new lesson. Playing baseball, hockey, basketball or lacrosse, our coach told us how to do it. We didn't ask anybody else's coach how to do it. We did it his way. But in golf, you can take a lesson from your pro at the country club, then read an article in a magazine, or watch a video, or read a book. Because of all this, you can never make up your mind how to swing. This creates nothing but doubt.''
The best players, Rotella said, decide what they believe and stick to it. ``They believe in it. `This is what I'm going to do and I don't care what anybody says. I'm going to stick with it,''' Rotella said. ``If you look at Ben Hogan, he didn't try to swing like Bobby Jones. Everybody found their own way.
``People have to find a way that works for them and stick with it and not bounce around,'' Rotella said. ``Once you find a way of swinging that works, stick with it. Commit yourself to it. And that's what's getting lost.''
by CNB