Three award winning storytellers and veteran amateur golfers have launched Golf's Ultimate Guide To Respectable Cheating, a hilarious and totally-relatable new book designed to tackle one of golf’s most enduring and entertaining subjects: the rules that golfers bend, the excuses they make, and the remarkable ability of otherwise respectable people to suddenly develop a very flexible interpretation of “the rules.”
The authors; Mark Goldman, a 40 year award winning marketing executive, Ross Greenburg, former President, HBO Sports and winner of 56 Sports Emmy® Awards and 8 Peabody Awards and his brother Michael Greenburg, Producer of more 500 prime-time television episodes, including MacGyver (Paramount/ABC) and Stargate SG-1 (Amazon/MGM/Netflix).
Ross and Michael Greenburg join SportsJam with Doug Doyle to talk about the new 100-page book that through clever writing and funny illustrations really puts you on the golf course with them.
While the authors highlight all the ways golfers cheat on the links, Ross and his older brother Michael both played high school golf. Ross also played golf at Brown University for a year.
"Michael and I like to say we've been researching for 60 years because we've just played too much golf together. Our friend Mark Goldman, who is very much a part of this book, would go back and forth for years about all the different ways (we cheated), and after finishing a round we'd start talking about everything we did during the round and it made sense to write the book."
Ross admits 100 percent of amateur golfers cheat if they take "gimmes" or "mulligans".
"I'd venture to say most do. So, if you look at the letter of the law, we've been doing that for centuries thanks to our Scottish friends, they came up with both ideas and it stuck. Other than that, there are too many grey areas in these rules (laughs)"
Ross and Michael cherish the days when their father, Bobby Greenburg, would take them to either the driving range or the course when they were little. Michael says they learned early own how to enjoy a very challenging game. He stresses those lessons still resonate with them.
"You've got to really pick your foursome. If you got some rule-carrying guy in there, that's trouble for us. Our banter on the course is non-stop. Our dad used to talk in his backswing. It's a tough game. You have to have fun or else what's the point of being out there. That's kind of the philosophy of the book is more fun, faster play and make it palatable. "
The book is about the little negotiations, traditions, rationalizations, rivalries and rituals that make golf unlike any other sport. It asks the questions golfers have debated for generations. Those topics covered in the easy to read format, along with dozens of humorous illustrations include:
- Modifying the rules to achieve perfection, positivity, and overall happiness on the course.
- The Mulligan: The story of David Bernard Mulligan and the 1920s birth of the do-over.
- Point of Entry: Flexible drop options to ensure your actual distance isn’t penalized by water or woods.
- Safety Free Drops: Prioritizing Self-Preservation over Par—how to legally avoid alligators, snakes, and poison ivy.
- Club Slamming: Proper techniques for relieving stress without breaking your wrist or the club.
The Greenburgs grew up on the 15th hole at Winged Foot (Country Club) in Mamaroneck, New York. Ross says everyday he would play several holes on the professional course and never got thrown off. However, Michael admits there was a time when they weren't welcome.
"The greenskeeper did come up to our front door before the PGA that one year when we were young and told my dad to please keep your kids off the fairway of 15th because we got the PGA Championship coming here in a couple of weeks and their digging up the approach shot which was right before the little creek on the 15th."
Ross Greenburg says he remembers Michael's rather unusual "club throwing" incident.
"Growing up, Michael and I had tempers on the course because we were pretty good. I remember the 14th hole was a par three. Michael hit a shot that he wasn't really happy with. He actually flung the his 7-iron way up in the air and it nestled in a tree. The next day we get to the course to play a round and his caddie Ray comes up to Michael and hands him the club."
Ray had climbed up the big tree and found Michael's 7-iron.
Golf's Ultimate Guide To Respectable Cheating is available on Amazon, Barnes and Noble and most places where you buy books.
You can SEE the entire SportsJam interview with Ross and Michael Greenburg below:
