The Scratch Dad Project

The number didn’t move — still 17.6 — but this week the number isn’t the point. This week I got a real round back on the card after rain had zeroed my volume, and I played nine with my daughter riding along for it. That’s the win. Everything else is detail.

And there was one shot I’ll keep: a par 3, flushed to nine feet, and I rolled in the birdie putt from there. In a round that was frustrating more often than not, that’s the one that reminds you why you keep showing up.

Now the honest part. The round itself was rough — I bled strokes on approach and never got the putter going. And the rolling five-round trend slipped across the board:

• Driving: −4.4
• Approach: −5.1
• Short game: −3.1 (still my one green light)
• Putting: −5.7 — flagged as my focus, and the worst it’s been

The Quant’s caveat, because I’ve fooled myself on this before: that’s a rolling five-round window. My rough nine just entered the sample and a better round rolled out, which drags every number down mechanically. So this isn’t “I got worse everywhere in seven days.” But two things survive that caveat. Putting has now slid every single week I’ve tracked it — that’s not variance anymore, that’s my standing biggest leak. And I can name exactly why the rest felt off: it was a brutal work week, and I let the workouts and mobility go. The swing felt out of touch because the body was.

So the real lesson of the week isn’t about golf mechanics. It’s that I’ve been trying to spin too many plates — and when life got busy, the two that dropped were the two that matter most: my body base and my putter. The Doc’s been telling me mobility is the foundation everything sits on, and this week proved it by its absence.

The fix is subtraction, not addition. Next week has exactly two non-negotiables: get mobility back to daily, and finally run the putting diagnostic so I know what the −5.7 actually is instead of guessing. The driver and speed work I was so eager to add? Parked — they come back when the base is solid. You don’t build power on a foundation that just went quiet.

The Professor would say: simplify until it’s doable on your worst day. That’s the plan.

Next week: two things, done well.