Dear Russell,
Thanks for contacting me! "Ain't no ham like Birmingham!"
I would suggest the book, The Master of Putting: Classic Secrets of a Putting Legend, by George Low, With Al Barkow (Paperback, 1988, $12.95), available at Barnes and Noble,
here.
George Low taught the arcing stroke in the 1950s-1970s to Arnold Palmer, Jack Nicklaus and others. His approach is Horton Smith without the hooding or the straightness of path, so it is a simpler arcing without hand manipulation. It is also simpler than the arcing stroke of Stan utley, which has some deliberate and precise forearm rotation and counter-rotation that is essentially a sort of forearm "hooding" like Smith's wrist "hooding." Bobby Locke's technique was not quite the same sort of hooding, as he had a putter path that came straight inside going back with wrists keeping the face oriented as at the start (not even at the target but staying parallel left of the target). Locke had no "un-hooding" action, as he froze his wrists at the top of the backstroke and then shifted to a body stroke more of the upper torso rotating into the back of the ball from the inside, and then straight down the line.
The sort of technique you are looking for is a combination of wrists and arms, with the shoulderframe staying more or less square and uninvolved in the stroke. With that sort of action, you will have clear arcing, and you accuracy will depend upon getting a pattern of arm-hands combination, with the hands being all important for about 8 inches on either side of the ball. With this stroke action, it is not too advisable to try to manufacture a very specific wrist movement, because the coordination of the upper arms, forearms, and wrists is easier done with a natural action-reaction smoothness. Too much focus on one part of the total system tends to introduce difficulty and tension, leading to inconsistency. What you want is a smooth fanning back and forth of the arms (even with a touch of shoulderframe turning back and thru) with increasing amplitude out from shoulders, upper arms, forearms, and hands.
I think there are two key matters with the hands that will glue all this together nicely. First, the hands have to retrace their trajectory right near the ball, always the same distance from the waist or thighs at each point along the slight arc and always the same height above the ground at each point. This arc trajectory of the hands in the air is a 3-dimensional arc, not a line and not an arc in the horizontal dimension only. The arc both comes inside and rises subtly going back, and then reverses this to impact and then rises subtly and comes inside on the forward arc. To keep the hands at the same elevation at all points from one stroke (size 10 for a 10-footer) to another identical stroke (another size 10 stroke) mostly means not "lifting" the putter with an unnoticed crooking of the elbows. This quietness in the elbows leaves the "natural" or unforced wrist action uncomplicated. A lifting of the forearms by crooking the elbows is a very easy flaw to commit because the upper arms and forearms on either side of the elbows want to get into the action of moving the putter. Golfers generally need to retool their thinking about how the body moves by going up the limb chain one muscle group. Thus, golfers who want to move the hands really need to think about the wrists and forearms, not the hands. Golfers who want to or don't want to move the elbows need to think most about the upper arms. Golfers who want to move the upper arms need to think about the shoulders and pecs. Golfers who want to move the shoulders need to think about the gut and lower back muscles. In the sort of action you prefer, the pecs and shoulders start the upper arms in motion, and perhaps the forearms move the hands at first away from the static address position, but just don't lift the forearms with a crooking of the elbows. This way, your "arc" trajectory will produce a much more consistent path of the hands in the air for every stroke.
Second, the orientation of the hands at impact needs to have the putter face squarely aimed at the target. If you setup with the palms opposed, this ought to have the back of your left hand aimed parallel left of the target and the back of the hand mirrors the putter face aim. So if your hands arc in space going back and coming thru impact, there is a moment of truth where the hands have to regain their starting orientation parallel left of the target. (If your grip is other than palms opposed, you will still have to regain the starting position). Billy Casper in his wristy style focused very much attention on just this, retruning his hands to exactly the same orientation as at address right before and at impact. He did this by recognizing the exact middle or bottom of his stroking ever time and always repeating his hand orientation at the bottom to make sure the face was aimed correctly from there thru the ball. You should do the same with an armsy-handsy stroke. This again means that the critical area to focus on in the stroke path is the 6-8 inches right behind the ball in the downstroke, where the putter face is approaching the ball, resquares right at the bottom, and then impacts thru the ball while square. Although it is true enough that the bottom of the stroke is usually in the middle of the stance, the exact bottom can vary a little depending upon your setup and putter design. Almost all changes from the exact middle move the bottom a little closer to the front foot. So you will have to learn your own bottom and then play the ball just ahead of that in your stance for best results (never behind that point).
Once you get this far, you will have to make a choice about what happens thru and after impact in your stroke path. If you opt to continue the arc past impact, just do so. Your accuracy will depend very heavily upon your consistency of timing and the repetition of your stroke movement pattern and setup (including ball position). On the other hand, you could opt to artificially prolong the time thru and past impact that the face of the putter remains aimed at the target. This sort of "down the line" stroke, it seems to me, is actually favored by all the great putters, and is in any event productive of greater consistency and accuracy than a style that continues to gate past impact. This "down the line" style actuyally puts greater demands on your hands thru this area from impact to about 6-8 inches past impact, and for that reason, a golfer who prefers the feel of their hands in control of the stroke ought to like this style more than just continuing the gating. The key to this action lies in the lead elbow and in the sole of the putter. The lead elbow will have to separate from the hip asthe putter head is moved out and down along the line. This stroke path moves farther away from the feet than an arcing path, so the lead armpit will open as the putterhead gets farther away down the line. The sole of the putter ideally will be arcing up from flat to tilted in a very specific way, mirrored by the wrist action and the back of the left hand. "Yes, Virginia, there really is a left-wrist breakdown that is desirable." Going thru impact and beyond, with the left elbow moving parallel left of the line of the putt, it is completely natural for the wrists to uncock or release in such a fashion that the back of the left hand stays facing the target (parallel left a little) as it changes from vertical and unhinged at the bottom of the stroke to slightly hinged after impact. All this keeps the face of the putter aimed at the target thru and past impact for a little bit, with the sole of the putter flat to the green at the bottom of the stroke and then tilting up towards the target. If you exaggerated this action by continuing to move the putterhead straight down the line with the putterhead rising above the line until the bottom of the shaft pointed straight at the target, the sole of the putter would be "square" to the target. If you continued further, past the target, until the shaft was horizontal, the face of the putter would be perfectly flat and facing straight up to the sky, and the sole of the putter would be vertical. I call this the "Waiter's Tray" position. The important point is that right thru impact and for a little beyond, this style uses the wrists to manage the sole of the putter so it is flat right before impact and then heads in the direction of the Waiter's Tray for just a little after impact (maybe 6 inches). Again, lifting the elbows is the flaw that ruins this action. The feeling of going down the line like this is not really the same as trying to keep the putterhead low (the same lowness for a while down the line), because you don't mind the putterhead naturally rising -- it's all about the alignment of the face thru and past impact. The slight release of the wrists just speeds this action up to get it over with a little quicker than otherwise, but that doesn't mean it's not a precise move or even a pronounced move.
All together, I would work exclusively on straight putts for a while. By straight putt, I mean one in which the ball rolls straight away from the way the putter face is aimed at address. You don't need a target to practice this, as you can simply putt ball after ball down the same line straight off the putter face. I sometimes take a business card and stick a tee peg thru the center into the green so the peg is level with the turf and the card is pinned in place. You can then tee up a ball and putt it out of the rectangle of the business card, with the face square to the edges of the card. Thisremoves aiming from the equation and allows you to receive clear feedback about whether each stroke is sending the ball away straight from the face.
After you get pretty confident with the straightness of your stroke, try a bunch of 10-footers. From there, graduate to 20- and 30-footer straight putts. Then, graduate higher to making 5- and 6-foot straight putts with this stroke. You should see a steady growth of your competence with this, and I think it should have just enough handsiness to keep you happy.
Let me know how it's going.
Cheers!
Geoff Mangum
Putting Theorist and Instructor
The PuttingZone
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