Brandel Chamblee compares Tiger Woods’ ‘chipping yips’ to Charles Barkley’s hideous golf swing

Tiger Woods -- depending on which expert you listen to -- has the yips, lack of motivation, an easily correctable glitch in his short game, an overly mechanical technique, and/or mental issues that may require years on the couch.

Some of the best minds in the golf world have studied Woods’ recent but obvious short-game shortcomings and come to a variety of conclusions -- some seemingly half-baked, others food for thought. No one, until Brandel Chamblee, however, had likened Woods’ woeful wedge shots with the notoriously worst golf swing in the history of everything.

“Think about Charles Barkley, who’s got the yips in his downswing,” the Golf Channel analyst suggested during a Sunday edition of the network’s Morning Drive program in which talking-head chatter focused largely on Woods and his inability to get up and down from around the green. “Try as hard as you want, he never overcame it.”

Yep, that Charles Barkley -- the NBA Hall of Famer whose jerky, lurching stroke has been compared, unfavorably, to someone having a seizure. The same guy whose motion Woods’ ex-coach Hank Haney could not fix on the GC reality series, The Haney Project.

The theory was that the problems of the Round Mound of Rebound -- reportedly once a 10-handicapper who regularly finishes last at celebrity golf tourneys and was embarrassed to play even friendly rounds with his pals -- were all in his head. Haney, who could not remove the mental blocks that were causing the hitch in Barkley’s swing, saw his student make progress on the range but fail to bring the changes to the course.

Hmmm. Maybe Chamblee, who’s firmly in the camp of those who believe Woods has the full-on “chipping yips,” is on to something.