Charles Barkley’s golf swing now features a wild cross-handed grip, but somehow looks much better
Sir Charles is back at the American Century Championship with his infamous golf swing, which looks improved, but comes with a new odd wrinkle.
Charles Barkley’s golf swing has been a topic of fascination for years, for those who know everything about the mechanics of the swing and those who know nothing about it and don’t care at all about golf. You may have no idea how you’re supposed to swing a club, but when watching Chuck, you just know ... that’s not it.
Barkley once even enlisted the help of Hank Haney, Tiger Woods’ swing coach at the time and one of the best in the world, to try and fix his motion and he documented it for a Golf Channel show. It seemed to improve, but once the show ended, Sir Charles went back to his old habits and never really got better at the game.
Barkley’s swing has never been good from start to finish. But famously, the most unpleasant part was a violent hitch. It was cringe-inducing and became the subject of much social internet conversation.
Barkley, to his credit, keeps playing the game, although he does it much less these days. And he also keeps doing it in public, most notably each year at the American Century Championship. He even showed up one year to Lake Tahoe swinging one-handed, and that seemed to look good enough and less ... hitchy.
So we’ve seen just about everything from Charles, one of the most freak athletes ever, trying to figure out how to swing a golf club. This year he added another wrinkle in his attempt to discover the motion — the cross-handed grip. SB Nation tracked Charles on the ground in Tahoe this week, where he showed up to the first tee with a hard hat and a new grip.
Speaking relatively here, but ... It looks pretty good! There’s no hitch or pause that gives him enough time to contemplate the meaning of life at the top. But if you look closer, you’ll see the hands are not where they’re supposed to be.
Barkley is taking full cuts with his left hand gripped over the top of the club, which, if you golf at all, would feel totally foreign and dizzying. Think of a right-handed baseball player trying to swing with his left hand above the right hand on the bat, or a right-handed hockey player handling his stick with his left hand lower on the stick than his right. It would just feel totally off.
Charles handles it all right, and actually gets a little bit of speed on the swing and makes contact well enough. So the hitch has been subtracted — for the moment — but not without some wild new element added.
However odd or ugly it might look at times, we applaud Charles’ continued efforts and appreciate him doing it publicly.
