Long Shot

The once-legal anchor stroke saved Scott McCarron’s career. Even he’ll admit that. And though the SoCal native made an effort to abide by the 2016 ban on the technique, McCarron still draws the ire of putting purists. Let them whine. In this Champions Tour player’s eyes, he’s legal—and certain his stroke can save your game.

- Adam Schupak

Scott McCarron’s chili was running hot after a three putt bogey on the final hole in the second round of the 3M Championship, outside Minneapolis, last August. It would get a little hotter when a reporter approached him and began peppering him with questions about whether McCarron’s oh-so-close-to-anchoring putting technique might violate the anchoring ban (Rule 14-1b), which forbids the bracing of the club either “directly” or by use of an “anchored point” against the chest or any part of the body.

The ban was enacted by the USGA and R&A on Jan. 1, 2016, and players were given two years to prepare for its implementation. The cloud of controversy surrounding claims that some players continue to anchor long putters despite the ban on the technique has tainted the success enjoyed by McCarron and Bernhard Langer, another proponent of the broomstick putter.

Rather than simply state his case, McCarron invited the reporter to the back of the practice range at TPC Twin Cities and conducted a half-hour tutorial on how to putt with a long putter unanchored. McCarron said he had done the same for several spectators who were “getting on me,” he said. “I said, ‘Stay after the tournament. I’ll show you.’ I did that a couple of times.”

McCarron’s objective was simple: to remove the stigma associated with the long putter in the P.A. (post-anchoring) era. The way to overcome a misperception, he says, is through education. He wanted to demonstrate that there is another way to putt.

“Don’t ditch your long putter just yet,”he says.“I’mheretotell you that putting non-anchored is actually better.”