Why this junior golf trend is so troubling

One of the many reasons I embrace my son’s love of golf is that it’s a screen-free zone for both of us. He just turned 13, and our time on course feels like the only respite when he’s not glued to my iPad and begging for his own phone. I also enjoy those technology-free hours to myself.

That’s why I’m discouraged by a recent trend in junior golf: tournaments that require players ages 12 and up to keep score live on their own smartphones.

Serious?

We have an adolescent mental health crisis in this country, some of them research convincingly attributed to the rise of smartphones and social media. At last count, 31 states did forbidden or limits students’ use of cell phones in schools, and a national movement called Wait Until 8th advocates that children not be given smartphones until the end of 8th grade.

But golf inexplicably moves in the opposite direction. Many junior competitors are now expected to have their own phones on hand during tournament rounds to enter hole-by-hole scores.

We’ve all experienced the irresistible distraction of smartphones — and how annoying it is when that guy or gal in our foursome responds to a text and then gets sucked into their news alerts and Instagram feed, confirming their next dentist appointment. (Many of us have been that guy or that gal.)

If adults can’t resist the lure of those devices in our pockets, how can we expect children to do so?

Tournament directors say smartphones will enable live scoring, which players and families want. A live leaderboard “makes it feel a little more like a professional event and the events they watch on TV,” says Greg Hubbard, vice president of coach and tournament development for US Kids Golf, the world’s largest junior golf organization.

Live scoring also has benefits for tournament administrators. Spencer Sorensen, director of championships and events for the Oregon Golf Association, said live scoring allows him to monitor the pace of play and give slowpokes a boost before they fall too far behind. He recently oversaw a tournament where two players in the penultimate group finished tied; he saw that no one in the last group was in contention and could therefore immediately start the play-off. Soggy, torn, lost or illegible scorecards are also a thing of the past.

But for players, cell phone use is a mixed bag. Even Mason Howell, the 18-year-old who won the US Amateur earlier this year, has been sucked in. “It happened,” he told me. “I look at my phone and then at social media. I get distracted and then my mind isn’t where it should be.”

Fourteen-year-old Alexa Phung, a two-time Drive, Chip & Putt champion, agrees that cell phone use can be “quite a distraction.” She tells friends and family not to text her when she goes to a tournament, but she has seen her playing partners text during rounds. How does she know they don’t enter scores? “Their thumbs,” she says, waggling her thumbs in the universal sign for texting. “It’s very clear.”

According to Sorensen, some players want to know where they stand on the leaderboard because it motivates them and informs their decision-making. “They can say, ‘Okay, I’m two shots back now, maybe I’ll try to make a birdie here,’ or whatever it may be.”

But Sebastian Martinez, director of Skout Golf, a golf school in Beaverton, Oregon, says looking at the leaderboard is “the exact opposite of a performance mentality.” He said chasing birdies by playing more aggressively than usual would likely lead to doubles. Then the player you were chasing could make a big number so all you have to do is make par – or worse, you find out his or her score was entered incorrectly. Martinez urges his players not to change their decision-making based on what others are doing.

Katie Burgoyne, PGA teaching professional at Black Canyon Golf Club in Montrose, Colorado, and mother of two 10-year-old golfers, agrees. “Golf is not a game you can make yourself play better to beat someone,” she said. She advises her juniors not to score apps. “I want you to put your head down and think about your next shot – not about where you score and who you beat,” she said. “Because no matter what happens, you have to do your best every time, and not try your best to beat John.”

Burgoyne also wonders if there’s cheating going on: Does anyone check to see if the scoring apps are in tournament mode with the ramp feature turned off? Alexa Phung said her father exchanged numbers with another father at the beginning of one of her rounds. Later that day, he accidentally received a text message from his new contact, intended for the daughter. In the message, the father mentioned a hole location. Legal? Maybe. Suspicious? Certainly.

When my son and I arrived at the US Kids World Championships in Pinehurst, NC, in August, we learned that the participants in the 12-year-old flight were expected to manage their own live scoring. US Kids encourages parent caddies, who typically take on the responsibilities of the scorekeeper, so in this case the kids were in the clear. But it was still frustrating for me that instead of watching my son’s group get out and thinking about what to say to him as we walked to the next hole, I was fumbling with my phone to open the app and enter scores.

Hubbard of US Kids told me that his organization started doing phone scoring for all tournaments in 2020 during the pandemic. But in 2021, they received feedback from parents that phones were “a distraction” and detracted from an important part of US Kids’ mission: encouraging family interaction. “When we felt like it was taking away from our mission and the experience of these families, we reevaluated it,” Hubbard said.

US Kids dropped live scores for all ages except 12-year-olds in the 15 to 20 most elite events (out of the 2,500 tournaments it hosts each year). Hubbard said US Kids has kept the policy in place for that age group because his organization wants to “prepare them for the next level,” meaning teen events where they will almost certainly be expected to enter scores on their phones.

There are alternatives to telephone scoring. Some tournaments designate a spectator or volunteer to post a group’s scores. At other events, rules officials are asked to enter scores. Still others have provided custom scoring devices, although expecting players to navigate unfamiliar gadgets also has its drawbacks. However, in all these cases, paper scorecards are also kept as a backup.

Golf prides itself on respecting tradition and resisting the temptations of modernity. I still have a folder of old scorecards from rounds I played decades ago, as did my 83-year-old father.

But this isn’t just a plea for nostalgia. Requiring children to have smartphones in the first place goes against the spirit of accessibility that many junior golf organizations have worked so hard to promote. Furthermore, requiring children to play with phones during a round goes against what golf can so brilliantly promote: focus and presence.

I started this conversation in a junior-golf Facebook group with 30,000 members. With the passion that only social media can evoke, several commentators suggested that if a junior golfer is distracted by a phone, the phone is not the problem. I appreciate the sentiment: If I can’t stop eating Oreos, it’s on me and my willpower, not the Oreos. Still, I definitely try not to carry Oreos in my pocket all day.

The rest of the world realizes the disadvantages and distractions of smartphones; the golf world needs to keep pace. In a sport where green blazers and burgundy jugs still reign supreme, the paper scorecard can surely reign supreme as well – especially for our youngest competitors.

Christine Bader is a writer from Oregon.