The Birmingham age-herald., 1922-01-13
IS --- CARPENTER KNOCKS OUT GEORGE COOK SPORTS
TEE FAIRANNN,
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AMERICAS BEST AMATEURS
 Who Is the best amateur golfer In America and Canada today? have been asked to answer this question and to list the first 12 amateur golf CTS of the country. I will. have background of experience and ac- quaintance that should. think, quail fly me to undertake the task.
 It is not difficult to pick the first 12 amateur players. It is not any problem at all for me to say who Is the one best amateur golfer today. It is. though. quite a job to place the others in two, three. four. five, six order and so on down the list, It takes pretty fine shadings of judg- ment for me to say, for instance. who is the fifth best amateur in America In fact, 1t takes some fancy skating on thin Ice. but here goes.
 The Best Amateur
 The best amateur golfer in America; the best amateur golfer in all the world. bar none; the finest driver, the most decisive player with
 
 steady putter-the one outstanding player who possesses a mastery of every department and who has with his skill the energy of magnificent youth is Robert T. Jones of Atlanta, Ga.
 I place Bobby Jones first. I call him the greatest of the amateurs, despite the fact that he has not cap tured championship. l perhaps should emphasize that my choice oe positions in the list l shall Sive Is based on a shot-making ability on the part of the players named. Golf is a game of style, of grace, of endur- ance and of other factors, but in the final analysis games are won or lost on the basis of shots made. The man who can make the shots gets the score and the championship. no mat ter how he makes them. The basic object is to get the ball from tee to | cup.
 Master of His Shots Internationally Bobby Jones Is tho premier shotmaker of this continent. He has a mastery of all the shots required, and he has the youth, the i energy and the endurance required | to make them when he needs them. 1 Those who may question my judg- ment in this selection will perhaps find reason for the question: If Jones has all that why doesn't he win a championship My answer l is this: He will.
 l Some golfers have become famous | because of an unusual ability with q few shots on courses that were kind 1 to them. Not so with Bobby Jones. i He has not won his titular honor be- | cause the only troubles he has ever i known in national tournament l have grown out of a too great con | sciousness on his part of the great excellence of his own playing. A ! good many times l have watched Bobby struggling with all his might to forget. just for a little while at l least, that he was good player. had been all through such expe- richness myself, and I knew all the bangs he was feeling. It was much like the first pair of long trousers you know the whole world has stopped just to watch you, and that great things, because of the long pants, are expected of you. The i'm mediate result of this, with a player like Jones, is that when shot i'
 less than the followers of the tour nament match expect. the seif-con { sciousness, the realization that tn:
 ball did a little less than 1t had don'
 previously in similar shots-thes'
 thoughts bear heavily into the young
 players mind and have tremendou effect on all his tournament play If I blow a shot at a tournament, fo!
 instance, nobody pays any particular
 attention to 1t, and that include
 myself.
 Learned Indifference
 I played in tournaments for year
 before l captured a championship
 and never won a championship unti I could view with utter indifference
 foozled shot in tournament play
 So long as poor shots in critical pla!
 depressed me and upset me, the semi
 finals were as far as l got. Jones has always appeared at th'
 tournaments bursting with the won
 derful confidence of impetuous youth
 His was the boyish confidence. thu
 great and, to him, completely justi
 fled confidence. Nothing but expe
 rience cuuld. show him the depths O.
 the depression that succeeds grea confidence interrupted and set back
 These spells of depression are disas trous. and Bobby will know how |, sidestep them before many nor.
 tournaments have rolled around.
 This may be Bobby's year. I rathe
 think 1t will be. If he misses tn. , championship this year I will know . that he still hasn't been able to es
 cape from the consciousness of hi : own good playing. In that event h. may have to wait another year foi the tile, but this is sure: Bobby Jone ) and the amateur title are to take trip to Dixie sooner or later. I choose Jesse Guilford, presen amateur champion as the second bes , amateur in America, and give Franci