The 20 Funniest Golf Quotes of All-Time

They Said It …

The 20 Funniest Golf Quotes of All-Time 

We golfers love reading lists and rankings: • The Top 20 Golfers of All Time (Without question Jack Nicklaus is the GOAT.) • The Current World Rankings (Rory is currently No. 1.) • Best Courses in the U.S. • Best Courses in the World • Best Public Courses • Best New Courses • Leading Golfers in Greens in Regulation (GIR), Up & Down/Scrambling Percentage, Putts per Round and Driving Distance • Equipment Rankings for Best Drivers, Best Irons for Forgiveness, Best Putters, Best Golf Balls for Distance, Best Golf Balls for Seniors. Well, you get the idea. Lists and rankings are fun to think about and talk about.

Well, today is a list that The Committee has spent hour after hour researching, accumulating and then ranking The 20 Funniest Golf Quotes of All-Time. Let me know if you think I have omitted one.

“I have noticed, and I suppose other people have noticed, that in the golf education of every man there is a definitive point at which he may be said to have crossed the dividing line – the Rubicon, as it were – that separates the golfer from the non-golfer. This moment comes immediately after his first good drive. – Englishman P.G. WODEHOUSE (1881 to 1975), who wrote over 100 books, including the Jeeves and Blandings Castle series and his golf books, The Clicking of Cuthbert, The Heart of a Goof, Fore!, Golf Without Tears and The Golf Omnibus.

2. “They say ‘practice makes perfect.’ Of course, it doesn’t. For the vast majority of golfers, it merely consolidates imperfection.” – British golf writer and commentator HENRY LONGHURST (1909 – 1978), who was the golf columnist for the London Sunday Times for 45 years as well as BBC’s senior golf commentator from the late 1950s until his death. He was inducted into the World Golf Hall of Fame in 2017.

3. Describing the greens at the 1994 Masters: “I am not saying the greens are fast, but it’s like they have been bikini-waxed.” – Professional golfer, commentator and author GARY McCORD (Born 1948), whose comment on the Augusta greens upset the Masters hierarchy, resulting in McCord being banned from the CBS broadcasting team.

4. “Golf is, in part, a game; but only in part. It is also in part a religion, a fever, a vice, a mirage, a frenzy, a fear, an abscess, a joy, a thrill, a pest, a disease, an uplift, a brooding melancholy, a dream of yesterday, a disappointment to-day and a hope for to-morrow.” – GRANTLAND RICE (1880 to 1954), from his book, The Duffer’s Handbook of Golf, which was originally published in 1926 by The MacMillan Company, New York. Clare Briggs did the book’s wonderful illustrations.

5. “There is a widely held belief among golfers who finish second in tournaments that they are the tragic victims and have been swindled by the law firm of Destiny, Fate & Luck. – DAN JENKINS (1928 – 2019), who in addition to writing for Sports Illustrated and Golf Digest, wrote numerous golf books, Dead Solid Perfect; The Dogged Victims of Inexorable Fate; The Money-Whipped Steer-Job Three-Jack Give-Up Artist; Jenkins at the Majors, and Unplayable Lies: Golf Stories and Fairways & Greens.

6. “Golfers who carry ball retrievers are gatherers, not hunters. … Their dreams are no longer of conquest, but only salvage.” -- Author/Columnist DAVID OWEN (Born 1955), who a staff writer for the New Yorker. He has written more than a dozen books, including golf books, My Usual Game, Hit & Hope, The Making of the Masters and The Chosen One.

7. “And from all this experience I’ve learned that a good driver is a helluva lot harder to find that a good wife.” – Six-time Major winner LEE TREVINO (Born 1939), From his book, The Snake in the Sand Trap and Other Misadventures on the Golf Tour, 1985)

8. “Watching Phil Mickelson play golf is like watching a drunk chasing a balloon near the edge of a cliff.” – DAVID FEHERTY (Born 1958) played professionally from 1976 to 1997. He had 11 worldwide wins, including five on the European Tour. He began his broadcasting career in 1997 as an on-course reporter for CBS. You should check out these books, A Nasty Bit of Rough, Somewhere in Ireland A Village Is Missing an Idiot, An Idiot for All Seasons, and David Feherty's Totally Subjective History of the Ryder Cup. 

9. “One of the troubles with a very high handicap is that the owner is either looked upon as a poor golfer or a possible cheat.” – American author GEORGE PLIMPTON (1927 – 2003), who wrote 17 books, including The Bogey Man, which chronicled his experiences travelling with the PGA Tour in 1967.

10. “GOLF: A passion, an obsession, a romance, a nice acquaintanceship with trees, sand, and water.” -- Sportswriter and author BOB RYAN (Born 1946). He also became a regular panelist on ESPN’s "Around the Horn" and appeared on "Pardon the Interruption."

 11. “I’m gambling that when we get into the next life, Saint Peter will look at us and ask, ‘Golfer?’ And when we nod, he will step aside and say, ‘Go right in; you’ve suffered enough.’” – LA Times and Pulitzer-prize winning sportswriter JIM MURRAY (1919 to 1998).

12. “Tell me honestly: Do you know anyone who truly like to play golf? Oh, I suppose there are some people who derive pleasure from golf just as there are certain kinds of individuals who enjoy being snapped in the rib cage with knotted towels.” -- PETER ANDREWS (1931 – 2021), who was an American reporter and author, including being a contributing writer for Golf Digest for 35 years.

13. “You can’t let a putter think it is indispensable. I keep another one (named Number 2) in the car trunk. I switch at least once a year, just to prove to Betsy she can be switched.” – FUZZY ZOELLER (Born 1951), 10-time PGA Tour winner, including two Majors, the 1979 Masters and the 1984 U.S. Open

14. “Human nature is so funny, it is a thousand pities that neither Aristotle or Shakespeare was a golfer. There is no game that strips the soul so naked.” – HORACE G. HUTCHINSON (1859 to 1932) is considered to be the Father of Golf Instruction. His nine books include Hints on the Game of Golf (1886) and The Badminton Library: Golf (1890). He was a fine player in his own right, winning the British Amateur in 1886 and 1887.

15. “Golf is played by twenty million mature American men whose wives think they are out having fun.” – American reporter and author JIM ALONZO BISHOP (1907 – 1987).

16. “Golf combines two favorite American pastimes: taking long walks and hitting things with a stick.” – Author and columnist P. J. O'ROURKE (1947 – 2022).

17. “The best way to tell whether any golf gadget will help your game is to try to picture Fred Couples using it.” – HENRY BEARD (Born 1945) whose humorous golf books include Golfing: A Duffer's Dictionary; Mulligan's Laws; Murphy's Laws of Golf; The Official Rules of Bad Golf, and Golf: An Unofficial and Unauthorized History of the World's Most Preposterous Sport.

 18. “One thing about golf is you don’t know why you play bad and why you play good.” -- GEORGE ARCHER (1939 to 2005), who won 13 PGA Tour events, including the 1969 Masters and 19 Champion Tour tournaments.

19. “People who say golf is fun are probably the same people who rationalize the game by saying they play it for their health. What could be fun about a game in the entire history of which nobody has ever shot the score he thought he should have?” -- CHARLES PRICE (1926 to 1994), founding editor of Golf Magazine.

20. “Being a Scotsman, I am naturally opposed to water in its undiluted state.” -- Golf course architect DR. ALISTER MACKENZIE (1870 to 1934). His designs include Burning Tree, Cypress Point, Crystal Downs and Royal Melbourne’s (Australia) West Course. He co-designed Augusta National with Bobby Jones.

Golf Is A Funny Game,

Allan Stark

Photo Credits:

Cartoon Man Laughing, DepositPhotos

Wodehouse on Golf book cover, New York, NY: Doubleday, Doran and Company, 1940.

Lee Trevino: Allan Stark

Man near creek: Allan Stark

Golf training aid: "Www.theprozone.net" by Golfenthusiast is licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0.

Alister MacKenzie: Bain News Service, publisher, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons