Hank Haney never had a bigger project than this one

Mike Dudurich

Posted 2009-05-31

Everybody has projects that seem Mt. Everest-like to them. Whether it’s cleaning out the garage, a couple days of landscaping and gardening or remodeling that bathroom, all tend to make a grown man sigh.

Imagine then, what Hank Haney must have felt when the idea was originally posed to him:

Give Charles Barkley, former NBA great also known as The Round Mound of Rebound, large helpings of your knowledge in order to reclaim his golf swing from the garbage dump.

Barkley, who 10 years ago had a swing good enough for him to shoot in the high 70s and low 80s on a regular basis, had become a caricature of a golfer. He dipped, stopped, paused, lurched and had become a danger to himself and anyone else on the golf course.

Even a guy with the glittering resume of Haney – one of his students is that Woods fellow, Tiger, I believe his name is? – would think such a project was too much to tackle.

But there they were, Barkley and Haney on the practice range, spending hour after hour with Barkley beating balls and Haney beating on Barkley. And the Golf Channel thought enough of the idea to make a mini-series out of it entitled, appropriately, the Haney Project.

“Wow, it was a big hill to climb,” Haney said a day or two after the final episode. “There's no doubt about it. Charles’ game was in a bad way. But I never had anybody work as hard as Charles did. He's improved a lot. He has to take it to the course still. That's an issue.

“I think there was a misconception maybe before that he hit it just great on the range. But I mean, he hits it really good on the range now a lot of times. He has flashes of brilliance on the course, which tells me I know it's in there, I know he can do it. It's just hard.”

Because Barkley had built his game (and his swing) on his own to the point that he had become a 10-handicapper, fixing that swing had proven to be too much for a list of coaches. To Haney’s way of thinking, the fact that everyone tried to fix the hitch in Barkley’s swing was a problem.

“Yes, the hitch was there, but the hitch wasn’t everything. It was caused by something,” Haney said. “The way I describe it, it's like driving your car to work on a certain route, day after day for years, and there's a stop sign you always stop for. It's awfully hard to all of a sudden drive that same route, but do it without stopping at that intersection."

It got so bad for Barkley that he came close to giving up the game. When he would play in celebrity golf events like the American Century Championship in Lake Tahoe, it would be almost painful for spectators to watch, but if they didn’t watch, it could turn out to be physically painful.

From a golfer’s perspective, you didn’t necessarily have to be a fan or reality television to enjoy the Haney Project. While 99.9 percent of those playing the game don’t have the kind of swing catastrophies that Barkley does, we all have our flaws and can feel the pain of the big fella each time he takes the club back.

On many days, Barkley hit over 1,000 balls on the range under Haney’s watchful eye. Then there would be days on which the two would play a few holes.

“It was one of the great experiences of my life, to be honest with you guys,” Barkley said. “You know, you think about it, it's not -- a guy like me is not ever going to get a chance to work with a coach of Hank's magnitude for an extended period of time. And I thought it was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. It was a lot of work, I loved it. But the way I looked at it was, for a regular hack like myself to spend time with Hank, that was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity and I loved it.”

While Barkley worked hard during the show, there were plenty of light moments, especially in the final two episodes when he played what could have been his final round of golf. Long-time friends and golfing buddies Julius Erving, Chris Webber, Ernie Johnson among others each played a hole with him. Needling, trash-talking, all the things that make golf fun took place and eventually Barkley decided to continue his quest to play good golf again.

“The game is not easy to change,” Haney admitted. “But you know, my expectation was to try to get Charles to play and enjoy the game. He loves to play, he loves to golf, and golf loves him. You see all the people who watch him play. They wish him luck. I mean, who else has had 4 million people go on You Tube and look at their golf swing?

“They all want him to do good. And it's pretty neat to see. I know he's going to do better, but hopefully I can get him tuned up. So when he goes up there to Tahoe he might surprise a few people.”

If you’re fortunate enough to attend the American Century Championship July 14-19 and see Barkley with a club in his hand, don’t follow the sage advice of keeping your head down. By all means, keep your head up when you see him swinging!

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About Mike...
As a sports writer for over 35 years, Mike Dudurich has seen a lot of great things, covered spectacular events, but his passion is, and has been golf. He recently ended a 29-year career at the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review and will now be a frequent contributor on GolfGearReview.com. Mike hosts a weekly golf radio show on 1250 ESPN in Pittsburgh from the beginning of April through the end of August. The show airs Saturdays from 8-9 a.m. and can be heard online at http://stations.espn.go.com/stations/espnradio1250/show?showId=insidepghgolf - Listen to Mike Here!.

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