The essence of a message I sent to a golf writer in response to a piece he wrote on the subject of Jason Day’s lament that he opposes efforts to make him play faster, because he feels the slower he plays, the better he plays:

Interesting comments by Day.  Two thoughts:  (i) I think he is correct in his assessment that he is a better player when he takes longer.  I have the same feeling in my Sunday Nassau game – I wish I had a half hour on every putt, so I could look at it from every angle, try the read-thru-your-feet technique, try Stacy Lewis’s thing with the finger-counting, read the grain, read the grass around the edge of the cup, look for the drainage direction of the green, read the wind, do a plumb job, and then maybe ask my playing companions for their opinions, based on their local knowledge.  For that matter, I wish I had one of those topographical charts that the Tour pros get from their caddies, so I could get the last word on every single slope at any location on the green.   However, if I tried all of that crap, I would quickly find myself trying to remove a pitching wedge from my forehead.  (ii) This might be a good time to remind Mr. Day (and others with similar habits) that they are in the entertainment business, not trying to cure cancer.  Sure, he gets better with more time, and some guys (Snedecker) would benefit more than others by the tour’s installing a shot clock, but what difference would the Day-model make if the result were that everyone played at Day’s pace and eventually no one gave a damn about watching TV golf – which is already at the threshold of wearing out the audience’s patience.  The point of pro golf is not to “identify the best golfer”, as the USGA insists, it is to entertain the viewing audience sufficiently that they will continue to pay for the Jason Days of the world to live like a Saudi prince.

Of course, some day soon, we will have an electronic device, perhaps built into our GPS distance-finder, and all you have to do is say, Hey, Siri, how does this putt break?  And by the way, how’s my launch angle with my driver?  Boy, would that ever make must-see TV.  Of course, Jason Day might still find a way to take 6 hours to play his round.