We are just kidding, disc golf is awesome bro! But, is it just us, or has there been a lot of hurt butts waddling around the courses lately? As owners of (we hope) a respected and growing disc golf company in one of the nation’s hotbeds of disc golf, we have noticed some troubling shifts in our sport. We are admittedly a company who bases our decisions on getting more exposure for our brand and building our reputation to become the “friendliest company in disc golf.” Having said that, we still take this sport we all love seriously, just not in the way a lot of folks have been leaning.
When we talk to people who are unfamiliar with disc golf about all the great benefits of the sport and why we play, things like nature, exercise, sportsmanship and healthy competitiveness come out of our mouths. We talk about how disc golf has helped to provide positive growth in the amount of parks that would otherwise go underused. We also bring up how the sport promotes spending time in the outdoors and fosters a healthy environment for youth. Let’s not forget the social skills (i.e. how to handle failure/success among many others) they might not get naturally otherwise. We talk about the hole-in-ones, crazy putts, tree love and monster drives.
Now, let’s hop onto our Facebook feed. A rough estimate would be that we (Rich and Brian) have about 1,000 friends combined who are disc golfers. You can imagine it is clogged with awesome shots from courses around the world, sweet disc dyes, collectibles that people are selling, people humping a basket after an ace and the obligatory baby pic with your favorite mini. We love that shit. Lately, the sunny and happy disc golf feed has gotten a little cloudy. It seems that now that our little sport is becoming more mainstream with #sctop10 accompanying every big ace video and tournaments getting live coverage (thank you smashboxx) and sponsors, there is an arms race of sorts happening around the sport. We have the PDGA, the disc golf pro tour, company A vs company B and thus their sponsored players against each other, and even players vs the governing bodies and/or other companies. Healthy competition is necessary, fun and good for growth, and a lot of things happening now are making that competition sick.
Our true plea is to just relax folks. As with anything that people care so much about, there is never going to be a black and white answer or route to take. Sometimes, shit happens that is unexpected or out of people’s control. Just because something goes unexpectedly or people have different opinions of how something should be handled, doesn’t mean we need to have a social media uproar. We’re better than that and you know it. As our friend and WPD team member, Coby Guice says about why he got into the game; “it was because it was fun!” Let’s not forget that and let’s come together and figure where we want to be in 10 years as a sport, but more importantly as a community and a culture and get there. Don’t like how tournaments are run? Run one! Sanctioned or not, who cares, run it! Want to have an opinion about what is happening with your clubs, leagues, tourneys and governing bodies? Tell them, get out and help out on volunteer day, go to the off-season club meetings, pay attention to the PDGA votes and be present. Dont just be a keyboard warrior and just bitch up a storm. If you ask us, we have a pretty good thing going here and we pledge to stay positive and support the sport. Are you with us?
Chive On and let’s all end the butt hurt!