Sam Snead Quotes

Of the mental hazards, being scared is the worst. When you get scared, you get tense.

Thinking instead of acting is the number one golf disease.

If a lot of people gripped a knife and fork the way they do a golf club, they'd starve to death.

I looked like a monkey trying to wrestle a football.

In golf, as in life, you get out of it what you put into it.

Those who go along get along.

Most people who play golf have one big trouble: they think too much. To get any real mileage out of this game you've got to sit on your imagination.

That little white ball is always staring back at you, daring you to make a mistake.

Forget your opponents; always play against par.

Golf got complicated when I had to wear shoes and begin thinking about what I was doing.

Just have a Coke or something and watch the boys go past.

Practice your swing until it becomes a habit of mind and muscle.

If I could have shot 69 in the last round every time, I would have won nine U.S. Opens. Nine!

Golf tip: Lay off for three weeks and then quit for good.

I give the ball some sweet talk. I tell it that this isn't going to hurt a bit. I'm a friend and all I'm going to do is give it a nice little ride.

Grip the club as if you were holding a baby bird.

I've gotten rid of the yips four times but they hang in there. You know those two-foot downhill putts with a break? I'd rather see a rattlesnake.

There is an old saying: if a man comes home with sand in his cuffs and cockleburs in his pants, don't ask him what he shot.

When I ask you what club to use, look the other way and don't answer.

I hope I'll never get too old to want to take part in this event, and I don't think I will ever age that much.

Keep close count of your nickels and dimes, stay away from whiskey, and never concede a putt.

These greens are so fast I have to hold my putter over the ball and hit it with the shadow.

You can't go into a shop and buy a good game of golf.

Until you play it, St. Andrews looks like the sort of real estate you couldn't give away.

Never let up. The more you can win by, the more doubts you put in the other players' minds the next time out.

Of all the hazards, fear is the worst.

Don't just play your way around the course. Think your way around way around the course.

Good golfing temperament falls between taking it with a grin or shrug and throwing a fit.

Playing golf is like eating. It's something which has to come naturally.

The mark of a great player is in his ability to come back. The great champions have all come back from defeat.

The only thing I fear on a golf course is lightning ... and Ben Hogan.

Practice puts brains in your muscles.

I was a better player at 50 than I was at 30.

If I had cleared the trees and drove the green, it would've been a great shot.

The only reason I ever played golf in the first place was so I could afford to hunt and fish.

Golf course architects make me sick. They can't play themselves, so they rig the courses so nobody else can play either.

I've been on some fairways that are as good as the greens we putted on back then. We had crab grass. I remember one green where I putted through ants.

The only place that's holier than St. Andrews is Westminster Abbey.

But you don't have to go up in the stands and play your foul balls. I do.

You've just one problem. You stand too close to the ball after you've hit it.

The fairways were so narrow you had to walk down them single file.

There are no short hitters on the tour anymore - just long and unbelievably long.

To win,you must have both talent an desire- but desire first.

Nobody asked how you looked, just what you shot.

What abandoned course is that?

Correct one fault at a time. Concentrate on the one fault you want to overcome.

I'd say that golf is about 75% mental. If your state of mind gets out of kilter, you're worse off than a tomcat floating on a log.

Golf is played with the arms.

When I swing at a golf ball right, my mind is blank and my body is loose as a goose.

You have more potential than you think.

Make the basic shot-making decision early, clearly and firmly, and then ritualize all the necessary acts of preparation.