Professional golf can be a lonely sport.
It is a game that creates and outright forces solitude. Golf is about you, your decisions and your performance on the course. You are measured against others competing under these same circumstances, but it is not exactly football where a different wide receiver can score a touchdown or basketball where someone else can rain it in from beyond the arc.
This isn’t to say that golf is something that professionals who play it experience alone. The expression of something taking a village is applicable to a lot of walks and experiences in life, but playing golf certainly falls within that range.
Consider the breakdown of world number one Nelly Korda and the team that helps power her that Amy Rogers recently did for Golf Channel. In it Rogers highlighted just how much of an ensemble the effort is to keep Korda playing her best.
By the time Nelly Korda wrapped up her media obligations and finished signing autographs for the young fans who stuck around to meet the newest winner of the Chevron Championship, darkness had already descended on The Woodlands, Texas.
Korda had just capped a historic run of golf in which she won five consecutive events, matching Hall of Famers Nancy Lopez and Annika Sorenstam as the only women to accomplish that feat. In celebration of capturing the first major of the season, as is tradition, Korda leaped into the water beside the 18th green at the Club at Carlton Woods alongside her devoted inner circle – swing coach Jamie Mulligan, caddie Jason McDede, agent Chris Mullhaupt and athletic trainer Kim Baughman.
“By having a great team around me full of positivity and working hard, hard work will always get you somewhere,” Korda told the media that Sunday.
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It’s all part of the delicate balance that not just McDede, but the rest of Korda’s team, tries to maintain in their day-to-day management of the world No. 1, which ranges from juggling practice time with media opportunities to regulating emotions on the golf course.
Maintaining a level of play that keeps you as the top person in the world at your sport is clearly no easy task which is why it makes sense to involve other people who specialize in certain areas. The idea of teamwork makes sense in that regard.
But what seems to make Korda a bit more unique here is her intentionality with highlighting her team and giving them their due. This is not always the case with professional athletes.
Consider what Korda had to say on Tuesday at the Chevron, where she will look to defend her 2024 title, when she was asked about the most fulfilling aspect of golf to her.
I think it’s definitely changed every year, but right now I would say there is two different sides to it. One is seeing all the little kids come out and say that we inspire them to pick up the game of golf and knowing that the game of golf is heading in the great direction with seeing all the little kids picking up the game.
Two is my team. I love them so much. And then for us being together, no matter the ups, the downs, like we just all stick together, we grind through it.
There is a lot of humility, among world-class talent, in Nelly Korda’s game. That the togetherness of her team is among the most fulfilling parts of all of that she is accomplishing is indeed a unique thing relative to her contemporaries.
Time will tell whether or not Korda can successfully defend her Chevron crown, but she seems to be in as solid position as she can be to do so. What’s more is that she seems to have the right mindset for her to do so.
It should be fun to watch.
