The Front Nine: Golf's 9 All-Time Greatest Shots [Hardcover]

Barry LeBrock (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: April 25, 2008

From the most famous shot in golf history--Gene Sarazen's double eagle, which led to victory at the 1935 Masters--to Tiger Woods's nearly impossible chip shot on the 16th hole of the same course 70 years later, the greatest and most memorable shots in the long and storied history of this grand game are brought to life in The Front Nine. Explore how something as simple as hitting a ball toward a hole has evolved and discover the people who took golf to the next level.

Editorial Reviews

From the Publisher

"The object of golf is so simple it can be stated in on sentence: hitting a ball with a club, the player tries to get the ball from the tee box into a particular cup in as few strokes as possible. That's it. How can something so basic be so complex?"--from the introduction

From the Inside Flap

How did the game of golf move from simply swinging a club to an art form? Who are the men that changed the game, elevating the level and standards of play, with a single shot? The Front Nine fleshes out the stories behind, and analyzes the importance of, the top nine golf shots of all time.

Author Barry LeBrock carefully evaluates each shot on the basis of its significance to the world of golf, the immediate impact the shot had on the game at hand, and the personality behind the swing. In The Front Nine, the reader will go into the clubhouse with Ben Hogan, onto the first tee with Arnold Palmer, and behind the scenes with the most famous American Ryder Cup team of all time.

Triumphant victory as well as heartbreaking defeat play out shot-by-shot as the most celebrated tournaments of the past come to life. Readers thrill to both the joy and the agony of the most significant shots in golf history through detailed description, commentary from the men who pulled them off, and fresh insight from golf historian Barry LeBrock.

As a nationally known sportscaster with Fox Sports Net, author Barry LeBrock has access to almost everyone in the game of golf, past and present. Scores of interviews and long hours of research bring to light previously unknown information and ensure historical accuracy. This book is a must for golf fans of all ages.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 320 pages
• Publisher: Triumph Books; 1ST edition (April 25, 2008)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1600780717
• ISBN-13: 978-1600780714
• Product Dimensions: 8.7 x 5.7 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,486,928 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

3.0 out of 5 stars I have some bones to pick, but GREAT stories none the less, January 28, 2012

By 

BCastro - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Front Nine: Golf's 9 All-Time Greatest Shots (Hardcover)

Yes this book provides AMAZING stories in great detail and great context. However, this clearly was not written by a very talented writer. Run-on sentences that are difficult to read litter it from beginning to end. There's a typo on one of the first pages to a chapter that is just too obvious to be in anything published: Oakland hills is in Birmingham, MICHIGAN (which is mentioned numerous times within the chapter), but the title page of the chapter says Birmingham, Alabama! The worst part is that if you look about an inch below, where the text is, it says Michigan. Also, he chooses some kind of, for lack of a better word, dumb quotes and tends to repeat things that should not be repeated as well as uses some pretty juvenile metaphors. All in all, GREAT stories, POOR execution. Still though, I started this book on Monday. Saturday at 8am I was on the range because it just instilled that craving in me that a book on the subject should.

5.0 out of 5 stars Great read, June 25, 2008

By 

Number Seven "Krane" (Myrtle Beach) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Front Nine: Golf's 9 All-Time Greatest Shots (Hardcover)

Very interesting book. So many details about each of the nine shots from the first one (Sarazen in 1935) to the last one -- the chip by Tiger at the Masters when you saw the swoosh on the ball before it dropped.
I am not a low-handicapper, but I do love golf and know the sport very well. This book kept my interest from page-1. He writes about not only the stars, but all the great characters of the game too.
Very entertaining.