Rochester Pro Launches “Manage Your Game” Video Series

By Dave Allen

Prior to becoming one of the top PGA teaching professionals in Western New York, Brian Jacobs was a teacher, caddie and assistant high school football coach in New York State. As a football coach, he drilled the basic fundamentals hard into his players, but he knew that the only way to develop his players into major contributors was to take the foundational skills they learned off the field and apply them on the playing field, under pressure, in game situations.

That coaching philosophy has served Jacobs well for more than 20 years as a golf instructor. A two-time Western New York PGA Section Teacher of the Year (2017, 2021) and Golf Digest “Best in State” teacher, Jacobs believes that the best learning is done ON the course, where the emotional, mental and physical aspects of the game are all at play.

“When my students are with me I want them playing golf,” said Jacobs, who helped lead all three of the high school programs he coached to sectional championships. “The goal is to get your students to play better golf, and how are they going to get any better standing around on the range hitting thousands of balls, with no gaming or on-course training? It’s a human game played by human beings. We’re not robots.”

Unlike other sports such as football, baseball or basketball, where the vast majority of learning is done on the field or court of play, golf instruction has long been associated with the lesson tee. A student signs up for an individual lesson or series of lessons, and spends hours with his or her coach on the lesson tee or short-game area, learning technical aspects of the swing, short game and putting stroke. Little to any instruction is conducted on the course.

Jacobs believes that most of the foundational skills in golf can be learned and practiced at home. When a returning student comes to see him, he has them do games built around the foundational work they’ve done. They might have to wedge 10 balls within six feet of the hole from 50 yards away before their lesson. (Some of his students arrive up to two hours before a lesson to complete their task.) It’s a way to test his students and hold them accountable for the work they’re supposed to be doing. Once they gain some confidence and competence in these various skillsets, then it’s time to put them to the test on the course.

Convinced that not enough learning is being done on the course, Jacobs teamed with Golf Content Solutions last summer to film a series of playing videos at his outdoor teaching location, Mill Creek Golf Club, just outside of Rochester. The series of “Manage Your Game” videos provides practical information and strategies to help golfers perform better on the course, when it matters most. Jacobs hopes the videos serve as “a wake-up call to the world of golf professionals,” as the average handicap in the United States continues to remain stagnant, as it has for years.

“It’s been the same forever because no one knows how to play golf,” said Jacobs, the WNYPGA Section’s Professional Development Award winner in 2018. “When you go on the internet these days, you’ll see very few instruction videos geared toward playing golf. I thought that by doing this series I could differentiate myself from other teaching pros. I also want to help other teachers coach better. It’s a little bit of teaching the coach. Why aren’t you out there on the course with your students? That’s where they want to be.”

The series of 22 videos covers everything from handling the first-tee jitters to plotting your way around a long par-5 to learning how to be more kind to yourself. As Jacobs points out in the “Manage Your Game” video below, if we spoke to our friends like we talked to ourselves on the course—i.e., degrading or berating ourselves—”we wouldn’t have any friends.”

You can access the “Manage Your Game” Coaching Series videos by signing up for a 3-, 6- or 12- month membership plan to the Manage Your Game-Digital 3D Players Club, and through other various Packages and Events at www.BrianJacobsGolf.com.

“My programs are built around getting my students on the course,” said Jacobs. “Even in the winter I have my students playing golf on a simulator. I’m constantly trying to take their skill acquisition and put them under pressure. That can only happen on the golf course.”

NOTE: Interested in filming your own on-course video series or other instruction content? Please email Dave Allen at dave@golfcontentsolutions.com or call 407-717-4677 for more information. Headed to the PGA Merchandise Show in Orlando later this month? Golf Content Solutions will be on site Wednesday, Jan. 25^th. Please email or call Dave to schedule an appointment.

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