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The Rise of the $10M Disc Golf Celebrity

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Re: The Rise of the $10M Disc Golf Celebrity

#61

Post by deberon »

iandinwoodie wrote: post #24

For anyone interested in the sport, UDisc is the “go-to” app for finding courses, viewing course maps, and tracking scores. I’m not affiliated with UDisc, but their dev team has done such a great job listening to feedback from users and actually implementing features requested by the community that I couldn’t help but give them a mention.

I also recommend UDisc. Good Apple Watch integration as well. They make it easy to track granular stats like the length of your drive or you can just use it to keep score during a friendly game. Worth the price.

Re: The Rise of the $10M Disc Golf Celebrity

#62

Post by elijaht »

kasey_junk wrote: post #60

One of the things I really appreciate about disc golf is the low barrier to entry. My local club does events where we give discs away to kids to get them started. We’ll give hundreds of putters away this year and it will cost about $1700. For $15 we can outfit a kid with a three disc set once they’ve decided they like the sport enough to learn about the differences in discs. The kids we give these away to are unlikel…

Yup- no longer playing (moved to an area where there is no scene/courses), but I was a casual player for a few years. The cost inspires a lot of generosity. When I started I probably was tossed 10-20 discs over the first few months, precisely because it is such a low cost sport. Really helped get it's hooks in me and made some great friends

Re: The Rise of the $10M Disc Golf Celebrity

#63

Post by elb2020 »

nickmonad wrote: post #11
paulcole wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> You can make money doing anything if you're good enough The thesis of the article seems to be that this isn’t enough. It’s the marketing and social media aspect that makes the money possible. McBeth might not be the disc golf GOAT, but he’s close and he’s in the right place at the right time and is learning to market himself. His lifetime on the course earnings (again, from the article) are less than 5% of one year…

It does make me wonder when that will flip though. "Ball" golf (as disc golfers like to say) seems to be at a point where you can make a serious living without much to do on the social media side. Companies dump so much money into the purse because there are enough eyes on the game, and I think disc golf can get to that point. But then again, maybe disc golf is coming of age in a different era, where social media wil…

> Companies dump so much money into the [golf] purse because there are enough eyes on the game, and I think disc golf can get to that point.

Maybe, but traditional golf also has the image, historically, of being a sport for the wealthy. I think this becomes sort of self-perpetuating, since it automatically attracts new wealthy people to the sport.

I think the spending power within the group of people that practices the game also affects the size of the total purse.

Re: The Rise of the $10M Disc Golf Celebrity

#64

Post by kasey_junk »

elijaht wrote: post #62
kasey_junk wrote: post #60

One of the things I really appreciate about disc golf is the low barrier to entry. My local club does events where we give discs away to kids to get them started. We’ll give hundreds of putters away this year and it will cost about $1700. For $15 we can outfit a kid with a three disc set once they’ve decided they like the sport enough to learn about the differences in discs. The kids we give these away to are unlikel…

Yup- no longer playing (moved to an area where there is no scene/courses), but I was a casual player for a few years. The cost inspires a lot of generosity. When I started I probably was tossed 10-20 discs over the first few months, precisely because it is such a low cost sport. Really helped get it's hooks in me and made some great friends

There is no public course in Chicago (where my club is located). Fixing that is a major long term goal of our club but we’ve had a lot of success working with the parks putting up temporary baskets.

Our club only exists because a buddy and me took a cheap basket down to the park to goof around and lots of like minded folks saw us. Now we have a pretty big Wed putting league in one park and temporary baskets we leave in others for putting & field work.

You might try just putting in a park with friends and see what happens.

Re: The Rise of the $10M Disc Golf Celebrity

#65

Post by butterisgood »

This sport is my downtime activity, again, after about an 8 year break when I hurt my back a bit (not by playing the sport mind you - just being out of shape).

I can't say enough how much I love playing it. There's just something about flinging a disc a hundreds of feet around obstacles, walking around with your friends chatting about whatever that's a nice break from basically everything that's not disc golf.

It's had a serious effect on my overall happiness.

Re: The Rise of the $10M Disc Golf Celebrity

#68

Post by jartelt »

gus_massa wrote: post #67

Sorry if it's a very stupid question, but why don't they add some bumps in the border of the disk so it does not roll on the floor? Does that destroy the aerodynamic properties?

There are regulations governing the size and shape of the discs, so that type of modification would likely be illegal. But also, it would probably destroy the aerodynamics

Re: The Rise of the $10M Disc Golf Celebrity

#69

Post by losvedir »

gus_massa wrote: post #67

Sorry if it's a very stupid question, but why don't they add some bumps in the border of the disk so it does not roll on the floor? Does that destroy the aerodynamic properties?

"Rolling on the floor" is an important part of the game. Depending on disc selection, the type and slope of terrain, and angle that the disc makes contact, the amount and direction (forehand vs backhand) of spin, etc it can "spike" into the ground, it can lightly touch and stop immediately, it can roll 20 feet to the left or to the right, it can "skip" and fly another 100 feet, it can roll for another 300 feet, etc. The best players can control this behavior and use it to shape their shots around trees, hills, hazards, rough grass, etc.

Discs with thick, round rims (generally "putters") already stop pretty short when they land. It's the distance drivers with sharp edges that can roll a long way, but those are very aerodynamically designed and bumps would probably mess that up.

Plus, there's regulations about the size and weight of discs, so it might not be allowed on PDGA tour anyway.

Re: The Rise of the $10M Disc Golf Celebrity

#70

Post by losvedir »

kasey_junk wrote: post #64
elijaht wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yup- no longer playing (moved to an area where there is no scene/courses), but I was a casual player for a few years. The cost inspires a lot of generosity. When I started I probably was tossed 10-20 discs over the first few months, precisely because it is such a low cost sport. Really helped get it's hooks in me and made some great friends

There is no public course in Chicago (where my club is located). Fixing that is a major long term goal of our club but we’ve had a lot of success working with the parks putting up temporary baskets. Our club only exists because a buddy and me took a cheap basket down to the park to goof around and lots of like minded folks saw us. Now we have a pretty big Wed putting league in one park and temporary baskets we leave…

There's tons just across the border here in Indiana! I live in Whiting and they just put up a great disc golf course in Forsythe Park here. Come out sometime and play! (And send me an email so I can join :)).
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