Opinion: Let expert add fizz to games on sideline

It was a perfectly innocent question I had put across the floor that spring of 2008.

All right, there was a thread of naivety in it - perhaps up there with the question I once unwittingly asked of a magistrate as a rookie court reporter.

We happened to be sharing a table at a hotel restaurant during lunch and I asked: "Do you think the accused is guilty?"

Anyhow, let us move on to a grinning Hunter Mahan who had just pocketed the US$1.5 million ($1.9 million) prize for having won the inaugural made-for-TV four-way Kiwi golf challenge culminating at Cape Kidnappers course, thanks to the Hawke's Bay resort owner and Wall Street tycoon Julian Robertson.

The PGA world No38 in those days, Mahan was referring to his sports psychologist, Neale Smith, in the same breath as his title-winning clutch shots that stole the thunder from fellow Americans Anthony Kim and Brandt Snedeker as well as Australian Adam Scott.

So I asked: "Did he [the shrink] say anything that made a difference to your game?"

That victorious smile instantly deserted him, like the many dimpled titanium balls that develop a mind of their own as they hurtle towards anywhere but the pin planted precariously on the prime man-made patch of real estate.

Mahan had slipped on his game face, eyes locked as if to ask: "Are you for real?"

He reacted with a glare reserved for Philistines who dare to utter a word or snap a photograph when the professionals are about to tee off.

I was guilty of ignorance, the designer clothes-clad one casually pointed out as one would to a social hacker who walks right past without replacing his divvy on the fairway.

Hey, in my defence few journalists from the outback of New Zealand have had the privilege of covering a PGA Tour event, let alone any other distant relative in the OneAsia circuit.

I wasn't any wiser than most other media wallahs - TV One's Peter Williams excluded - when course officials used ropes to herd us like livestock on the former sheep station overlooking panoramic views of the ocean.

I incorrectly assumed that if Mahan's caddie, John Wood, could walk the entire course to furiously take notes on every dogleg and wildlife sanctuary during inclement weather on the eve of the Kiwi Challenge then what could possibly be the big deal about a golfer consulting his mental mentor at the height of battle.

It is, for the record, a sin to consult any coach - mental or technical - although, like tennis, there's nothing stopping them from developing cryptic body signals without a word uttered.

Hastings PGA professional Brian Doyle emphasises how valuable a caddie becomes as a player's only point of contact on the course.

While codes such as golf, tennis and cricket are steeped in tradition and etiquette and more likely to shorten the hemlines of skirts than change rules, what harm could it do to pave the way for players to consult coaches.

In fact easing archaic conventions may enhance player performance and heighten viewer interest.

So when Sky TV cricket commentators wonder what Black Caps bowling coach Shane Bond was doing talking to Neil Wagner on the boundary it is perfectly all right to say: "So what?"

For all we know they may have been talking about what they had for Christmas or what their New Year Day plans were but why shouldn't they be allowed to talk shop.

"Hey, Wags. Why not go around the stumps to Kumara Sangakkara and try cross seam," Bond may suggest to Wagner during the one-day internationals when the white ball starts dictating terms.

Central Districts Stags mental coach Gary Hermansson, who received a gong on this New Year's Honour's list, regularly skirted the ropes to put the minds of players at ease.

The players are professionals who have acquired an acceptable level of skills to know what they are doing wrong but, as US Open champion Michael Campbell revealed, aliens had possessed his body.

Sure, some of the most memorable moments in sport come from mental meltdowns but allowing mentors to exorcise the demons can add a totally fresh dimension to games.

"Ah, look at the difference Bondy's just made to Milney's approach to the bowling crease, Rigger," Simon Doull will say to fellow commentator and ex-Black Cap Mark Richardson.

Some codes are light years behind when American football uses Microsoft Surface tablets on the sidelines for things like instant replays, checking out medical records and concussion testing, albeit some of the members of coaching stable are still trying to get their heads around it.

It's time for codes such as cricket, golf and tennis to switch on or find themselves sucked into the black hole of inertia.