This Golf Trick Shot Is So Smooth, People Think It’s Been Faked

Until the days of Tiger Woods, golf wasn’t exactly a sport known for its flair. (Ok. Except for their outfits.) But since the phenom golfer came along, the sport has made great strides in showmanship and, dare we say it, fun. It’s might not be a bold statement to say that Tiger Woods changed the way golf is seen and played, but we can go a step further and say that this single, wordless Nike ad was the catalyst for it all:

Since that ad, which was just taken from footage taken of Tiger goofing around between takes for his actual commercial, we’ve seen all sorts of crazy drives, chips, and putts put on display for the world to see.

Most recently, this linksman, Taylor “JT” Laybourne is making jaws drop with a stunning trick that he makes look effortless. Perhaps a little too effortless.

Take a look. Haters gonna say it’s fake:

For good measure, he grabs another ball and performs the trick again while the camera’s still filming.

His feat got another golfer from the Instagram account holein1trickshots trying the same trick, which he says in the caption he had attempted years ago, but to no avail. Looks like he figured it out this time around:

While there’s not doubt the second clip is impressive, if looks a lot more...human. It gives the impression the golfer is trying, and it doesn’t look completely perfect. It’s only in the context of the second golfer that the first clip looks so fluid and effortless that we find ourselves looking for an editing cut or some evidence of a CGI ball or something.

Then again, the the first golfer, JT Laybourne, has the hashtag #golfgods in his post. Maybe they had something to do with it.

Because even when people believe it’s real (which is almost certainly the case), it naturally begs the follow-up question: