Barber Discovers Shortcut

Tommy Barber of Notre Dame High swung his first golf club--a miniaturized version--a few months after he began to walk.

His grandfather Jerry won the 1961 PGA Championship.

His father Tom played in PGA Tour events in the late 1960s and early ‘70s and has been the head professional at Griffith Park’s Harding and Wilson courses since 1972.

Yet the youngest Barber made an important discovery this year.

Improving your short game can make a huge difference on the golf course.

“My Dad always beefed on me about my short game,” Barber said with a laugh. “But I just never listened to him.”

Like a lot of young golfers, Barber preferred blasting the ball on the driving range to working on his wedge game. But things changed this year.

He often played 27-54 holes three days a week at DeBell’s par-three course in Burbank, and the work paid. Barber is The Times’ region player of the year.

“My short game absolutely turned my game around,” said Barber, who signed with Long Beach State. “I could always hit the ball, but I could never score well because I lacked a short game.”

Barber, a four-year varsity player at Notre Dame, averaged 35.7 strokes for every nine holes played this year and shot par or better in 14 of 20 matches. He was most impressive in postseason play, when he shot a combined nine-under in the last four tournaments of the season.

“I was expecting to do well,” he said. “Because I had so much more confidence in my short game.”

Barber won his second consecutive Mission League title with a four-over 148 at the Harding and Wilson courses in the first week of May before breaking par in four consecutive tournaments.

He shot a two-under 70 to tie for medalist honors in the Southern Section Northern team divisional at Soule Park Golf Course in Ojai on May 8, and he fired a three-under 68 to place second in the North regional individual tournament at The Montecito Country Club in Santa Barbara a week later.

That was followed by a three-under 69 to tie for fourth in the Southern Section individual championships at Canyon Country Club in Palm Springs on May 22, and a one-under 71 to tie for fifth in the CIF-Southern California Golf Assn. championships at The SCGA Members’ Club in Murrieta on June 6.

“I wanted to definitely make it to [the CIF-SCGA tournament] because I had never done that before,” Barber said. “I knew the talent was there in the past, but I wasn’t able to bring my game up to the next level when I needed to.”

He changed that this season.

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ON THE GREEN: Craig Steinberg of Van Nuys tries to make history in Southern California Amateur. D17