Golf Slang Dictionary: 40 Terms Your Buddies Keep Saying

Golf has two languages. There is the official one, written by rules committees, and then there is the real one, spoken in carts and group chats, where a bad lie in a bunker is breakfast food and hitting it left then right then left is a military exercise. This is the dictionary for the second language - so you can stop nodding along and start using these against your friends.

Ways to hit it badly (a rich genre)

Worm burner - a shot that never gets more than a foot off the ground, screaming across the grass. The worms are fine. Your ego is not.

Chunk (also: fat, chili dip) - hitting the ground well before the ball, sending a slab of earth farther than the shot. You did not play golf, you gardened.

Thin (also: blade, skull) - the chunk's evil twin. You catch the ball's equator and it takes off like a stray bullet, usually over the green and into the next zip code.

Duck hook (also: snap hook) - a shot that turns hard left immediately, like it remembered it left the stove on.

Banana ball - a slice so dramatic it draws a full piece of fruit in the sky. The most common shot shape in amateur golf and the reason the right rough has no grass left.

Shank - the ball strikes the club's hosel and rockets sideways at a 45-degree angle. The scariest word in golf. Many groups won't even say it out loud, like a curse.

Air swing (also: whiff) - a complete miss. It counts as a stroke. Yes it does. We checked. Stop arguing.

Army golf - left, right, left, right, all the way down the hole. Marching cadence, zero fairways.

Snowman - an 8 on a single hole, named for the shape of the number. Builds character and Dad Golf badge progress simultaneously.

Where your ball ends up

Fried egg - a ball half-buried in soft bunker sand, sitting in its own crater like a poorly plated breakfast. Good luck.

The beach - the bunker. As in "Matt's on the beach again," said by people who have never seen Matt near an ocean.

Cabbage (also: the jungle, the gnarly) - rough so deep you are legally more of a search party than a golfer.

Jail - behind trees with no realistic shot. The only escape routes are sideways, backwards, or a miracle you do not deserve.

Cart path only - technically a course condition, spiritually a punishment. Your ball is 40 yards from the path, and so begins the walk of shame with three clubs.

Water ball - a ball whose retirement ceremony involves a splash. See also: donation, offering, sacrifice to the pond gods. ↳ The 7 Stages of Losing a Golf Ball (A Scientific Study)

People you will meet

Sandbagger - a golfer whose claimed handicap is mysteriously higher than their actual skill, discovered every time money is involved. The most despised species on the course.

Weekend warrior - plays Saturday, ices something Sunday, talks about it until Friday.

Ball hawk - the guy who finds six balls in the trees while looking for yours, and keeps all six.

Fore! - not slang, but the single most important word in golf: the warning shout when a ball is heading toward humans. Yell it loud, yell it early, apologize later.

Scoring talk

Bogey golf - averaging one over par per hole, a 90 on a par 72. Secretly a respectable achievement. ↳ What's a Good Golf Score for a Beginner? Honest Numbers

Three-jack (also: three-putt) - taking three putts. "Three-Jack City" is when you do it all day, and yes, it is a Dad Golf badge.

Up and down - getting the ball in the hole in two shots from off the green. The classiest thing a bad golfer can do.

Sandy - an up and down from a bunker. Escaping the beach with a par feels illegal.

Gimme - a putt so short your group lets you skip it. Officially does not exist in stroke play. Unofficially holds most friendships together.

Mulligan - an illegal do-over of a bad shot, permitted in casual golf by mutual crime. The first tee mulligan is a sacred tradition and a gateway drug.

Breakfast ball - the first-tee mulligan's respectable alias, because you "weren't warmed up yet."

Nineteenth hole - the clubhouse bar. The only hole where everyone plays to scratch.

Bonus round: shots with delusions

Hero shot - the 210-yard carry over water through a gap in the trees that you have a 4 percent chance of pulling off. You are attempting it anyway. We respect it. The pond thanks you in advance.

Tiger line - the aggressive shortcut line off the tee that only makes sense if you are, in fact, Tiger. You are not. Aim there anyway.

Career shot - the best shot you have ever hit, immediately followed by a chunk, because golf demands balance.

Learn these, deploy them at the right moment, and you will sound like you have played for decades - regardless of what your scorecard says. And when your buddies produce a fried egg, a snowman, and a swim all in one round, there should really be an app keeping the official record.