Dave Hyde: Indoors and loud -- it's golf like you've never seen, cheered or experienced

PALM BEACH GARDENS, Fla. — As a rule, golf isn’t played inside, at night, off large divots of grass as “Boogie Oogie Oogie” blares over loudspeakers and fans are urged by a microphone-wielding emcee to “go crazy!”

But there’s never been anything like the indoor golf league that launched Tuesday night with some of the game’s biggest names in the techno-fitted SoFi Center on Palm Beach State College campus.

Live with curiosity and on ESPN, veteran pro Shane Lowry swung off the first tee with the TGL’s inaugural shot and ...

Thwock!

His golf ball struck a five-story-high screen that technologically translated his effort into a 258-yard shot down the middle of the virtual fairway.

“Oh, god, yes, I was nervous,’’ said Lowry, a 17-year pro. “It all happened so quickly, because it’s loud and a bit crazy.”

No, this isn’t Jack Nicklaus’ generation of golf. Or Tiger Woods’ either, even if he’s an inside backer of the league and makes his debut in the weekly format next Tuesday night.

It’s all so new the league didn’t even decide what the TGL letters stood for at first. Maybe The Golf League, it thought. Maybe Tiger Golf League. It settled on TMRW Golf League — that’s tomorrow shortened to TMRW, the company name of league founder Mike McCarley.

McCarley, a longtime NBC Sports executive, struck on the idea of indoor golf during the pandemic. He convinced Woods and fellow pro Rory McIroy to join the venture.

Six deep-pocket investors like the New York Mets owner Steve Cohen and Atlanta Falcons’ owner Arthur Blank each paid a reported $50 million for the league’s six team franchises. Players wanted in — 11 of the 24 players live in Palm Beach. ESPN signed on for two hours of programming to the inaugural season on 10 Tuesday nights.

After a few years of planning, there was Ludvig Aberg sinking a birdie putt on the first hole for The Bay Golf Club.

“So much fun,’’ Aberg said. “I told basketball and football players I was jealous of them playing where fans were on top of them and it was loud. This was like that.”

You think you know golf, right? It’s drives along the ocean in Pebble Beach. It’s putts amid azaleas and singing birds at The Masters.

That’s so yesterday.

The TGL “course” is housed in a 250,000-square-foot building. The estimated 1,500 fans ring a playing area the size of a football field in padded theater chairs in an upper and lower deck (four fans in front of me paid $200 each for tickets). Betting possibilities are flashed on large and small screens all over the stadium. Food and drinks are served. Volume is turned up.

“It’s like a glorified man cave in a way,’’ said Rickie Fowler, who plays on the TGL’s New York Golf Club.

Players hit off patches of grass, rough or sand into a virtual screen (the sand is from Augusta National, home of The Masters). After watching their shots land on the computer screen, players walk to an actual green that has 600 hydraulic lifts underneath it that can rotate or undulate it into different looks for different holes.

The digital holes were created by renowned golf course designers like Nicklaus Design and bring a mix of real golf and Hollywood. Hole No. 8 had a moat of lava. No. 15 had a green set high atop a rock.

Yet the biggest difference for the players is the ...

“Shot clock,’’ Xander Schauffele said.

Yes, in the desire for fun and fast golf, players get 40 seconds between shots. At 15 seconds, a heartbeat sound pumps over loudspeakers. At 10 seconds, fans began chanting a counting down.

Teams can use a timeout to stop the clock, if they want. Or maybe ice a competitor. Long-time NBA referee Derrick Stafford is there ruling on the shot clock, the timeouts and even “The Hammer,” where a team can double the stakes of a hole.

Tuesday’s prime similarity to a normal golf event besides the players was the upscale, middle-aged crowd that tried to rouse cheers at the right moments. Or boos, like on a botched Schauffele chip.

“I probably would have booed me, too,’’ he said.

The only thing missing from the first night was some competitive drama. The Bay team ran to a 6-0 lead before winning, 9-2. But the rest of the night went just the way the new league envisioned right down to the 15 holes being played in ESPN’s two-hour window.

Yes, 15 holes and not the traditional 18. Throw in the shot clocks, the noise and the indoor look, and it was golf like you’ve never seen, to the point it was fair to wonder if it was really golf at all.