Golf's inner games.

Byline: Mike Stahlberg The Register-Guard

It's a jungle out there on the golf course.

As if Bogeys and Snowmen weren't enough to worry about, many golfers also contend with the Wolf, the Snake, the Gorilla and the Camel - not to mention the possibility of being "skinned" by a golf shark.

Welcome to the wild world of side games that buddies play while they're golfing.

These games within the game are a world of (mostly friendly) wagering, designed to make a round of golf a little more interesting, or simply to settle the issue of who buys drinks at the 19th hole.

Golfers always seem to have "something going." What golfer never has risked a buck or two on the merits of his game, or never has been part of a weekend foursome that chose teams and set a price on the competition?

The pressure of facing a putt needed to win a wager allows weekend golfers to identify more closely with the pros, said Todd O'Neal, general manager and head teaching professional at Emerald Valley Golf Club in Creswell.

"How many times do people get the opportunity to play the last two holes with everything on the line, just like with Tiger Woods and Vijay Singh?' O'Neal said. "Now, all of a sudden they feel what it's like to be in the heat of battle."

And golf's wagers are not really games of chance, O'Neal said.

"It's not like normal gambling where the outcome depends on the roll of the dice or the turn of a card. The players have control of the outcome. That's the beauty of golf."

O'Neal estimates that "probably right around 40 percent" of the golfers who tee off at his course are playing more than simple stoke play.

Mark Keating, the head pro at Shadow Hills Country Club, puts the percentage of players involved in some sort of side game at closer to 80 percent.

Both pros agree there are more different side games out there than you can shake a sand wedge at.

Indeed, the book "Golfgames: The Side Games We Play & Wager," by R.M. Ussak, lists more than 150 different games, and variations on games. "How About a Little Action? Golf's Most Popular Betting Games," by Rodger Hess and Thomas Strauss, features fewer games but includes several that Ussak doesn't mention.

And some games that are in both books have different rules, underscoring the fact that variations on the side games are common. Things you can bet on are limited only by the golfers' imaginations.

One reason golf and gambling go together so well is the handicap system that serves as a great equalizer on the golf course. A hacker with a handicap index of 20 has a fighting change against a scratch golfer.

Even golf's official rules recognize gambling is part of the game.

"The Rules of Golf," allow "wagering among individual golfers or teams of golfers" provided: "participation in the wagering is limited to the players," the "players ... only wager on themselves or their teams" and "the sole source of all money won by players is advanced by the players and the primary purpose is the playing of the game for enjoyment."

One of the oldest techniques for making a round of golf more enjoyable - at least for the winner - is a side game devised in the early 1900s at the Nassau Country Club on Long Island, N.Y.

"The Nassau, and it's probably still the most popular," O'Neal said, and Keating agreed.

A basic Nassau is a match-play game pitting individual against individual or team against team for a set sum assigned to each of three betting points: winning the most holes on the front nine, winning the most holes on the back nine and winning the most holes for the entire 18.

Common variations on the game make the back nine and the entire 18 worth more than the front nine.

Adding to the drama and appeal of the Nassau is an additional betting tool known as the "press." Commonly, players who are two holes down may opt to press, thus opening another bet on the remaining holes. It's essentially a double-or-nothing proposition.

Another common game within the game is Skins, in which each hole is worth a set amount of money. A player must shoot a lower score on the hole than anyone else to win. In the case of ties, the money "carries over" (is added to the value of the next hole). The pot keeps building until it is won.

The Men's Club at RiverRidge Golf Course in Eugene plays a "pot skins" version of the game during its regular weekly event.

Players who opt to participate put $5 into the pot, which after the day's play is divided equally among those players who won a skin. By local rule, it takes a birdie or better to win a skin.

"Then there's a game called Snake," O'Neal said. "Whoever three-putts owes money to the other players."

Snake is an illustration of the fact that golfers will wager on anything - bad or good - that can happen during the round.

Animals, for example, is a game of errant shots - a ball hit out of bounds (called a `gorilla'), a shot into the water (`frog'), a shot into a sand trap (`camel'), a shot that hits a tree (`monkey') and the aforementioned three-putt (`snake'). The last person to have any animal during the round pays all the other players. Additionally, any player who has all the animals during the round pays the other players double.

The jungle game "is pretty hilarious because any one swing of the club can change everything," Keating said. "A ball could hit a tree, then land in the water or a bunker.

"If you want to do some laughing, that's a great, great game," he said. "I remember leaving the course with my stomach hurting from laughing so hard."

Bingo, Bango, Bongo is a game that awards points, and cash, for good things - hitting the green first (`bingo'), chipping closest to the pin (`bango') and being first to hole out (`bongo') At the end of the round, each player's points are totaled, and differences are paid out.

"There's lots of points games," O'Neal said. "There's points for getting up-and-down from off the edge of the green, points for `sandies,' `barkies' and `poleys.' '

A "sandie" is usually awarded to a player who pars a hole on which he was in a bunker.

A barkie (also known as a woody) goes to the player who pars a hole on which his ball hit a tree.

And a "poley" is any putt made from beyond the length of the flagstick.

All of those points basically reward a player for "scrambling," and one of the best scramblers of all time was Arnold Palmer. Hence, the Arnie, in which a player collects a point or bet for parring a hole on which his ball never touched the fairway.

Such point bets are sometimes referred to as "garbage," and can be added on to other bets, as in: "Let's play a $10 Nassau, with garbage at $1 a point."

At Shadow Hills, the points game is usually referred to as Murphy or Junk, said Keating.

"We have a lot of fun with that. We start at 10 cents a point and any time somebody gets a little mad they can double it, so it gets pretty exciting at the end," he said. "What may have started at 10 cents a point is now up to $1.50 or $2.50.

"The neat thing about a Murphy game is you can shoot 90 and make money."

And surviving in the jungle only adds to the enjoyment of the game.

GOLF'S SIDE GAMES: THE FRONT 9

Here are some of the most popular "games within the game" played by golfers. Variations are common.

Nassau: A basic Nassau is three match-play bets in one: low score on the front nine, low score on the back nine and low score over the full 18. In a common variation, a player or team that is behind may opt to "press," thus creating a new bet over the holes remaining to be played.

Round Robin: Also known as Hollywood or Sixes, this is a betting game in which two members of the foursome team up against the other two. Partners rotate every six holes. Points may be awarded on either a best-ball or aggregate-score basis.

Wolf (aka Pig): One of the classic golf betting games for groups of four, Wolf is usually scored on a best-ball basis. Players rotate as the Wolf. On each hole, the Wolf either chooses one of the three players to pick as his partner, or opts to go it alone against the other three. The value of the bet doubles if the Wolf opts to go it alone, and the Wolf must post a lower score than all three other players to win. In one variation, the Wolf's team pays double when it loses a hole (on the theory that the Wolf has a big advantage by picking after seeing his partner's first shot).

Bingo Bango Bongo: Awards points throughout the round for three different accomplishments - first on the green, closest to the pin and fist to hole out. At the end of the round, points are totaled and the differences are paid out.

Skins: The low-scoring player on each hole wins one unit, but if two tie, all tie and the bet (or skin) is carried over to the next hole. In one variation based on the televised Skins Game involving PGA Tour players, the value of a skin doubles after six holes and triples after 12.

Snakes: This is a putting game in which any player who three-putts a green pays every other player in the foursome a predetermined amount.

Garbage: A term that covers a number of bets a player can collect from other members of the foursome for accomplishing certain feats, such as making par or birdie after his ball has been in a bunker (a `sandie') or has struck a tree (a `a barkie'), hitting his ball closest to the pin on a par 3 (a `greenie'), making a putt from outside the length of the flag pole (a `poley') or chipping in from off the green (a `ferret').

Las Vegas: A team game based on combining the digits of each player's net score on each hole, using the lowest digit first. If Team A shoots a 4 and a 5, for instance, its score on that hole is 45. If Team B shoots a 5 and a 6, its score is 56. Subtract the lowest combined score from the highest to determine the number of points won on that hole. (In the example above, Team A wins 11 points). However, if the low score was a natural birdie, the losing team's digits are reversed. In other words, a 56 becomes a 65, and Team B loses 20 points instead of 11.

- Register-Guard research