One of Our Own, Jim DeLaby, Featured in NCGA Golf Plus
We’re proud to share that our instructor Jim DeLaby was recently featured in the August 2026 issue of NCGA Golf Plus, in a piece by writer Judd Spicer spotlighting his teaching philosophy and signature drills at Silverado Resort in Napa.
It’s a great excuse to talk not just about Jim, but about what we’re building here at Bird Golf Academy. The feature is a good window into why our approach works, and why an instructor with Jim’s experience and teaching philosophy is such a natural fit for Bird Golf.
What Makes Us Different
Golf instruction has changed a lot in the last decade. Between swing-analysis apps, YouTube breakdowns, and an endless stream of influencer tips, it’s never been easier to find advice, and never been harder to know which advice actually applies to your game. We built Bird Golf Academy as something of a counterweight to that trend.
Rather than chase scale or standardize a single teaching method across the board, we’ve grown to more than 20 locations spread across 14 states while keeping our approach deliberately personal. We don’t hand every student a rigid itinerary or run them through a uniform syllabus. Instead, each instructor on our staff brings their own areas of expertise, and we match students with a teacher and a plan that fits what they actually need to work on.
That’s backed up by the numbers behind our staff. Collectively, our instructors carry more than 250 years of combined teaching experience. And rather than running large group clinics, we’ve built our multi-day schools (3, 4, and 5-day formats) around a small-group philosophy, with 1:1 or 2:1 student-to-teacher ratios as the standard, not the exception.
As Jim put it in the article, the credentials behind our staff matter just as much as the ratios: teachers with real pedigree, real history, and playing backgrounds at genuinely proficient levels. Combine that with the freedom for students to train at whichever of our locations fits their schedule or travel plans, and you get a model built around flexibility without sacrificing quality.
Why We Love Silverado Resort
Among our 25-plus locations, Silverado Resort in Napa has become one of our most popular destinations, and it’s easy to understand the appeal once you look at everything available on site.
Silverado offers two championship, tour-quality courses, giving our instructors room to tailor the golf side of instruction to a student’s level. Jim, who trains students on both, has a clear preference depending on who he’s working with. The South Course tends to be our go-to for beginners and higher-handicap players, since it’s simply more forgiving and user-friendly. Stronger players, on the other hand, typically get steered to the North Course, where the challenge better matches their game.
The practice facilities are just as much a part of the appeal. Our instruction at Silverado makes use of a sizeable range with both mat and grass hitting areas, giving students the option to work on turf conditions closer to what they’ll actually face on course. Next to that sits a dedicated chip, pitch, lob, and bunker area, kept in a super condition. For full-swing work, our instructors can also head to the back side of the two-way range, or use a separate practice green built specifically for chipping and putting. And near the pro shop, there’s a large practice green with essentially every kind of putt a student could want to work on, from short comebackers to long, breaking lag putts.
It’s a setup that lets an instructor like Jim build a real curriculum around a student’s actual weaknesses, rather than working around whatever facilities happen to be available.
A Day of Instruction, Bird Golf Style
The NCGA Golf Magazine feature offers a glimpse into how a typical day with Jim at Silverado takes shape. A day will often begin with three hours of focused morning instruction, followed by lunch and another three hours taking those lessons onto the golf course.
During that on-course time, Jim doesn’t necessarily play alongside his students. Given the choice, he prefers to caddie, keeping his attention on the student and coaching through real shots, course management, and decisions as they unfold.
But “typical” doesn’t mean fixed. If a student would benefit from more time on the range, additional short-game work, or a different balance between practice and on-course instruction, Jim can adjust the day accordingly.
That flexibility is an important part of the Bird Golf experience. Rather than asking the student to fit into a predetermined schedule, we give our instructors the freedom to spend time where it can make the greatest difference for each individual golfer.
A Closer Look at Jim’s Teaching Style
What stands out about Jim’s approach is how he turns technical parts of the game into simple ideas students can feel and remember.
That starts before the first ball is hit. Jim typically begins with a warm-up designed to assess and improve a student’s range of motion, helping prepare the body for the work ahead. From there, the instruction becomes specific to what he sees in the student’s game.
One tendency Jim frequently works on is excessive wrist action, or “flipping,” which can affect everything from putting and chipping to the full swing. One of the drills highlighted in the feature uses something as simple as a hairband connected between the lead wrist and the club. The goal is to give the student an immediate physical reference for a quieter wrist rather than relying on verbal instruction alone.
Jim applies that same philosophy to other parts of the game. Alignment sticks can help students develop better connection through chipping and pitching, while his memorable “bird pressure” cue makes proper grip pressure easy to understand: hold the club like you would hold a small bird, firmly enough that it can’t escape but gently enough not to hurt it.
There’s nothing complicated about the language, and that’s the point. Jim takes concepts that can easily become overly technical and gives students practical ways to understand what needs to change, feel the difference, and begin applying it to their own game.
It’s a teaching style that comes from decades of experience and one that Bird Golf students at Silverado have the opportunity to experience firsthand.
A Career Built on Real Credentials
Part of what makes Jim’s approach land the way it does is the résumé behind it. He’s been teaching golf since 1986 and has held PGA of America membership for 30 years. Earlier in his career, he served as Head Golf and Teaching Professional at La Purisima Golf Course from 1990 to 1996, and later ran the golf academies at Cypress Ridge and Monarch Dunes. He’s also been recognized twice as “Teacher of the Year” by the Northern Chapter of the SCPGA, in both 1996 and 2003.
It’s exactly the kind of pedigree we build our reputation around.
Come See What the Fuss Is About
If you’d like to experience Jim’s instruction firsthand, reserve your Bird Golf School at Silverado Resort in Napa and spend dedicated time working on the parts of your game that matter most to you.
