Improving score - Forgiving Irons or Forgiving Driver?

[Kirasdad]

I’m in my 60’s, single digit, still have decent length off the tee so I’m playing courses at mostly between 6400 and 6500 yards. I find in many rounds I barely have to clean my 5,6, 7 and 8 irons. It’s either a 5 wood or hybrid or 9 - LW. I don’t carry a 3 wood anymore so the driver is really key to my scoring. My driver and 53 degree wedge (and putter obviously) are the linchpins to scoring for me. Five iron through PW I probably could use grandads Spaldings (which I still have ) and score pretty much the same. 
 

Having said that, unless your using Bryson’s 5 degree driver or a shaft that is totally unsuited to you, all recent model drivers are forgiving. Some might be a little longer, but the right shaft and the right length, 44” in my case, and just about anything in the 9.5 to 11 degree range is very playable.

 

So there is forgiveness and there is scoring. In terms of forgiveness there is probably a wider range of forgiveness in irons between a mb blade and a SGI iron over any modern 460 driver you might choose, but the forgiving iron probably won’t help your scoring nearly as much as the driver.

[NRJyzr]

The way it's worked in my golf game, the answer is actually neither.  I've always scored better using irons that are decidedly not high on the forgiveness scale.  And, my best tee game efforts have been with relatively unforgiving drivers; using an Original One at moment, and tend to get better results even with persimmons than 460cc clubs.

 

I've kept trying otherwise, but it doesn't do the job.  So I drive the road before me...   <shrug>

 

[RacineBoxer]

On 6/1/2021 at 7:28 AM, nitram said:

Amazed we haven't heard much from the Broadie crowd...

 

I'm not an official member of the "Broadie crowd" but you're right, his analytics would be insightful here.

 

Whether you are a scratch golfer or a 10 handicap, on average, you're losing more shots to approaches than driving:

strokes-gained-shot-scope-1.webp (1024×768) (netdna-ssl.com)

 

 

Broadie wrote an article back in October on where "awful" shots are hurting average golfers the most. An "awful" shot and having "forgiving" clubs isn't exactly the same thing, but they are loosely related. And again the conclusion was that average players are losing more strokes to their approach shots than their driving (1.93 vs 1.2 per round, comparing a 90 shooter vs an 80 shooter).  The smart-player's guide to dropping 10 shots — guaranteed (golf.com)

 

[DavePelz4]

The most important is a forgiving wife who lets you practice and play as much as you want.

[SwooshLT]

On 6/2/2021 at 5:38 PM, RacineBoxer said:

 

I'm not an official member of the "Broadie crowd" but you're right, his analytics would be insightful here.

 

Whether you are a scratch golfer or a 10 handicap, on average, you're losing more shots to approaches than driving:

strokes-gained-shot-scope-1.webp (1024×768) (netdna-ssl.com)

 

 

Broadie wrote an article back in October on where "awful" shots are hurting average golfers the most. An "awful" shot and having "forgiving" clubs isn't exactly the same thing, but they are loosely related. And again the conclusion was that average players are losing more strokes to their approach shots than their driving (1.93 vs 1.2 per round, comparing a 90 shooter vs an 80 shooter).  The smart-player's guide to dropping 10 shots — guaranteed (golf.com)

 

 

Say again for the players in the back ! Stop pretending as though you're hitting 12+ greens.....just stop.....you can hit greens from the rough or fairway bunkers but just keep missing greens and see how your scores don't improve....

[me05501]

Driver. Though I’d replace “driver” with “tee club.”
 

You need something you have confidence in that will get your ball in play a good distance down the fairway. If you don’t have that you don’t stand a chance at scoring. 
 

Broadie et al base their conclusions on the data they can collect and analyze, which is heavily weighted toward better players: pros, college golfers and ams who care enough about their game to record every shot using Arccos or Garmin. 
 

I don’t think the data includes those duffers who lose 7-8 tee balls a round into OB, hazards, or whatever, but there are way more of those golfers than there are pros and good ams.
 

Encouraging them to whale away with driver off every tee is not going to bring down their scores. It’s certainly not going to help their confidence or enjoyment. 

Get a mini driver or strong three and put a smooth pass on it, get 200-225 down the fairway and then start playing golf. 
 

From that point on the irons simply need to be confidence inspiring. Whatever a player can look down at and feel good about should be fine. 

[puttingmatt]

Improving score can be mostly attributed

to the player improving skills both physically and mentally. Being comfortably confident  with your equipment will enhance your  chances , but  will not cover up a  poor swing motion leading to  impact.  So many equipment choices,  woods and irons both play equally big parts in the total score.

 

[tbonetw]

Given the 2 options presented I'd say a more forgiving driver. I've found that I can hit good and bad iron shots with blades, CB, and game improvement clubs at times. However, for me driving and putting are what really affect my score the most.

 

 

[SwooshLT]

3 hours ago, me05501 said:

Driver. Though I’d replace “driver” with “tee club.”
 

You need something you have confidence in that will get your ball in play a good distance down the fairway. If you don’t have that you don’t stand a chance at scoring. 
 

Broadie et al base their conclusions on the data they can collect and analyze, which is heavily weighted toward better players: pros, college golfers and ams who care enough about their game to record every shot using Arccos or Garmin. 
 

I don’t think the data includes those duffers who lose 7-8 tee balls a round into OB, hazards, or whatever, but there are way more of those golfers than there are pros and good ams.
 

Encouraging them to whale away with driver off every tee is not going to bring down their scores. It’s certainly not going to help their confidence or enjoyment. 

Get a mini driver or strong three and put a smooth pass on it, get 200-225 down the fairway and then start playing golf. 
 

From that point on the irons simply need to be confidence inspiring. Whatever a player can look down at and feel good about should be fine. 

 

 

Going with synopsis.......put in play and start playing.......how many greens are you personally hitting? I'm just posing the question.....

[me05501]

23 minutes ago, SwooshLT said:

 

 

Going with synopsis.......put in play and start playing.......how many greens are you personally hitting? I'm just posing the question.....

Many more from the fairway than from the pond. 

[SwooshLT]

31 minutes ago, me05501 said:

Many more from the fairway than from the pond. 

 

Not talking water or ob ......just rough .....not sure why......but how many greens do you average per round? Correlating obviously with DECENT driving......

[me05501]

18 minutes ago, SwooshLT said:

 

Not talking water or ob ......just rough .....not sure why......but how many greens do you average per round? Correlating obviously with DECENT driving......

If you were a true believer in stats-based golf you probably wouldn’t have so much interest in one data point from one player’s game. 🙂 I’m not a data-based guy and I don’t keep my stats. Just scores. 

 

I’ve definitely been through this evolution though. Up til about three seasons ago I never knew where the ball was going off the tee. So I dug back into IRL lessons and left my driver in my bag for an entire year. I played a TM Mini Driver exclusively, focusing on putting the ball in play and learning to score from the fairway. And my scores came down. 
 

Sure, I still missed some fairways, and for sure I missed some greens. But as any stat hound knows, there‘s missing greens and then there‘s MISSING GREENS. I found that I could control my iron shots much better from the fairway and both my pure shots and my misses improved. Instead of being 15 yards wide I was often in the fringe or just off. 

 

Now I have more confidence in my driver and will often use it to get me closer to the green. I also like my strong three wood and will use it just as often. The goal is always to hit the fairway. I’m not trying to cut over doglegs or any other aggressive plays off the tee. That’s never going to be my game. 

 

Still I’ve gone from being happy to break 90 to breaking 80 a few times, and putting up an 89 like I did today is now a disappointment instead of a minor victory. I’m easily 7-8 strokes better than I was two years ago and most of that has come from approaching the tee game differently. I still play reasonably player-oriented irons because I get a ton of enjoyment from using them and I don’t think I could shave many strokes by going to GI irons. 
 

 

[hammergolf]

On 5/28/2021 at 12:52 PM, mvhoffman said:

What is more important... forgiving irons or forgiving driver?

 

This thread is not for seeking advice just a generalized opinion.  

 

There are a ton of threads out there talking about looking for a bit of forgiveness in irons and even wedges for that matter, with the tour version driver in their bag with a 6X shaft.  I pose the question as someone who just recently went back to blades, is it more important to have more forgiving irons/wedges or more forgiving Driver/Woods?  What would lower scores in your opinion?  I personally think that there are not enough people playing the more forgiving/playable drivers/woods and that is driving up scores.  I think that there is more of a consequence with hitting less forgiving "woods" than irons simply because of length of club/swing/speed/dispersion.

 

Could Callaway and Cobra have already thought about this when bringing back the offset Drivers/Woods that more and more people shy away from because they are not marketed properly?

Driver. If you can’t drive it in play, doesn’t matter about the irons. Plus a mishit iron will always be less off line than a mishit driver. 

[SwooshLT]

19 minutes ago, me05501 said:

If you were a true believer in stats-based golf you probably wouldn’t have so much interest in one data point from one player’s game. 🙂 I’m not a data-based guy and I don’t keep my stats. Just scores. 

 

I’ve definitely been through this evolution though. Up til about three seasons ago I never knew where the ball was going off the tee. So I dug back into IRL lessons and left my driver in my bag for an entire year. I played a TM Mini Driver exclusively, focusing on putting the ball in play and learning to score from the fairway. And my scores came down. 
 

Sure, I still missed some fairways, and for sure I missed some greens. But as any stat hound knows, there‘s missing greens and then there‘s MISSING GREENS. I found that I could control my iron shots much better from the fairway and both my pure shots and my misses improved. Instead of being 15 yards wide I was often in the fringe or just off. 

 

Now I have more confidence in my driver and will often use it to get me closer to the green. I also like my strong three wood and will use it just as often. The goal is always to hit the fairway. I’m not trying to cut over doglegs or any other aggressive plays off the tee. That’s never going to be my game. 

 

Still I’ve gone from being happy to break 90 to breaking 80 a few times, and putting up an 89 like I did today is now a disappointment instead of a minor victory. I’m easily 7-8 strokes better than I was two years ago and most of that has come from approaching the tee game differently. I still play reasonably player-oriented irons because I get a ton of enjoyment from using them and I don’t think I could shave many strokes by going to GI irons. 
 

 

 

I posed this question earlier......would you rather hit all 14 fwys yet only hit 4 greens or hit 4 fwys but hit 14 greens? Obviously we're looking at it from different levels but one of the easiest ways to decrease score is to hit more greens! You could drive it in play all day but still not convert the opportunities......yes it most certainly easier to play from fairways but it isn't imperative to hit fairways.  From a SCORING perspective,  hitting greens is a MUST! 

 

If your level is bogey golf then yes the confidence built by hitting tee shots better is also a high priority but at that level every facet should be addressed.  

 

We've spoken on the Epic 2021 driver thread about confidence of a good driver. I'm far from the greatest but I can keep my ball in play and also play the appropriate tees......my scores recently have been a result of hitting 70% of my greens (not a hard stat to ascertain)  obviously the final piece of the puzzle is hitting it to decent proximity to convert said good iron play . I had rounds in the past in which I'd hit all of the fairways yet couldn't find the putting surface with more demanding irons......strike just wasn’t there.....switching into the Ping i210 irons has been salvation for my game.....wider sole, deeper cavity all leading to being far more forgiving without looking like a shovel. 

 

Great thoughts by all and understanding the needs of golfers on different levels might clear up the topic. 

[ChaosTheory]

For mid and high cappers, the driver is the card wrecker.

[RacineBoxer]

14 hours ago, Snowman9000 said:

For mid and high cappers, the driver is the card wrecker.

 

Yet the data clearly shows that "awful" approach shots are losing mid handicappers more strokes per round than "awful" drives.

 

I think what makes this conversation difficult for people is that most of us pull our driver 11-14 times per round but we don't hit any single iron close to that. I play 7 irons (5i-GW) and when you throw in 2nd shots on par 5's (often with fairway woods or a hybrid), I'm definitely hitting more approach shots that drivers in a round, hence more opportunity to lose strokes.

 

Everyone remembers the couple wild tee shots that leave the plant and cost us a ball. But the chunked 7 iron that comes up 30 yards short and in a hazard doesn't seem to occupy as much real estate in-between our ears. The same with the 190 yard par 3 where we sprayed one into the fescue. Or the 130 yard shot we hit over the back which we all know going long on that hole is "death". Or the second shot on a par 5 that we sprayed into the right trees with our 3 wood. 

 

We have perceptions and biases. And we have data and facts. I see no reason to doubt Broadie who actually has data. 

 

[jvincent]

12 minutes ago, RacineBoxer said:

We have perceptions and biases. And we have data and facts. I see no reason to doubt Broadie who actually has data. 

 

 

It's been a while since I read the book, but I don't remember Broadie saying that mid/high handicappers were losing more strokes on approach vs off the tee.

 

I know that for me personally it was definitely more off the tee when I was in the mid-teens index wise. As soon as I removed the multiple penalty strokes and topped tee shots from my game I was solidly into the single digits.

 

I lost my driver swing a couple of years ago and ballooned to an 11 briefly before sorting it out and getting back into the mid single digit range.

[teedub21]

There is something to this, but for me, a 16 cap, both are critical. I also thought driver was the most important but my round yesterday I was driving well, 12 out of 14 fairways. I put my Miura irons in my bag for the day which are much more demanding than my Callaway Epic forged irons. I missed a few approach shots short of the green in bunkers or my usual miss right of the green. Short game was decent but missed a number of putts as well that I should’ve made. The way I was driving the ball I would’ve normally shot around 90. Shot a 98 instead.   FWIW my club’s course slope rating is 136. 

[me05501]

56 minutes ago, RacineBoxer said:

 

Yet the data clearly shows that "awful" approach shots are losing mid handicappers more strokes per round than "awful" drives.

 

<SNIP>

 

We have perceptions and biases. And we have data and facts. I see no reason to doubt Broadie who actually has data. 

 

 

I think it's critical to understand that Broadie can only analyze data that's available to him. I don't know the percentages, but I play with a wide range from serious players all the way up to rank duffers and I've only met one or two people who collect their stats on a Garmin or in an app. The rest are flying under the radar of analytics. 

 

Another hole in the data-based argument is that analyzing approach shots in a vacuum is essentially ignoring the tee game, or at least setting it to the side.

 

No one hits an approach shot from OB or a pond, but a lot of people put their tee shots there and then take a drop before their "approach shot." If you analyze the accuracy of that next shot without considering that the player lies 3 instead of one, you're missing a TON. 

 

Not for nothing, but if you play with players at every level you soon learn that it's a small minority who are really concerned with steady improvement, optimizing their gear, etc.

 

A *huge* number of players believe that equipment doesn't matter (and maybe they're right).

 

A huge number believe that you shouldn't overthink golf (and maybe they're right). 

 

 

[fj_magni]

Just like everything else it depends. 

I still stick by that if a high capper (20 plus) it starts with with driver. And if I were to rank specific parts of the game I would put approach below short game and even putting. That is for high capper, somewhat new to the game.

The reason is starts with driving/tee game is obviously where the approach shots are then taken.  Someone that is new, inexperience or lacks a wide range of skills will take time to improve with approach and ball striking. Hitting out of the rough, from different lies and heights below or above the feet are all skills that take years to master, and a lot of rounds of golf, unless you recreate these conditions in practice.

I would like to echo that the distinction should be (tee shots). Some high cappers have the ability to hit three irons 220 yards, or three woods or hybrids. I would just advise the person to get comfortable with that arrangement first, because honestly that is when the other stuff starts to fall in place.

I just know that when I got my tee game in line, the game became so much different. Playing from different parts of the course. Closer proximity turned into more pars and birdies. More intermitted good play brought more confidence and so on and so on. When I could get closer to the hole from the tee, the game became more enjoyable and inspired me to work on ball striking, wedge play and putting more.

To the point of some that approach is vitally important to improvement and I couldn't agree more. I think that point is most app with  mid cappers. In fact I think I am at that point now as a 14 HC. If I am going to improve much past the point I am right now I need to hit more greens, plain and simple. 

As far as "forgiving" irons are concerned. I think that point is belabored a lot on these boards. There is no true answer on what kind of irons make you a better ball striker. There are guys the do it with the Pings G20s and there are guys that do it with Mizuno MP-33s. You just want irons that go the distance that you think they are going to go.

[fj_magni]

BTWs, the term "forgiving" anything as it relates to anything in golf is a oxymoron. 

Golf is a cruel, frustrating activity and fooling people into thinking a specific club make the game easier works at an OEM and wants to sell you another set of irons.

Sorry, I'm grumpy because I posted a 9 on a par three yesterday. 

[jvincent]

49 minutes ago, fj_magni said:

Sorry, I'm grumpy because I posted a 9 on a par three yesterday. 

 

I had 9 pars and ended up 15 over the other day if you want to talk grumpy.

 

On topic for this discussion, I hit exactly one bad tee shot that resulted in double. The other 5 on the day were from poor iron play / short game.

 

The fact that I was a spaz for 6 holes with my irons is a statistical outlier. I hit 7 GIR which is about typical for me the way I drove the ball but had cement hands for half the day and not only couldn't get up and down but turned easy pars into doubles was another story.

 

All to say that one round does not a trend make.

[Shanker84]

16 handicap duffer chiming in here.

 

I've noticed my score improving after switching to far less forgiving irons (Cobra OL to Hogan combo set). I'm technically not good enough for the bladed 8-pw but I find that my misses are not nearly as bad as I had expected and I'm hitting much better shots and way more GIR with these "harder to hit" clubs than I ever did with my SGI and I think it boils down to two things. 

 

1. The forged Hogans feel so good that I want to practice more. The Cobras didn't feel bad per se but they weren't rewarding like these are. I can go hit a bucket and even if I only pure one of them, it's worth it. 

2. Much more responsive. I have a bad tendency to miss off the toe and while I'm not penalized all that much, I can tell right away and I know what to do with the Hogans vs. the Cobras that weren't nearly as clear. 

 

Had I stuck with the Cobras I'm sure I would just keep playing more and more with giving little thought to swing faults and "getting by" vs. with the Hogans where I know I need to be more disciplined and put the work in and it's been much more rewarding and overall beneficial. 

 

[HackDaddy360]

On 5/28/2021 at 11:43 AM, mogc60 said:

Driver, wedge, putter!  The rest is just fluff really. Those three clubs are by far the most important to playing good golf. Get those right and your game will never be that far off. For the record I first heard that from a 7 time tour winner. Driver over irons any day. It sets up everything. 

Agree - but I’d put putter first for a low handicapper or scratch/+.    
 

No matter how far you bomb it, how sick your wedge game is or how Hogan-esque your overall ball striking… if you can’t get the ball in the jug on the greens consistently inside 10 feet you just won’t score as well. 
 

For a 10-15 handicap, keeping the ball in play can be a challenge and if you’re taking handfuls off penalty strokes per round then a Driver that fits your eye and swing is a good investment.  
 

Then, hop on the putter carousel until you find “the one”. 
 

Then dial your wedges. 

 

None of this replaces the harsh reality of golf, however - if you want to get better, you need to practice.   Spend the time. No club will overcome a lack of consistent practice.