From A Technical Perspective, WHY Are You More Likely To Have A 2 Way Miss Playing A Draw?

[Denny100]

Hello Everyone

 

I hear conventional wisdom that suggests *most* good players DON'T like a draw, because it increases the chances of a two way miss. Big push, or over draw. Over draw is quite a "bad" miss, and hence one to avoid.

 

Conventional wisdom is also that shots that leak to the right are usually weaker, spinnier and safer misses. So thats good.

 

WHY are you more prone to hitting a 2 way miss with a draw type swing than a fade type swing.

 

Lets assume all things being equal, your "fade" 2 way miss would be a pull, or an over-cut, rather than a push and an over-draw.

 

So why is that less likely to happen as a fader?

 

The bigger point is that almost every text book is geared around developing a draw (i guess as most amateurs slice) but when youve actually *got* a draw, its something that gives you a whole host of problems with contact, starting direction, low point, etc etc that you do everything in your power to get rid of it.

 

Just thought id ask the question.

[phizzy30]

Lee Trevino said it best. You can talk to a fade but a hook won't listen.  The fade is considered a safter shot that at the very least stays in the air with more spin making it much more playable compared to the overdraw which curves hard left with lower spin that usually runs out a lot more hence making it a bigger miss and potentially bringing more danger into play.  The two way miss for the fade is a pull which still stays in the air but can carry a bit longer which in a lot of cases is still ok.  My stock shot is a draw although I'd much rather it be a fade especially on days when my swing is off. 

[MonteScheinblum]

4 hours ago, Denny100 said:

Hello Everyone

 

I hear conventional wisdom that suggests *most* good players DON'T like a draw, because it increases the chances of a two way miss. Big push, or over draw. Over draw is quite a "bad" miss, and hence one to avoid.

 

Conventional wisdom is also that shots that leak to the right are usually weaker, spinnier and safer misses. So thats good.

 

WHY are you more prone to hitting a 2 way miss with a draw type swing than a fade type swing.

 

Lets assume all things being equal, your "fade" 2 way miss would be a pull, or an over-cut, rather than a push and an over-draw.

 

So why is that less likely to happen as a fader?

 

The bigger point is that almost every text book is geared around developing a draw (i guess as most amateurs slice) but when youve actually *got* a draw, its something that gives you a whole host of problems with contact, starting direction, low point, etc etc that you do everything in your power to get rid of it.

 

Just thought id ask the question.

There’s no bias between a draw or a fade for distance, accuracy or two way miss.  It’s all myth.  
 

Some swings are tailored for draw and some for fade.  

[rooski]

1 hour ago, phizzy30 said:

The fade is considered a safter shot that at the very least stays in the air with more spin making it much more playable compared to the overdraw which curves hard left with lower spin that usually runs out a lot more hence making it a bigger miss and potentially bringing more danger into play.

 

I've fought this as a natural drawer of the ball and long hitter with the woods, but the solution that has worked for me is making my clubs and ball very high spin.

 

All I know is I see uncountably fewer balls in the left hazards now that my driver spins at 2800-3000, funny enough with no loss in distance. An overdraw is simply a slight overdraw, not a knuckle ball giga hook that's 40 feet off the ground.

 

It is fun to crush one at 1,800 spin but if you dare hit it off the toe a single time you might as well write down a 6

[iacas]

1 hour ago, phizzy30 said:

Lee Trevino said it best. You can talk to a fade but a hook won't listen.  The fade is considered a safter shot that at the very least stays in the air with more spin making it much more playable compared to the overdraw which curves hard left with lower spin that usually runs out a lot more hence making it a bigger miss and potentially bringing more danger into play.  The two way miss for the fade is a pull which still stays in the air but can carry a bit longer which in a lot of cases is still ok.  My stock shot is a draw although I'd much rather it be a fade especially on days when my swing is off. 

 

Eh.

 

You can hit a push-draw that goes higher and has more backspin than a pull-fade. "Most" people that hit a "draw" hit a pull-hook, so yes, those curve a lot and have less backspin and run out farther because they launch lower due to the closed face.

 

But if your start line is 3° right and you play a push-draw, the above doesn't end up holding a ton of water.

[GungHoGolf]

1 hour ago, MonteScheinblum said:

There’s no bias between a draw or a fade for distance, accuracy or two way miss.  It’s all myth.  
 

Some swings are tailored for draw and some for fade.  

Exactly. Plenty of double-crosses to be seen on tour now that go left of left, with all the faders there.

[MonteScheinblum]

31 minutes ago, GungHoGolf said:

Exactly. Plenty of double-crosses to be seen on tour now that go left of left, with all the faders there.

I say this over and over again.  
 

Golfers in general aren’t better nit because of the reasons often spouted

 

Fitness and flexibility 

Talent

Lack of practice time

Etc.

 

Those are the reasons golfers aren’t elite.

 

The number 1 reason is misconceptions about what they’re supposed to do.

 

Nearly every struggling golfer I see has done an EXCELLENT job of doing what they were told when they were learning the game.

 

Imagine if you learned to drive a car with the left hand at 2 and the right hand at 10 and drove that way for 5,10, 30 years.  Then someone says one day, it’s easier with left at 10 and right at 2 or even just use one hand.  
 

Your head would explode.

 

Edited March 27 by MonteScheinblum

[phizzy30]

Just now, rooski said:

 

I've fought this as a natural drawer of the ball and long hitter with the woods, but the solution that has worked for me is making my clubs and ball very high spin.

 

All I know is I see uncountably fewer balls in the left hazards now that my driver spins at 2800-3000, funny enough with no loss in distance. An overdraw is simply a slight overdraw, not a knuckle ball giga hook that's 40 feet off the ground.

 

It is fun to crush one at 1,800 spin but if you dare hit it off the toe a single time you might as well write down a 6

The misses are more playable with the fade which gives me a better chance at putting up a decent score at the end of the day.  You know as well as I do that the misses get real ugly with a draw on bad days.  Too many countless balls over the years going hard left into OB and hazards.  I think I have PTSD from that, lol. 

[golferdude54]

Relative to address, the clubface will always be open at the top of the backswing no matter what. It is physically impossible to never rotate the clubface open in the backswing from address; if you did, the clubface would be pointing not straight up at the sky but 90* to the left at the top.

 

Now, to hit a draw, the clubface has to be closed to the path at impact. That means the clubface has to rotate from open at the top of the backswing to square just before impact to closed at impact.

 

That brings 3 scenarios: 1st is face too open at impact so it's a double-cross slice, 2nd is face being square which is a straight block, and 3rd being closed which draws the ball.

 

But if you play a fade, that brings down the amount of scenarios from 3 to 2. Because the face is already open at the top of the backswing, you just need to keep it open at impact with less face rotation to fade it. 2nd scenario is square which is a block but it's still in the same direction as a fade. This stops a 2 way miss.

[golferdude54]

3 hours ago, GungHoGolf said:

Exactly. Plenty of double-crosses to be seen on tour now that go left of left, with all the faders there.

 

I'd argue that the type of fade on tour today is influenced from Tiger's years with Foley, trying to hit pull-fades all the time.

 

The double-crosses you speak of comes from them squaring the face to their path at impact from time to time, which ends up left because their path was leftward. Turns out a leftward path with a square face-to-path ratio makes the ball go left, not right, who knew?

[iacas]

17 minutes ago, golferdude54 said:

But if you play a fade, that brings down the amount of scenarios from 3 to 2.

 

It doesn't, though. You're closing the face per what you're saying the whole downswing: so you can under-close it, close it the right amount, or over-close it.

[gators78]

First it is personal to the player. Bruce Lietzke had a fantastic career playing fades, where Kenny Perry was amazing with big draws on almost all his shots. Those dudes made a ton of money and from most accounts didn’t have to spend a lot of time maintaining the golf swings. 

 

Second, for your question I found under pressure I want my big muscles to do the work, that meant more turning/getting left, and naturally promoted a fade. More left path, more slice spin (or spin in general), which meant a miss was shorter and left. I’ve played a draw at times, when it’s on it’s great, but under the gun it was harder to time an out path and face closing, for me. YMMV.

[Valtiel]

3 hours ago, phizzy30 said:

I think I have PTSD from that.

Honestly I think this is half of where the overall perception comes from, hah. The left/hook miss always feels more traumatizing. It's snappy and violent and often in a very sad direction while diving into the ground. It's like a wounded bird and you don't even have time to come to terms with your failure before it goes screaming into something it shouldn't. The big block or slice however is at least majestic in it's failure and it's airborne long enough to give us time to cope and rationalize why we even play this stupid game. 😂

[Vintage1976]

12 hours ago, Denny100 said:

 

WHY are you more prone to hitting a 2 way miss with a draw type swing than a fade type swing.

 

Maybe I shouldn't, but I will. Let's presume we're talking about a non-professional right-handed golfer here so my head doesn't explode, and consider the ideas below if you so choose.

 

A sufficiently long putt which favors the low side of the hole will not overcome the physics of gravity to climb back up a hill through any means of face-to-path angle compensation, but a putt which favors the high side of the hole has the possibility to fall into the cup at a varying range of speeds if matched with an appropriate line or face-to-path angle compensation. Regarding holing of a putt, we consider possibility a good thing 🙂.

 

I think my pretzel logic here is that if a golfer does not have the physical ability to close their club face compared to their club path via means of talent or technique (usually resulting in fade/slice/push/push-slice shots), it would then be much harder for them to them to overcome the physics of the moving object in their hands and over close the club face compared to club path without changing their path extraordinarily more in order to accomplish this result. The fade shot will nearly always stay "under the hole" as it were - a one-way-miss. But, this description is only an adjective and doesn't really matter since we aren't holing a swung golf club (usually). For the *fade* golfer this is only an attribute to rely upon.

 

Conversely, a golfer who demonstrates the physical ability to produce a club face closed to their club path via means of talent or technique (push-draw/draw/hook/pull/pull-hook), still has the possibility through momentary lack of execution, fatigue, or a host of other possible reasons to unintentionally not overcome the physics of the moving object in their hands and leave the face open at impact, possibly resulting in a right-to-left golfer experiencing a shot that goes only to the right instead of the usual to the left - the two-way-miss. For the *draw* golfer this introduces the possibility of a disastrous and directly opposite-of-intended result. Regarding execution of a reliable golf shot, we consider possibility a bad thing ☹️.

 

 

 

 

 

Edited March 28 by Vintage1976

[Nels55]

18 hours ago, phizzy30 said:

Too many countless balls over the years going hard left into OB and hazards.  I think I have PTSD from that, lol.

LOL I have seen way too many big high slices go right into the pond, creek or strawberry field.  A low hook is ugly but I would much rather see a sniper then that big GD slice.  Everybody is different.

[MonteScheinblum]

2 hours ago, Nels55 said:

LOL I have seen way too many big high slices go right into the pond, creek or strawberry field.  A low hook is ugly but I would much rather see a sniper then that big GD slice.  Everybody is different.

Same for me.  I embrace the toe hook.  The high right block off the heel makes me want to take up pickleball 

[me05501]

I don't think professional players are better because they're "taking one side out of play." It's just that committing to either shape will give them more confidence under pressure and make their practice more efficient. 

 

I think today's bigger, stronger players like the fade off the tee because they can turn as hard as they want through the ball. The harder they turn the better the shot turns out (most of the time anyway).

 

Today's balls and shafts and driver faces provide a level of consistency that players from prior generations could only dream of. That's gotta be a factor too. The chances of a fade turning into a slice are significantly reduced when you have a 50 gram shaft that has less lag and torque than an equivalent length of rebar. 

 

[Celeras]

Who am I to disagree with Monte, but I think it's a pretty objective statement to declare that a higher spin shot (all other things being equal) is more likely to stay in play than the lower spin shot. That doesn't mean you can't banana one OB, and it doesn't mean you can't prefer to see the hook. But it does mean the odds are more in your favor playing a fade. #TeamTrevino

 

That said, I play a draw because I can't fade to save my life.

[rooski]

23 hours ago, Valtiel said:

Honestly I think this is half of where the overall perception comes from, hah. The left/hook miss always feels more traumatizing. It's snappy and violent and often in a very sad direction while diving into the ground. It's like a wounded bird and you don't even have time to come to terms with your failure before it goes screaming into something it shouldn't. The big block or slice however is at least majestic in it's failure and it's airborne long enough to give us time to cope and rationalize why we even play this stupid game. 😂

 

This reminds me of when I played a couple employee rounds at Bandon with a buddy of mine who was somewhat new to golf and hit, frankly, the biggest slices I've ever seen in my time around the game.

 

If you've played #12 at Pacific -- we were into the wind, and he hit a ball that started over the bunkers to the left of #4 all the way out towards the ocean. By the time it handed landed, it had sliced all the way back to in line with the gorse on the right of #12. For those that cannot picture the shot, it was a towering slice that probably had a good 200-250 yards of left to right movement on it.

 

Point being, we had a good 10-15 seconds of actual air time after he hit the shot to discuss how ridiculous it was as it was actively flying in front of our faces. We still talk about that shot years later, whereas the likely 6 duck hooks I hit that round have never once come up in discussion.

Edited March 29 by rooski

[rooski]

1 hour ago, Celeras said:

Who am I to disagree with Monte, but I think it's a pretty objective statement to declare that a higher spin shot (all other things being equal) is more likely to stay in play than the lower spin shot. That doesn't mean you can't banana one OB, and it doesn't mean you can't prefer to see the hook. But it does mean the odds are more in your favor playing a fade. #TeamTrevino

 

That said, I play a draw because I can't fade to save my life.

 

Not to put words in anybody's mouth, but I don't believe anybody would argue the facts of that statement. The argument is that it is a misconception that a draw is a lower spin shot than a fade, where in reality that isn't necessarily so.

 

The errors of most handicap golfers likely make the predominant slice a higher spin shot than the predominant hook, but it's not necessarily related to the direction the shot is curving, that is just a coincidence. I can pepper a 4000 spin draw as easy as I can hit a 1500 spin turbo cut

Edited March 29 by rooski

[MonteScheinblum]

2 hours ago, Celeras said:

Who am I to disagree with Monte, but I think it's a pretty objective statement to declare that a higher spin shot (all other things being equal) is more likely to stay in play than the lower spin shot. That doesn't mean you can't banana one OB, and it doesn't mean you can't prefer to see the hook. But it does mean the odds are more in your favor playing a fade. #TeamTrevino

 

That said, I play a draw because I can't fade to save my life.

You’re not disagreeing with me.  Everything you said was correct.

 

Odds are in your favor hitting 12 against a 10 instead of staying by 2/3%.  
 

However, some people like to stay.

 

What I meant was there is no bias from the club or ball to one or the other when hit with the same impact parameters.

[Soloman1]

i’ll say the 2-way is more likely from + aoa going wiggly than from draw/straight/fade bias with driver.

[doctor220]

6 hours ago, Soloman1 said:

i’ll say the 2-way is more likely from + aoa going wiggly than from draw/straight/fade bias with driver.

And personally think as AoA gets more positive it’s harder to match up face and path as well as contact 

[GDTBATH]

On 3/27/2024 at 3:58 PM, MonteScheinblum said:

There’s no bias between a draw or a fade for distance, accuracy or two way miss.  It’s all myth.  
 

Some swings are tailored for draw and some for fade.  

Jon Sherman has an excellent chapter on this in his book, the Four Foundations of golf. He points out that Dustin Johnson, at his peak (say 2015-2020), missed fairways almost equally right and left (to within a percentage point, literally), as do most top pros.
 

His point was hit whatever shot shape your body wants you to hit and don’t worry about the rest. The book is an excellent read if you haven’t yet read it. Highly recommend. 

[D4uphin]

One for the more knowledgable people than me - are modern drivers (say 8 or 9 degree) not more lending to a fade off the tee? Less loft, downward angle of attack perhaps not advised unless player has speed, therefore ball is moved up in stance to promote launch, which then places impact further ahead on the D-plane, which naturally means the club is moving left?

 

[D4uphin]

for a r/h golfer, I should have said