Cameron Champ...1st Strokes Gained off the tee...178th Approach to Green

[PedronNiall]

20 minutes ago, betarhoalphadelta said:

 

My apologies; you are correct. I actually just looked at his stats on the PGAT site and it is, indeed, addition. So yes, if he were tour average everywhere else, it would get him to around the top 30 this year (last season he was only 0.490 SG-OTT, so we'll see if he can keep it up). 

 

The point still stands though... If he's #1 on tour in SG-OTT and #1 on tour in driving distance, and he's missed 6 of 9 cuts this year and the only cuts he's made are non-Signature events, doesn't that suggest that driving, by itself, is overrated? You can be truly elite driving the golf ball, and that gets you to 133rd in FedEx cup points and #296 OWGR...

 

The numbers say that all things are equal and the main thing it kills is the "drive for show" you know the rest that was pervasive until real data came into the picture. 

 

Be tour average at everything else but have one area you're elite in that allows you to hit 1 or more strokes gained in that category--sick gains for those in the know--and as Dutch pointed out you're in top 30ish territory. SG paints a much better picture of what having a single world-class trait can do, as well as what having lots of them while being poo at one, a la Scheffler, can do as well. 

 

Nothing about his stats show elite driving is overrated, only that as always in almost any sport it's hard to be a one-trick pony. Maybe the Ruling Bodies of golf have overhyped hitting it long and straight by itself, but I don't see that as the case with most. Maybe from some of the broadcasters who tout up the driving stats of someone who's winning without also mentioning where they fall in other areas, but no specific examples of that come to mind. When they start talking stats they tend to get into all of them at some point. 

[smashdn]

25 minutes ago, betarhoalphadelta said:

doesn't that suggest that driving, by itself, is overrated? You can be truly elite driving the golf ball, and that gets you to 133rd in FedEx cup points and #296 OWGR...

 

Not entirely.  It suggests that being way worse than average in other categories is not outweighed by your good driving.

 

How about this, bad driving is more harmful than good driving is helpful.

 

---

"Gehman’s method was what he called a “straightforward regression model,” in which two variables are compared to each other using 129 qualifying players. The steady variable is FedEx Cup points accrued by a player during the regular season, which was our metric for success (you could argue that total strokes-gained average is better, but I wanted to go by the PGA Tour’s own standard, albeit before the points blow up in the playoffs and skew the results). The second variable is the other 130 stats, with a ranking value assigned to each based on a player’s finish in the year-end standings. By finding out which ones have the closest correlation to each other, you can see which statistics might predict success."

 

"Of the comprehensive strokes-gained numbers, SG/approach the green is the most “important” to overall success."

" The top six are: SG/approach the green, SG/off-the-tee, scoring average, SG/total, SG/around the green, and SG/tee-to-green. Again, this all stands to reason and functions as good quality control."

 

https://www.golfdigest.com/story/golf-stats-that-matter-most-which-skills-correlate-to-success-on-the-pga-tour

 

The bold above are the SG stats.  The underlined are SG stats that include some component or measure of the approach and/or chipping and pitching (what would have been the old "Scrambling" stat but is not the best because it is muddied with putting ability). 

[betarhoalphadelta]

11 minutes ago, smashdn said:

 

Not entirely.  It suggests that being way worse than average in other categories is not outweighed by your good driving.

 

How about this, bad driving is more harmful than good driving is helpful.

 

---

"Gehman’s method was what he called a “straightforward regression model,” in which two variables are compared to each other using 129 qualifying players. The steady variable is FedEx Cup points accrued by a player during the regular season, which was our metric for success (you could argue that total strokes-gained average is better, but I wanted to go by the PGA Tour’s own standard, albeit before the points blow up in the playoffs and skew the results). The second variable is the other 130 stats, with a ranking value assigned to each based on a player’s finish in the year-end standings. By finding out which ones have the closest correlation to each other, you can see which statistics might predict success."

 

"Of the comprehensive strokes-gained numbers, SG/approach the green is the most “important” to overall success."

" The top six are: SG/approach the green, SG/off-the-tee, scoring average, SG/total, SG/around the green, and SG/tee-to-green. Again, this all stands to reason and functions as good quality control."

 

https://www.golfdigest.com/story/golf-stats-that-matter-most-which-skills-correlate-to-success-on-the-pga-tour

 

The bold above are the SG stats.  The underlined are SG stats that include some component or measure of the approach and/or chipping and pitching (what would have been the old "Scrambling" stat but is not the best because it is muddied with putting ability). 

 

But also note where "Driving Distance" shows up on the list... 29th.

 

Driving distance and SG-OTT are correlated, but you can have pretty good SG-OTT without being a long driver. Last year Cantlay was 4th while being 37th in distance, Brent Grant was 5th while being 25th in distance, and obviously Morikawa was an outlier at 21st while being 134th in distance--his accuracy made up for his lack of distance.

 

And last year Champ was the inverse--4th in driving distance while being only 19th in SG-OTT. 19th is good, right? But he missed 17 of 29 cuts and the cuts he made were mostly in events with worse fields. Because all the distance in the world can't save you when the more highly correlated stat, SG-Approach, you're ranked 122nd (last season). 

 

So it seems to me that the key to being a successful golfer is being an elite ballstriker--which we usually talk about irons but Morikawa (and Scheffler obv) do it with the entire bag including driver, so it's factored in SG-OTT. 

 

Distance is good, but IMHO overrated. SG-Approach is underrated. 

 

I mean, just look at the top 25 SG-Approach names from last season, and the SG-OTT names from last season, and tell me which list is full of more impressive names?

[Titleist99]

This just in:

 

Apparently, Rory intercepted my email to Cam Champ regarding him going to Butch Harman. Rory will now be using Butch to teach him the dead arm wedge shot and to properly flight wedges into the green.

 

Cam Champ should also take my free advice.🤣

[Dutch1008]

2 hours ago, betarhoalphadelta said:

The point still stands though... If he's #1 on tour in SG-OTT and #1 on tour in driving distance, and he's missed 6 of 9 cuts this year and the only cuts he's made are non-Signature events, doesn't that suggest that driving, by itself, is overrated? You can be truly elite driving the golf ball, and that gets you to 133rd in FedEx cup points and #296 OWGR...

 

No, I don't think it means that driving is overrated. As @smashdn referenced earlier, these are independent variables. If I drive the green on a par 4 and 3 jack for par, that doesn't mean that drive wasn't valuable, it's means I wasted my advantage. 

 

Cam Champ is blessed w/ unbelievable swing speed. He' skilled enough to somewhat control it. It is a weapon and an advantage over most the competitors he tees it up against. The fact that he has mostly squandered that advantage is not an indictment on driving distance, it's an indictment on the rest of Cam's skill set. 

[Titleist99]

10 minutes ago, Dutch1008 said:

 

No, I don't think it means that driving is overrated. As @smashdn referenced earlier, these are independent variables. If I drive the green on a par 4 and 3 jack for par, that doesn't mean that drive wasn't valuable, it's means I wasted my advantage. 

 

Cam Champ is blessed w/ unbelievable swing speed. He' skilled enough to somewhat control it. It is a weapon and an advantage over most the competitors he tees it up against. The fact that he has mostly squandered that advantage is not an indictment on driving distance, it's an indictment on the rest of Cam's skill set. 

"Cam Champ is blessed w/ unbelievable swing speed. He' skilled enough to somewhat control it."

 

It's just as plausible that the excess swing speed is throwing off his rhythm with the irons and that is causing his erratic play through the greens. Even the putter would be affected. I believe that to be his problem as well as Rory's.

[betarhoalphadelta]

18 minutes ago, Dutch1008 said:

 

No, I don't think it means that driving is overrated. As @smashdn referenced earlier, these are independent variables. If I drive the green on a par 4 and 3 jack for par, that doesn't mean that drive wasn't valuable, it's means I wasted my advantage. 

 

Cam Champ is blessed w/ unbelievable swing speed. He' skilled enough to somewhat control it. It is a weapon and an advantage over most the competitors he tees it up against. The fact that he has mostly squandered that advantage is not an indictment on driving distance, it's an indictment on the rest of Cam's skill set. 

 

From the article that @smashdn posted, you can go to the list of statistics that correlate most tightly to FEC points. It's here.

 

It's evaluating 130 different statistics and ranking them in order of strength of correlation. All SG categories except putting lead the pack, followed by scoring averages. Which makes sense, as strokes gained is an indication of all the things you need you to do to score well, and scoring well is correlated with winning. 

 

But it's interesting that SG-Approach leads the pack. SG-OTT is second, but with a sizable gap. Distance is 28th (BTW I said 29th upthread, i.e. I got it wrong). 

 

SG-Approach is effectively an accuracy statistic. SG-OTT is a blended stat that incorporates both distance and accuracy. Driving distance is a distance statistic that really doesn't incorporate accuracy. 

 

It's my contention that it is the ACCURACY component of SG-OTT that makes it so important. You can see based on my post above with the link to the SG-Approach and SG-OTT stats that the top 25 for SG-Approach has more star power. And there are various players (such as Champ) that benefit in SG-OTT because of their distance but their accuracy is too poor to be stars. 

 

So it's my contention that distance is overrated, and accuracy is underrated.

 

Because you can hit the ball a long way (like Champ) and end up high in SG-OTT, and not have it correlate to FEC points if you can't do anything with that distance and end up #296 OWGR. Whereas if you're shortish, but straight, you can be a Morikawa and make lots cuts, win tournaments and majors, and be top 20 OWGR. 

 

That doesn't mean distance isn't important. If you're Scheffler and you have both distance AND accuracy, well, then you're unstoppable. 

[jimecherry]

39 minutes ago, betarhoalphadelta said:

 

From the article that @smashdn posted, you can go to the list of statistics that correlate most tightly to FEC points. It's here.

 

It's evaluating 130 different statistics and ranking them in order of strength of correlation. All SG categories except putting lead the pack, followed by scoring averages.

can you add bogey avoidance to the sheet?

[betarhoalphadelta]

5 minutes ago, jimecherry said:

can you add bogey avoidance to the sheet?

It's not my sheet, so I don't have any control over it. 

[Dutch1008]

26 minutes ago, betarhoalphadelta said:

 

From the article that @smashdn posted, you can go to the list of statistics that correlate most tightly to FEC points. It's here.

 

It's evaluating 130 different statistics and ranking them in order of strength of correlation. All SG categories except putting lead the pack, followed by scoring averages. Which makes sense, as strokes gained is an indication of all the things you need you to do to score well, and scoring well is correlated with winning. 

 

But it's interesting that SG-Approach leads the pack. SG-OTT is second, but with a sizable gap. Distance is 28th (BTW I said 29th upthread, i.e. I got it wrong). 

 

SG-Approach is effectively an accuracy statistic. SG-OTT is a blended stat that incorporates both distance and accuracy. Driving distance is a distance statistic that really doesn't incorporate accuracy. 

 

It's my contention that it is the ACCURACY component of SG-OTT that makes it so important. You can see based on my post above with the link to the SG-Approach and SG-OTT stats that the top 25 for SG-Approach has more star power. And there are various players (such as Champ) that benefit in SG-OTT because of their distance but their accuracy is too poor to be stars. 

 

So it's my contention that distance is overrated, and accuracy is underrated.

 

Because you can hit the ball a long way (like Champ) and end up high in SG-OTT, and not have it correlate to FEC points if you can't do anything with that distance and end up #296 OWGR. Whereas if you're shortish, but straight, you can be a Morikawa and make lots cuts, win tournaments and majors, and be top 20 OWGR. 

 

That doesn't mean distance isn't important. If you're Scheffler and you have both distance AND accuracy, well, then you're unstoppable. 

 

I agreed w/ you yesterday that SG-APP is probably the stronger metric. More predictive power and probably more common among the best of the best. If you could choose only one superpower, that's probably your best bet. I think it's pretty intuitive. To be a great iron player, you have to be able to find the middle of the club face consistently. You have to be able to hit a variety of shot (low, high, draw, fade). I'd bet that it's pretty highly correlated w/ skill and hand eye coordination. Those skills certainly carry over to the driver. A guy like Morikawa may not be long, but he finds the center of the club face and hits more fairways than most. He gets more out of his driver than his raw swing speed may imply he should. 

 

That said, I also think power plays a role in SG-APP. If Morikawa is pulling 7i from 175 and Scottie is pulling 8i, Scottie has an advantage. If Morikawa is pulling 3W from 260 into the Par 5 and Rory is pulling 3i, Rory has an advantage. 

 

All of these things play a role. As the old saying goes, "golf is a game of misses". I think strokes gained does a really good job of capturing that idea numerically. Cam Champ's driver is a major advantage. That advantage has been wasted because he has too many "misses". These "misses" are very clearly shown in all of his negative strokes gained categories.

 

And who hasn't experienced that in real life? We've all split the fairway off the tee only to screw up an approach shot. Just last week I nearly drove a short 340 yd Par 4. It was by far my best tee shot of the day and I was about 50-75 yds ahead of all my playing partners. I left myself just about as straight forward a chip as I could have possibly asked for. The type of chip I've holed countless times and despite a balky short game, typically get up and down without much fuss. Of course I proceeded to hit the chip fat and left myself a 30 footer for birdie, which I didn't make. Advantage wasted. 

 

Me botching that chip does not change the fact that the drive gave me a huge advantage on that hole. That's basically Cam's career in a nutshell.   

[Dutch1008]

58 minutes ago, betarhoalphadelta said:

It's my contention that it is the ACCURACY component of SG-OTT that makes it so important.

 

I would guess that Tiger, Phil, Rory, Bryson, and others would disagree with you here. You can't survive going OB or losing balls into the water. But missing a couple more fairways doesn't hurt that much. As a counter point I present Mr. Brian Harman. Brian is an absolute stick. Super accurate, a wizard around the greens, and comfortably above average w/ his irons.  However, despite being comfortably above average in 4 of 5 categories, Brian has 3 wins. Wonderful career, he'll retire w/ vaults of money, but he'll never really be seen as one of the greats of his era. Had he followed the Matt Fitzpatrick path, would he have more wins? Spent more time as a top 10 player? Who knows. I just know that he's an exceptional golfer missing one vital skill. A skill that helps all those other skills play up. 

 

https://datagolf.com/player-profiles?dg_id=8825 

[Dutch1008]

1 hour ago, Titleist99 said:

"Cam Champ is blessed w/ unbelievable swing speed. He' skilled enough to somewhat control it."

 

It's just as plausible that the excess swing speed is throwing off his rhythm with the irons and that is causing his erratic play through the greens. Even the putter would be affected. I believe that to be his problem as well as Rory's.

 

I think chasing speed can be dangerous and disrupt timing but I don't think natural speed is a hinderance. The tours history is full of dudes that absolutely went at it. Jack, Johnny Miller, Tiger weren't exactly swinging it like Snead, Couples, or Els.  

[betarhoalphadelta]

@Dutch1008 I think we're pretty much in agreement. Distance is important, accuracy is important, and more distance is an advantage for players that have it over players who don't. 

 

As you point out, being closer to the hole is not only an advantage on the drive, but since distance often carries over to irons too, it means the longer player is taking less club than the shorter player would take, even if they had put their first shot into the same place. So 20 yards off the tee isn't a 2-club difference on approach, it gets magnified into a 3 or possibly 4 club difference on approach. 

 

I'm definitely not trying to diminish the importance of distance.

 

I think we're quibbling over the term "overrated", which is a highly subjective term and depends significantly on how "rated" we think something is to begin with. 

 

I doubt it's worth continuing based on something like that. I agree with you that Cam's distance (while still being semi-accurate off the tee) is an advantage, but that the rest of his game lets him down. 

[smashdn]

52 minutes ago, Dutch1008 said:

A skill that helps all those other skills play up. 

 

That is a super way to put it.  

 

---

 

An actual wrx article with some of the calculations in it.  I didn't verify the accuracy of the formulas that were posted.  I found that article when I was looking for the actual formula to calculate SG-OTT.

 

https://www.golfwrx.com/524752/do-you-actually-understand-strokes-gained-stats-heres-a-breakdown/

[smashdn]

46 minutes ago, Dutch1008 said:

 

I think chasing speed can be dangerous and disrupt timing but I don't think natural speed is a hinderance. The tours history is full of dudes that absolutely went at it. Jack, Johnny Miller, Tiger weren't exactly swinging it like Snead, Couples, or Els.  

 

And going at it, or distance, gives you the luxury of "dialing it back" when needed, to increase accuracy, while not "giving up" much to the rest of the field.  

 

Jack, because of his length, could afford to hit a more controllable fade, giving up some distance compared to what he would have had had he played a running draw like the bulk of his competition.  He didn't have to though.

 

Tiger could hit a controlled, 2i stinger off the tee and be not terribly far back from his contemporary's drivers.  All else being equal, el Tigre is going to best you with an iron in his hands.

[Ironman_32]

1 hour ago, Dutch1008 said:

 

I would guess that Tiger, Phil, Rory, Bryson, and others would disagree with you here. You can't survive going OB or losing balls into the water. But missing a couple more fairways doesn't hurt that much. As a counter point I present Mr. Brian Harman. Brian is an absolute stick. Super accurate, a wizard around the greens, and comfortably above average w/ his irons.  However, despite being comfortably above average in 4 of 5 categories, Brian has 3 wins. Wonderful career, he'll retire w/ vaults of money, but he'll never really be seen as one of the greats of his era. Had he followed the Matt Fitzpatrick path, would he have more wins? Spent more time as a top 10 player? Who knows. I just know that he's an exceptional golfer missing one vital skill. A skill that helps all those other skills play up. 

 

https://datagolf.com/player-profiles?dg_id=8825 

I think that's somewhat the point of the current PGA/golf, one skill is heavily weighted toward success in a way. 

[Dutch1008]

3 minutes ago, Ironman_32 said:

I think that's somewhat the point of the current PGA/golf, one skill is heavily weighted toward success in a way. 

 

Some courses certainly handle it better than others. I think Kisner said it best...

 

KK - "There are some courses I just can't compete"

Interviewer - "Why tee it up?"

KK - "The tour pays a lot of money for 20th place"

 

Rahm called PGA West, "A stupid f*^&%$!& putting contest". Drive it a mile, hit a wedge, make the putt. A place like Sawgrass does a better job of testing the whole skill set. Brian Harman and Si Woo Kim can compete w/ Scottie and Wyndham because it's not a course where you pull out the driver 14x / round.  

[smashdn]

Harbour Town has entered the chat.  (Or Harbor Towne, I can't keep up with where the superfluous vowel is located.)

 

 

(Should add, the playing field is balanced, regarding distance, when either hardly no one can hit the par fives in two or when everyone can.  It seems you get the shorter guys winning when it is actually playing harder and longer.  Brian Harman's Open, made level by a great round and then holding onto the lead during weather impacted rounds.  Zack Johnson's Masters.  On a short course, a long guy still has an advantage because, even though he may not be able to hit driver as often, he is able to hit shorter clubs which should theoretically offer him an accuracy advantage over someone who is still hitting driver or three wood.  D. Johnson won at Harbour Towne.)

Edited April 3 by smashdn

[Valtiel]

3 hours ago, Titleist99 said:

"Cam Champ is blessed w/ unbelievable swing speed. He' skilled enough to somewhat control it."

 

It's just as plausible that the excess swing speed is throwing off his rhythm with the irons and that is causing his erratic play through the greens. Even the putter would be affected. I believe that to be his problem as well as Rory's.

 

1 hour ago, Dutch1008 said:

 

I think chasing speed can be dangerous and disrupt timing but I don't think natural speed is a hinderance. The tours history is full of dudes that absolutely went at it. Jack, Johnny Miller, Tiger weren't exactly swinging it like Snead, Couples, or Els.  

Theory:



Champ up top, then Morikawa and Woods for comparison as two of the most accurate iron players ever. Left to right; driver, iron, wedge.

Champ's speed comes from an incredible amount of lag and fast hands, and that lag varies up and down the bag far more than most. At the highest levels when you have an additional variable that very few others have, that is going to make a difference. Significantly different shaft angles at P6, or if you want to look at it another way, significantly different *hand* positions when the shaft reaches parallel to the ground....that's not something really any top players have to manage.

And if you look at the other undisputed king of lag:



Sergio doesn't have this variable.

[PedronNiall]

@Valtiel from what I can see browsing a few shots it appears that's playing out at impact. Champ's hands were the only ones I saw in searching through a handful of long or better hitters to have multiple shots where his hands are comparably ahead of the face and ball at impact, along with another quirk. 

 

Champ: 

 

Everyone else more or less: 

 

Berkshire's isn't a perfect impact clip, but he pretty much mirrors that a few ticks before. Giving weight to the slightly different teeing position for long drive it still seems informative. Even Garcia at the most extreme I could find doesn't have his hands leading that much at impact. 

 

 

It's not huge, but that leading along with the quirk of noticeable bowing of Champ's wrist is a variable others aren't dealing with. Gives enough margin for bad days with the driver when he's off and difficulty being accurate with short irons & wedges trying to move dirt as he comes into the ball. 

 

Thoughts? Maybe I'm seeing too much in the limited stills I can find of him. 

[Valtiel]

32 minutes ago, PedronNiall said:

@Valtiel from what I can see browsing a few shots it appears that's playing out at impact. Champ's hands were the only ones I saw in searching through a handful of long or better hitters to have multiple shots where his hands are comparably ahead of the face and ball at impact, along with another quirk. 

 

Champ: 

 

Everyone else more or less: 

 

Berkshire's isn't a perfect impact clip, but he pretty much mirrors that a few ticks before. Giving weight to the slightly different teeing position for long drive it still seems informative. Even Garcia at the most extreme I could find doesn't have his hands leading that much at impact. 

 

 

It's not huge, but that leading along with the quirk of noticeable bowing of Champ's wrist is a variable others aren't dealing with. Gives enough margin for bad days with the driver when he's off and difficulty being accurate with short irons & wedges trying to move dirt as he comes into the ball. 

 

Thoughts? Maybe I'm seeing too much in the limited stills I can find of him. 

Yeah that would seem to be an extension of the extreme lag, good spot. The difficult line to walk between releasing all that lag and thus creating a lot of clubface rotation and bringing in the left miss vs. getting too blocky/slice-y if you don't release quickly enough. He has one of the latest releases out there and it would seem like he stabilizes that speed with the bowed left wrist in a bit of a handle drag-y kind of move. The funny thing is, everytime I hear "handle drag" I think "probably a poor bunker player", so I was crossing my fingers that the stats supported that connection in this case. Thankfully (for me not him) he is statistically one of the worst bunker players on tour. His best year (2020) had him sub 30% in sand saves, DFL (196th). Sub 30% is rare, and it wasn't a fluke as he was DFL in 2018 as well. This tracks for other "handle draggers" as well. DJ was terrible out of the sand until he put in all the short game work to get to #1. 

All that is to say, Champ's swing seems to be built around stabilizing an extremely late release with mechanics that result in kinda crappy touch (by tour standards).  

Edited April 4 by Valtiel

[tomjas]

Apropos of pretty much nothing, I watched an interview a couple of days ago with Hovland (I think but might be wrong) who said that Champ is easily the longest hitter on the PGAT and often dials it back in tournaments 

 

FWIW, same guy rated Reed’s short game as the world’s best 

[Dutch1008]

8 hours ago, tomjas said:

Apropos of pretty much nothing, I watched an interview a couple of days ago with Hovland (I think but might be wrong) who said that Champ is easily the longest hitter on the PGAT and often dials it back in tournaments 

 

FWIW, same guy rated Reed’s short game as the world’s best 

 

That's probably true. Rory doesn't lead the tour in driving distance because he has the fastest swing speed. He leads the tour because he's optimized his launch conditions. Cam's picture above highlights this pretty well. It's hard to tee it high and let it fly when you have that much forward shaft lean. 

 

I also begrudgingly agree about Reed. Can't stand the dude but his hands are freaking magic. 

[woahnelly]

9 hours ago, tomjas said:

Apropos of pretty much nothing, I watched an interview a couple of days ago with Hovland (I think but might be wrong) who said that Champ is easily the longest hitter on the PGAT and often dials it back in tournaments 

 

FWIW, same guy rated Reed’s short game as the world’s best 

 

They referenced on last week's broadcast, might have been ESPN+, that Rory agrees Champ is the longest hitter. 

 

Not doing him any good now at Valero, he's DFL last I checked! 

[SoCalTitleist]

chicks love the long ball

[jimecherry]

1 hour ago, woahnelly said:

 

They referenced on last week's broadcast, might have been ESPN+, that Rory agrees Champ is the longest hitter. 

 

Not doing him any good now at Valero, he's DFL last I checked! 

dont worry i'm sure he wont be alone back there as the course is winning.

[Titleist99]

21 hours ago, Dutch1008 said:

 

Some courses certainly handle it better than others. I think Kisner said it best...

 

KK - "There are some courses I just can't compete"

Interviewer - "Why tee it up?"

KK - "The tour pays a lot of money for 20th place"

 

Rahm called PGA West, "A stupid f*^&%$!& putting contest". Drive it a mile, hit a wedge, make the putt. A place like Sawgrass does a better job of testing the whole skill set. Brian Harman and Si Woo Kim can compete w/ Scottie and Wyndham because it's not a course where you pull out the driver 14x / round.  

Golf comes in all field sizes, that's the beauty of the game. Choose the tournaments that fit your game. That's why the PGAT has 45+ tournaments a year. Rahm should know that.🙂

[Dutch1008]

1 minute ago, Titleist99 said:

Choose the tournaments that fit your game.

 

I actually find that exceptionally lame. I want to see the best of the best compete across the spectrum. 

 

Could you imagine the Los Angeles Lakers refusing to play the Denver Nuggets because they don't like playing at altitude? The Miami Dolphins refusing to play the Buffalo Bills in December because they're not built for the cold? The Boston Red Sox refusing to play the Texas Rangers because they don't want to deal w/ Texas heat in August? Weak.  

 

I want to see Rory play in Mexico City to see if he can control his high ball flight at 7000 feet. I want to see Bryson navigate a tight course that takes driver out of the bag. I want to see Viktor Hovland on a course that really stresses the short game.  

[jimecherry]

2 minutes ago, Dutch1008 said:

 

I actually find that exceptionally lame. I want to see the best of the best compete across the spectrum. 

 

Could you imagine the Los Angeles Lakers refusing to play the Denver Nuggets because they don't like playing at altitude? The Miami Dolphins refusing to play the Buffalo Bills in December because they're not built for the cold? The Boston Red Sox refusing to play the Texas Rangers because they don't want to deal w/ Texas heat in August? Weak.  

 

 

this kind of describes college football before the ranking system started to favor teams that played strong out of conference schedules ;}

[Dutch1008]

3 minutes ago, jimecherry said:

this kind of describes college football before the ranking system started to favor teams that played strong out of conference schedules ;}

 

Agreed. Nothing lamer than Alabama starting the season against Louisiana Monroe.