Johnny Miller on FLOG

[jeffwarne]

Plenty of players from a generation ago swung hard so I don't buy that arguement.
The difference now is the players on the whole are better atheletes and in peak phsical condition (on average)

Additionally the golf ball and drivers respond disproportionately better to a swing speed above 115
i.e. raising your clubhead speed from 105 to 110 doesn't produce the dramatic differences that going from 115 to 120 does (for reasons I don't understand-presumably the rebound effect and maximizaton of the low spin/high launch)

I've always agreed that FLOG was the way to go for tour players under most circumstances because your year was always made in a few hot weeks for most tour players in both eras.
Besides,weekends off in many cases isn't a terrible thing,and making 30 cuts in a row has to be more tiring than missing occasionally(or even frequently
Jack's goal used to four 68's-which produced a win with his conservative play-that only works in majors now

I keep hearing that the equipment is so good that you can swing as hard as you want and it still goes straight.Tell that to Tiger
who always seems to be in the schmoo-
It seems to me that the players just worry less about being in the fairway(my guess is the stats bear this out)-choosing to compete on a subpar ballstriking week with the strengths of their short game and creativity.
So it isn't the self correcting equipment that bails them out,but the choice of a more aggressive style of play and short game which produces more big checks.

Perhaps improved greens are the genesis of this.
Tough to make repeated scrambling 5-12 foot putts for par on grainy inconsistent greens,but Tiger can do it all day on perfect greens.Thus in addition to his 5-6 birdies he'saking the same score on a hole as the guy who hits it down the middle and 20 feet.

Anecdotally,I can't hit the new equipment any straighter than the old equipment,but definitely farther,but suffer from the same maladies as others unable to generate the magic 115mph.

[Brent Hutto]

Jeff,

I haven't seen the numbers worked out so I don't know how the 115mph range you discussed happened to work out that way but there is in fact a threshold between two different modes of getting distance out of your drives. Here's what I've gathered from reading everything I can find on the subject over he past couple years.

In hitting a golf ball with a driver there's a certain range of clubhead speeds where you need the ball to spin a good bit in order to get enough aerodynamic lift from backspin to carry the optimum distance. I don't know if that regime extends all the way to 115mph but it's somewhere well beyond 100mph for sure. Then at some minimum clubhead speed there's another mode you can access. In this high-speed range you actually want the ball to spin less, in part to avoid upshooting and in part because a ball with less backspin actually leaves the clubface at a higher initial launch angle.

What happened several years ago was the confluence of three factors: 1) large driver heads with a certain special characteristic rebound time in the center of the face 2) the adoption on Tour of three-piece solid core golf balls which spin much less at high clubhead speeds than the old wound ones and 3) the proliferation of portable measuring equipment that could be widely used in the field to gather data on real world launch conditions. I suppose you could say a fourth factor is the new stronger players with swing techniques that can produce much higher clubhead speeds with acceptable accuracy.

Anyway, the old players with old technology had a situation where the payoff for exceeding 115-120mph or so with a driver was attenuated by the fact that the balls they used (aided by the small-headed drivers) would spin so hard that upshooting and exaggerated sidespin was hard to avoid. The equipment used today, as you note, lets the payoff for higher clubhead speed keep on piling up like compound interest so that 125mph isn't just better than 115mph it is much better and 135mph is much better still.

To briefly address your other points, I think you are correct about the effect of perfect greens (and the superior modern putting stroke that has evolved along with the greens). Given that modern Tour players don't really fear fast Stimp speeds the only defense is tucking the pins next to edges and so forth. That has in turn just forced the evolution of remarkable short games and recovery games so that someone like Tiger or Mickelson can give themselves those 5-8 foot par putts when they're in trouble. On modern Tour greens, if they can read that 8-footer correctly and put a good stroke on it the ball almost always goes in. Thirty years ago they played a lot of tournaments on greens where a perfectly-read, well-struck putt was going to miss the hole 1/3 of the time just due to bumpy, grainy grass.

[john_stiles]

Smooth greens, better bunker maintenance, more wedges, 'tour' grooves, etc. all help in scoring.

However,  this all begins with the additional distance.

There are a lot of factors but it comes all down to distance as the primary factor in this 'flogging' and the corresponding short distance left to the greens.

Only longer courses could stifle any concerns about flogging in my opinion.

I wonder how many fairways Tiger would hit if fairways were as wide as they were in the 60s/70s.  Don't forget that fairways have narrowed through the years and roughs are now watered and lush.  So, there are a few factors going the other 'way', against flogging.

[JohnV]

Are we over weighting how far the players hit it because of the way the PGA tour measures driving distance?

The average driving distance stat that the PGA Tour publishes is only for 2 holes a round.  That stat tells us that 26 players "averaged" 300 yards per drive.

There is a new stat that can be seen on the PGA Tour website that shows the percentage of the time that a player hits it over 300 yards (see: >300 PCT).  This is for ALL drives.  If you look at that stat, you see that only 5 players hit 50% or more of their drives 300 yards, only 11 do it 40% of the time and only 30 do it more than 1/3 of the time.  Of the 202 players who stats are shown, the median player hits it over 300 yards 20.6% of the time.

[JESII]

John,

Even the FLOGGERS hit fairway woods and irons some of the time.

[A.G._Crockett]

Smooth greens, better bunker maintenance, more wedges, 'tour' grooves, etc. all help in scoring.

However,  this all begins with the additional distance.

There are a lot of factors but it comes all down to distance as the primary factor in this 'flogging' and the corresponding short distance left to the greens.

Only longer courses could stifle any concerns about flogging in my opinion.

I wonder how many fairways Tiger would hit if fairways were as wide as they were in the 60s/70s.  Don't forget that fairways have narrowed through the years and roughs are now watered and lush.  So, there are a few factors going the other 'way', against flogging.

John,
How can LONGER courses reduce the concerns about length?  Longer courses can ONLY make length more important!  As to whether or not that reduces "flogging", that is another matter, dependent on WHY players flog in the first place.  Miller's contention is that the tour guys flog to ride hot streaks to big money.  I think that lesser players flog because the incentives not to have been reduced, and because drivers are now so much easier to hit.  Ironically, narrow fairways play right into flogging, IMO.

I agree with you about fairways narrowing, but I go the other way on what that has done.  With drivers now being much, much easier to hit straight than they were just a few years ago, if you narrow the fairways, you REDUCE the incentive NOT to hit driver once the fairways get so narrow that they are hard to hit even with a 3 wood.  If I get an additional 20 yds. off my driver over my 3 wood, but the 3 wood is only 10% or so straighter than my driver, then why would I EVER hit the 3 wood off the tee?  In reality, in fact, I only use my 3 wood off the deck, and then only because I can't hit a 460 cc driver off the deck; I have every bit as good of a chance at hitting a tight fairway off the tee with my driver as I do with my 3 wood!

Hope that makes some sense, though I realize you might not agree.

[A.G._Crockett]

Are we over weighting how far the players hit it because of the way the PGA tour measures driving distance?

Yes.

[JESII]

Agreed, Yes, but behind that question lies another....Who are "WE"?

[Patrick_Mucci]

Are we over weighting how far the players hit it because of the way the PGA tour measures driving distance?
[size=4x]

NO[/size]

Not when kids in high school and guys getting ready for Medicare hit it farther than Nicklaus did in his prime.

[john_stiles]

AG,

If players are hitting less lofted clubs to the green, because the hole is lengthened,  I think the rough would be more of a factor.  The player would then hit the club most likely to give the desired second shot to the green. Maybe that would still be a driver.

Flogging is the result of being able to hit it far, and have a short iron to the green.

JVB,

In all of these 'driving' stats, is the information gathered as to length of hole and the club used from the tee.  In other words,  is it a 440 yard par 4,  3 wood hit 290 yards, 9 iron to the green.  Is there a stat on the club used at the tee ?  I'm too lazy to check the PGA website.

I think they (the floggers) can it 300 when they want to.

[A.G._Crockett]

AG,

If players are hitting less lofted clubs to the green, because the hole is lengthened,  I think the rough would be more of a factor.  The player would then hit the club most likely to give the desired second shot to the green. Maybe that would still be a driver.

Flogging is the result of being able to hit it far, and have a short iron to the green.

John,
I agree that there is a point at which the iron in the player's hands for the second shot would so long that being in the fairway would be a must, but this would still play into the hands of the longest hitters.  Long, long before the floggers were forced to hit 3 woods or 2 irons off the tee, the shorter hitters would have been eliminated from contention, because even from the fairway they would be hitting clubs too long to be accurate or hold the green.  It's all relative, and ALL are punished by more length, but the shorter hitters would be punished more quickly and more thoroughly.

It just seems to me that selectively wider, not narrower, fairways that are kept very, very firm and allow errant tee shots to run into trees and hazards and slopes, rather than just rough, along with very firm greens, are the best way to penalize inaccuracy off the tee.  Ultimately, I think that this will also involve more short par fours and long par 3's in GCA.

I just can't get my head around additional length as a successful way of penalizing long hitters.  It's just too counter-intuitive.

[Patrick_Mucci]

AG Crockett,

Why did your theory fail at ANGC ?

[Craig Van Egmond]

Shivas,

        That woman tennis player in question is Monica Seles. Could have been one of the greatest, she won 9 grand slams in very short order, was very dominate.  Annoying as hell though.

[A.G._Crockett]

AG Crockett,

Why did your theory fail at ANGC ?

I don't really have a theory, except for the fact that I can't see how adding length to golf courses deemphasizes distance.  The longer the course, the more important distance becomes; it is just inescapable!  To give an extreme analogy, I have a chance of beating Tiger Woods on a 10 yd. putt; I have virtually NO chance of beating Tiger on an 800 yd. hole.  The longer the hole or course, the less my chance of beating him becomes.  It just can't be otherwise.  And if you combine that with ever more narrow fairways, then flogging becomes the by-product as golfers realize they are going to miss a lot of fairways anyway and elect to bomb away so that WHEN they miss, they are as close as possible.  Miller's contention (which is why I started this thread) is that the money situation on Tour promotes the strategy as well.  Bomb it, an ride a hot streak...

Not to answer a question with a question, but how successful has it been so far to counter driving distance with more length and narrow fairways?  Is flogging becoming more or less prevalent?  Until technology is changed, if it is, maybe it's time to rethink how to best cope with it.

As to AGNC, I would assume that you refer to the conventional wisdom that the longest hitters don't always win there.  However, other than Mike Weir in 2002, "floggers" have won every year since 1998 (Jose Maria I Lost My Ball).  To the extent that long hitters do NOT completely dominate at AGNC, I would guess that it is a tribute to the amazing intricacy and subtlety of the greens, which seem to be unlike any others.  However, prior to the recent yearly lengthening at AGNC (not to mention adding rough) it would appear that shorter hitters had a much, much greater chance of winning if you look at a list of past champions.

[Patrick_Mucci]

Shivas,

Not long ago I knew a tour pro who exhaled-grunted, as they were hitting the ball, in the same way that Karate experts exhale-grunt when they impact bricks, boards or other objects they're striking.

But, when it comes to grunting, there are distinct categories.

Some take the form of excessive typing.
This is known as the Paul Grunt, a derivative of the Marine Grunt.

[Patrick_Mucci]

AG,

I understood your theory and for a fleeting second, bought into it, until I recalled what happened at ANGC where fairways were wide and no appreciable rough existed.

Other than a few areas, such as # 2 and # 5 balls running through the fairway and rough don't encounter dire consequences, and recovery, recovery with good results is a possibility.

Remember too, that today's golfers don't drive the ball with the same trajectory or shape as their predecessors.
Today's golfers hit the ball very high, thus it doesn't get much roll upon landing, and that diminishes the effect of the terrain.

It's also a possibility that if increased financial pressures come to bear on clubs, that fewer areas will be maintained as fairway, thus exacerbating the trend.

In addition, the cost to realign the irrigation systems to accomodate wider fairways, coupled with the cost of tree removal from those areas, and the cost to grass and maintain those areas, is a deterant to wider fairways.

This is why I'm so against "decorative" areas on a golf course.
They soak up funds that could otherwise be used to improve the field of play.

[A.G._Crockett]

AG,

I understood your theory and for a fleeting second, bought into it, until I recalled what happened at ANGC where fairways were wide and no appreciable rough existed.

Though only a fleeting second, I'll take that as a victory!

[George Pazin]

It would be interesting to compare the winners pre-late 90s Tiger proofing and post to see if the rough has helped or hurt the bombers. Unfortunately, that Tiger guy keeps winning them all, so the sample isn't very good! I do think that Augusta still did a good job of "defending itself" with no rough, and that the recovery shots were far more interesting.

* In thinking more about ANGC and the former lack of rough, can anyone cite a wild long driver who won due to the course's inability to defend itself? It's not like wild drivers were winning all the time - seems to me the theory (no rough, course defended through contour, greens, etc.) worked reasonably well.

[A.G._Crockett]

It would be interesting to compare the winners pre-late 90s Tiger proofing and post to see if the rough has helped or hurt the bombers. Unfortunately, that Tiger guy keeps winning them all, so the sample isn't very good! I do think that Augusta still did a good job of "defending itself" with no rough, and that the recovery shots were far more interesting.

* In thinking more about ANGC and the former lack of rough, can anyone cite a wild long driver who won due to the course's inability to defend itself? It's not like wild drivers were winning all the time - seems to me the theory (no rough, course defended through contour, greens, etc.) worked reasonably well.

George,
First of all, I think at this point Tiger IS a wild long driver, and Mickelson certainly tends in that direction as well.  They have won 4 of the last 5 Masters, with only Weir in 2003 intruding.  Then you have Singh in 2000.

Before that, the list is as follows for the last 20 years:
1999 — Jose Maria Olazabal
1998 — Mark O'Meara
1997 — Tiger Woods
1996 — Nick Faldo
1995 — Ben Crenshaw
1994 — Jose Maria Olazabal
1993 — Bernhard Langer
1992 — Fred Couples
1991 — Ian Woosnam
1990 — x-Nick Faldo
1989 — x-Nick Faldo
1988 — Sandy Lyle
1987 — x-Larry Mize
1986 — Jack Nicklaus
1985 — Bernhard Langer

x = won in playoff

You can draw various conclusions from this, but the one conclusion that you CANNOT draw is that the additional length at ANGC since 2001 is lessening the importance of distance off the tee.  Whether or not the added length is making distance off the tee MORE important is impossible to know.

Let me hasten to point out (before a real statistician like Brent Hutto does! ) that we only know who DID win over the past few years with the added length.  Had the course NOT been lengthened, or rough not grown, I am NOT claiming that the list of recent champions would look like the list prior to the last 5 yrs.

[Phil Benedict]

As the game and equipment have evolved I wonder whether you have to be a bomber to achieve greatness, which I (arbitrarily) define as winning 5 majors or more.  My awareness of the game started in the 60's.  Over that period, Palmer, Nicklaus, Trevino, Player, Watson, Sevy and Faldo have achieved this standard (excluding Tiger because he is contemporary).  Of these 7 guys, three (Player, Trevino and Faldo) were not considered long by the standards of their time.

Among contemporary players, Tiger (the ultimate bomber) is way past my standard of greatness, and the others who seem to have a chance (Phil, Ernie, Vijay, although time is running out on him, and Goosen) are all pretty long.

Does anybody think a player of the Faldo or Trevino style can win a bunch of majors in the post-balatta game?  If not, hasn't the game lost something?

[Brent Hutto]

A player like Nick Faldo is at a serious disadvantage against today's players because the game has changed.

Bobby Jones would not have been competitive in the 1980's and 1990's against Nick Faldo because the game was different than in the 1920's and 1930's.

Young Tom Morris would not have been competitive playing against Bobby Jones during the 1920's because the game was totally different than in Young Tom's time.

And there will be a time when the style of game Vijay Singh plays today will no longer be competitive. Tempus fugit and the times they are a'changing.

[Phil Benedict]

Brent,

My point is not whether Faldo or Trevino personally would be competitive today.  All sports are subject to an evolution in standards due to better training nutrition, training, worldwide growth in participation etc.  My question is whether anyone who doesn't rely on power can win a bunch of majors.

[Brent Hutto]

Well, as long as Tiger is around it's going to be tough for anyone to win a bunch of majors over the next decade or two. But I'd say the answer is probably no. I think the game as played today renders anyone who can't hit it pretty darned far at a serious disadvantage.

The game has always changed. The form that change has taken in the past 20 years is an explosion of power. Mike Weir can certainly win another major somewhere down the road but the next guy to win five of them is almost certainly going to play a power game in my estimation.

[TEPaul]

I agree with Pat---if anyone is saying Nicklaus and certainly Palmer didn't try to hit it really hard back then (100%) and certainly the driver in spots then I doubt they actually saw Nicklaus or Palmer or even Miller and Watson. They all tried to hit it as hard and as far as they could with driver, certainly in spots. That's probably just the nature of the golfer, no matter who they are.

One time, maybe maybe about twenty years ago I asked this guy from my club, Charlie Bolling who's now a club pro in the MET area and who was on TOUR for a while what it was like out there and what you basically needed to think about and watch out for. Charlie is a real intelligent guy and I remember so well he said that when some of those tour pros back then got hot early and made the amount of money they'd basically had as a goal or whatever that year that was when they really got dangerous because after that they'd just shoot for pins feeling they had absolutely nothing to lose.

[James Bennett]

Patrick Mucci commented on #42 that

It's also a possibility that if increased financial pressures come to bear on clubs, that fewer areas will be maintained as fairway, thus exacerbating the trend.


My question is, does fairway really cost more than rough?  Does fairway cost more than high quality rough?


My experience is that couch (bermuda) with some watering  makes a good, cheap fairway (once established).  Frequency of mowing is not extreme, nor is the fertiliser requirement, nor the water.  Need to spend some time and money limiting the ingress of winter grass.  By contrast, soft grass rough is difficult to maintain if you have summer droughts so may actually require more maintenance to maintain (irrigation, cutting, feeding, weeding).  And couch (bermuda) rough of any significant height is not what I call desirable.  My experience is also that members like to have a playable width of something, be it fairway and/or rough.

James B