Shot Values- Definition

[Lou_Duran]

I am trying to get my arms around what we mean by Shot Values.  How are they related to strategy, risk/reward, strength vs. control?   Are Shot Values primarily the result of architecture (including site selection), or a good part due to weather, conditioning, and course set-up?

[ward peyronnin]

Lou

Sounds like your arms are at in a circle around them.

I think of shot values as potential a course offers the player to first envision  and then experience shots that call for a definite strategy apart from throwing straight darts one of the best examples being running shots. Teeing grounds that set up for placement that benefits from using the fairway characteristics make for a "great driving hole", etc.

Examples of poor shots values abound but one might be a flag closely tucked behind an obstacles on a downslope on a firm green with a downwind bias in play. Impossible and strictly luck if you come to rest at all close to the hole or even on the green.

[Jeff_Brauer]

Lou,

Stick with an easier subject, like understanding women.

[Pete Lavallee]

Lou,

Don't you know that only GD raters can discern shot values.

[RJ_Daley]

If a course only has limitted options to play, and in order to play, one is demanded to make only one kind of shot or be penalized ie.e narrow FWs with extravagantly penal hazards, limitted LZ, and greens set up to demand distance and spin control- flighted to a spot, and only the 1% of the most talented players can play effectively, then there are poor shot values.  If the 99% of the rest of the golfers have ways and opportunities to play with alternate strategies, then it has high or good shot values.  

When or if all courses become designed as an architectural movement to favor only the 1%, the game becomes so exclusive and constraining  that no one in the 99% wants to play anymore and the industry fails as a matter of growing participation...  

[Garland Bayley]

You want to understand shot values? Get yourself a good case of vertigo and then go play golf. You will find that almost every golf course has a vast variety of shot values.

[DMoriarty]

Shot Value = 1.

[Doug Wright]

Lou, here are several threads from the archives on various aspects of shot values FYI. Jeff Brauer is remarkably consistent in his responses on this (see above). His comment in 2003 regarding shot values was as follows:

"I've always said that if you want an embarrassing silence, you should go to a cocktail party of golf course architects and randomly ask "what is your definition of shot values?"  While we (and lots of golfers) throw the term around, its hard to define."

Happy Thanksgiving.

 
http://www.golfclubatlas.com/forum/index.php/topic,7190.0.html

http://www.golfclubatlas.com/forum/index.php/topic,20633.0.html

http://www.golfclubatlas.com/forum/index.php/topic,29169.0.html

http://www.golfclubatlas.com/forum/index.php/topic,4329.0.html

http://www.golfclubatlas.com/forum/index.php/topic,7237.0.html

http://www.golfclubatlas.com/forum/index.php/topic,5045.0.html

[Jeff_Brauer]

Here was my response in the 2005 thread

"....and while we are at it, tell me "what is the meaning of life?"

I'm consistent. I got that going for me!

[Jason Topp]

For what it is worth - I understand the term to mean - how does a course define what constitutes a successful v an unsuccessful shot and how does the course treat each outcome.  Three examples:

The two primary courses I play have very different shot values on iron play.  One has large greens with relatively tame contours.  The other has small greens with both significant tilt and many micro contours within that tilt.  That difference alone makes the demands on iron play very different.  I hit on average 6 greens on one course and 9 greens on the other.  On hit greens - one course demands I hit it on the correct side of the hole or else I am faced with a very difficult two putt.  In many cases I am better off missing the green on the correct side than hitting the green on the wrong side.

If I play a course of more than 7000 yards, such a course places great value on driver distance.  I am hitting driver- wood all day when a long hitter is hitting a wide variety of clubs off the tee and a wide variety of approach shots. 

Desert target courses place value on simply putting the ball in play.  I spent several years in college getting beat by a guy that hit a 190 yard  slice off the tee but he knew where it was going.  I couldn't beat him until I finally realized I needed to find a club I knew I could put in play and just be conservative because putting the ball in play is rewarded above all other skills.

[Jackson C]

I'll try with some thoughts.

*For the architect it is easiest to create shot value off of par 3s, as there is a fixed position on the tee box and the green is also fixed.
For example, I assume for raters, it is easy to say Cypress #16 has huge shot value.

*Off the fairway, rough, etc., my guess is that shot value correlates with hitting a great shot (whether hitting it flush and dropping right down on the flag, or hitting a running shot to match the contour of the fairway/green, that is amply rewarded.  Rewarded compared to a mediocre shot.  And I would add that shot value in this situation energizes the player.  That is, from the perspective of the thrill of a well executed shot, and/or the thrill of standing over the shot and a heightened sense of challenge (for example, carrying the ocean as in Cypress #16 and the lake in TPC #18, or an overall setting with changing variables, sloping land, ticklish hazards, ungodly beauty, etc. such as the second shot into Augusta #13 green).  For what it is worth, I would say the tee shot on TPC#18 is a higher shot value than TPC#17.

*I feel there is a strong correlation between how long it takes (either actual or perceived) between how long it takes from the moment you start your swing and the moment your ball stops  -- assuming you hit a very good shot.

[Jed Peters]

Lou:

I think the pin front right on 17 at Bandon Dunes is a good example of what you're talking about.

Best,

Jed

[Pete Lavallee]

For example, I assume, it is easy to say Cypress #16 has huge shot value.

Wow, Jackson is only 5 posts in and already poking fun at Lou! No doubt he's heard how Lou blew up his under par round at CPC by blowing a 5 wood over the green on #16 to the left into the Pacific; no option there other than to re-tee or drop somewhere in Hawaii Please, at least wait until you get to double digits until you start ribbing the man!