[TAG]

Over the last 10 years, the PGA Tour fairways % leaders for each season have won a combined 0 tournaments. I pulled these players' FedEx cup rankings at the end of each year which they led the tour in Fairway %:
2017 / Armour / 159
2016 / Knost / 54
2015 / Molinari / 99
2014 / Toms / 112
2013 / Kelly / 79
2012 / Kelly / 122
2011 / Durant / 149

2010 / Uresti / 173
2009 / Durant / 167
2008 / Brown / 204

Only 3 of these players cracked the top 100, and half of them lost their cards by finishing above 125th without a win (unless they had some other exemption at their disposal)

Just as paltry are the fairway % ranking of FedEx cup point leaders each year...
2017 / Matsuyama / 121
2016 / Day / 181
2015 / Spieth / 80
2014 / McIlroy / 108
2013 / Woods / 69
2012 / Woods / 55
2011 / Watney / 136
2010 / Els / 147
2009 / Woods / 86
2008 / Woods / 168

For how much we all talk about the importance of angles setting up approach shots and how this contributes to the enjoyment of a golf course, it sure doesn't seem to effect players' ability to score - at least not at the elite level.
Perhaps distance isn't as much the culprit for scoring as is the lack of a demand for accuracy off the tee.
Can golf course design solve this issue without the need to bifurcate? Can we look at the golf courses that the worlds best play each week and set them up in a way that puts more demand on hitting fairways (it's a relatively set list of courses)? Is that even worthwhile, or is it too much work/expense compared to equipment rollbacks?
As a PGA professional who tries to help club members play better golf everyday, I don't think a unified ball rollback is the answer for continuing the success of this game.

[Carl Rogers]

15 yard fairway width, flanked both sides by water?

[Jake Marvin]

It sounds like an effective way to end this era of architecture (which I'm not necessary opposed to, but I'll pass if this is its chosen form).

Bifurcating design works until the masses decide they want to play courses that look like what the pros play, and then most every other course has to adapt to that or die. So the bifurcation is really just a style change, and not one that most golfers would find flattering as they hit their eighteenth straight approach from what I'm assuming is ankle-high, mid-2000s-US-Open rough.

Personally, I'd be fine if we stopped caring so much about what the pros shoot, but good luck telling that to USGA.

I'm curious why helping members play better leads you to question a ball rollback. Shorter balls mean fewer lost balls, which I'd wager kill the average golfer much more than some extra yardage, especially if the rollback moves them up a tee. But good luck telling that to the average golfer, I suppose.

[Jeff Schley]

I would say that tour players can play from the rough much easier than amateurs, although they lose the ability to spin the ball. However if you are 50 yards closer to the flag and in the rough as opposed to 50 yards back using 3 clubs more it doesn't seem to matter.  When looking at GIR for the top 10 last year for example:

GIR / Total Driving / Fed Ex Cup Standings
1 / 174 / 103 Martin Flores 
2 / 33 / 24 Kyle Stanley 
3 / 4 / 11 Paul Casey   
4 / 48 / 2 Jordan Spieth 
5 / 94 / 159 Ryan Armour   
6 / 16 / 43 Lucas Glover 
7 / 137 / 144 Cameron Percy
8 / 105 / 21 Sergio Garcia 
T9 / 108 / 109 Robert Garrigus 
T9 / 28 / 4 Dustin Johnson 

[Jeff Schley]

Not surprisingly the 2017 putting average is more highly correlated with success.

                               AVG / BIRDIE CONVERSION / GIR RANK
1 Justin Thomas  1.694  / 37.39 / 46
2 Jordan Spieth  1.711 / 35.00 / 4
3 Jason Day  1.716 / 35.86 / 139
T4 Rickie Fowler  1.721 / 34.75 / 51
T4 Brooks Koepka  1.721 / 36.40 /  148
6 Anirban Lahiri  1.730 / 34.23 / 149
7 Phil Mickelson  1.734 / 33.04 / 163
8 Cameron Smith  1.737 / 32.94 / 157
9 Brian Harman  1.738 / 31.09 / 137
10 Hideki Matsuyama  1.739 / 34.22 / 16

[Ally Mcintosh]

Am I missing the point here? Isn’t the main post stating that rough makes no difference? So you may as well have wide fairways as much as narrow?


In which case, the answer is extremely bold green design and firm conditions.


Trouble is pro’s hate bold greens.

[Jon Wiggett]

Ally,


yes and no. Rough makes no real difference with a wedge in your hand and a flat, receptive green. The answer is most certainly shorten the ball by a good 15%, slow down green speeds to enable bold contouring as you suggest and firm up the courses by less nutrient input. The first is down to rules, the second down to the golf industry as a whole selling the concept though I suspect it is really up to the pro tours and the latter is down to governmental legislation.


Jon

[Andy Stamm]

For how much we all talk about the importance of angles setting up approach shots and how this contributes to the enjoyment of a golf course, it sure doesn't seem to effect players' ability to score - at least not at the elite level.

Why do you equate a weak correlation between fairways hit and PGA tour success with angles not being important to scoring? How does that data support that conclusion?


A good PGA tour hole will often have a narrow fairway and one side from which a reasonable approach can be made from the rough. The other side's rough will be out of position because of a lack of spin/control and a bad angle. The big hitter scores better if he can either hit the fairway further up than the short hitter or miss in the correct position, thus utilizing the superior angle. It's the guy playing from the fairway all day who's not really using angles because with narrow fairways, there's not much room to take advantage.

[Thomas Dai]

There are short-n-straight hitters and bombers and those in between.
There are lots of bombers however, and at each tournament several of them, although not necessarily the same ones, will have an 'on' week, every week. During an 'on' week bombers hit fairways (both long and straight), play their second shots from closer to the green and their putts from nearer the hole. Thus they usually finish at the top of the leaderboards.
When an individual bomber has a 'bad' week they tend to miss fairways, miss greens, miss putts and miss cuts whereas short-n-straighters normally carry on hitting fairways but their second shots aren't usually close enough for them to beat the other bombers who are 'on' that particular week. Sometimes a short-n-straight might contend/win but it's not as often as one the bombers, and there are lots of bombers and several of them, although maybe different ones, have an 'on' week, almost every week.
atb

[TAG]

I'm curious why helping members play better leads you to question a ball rollback. Shorter balls mean fewer lost balls, which I'd wager kill the average golfer much more than some extra yardage, especially if the rollback moves them up a tee. But good luck telling that to the average golfer, I suppose.

I certainly see your point- but I also feel that only rolling the ball back to dampen distance only serves one purpose, of maintaining the relevance of shorter golf courses... IMO, if the ball is to be rolled back simply by going X% shorter, I don't think it tackles the issue of the significance of distance when identifying the best players in the world. Long players will still dominate the game as they do now.


Does a larger question need to be posed around about how we could use a change in equipment to bring back the importance of accuracy in elite players' games? Perhaps a ball that spins more (addition to coming off the face slower) would help a straighter player be more successful. WITH THAT SAID, I don't think that a ball which spins and curves more does ANY good in growing the game or helping club players enjoy golf more.


Frankly, I was shocked that the in the last ten years, no player who led the tour in fairway% won a single tournament! and I'm just curious how we can revisit accuracy and add value to this part of the game.

[Alex Miller]

Ah yes, golf the sport in which the goal is to get the ball in the hole in the fewest strokes possible. Everyone knows the most important part is hitting the fairway! From there it doesn't matter... 


I understand why this is getting brought up on an architecture forum, where many of us lean to idealistic values of the strategy golf course architecture imposes. But come on... this is one statistic of many, and it's not like missing the fairway was ever intended to be a death knell for scoring on a hole anyway! It's no surprise that uber-talented professionals can score from anywhere, and also not necessarily an issue either.


Finally, we don't know what fairways players are hitting or missing and we don't know how the courses are set up. Maybe the fairways are too narrow and the rough not penal, maybe the other way around? Perhaps individual schedules are set up to exploit that player's advantage, meaning the straight hitters are selecting their best opportunity to hit more fairways just to compete?


In short - I question the assumption that there is a problem with this statistic and agree with Andy's conclusion as one possible explanation.

[Jon Wiggett]

(I thought we had done away with hidden names )


TAG (I assume that stand for 'Terrible At Golf'  ),


reducing the distance by say 15% reduces a 330 yard drive by almost 50 yards turning a wedge into a 6 or 7 iron and a 280 yard drive by just over 40 yards turning that 6 or 7 iron into 3 or 4 iron. The difference in control between a 7 iron and a wedge is a bit greater than between a 4 iron and a 7 in my opinion. It does not make a huge difference but even a little will redress the balance a tad. If this is combined with other measures of course GCA and maintenance it would go a way to redressing the balance.

[Jeff Schley]

(I thought we had done away with hidden names )


TAG (I assume that stand for 'Terrible At Golf'  ),


reducing the distance by say 15% reduces a 330 yard drive by almost 50 yards turning a wedge into a 6 or 7 iron and a 280 yard drive by just over 40 yards turning that 6 or 7 iron into 3 or 4 iron. The difference in control between a 7 iron and a wedge is a bit greater than between a 4 iron and a 7 in my opinion. It does not make a huge difference but even a little will redress the balance a tad. If this is combined with other measures of course GCA and maintenance it would go a way to redressing the balance.

Exactly.  Also maybe we will get away from this air game of having to carry hazards all the way to the green and be able to actually run the ball up to the green??     

I mean how many times do the long hitters use their mid to long irons?  They need a wire brush to get the rust off after every tourney I think.  Whereas some switch out their wedges every week.

[Kalen Braley]

Jon,


Great point.


While most Tour Pros would probably take a wedge from the rough over a 7 iron in the fairway....I'm guessing they would rather have a 4 iron from the fairway over a 7 iron in the rough.

[Peter Flory]

Martin Flores must be a terrible putter. 

[Jeff_Brauer]

If wide fairways don't cut it to create tempting choice, or narrow fairways, maybe we need to rethink the rough as part of the equation. 

Never have gotten anyone to bite on this, but I have tried to propose different length roughs on either side of the fairway to accentuate the need to be on one side or the other. 


Make the "prime side" of the fairway have 6" rough.  The other side of the fairway, with a bunker to cross, etc., have 2-4" rough.  As noted, coming over a bunker from medium rough is no picnic for most, but doable. Hard to get close for birdie.  Should be enough to make golfers think again about taking the aggressive line.


Or, you could do it the other way, put the 6" rough on the less favored side to really screw the guy who didn't play aggressively even more, and reward those who did, but missed wide, rather than favor the middle.  Could be room for both.  Mix and match to keep it interesting.

[James Brown]

Would like to see the same kind of stats for US Open setups.  I bet there is a much higher premium on fairways there. 

[Jim Hoak]

I think Mike Keiser has proved your point--at least for amateurs.  Popular courses.  All under 7000 yards.  The common denominator--good/great design!
I think adding length is just an excuse for poor design.

[Erik J. Barzeski]

Not surprisingly the 2017 putting average is more highly correlated with success.

Huh? Ballstriking is what matters most on the PGA Tour. The top 10 in SG:Putting in 2017 have a few players with good records and some with bad records. Also, #5 on that list gained only 0.542 strokes per round. #5 on the SG:Driving gained 0.738 and #5 SG:Approach gained 0.702.

I think Mike Keiser has proved your point--at least for amateurs.  Popular courses.  All under 7000 yards.  The common denominator--good/great design!I think adding length is just an excuse for poor design.

I like it.

[BCowan]

I think Scott Hoch deserves better for pointing out how much easier they were setting up the course for the last 20 years, with high scoring king and low rough.  This has helped lead to Bomb and gauge mentality.  He was ahead of his time.  If you listened closely to what Tiger said about the course last week, the reason why low scores weren't in the cards is the course was a lot firmer then years past.  Lack of Firmer courses is elephant in the room.  I was just happy to have witnessed the Pinehurst #2 open (in which people on here said was too firm  ), where it was set up properly and one german put on a great show.  Of course the simple minded need a horse race and can't appreciate excellent play without dyed water hazards and dogwoods.   

[Jeff Schley]

Not surprisingly the 2017 putting average is more highly correlated with success.

Huh? Ballstriking is what matters most on the PGA Tour. The top 10 in SG:Putting in 2017 have a few players with good records and some with bad records. Also, #5 on that list gained only 0.542 strokes per round. #5 on the SG:Driving gained 0.738 and #5 SG:Approach gained 0.702.

I think Mike Keiser has proved your point--at least for amateurs.  Popular courses.  All under 7000 yards.  The common denominator--good/great design!I think adding length is just an excuse for poor design.

I like it.

I didn't point out that stat of SG, I pointed out the average putts per hole, as SG is not a historic stat that has been kept to compare to past.  Only been around 13 years. Top 5 for 2017 nobody with the yips on this list.

1 Justin Thomas  1.694  / 37.39 / 46
2 Jordan Spieth  1.711 / 35.00 / 4
3 Jason Day  1.716 / 35.86 / 139
T4 Rickie Fowler  1.721 / 34.75 / 51
T4 Brooks Koepka  1.721 / 36.40 /  148

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