[Phil McDade]

Tidbits from the Masters:

Four hardest holes (in order): 11, 10, 7 and 1.
Four easiest holes (in order): 15, 8, 2, 13.

Easiest hole not a par 5: 3 (the only par 4 on the course under 400 yds), with an average score of 4.03, ranking it 13th. Next easiest par 4: 14.

Round 4 was notably harder than round 3 -- 74.66 vs. 72.57 scoring average. Twice as many double/others Sunday vs. Saturday, 25 fewer birdies, and 52 more bogeys.

The front nine all four days played slightly more difficult than the back nine: 36.90 to 36.88

Interestingly (to me), 12 played as the easiest of the course's par 3s during the tourney. 4 played the toughest, followed by 16 and 6 (nearly equally difficult during the tourney). 12 did play as the second-toughest of the par 3s on Sunday, however.

Finally, the stats between Immelman and Tiger are pretty revealing. For me, they reinforce the notion that Augusta is emerging as a course that puts a premium on driving accuracy. Zach Johnson last year -- among the half-dozen or so players who contended on Sunday -- was far and away the most accurate driver of the bunch. Same held true this year; Immelman ranked 1st overall in driving accuracy, and hit 48 or 56 fairways, or fully 10 more than Tiger. It certainly accounted for Immelman's lead in birdies -- they each had four birdies on the par 5s (Tiger eagled one par 5), but Immelman had 11 birdies on the par 4s compared to only six for Tiger. Immelman hit one more GIR than Tiger during the tourney.

Two more interesting stats about Tiger:

-- He was 1 for 6 in sand saves, an abysmal percentage for someone who has the best short game in golf (I remember Tiger saying when he turned pro that he was an admittedly poor sand player, and worked hard at becoming better).

-- He had 11 birdies and one eagle this week. That seems like an awfully small number for someone who seemingly owns the course, and a course that is nearly ideally set up for his game (long, hits lots of greens, usually a very good putter, aggressive by nature in going after a course). Have the changes at Augusta denuded his game? Or turned him into a safe, wait-for-others-to-fold golfer at this particular course? Or did he just have a bad week with the putter?

[Wade Whitehead]

Great observations.

I think the answer to your final question is that his putting was absolutely abysmal (even by standards lower than his).  He hit a sufficient number of greens to win, but made nothing.

If he converts four more sands saves, and the putts that lipped out fall in, he wins going away.  Throw in an avoided three putt or two, and it's a blowout.

Immelman will be a fantastic champion.  However, as he observed in his press conference, Tiger is still light years ahead of the rest of the world.

WW

[Jim Nugent]

Compared to Tiger, Immelman hit one more green, way more fairways, had one more save out of the sand even though he only hit into half as many bunkers, drove the ball further on average, and took fewer putts per green.

What amazes me is Tiger's driving average.  Just under 284 this year.  Last year was even less, by a few yards IIRC.  Two years in a row, he has averaged barely more than the field at ANGC.

He has lost one of his biggest advantages there.

[Doug Siebert]

Tiger generally plays poorly in the wind, and putts worse in the wind to boot.  Look at his record in British Opens played in benign conditions versus those in vicious conditions.  If it was sunny, 80 degrees and a little 5-10 mph breeze, Tiger might have had a chance today.

I'm also kind of thinking that all the talk about Tiger being unable to come from behind to win majors has some merit.  He's unbeatable when he's in the lead because he can play a steady game, play the percentages, and not make the mistakes that give the other guys some hope.  Its a different ball game when he's behind and I think it goes against his whole Nicklausian strategy for the majors to not be able to just play steady and wait for the other guys to screw up.  After all that strategy has served him well in all the majors he has started tied for the lead or only one or two shots out in front.  The other guys usually have shot themselves out of it before the first nine is over and then he's got an easy time of it.

I think to point to his missed putts and claim he should have won is ludicrous.  We could say the same thing about a half dozen guys who didn't win, and just needed to have a few putts that lipped or or shots that missed their mark by a few yards and led to a bogey instead of a birdie.  You could equally claim that Immelman didn't deserve to win because he got a lucky break when his ball didn't roll back into the water on 15 yesterday and he made a long putt on 11 when it looked like he'd have a sure bogey -- which would have really put him in a pickle considering he bogied 12 as well.

You even saw this with the announcers talking about Tiger's bad breaks, but one of them pointed out that everyone on the course has bad breaks and it is how you deal with them that counts.  When Immelman ran into trouble he either got himself out of it or just went on about his business without worrying.  Tiger was in one of his whiny moods today and couldn't accept when things didn't go his way, and that's why he lost.

[Lester George]

Phil,

Great stuff!  Thanks for posting this.  I had an idea on the par 5's being easiest, but didn't follow on the fours. 

Lester

[Sean_A]

Tidbits from the Masters:

Four hardest holes (in order): 11, 10, 7 and 1.
Four easiest holes (in order): 15, 8, 2, 13.

Easiest hole not a par 5: 3 (the only par 4 on the course under 400 yds), with an average score of 4.03, ranking it 13th. Next easiest par 4: 14.

Round 4 was notably harder than round 3 -- 74.66 vs. 72.57 scoring average. Twice as many double/others Sunday vs. Saturday, 25 fewer birdies, and 52 more bogeys.

The front nine all four days played slightly more difficult than the back nine: 36.90 to 36.88

Interestingly (to me), 12 played as the easiest of the course's par 3s during the tourney. 4 played the toughest, followed by 16 and 6 (nearly equally difficult during the tourney). 12 did play as the second-toughest of the par 3s on Sunday, however.

Finally, the stats between Immelman and Tiger are pretty revealing. For me, they reinforce the notion that Augusta is emerging as a course that puts a premium on driving accuracy. Zach Johnson last year -- among the half-dozen or so players who contended on Sunday -- was far and away the most accurate driver of the bunch. Same held true this year; Immelman ranked 1st overall in driving accuracy, and hit 48 or 56 fairways, or fully 10 more than Tiger. It certainly accounted for Immelman's lead in birdies -- they each had four birdies on the par 5s (Tiger eagled one par 5), but Immelman had 11 birdies on the par 4s compared to only six for Tiger. Immelman hit one more GIR than Tiger during the tourney.

Two more interesting stats about Tiger:

-- He was 1 for 6 in sand saves, an abysmal percentage for someone who has the best short game in golf (I remember Tiger saying when he turned pro that he was an admittedly poor sand player, and worked hard at becoming better).

-- He had 11 birdies and one eagle this week. That seems like an awfully small number for someone who seemingly owns the course, and a course that is nearly ideally set up for his game (long, hits lots of greens, usually a very good putter, aggressive by nature in going after a course). Have the changes at Augusta denuded his game? Or turned him into a safe, wait-for-others-to-fold golfer at this particular course? Or did he just have a bad week with the putter?

Phil

Wait, something doesn't add up.  The par 5s had the lowest scoring average of the entire course?  This doesn't sound right.

Ciao 

[Phil McDade]

Sean:

Relative to par, the par 5s played as the four easiest holes on the course, and were the only holes that played under par for the tourney:

http://www.masters.org/en_US/scores/stats/cstats.html

The par 3s played, I would argue, relatively benignly compared to the par 4s. Three of the par 3s -- holes 16, 6, and 11 -- were among the nine easiest holes of the week. Only the 4th played as one of the toughest nine holes of the week (it was 5th hardest for the tourney).

Eight of the nine hardest holes on average this week were par 4s, led by 11, 10, 7 and 1.

[Sean_A]

Sean:

Relative to par, the par 5s played as the four easiest holes on the course, and were the only holes that played under par for the tourney:

http://www.masters.org/en_US/scores/stats/cstats.html

The par 3s played, I would argue, relatively benignly compared to the par 4s. Three of the par 3s -- holes 16, 6, and 11 -- were among the nine easiest holes of the week. Only the 4th played as one of the toughest nine holes of the week (it was 5th hardest for the tourney).

Eight of the nine hardest holes on average this week were par 4s, led by 11, 10, 7 and 1.

Phil

I gotcha ya.  Do you think this is one of those meaningless stats?  What does it tell us that #11 played the hardest AGAINST PAR of the all the par 4s?  Or should I say, what can be meaningfully inferred from this info? 

Ciao

[Phil McDade]

Sean:

Without doing a side-by-side comparison of years past, particularly post-2002 (the year of the big changes/lengthening, I think) and pre-2002, I think meaningful judgements about particular holes might be hard to come by. However, the interesting thing about this year's stats to me are the following:

-- The par 5s are the only holes that played under par, and they weren't under par by a lot (less than a quarter-stroke in every case). In short, none of them plays as a true half-par hole in which the average score is around 4.5. But they are the closest thing left at Augusta resembling a half-par hole.

-- The course really has not much "breathing space" -- places where you can take it easy for a hole (or two or three), make a relatively easy par, and then get ready for either a shot at birdie/eagle or gear up for a tough par. Eight of the nine toughest holes this week were par 4s, and they were evenly distributed among the front and back nines. Both nines really start off tough (holes 11, 10 and 1 were three of the four toughest holes this week) and end with not-easy holes (7 and 9 were ranked 3rd and 7th toughest this week, while 17 and 18 were ranked 8th and 9th toughest).

-- The most meaningful stat (lately, at Augusta) for me -- and I say it because I looked it up last year and this year -- is that of driving accuracy. Driving distance to me has always been an over-rated stat, because it's only measured on a few holes and esp. at Augusta the elevation changes and turbo-boost areas on some holes (10 esp.) distort the overall picture. I'm not a big fan of GIR, either; on a course with very large greens and severe contouring (like Augusta) you can hit a green and be in worse position than being somewhere else off the green. But both Immelman and Johnson ranked very high relative to their contending peers in fairways hit. It stands to reason that the more fairways you hit at Augusta, you greatly increase your chances of hitting a GIR in the proper position on those greens for a decent run at birdie (or avoidance of a three-putt, often as much of a consideration on those greens as having a run at birdie).

[Mark Bourgeois]

Phil

Thanks for the stats. Re out vs in, here's how the field did collectively:

Saturday
Out = -5
In = +31

Sunday
Out = +54
In = +66

Mark

PS (The field needed 47% more strokes to play the Out than the In on Thursday and 27% more on Friday.  The out has long been regarded as the tougher of the two nines; interesting to see the relationship reversed over the weekend.

PPS The entire field on Friday played the inward nine in +64!

[tlavin]

I have a friend who is a tour caddie and his analysis of a tough golf course is how many holes could cause a professional to think "F&^#, I could make double here."  There are a handful of golf courses in the U.S. that could boast of ten or more holes that could earn that fearful description.  Augusta National, before or after the changes, has at least a dozen holes like that.  Before the changes, admittedly, a pro could stand on a couple, maybe three holes, and have a thought of putting together an eagle to boost the round, but the golf course has always been a tough place to score because a lot of bad things can happen out there on a lot of holes.

[Chuck Brown]

Is it correct to understand that Augusta either doesn't contract with Shotlink, or doesn't allow publication of the data -- that all of the published driving distance info is based on two or four holes, the old-fashioned way?

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