Phil on Strategy

[Jeff_Brauer]

http://thesportsdaily.com/the-sports-daily/phil-mickelson-opens-up-about-approach-to-shot-selection-video/


Not sure anyone saw this, so I post.  Strategy is more numbers and less feel all the time. 

[BCowan]

His 2 choices he gave for 13 at ANGC was hilarious.  More loft is bad on pine needles so he went for broke.  How about option 3 Phil taking a 5 iron and punching out down the fairway instead of lofted iron punch out.  2nd guessing a shot he pulled off takes knowledge and takes courage because the shot was successful. 

[Ed Homsey]

I have not been a great fan of Phil's.  But, after watching his interview with Flaherty, I'm re-evaluating my opinion of him.

I was impressed by the numerous variables involved in each shot selection. None seemed to involve golf course architecture.  There is not enough room here to list all of the variables that he, and his caddy, take into account for a shot.  Impressive.  Will be interesting to watch folks second-guess his choices.  Second-guess Phil?  Perhaps on some of his "high-risk" shots that failed.  But, seems to me that he takes into account every possible variable. 

[Steve Lang]

    1500 balls a month practice with 9 iron (50 per day)... i wonder how many with the other clubs?


I like Phil, but i have to think that integrating all the physical shot variables should be basic intuitive stuff for a pro/caddy combo package like Phil & Bones, with the chat the we hear just used for going through routine checks...  it seemed more like pro-am sharing stuff than profound info.


I thought Feherty was going to say something like, "I guess that's why I didn't make more money as a pro!" 


If the caddy does the course analyses, do the pros really have to think of gca issues on their full shots?  With the short game issues its surely what you see and can imagine and translate through the hand/ball contact dominating.

[Martin Lehmann]

Not sure what to think of this. I was lucky enough to witness Severiano Ballesteros playing a round of golf from very close by twice. It was all about feel, instinct and touch. He played the golf course and not numbers. I still prefer that over the accountant like approach of Phil Mickelson and many other modern players.

[Neil Regan]

  ... I was lucky enough to witness Severiano Ballesteros playing a round of golf from very close by twice. It was all about feel, instinct and touch. He played the golf course and not numbers. ...

I watched Seve at Westchester one year when he won in a playoff against Norman, Frost, and Green, iirc.
To get into the playoff, he needed a birdie on the par 5 18th.
I was standing nearby as he had a vehement argument with his caddie (I think it was his brother.)
Seve wanted to try for the green in 2 from thick rough just off the fairway.
They argued, he lost, he wedged out.
Then I watched as he counted his steps all the way to the spot on the putting surface where he wanted to be.
Then he counted his steps back to his ball.


I think he was playing numbers.


(He hit the ball where he planned, made the putt, and won the playoff with a birdie after a magnificent bunker shot stiff from an ugly stance after driving his tee shot into the greenfront bunker.)

[A.G._Crockett]

When I watched that explanation by Mickelson, I had two immediate impressions:

1. Feherty was stunned into speechlessness; no mean feat.

2. Mickelson made good use of the time that has passed to come up with that explanation.  I've never heard anybody say anything even remotely similar; leave it to Phil.

But by far the funniest segment in the first part of the interview was when Feherty asked him about hitting spectators, to which Mickelson replied that if you stand in the left rough 280 to 320 out while he's hitting a tee shot, you have nobody to blame but yourself if you get hit.

Mickelson is a fascinating person, at least to me.  Nobody at that level has ever done as much weird stuff, and nobody has ever exhibited more grace in the face of self-induced failure.  After all these years, I still don't know what to make of him, but it never gets old watching him careen through the world of golf.

[Tom_Doak]

I was telling Andy Johnson on his podcast that one of my highlights in golf was to twice walk with Ben Crenshaw in practice rounds that he played with Seve.  His feel for little shots around the green was amazing ... but Neil is right, he also paid attention to exactly how far he had to hit those little shots.  I think that many players who are all about yardages from 189 yards out forget to do that in the short game, where it is more likely to pay off.


Also, as Steve Lang reports, I think many Tour players DO rely on their caddies to figure out the course architecturally.  Before the Kiwi Challenge at Cape Kidnappers, I had breakfast with Adam Scott's caddie at the time, Tony Navarro ... who was Ben Crenshaw's caddie back when I used to follow him around.  Tony had scouted the course for Adam, so I was asking him how they'd play certain holes, and I had more questions for him than he had for me.

[Brad Tufts]

I've always liked him.  I haven't  had the chance to watch the full Feherty episodes, but I've caught snippets.  The David Toms story was hilarious...Phil just couldn't understand why DT wouldn't just will the ball into the hole like he does....it was like Toms was from another planet.

I always think of how his career (and Ernie's too) would look if there had been no Tiger...but of course there was a Tiger, so many of Phil/Ernie's career achievements are a response to the "what can you do" aspect of competing with Tiger in his prime.

Bottom line, Phil is must-watch whether he is playing good or bad...you'll always see him do something that even a good amateur player can't comprehend.  When he's on, he loves playing the showman, and when he's off, it's like watching a diving plane on fire...can he land it somehow?  Will it crash?

I went back and watched his match v. Sergio in the Ryder Cup a few months ago, and the ability to turn it on like that is unreal, especially when most career primes these days are 20-30 and he's 46.  Sergio shot 63, and it wasn't enough!

I've always thought Phil was refreshing in that he owns all his results, shot by shot, tourney by tourney...and he knows how much pressure is on when in contention, and revels in it win or lose.  He's one of those guys who would lose a tough one and say "But how fun was that though?" 

I've always been glad he has won a few majors, as a guy with this kind of attitude and love for his sport deserves it.   

[Jim Tang]

My impression of Phil has always been that he loves competing and has more fun out on the course than just about anyone else.

[Erik J. Barzeski]

Not sure what to think of this. I was lucky enough to witness Severiano Ballesteros playing a round of golf from very close by twice. It was all about feel, instinct and touch. He played the golf course and not numbers. I still prefer that over the accountant like approach of Phil Mickelson and many other modern players.

I think that, whether he was conscious of it or not, he was doing many of the same things as Phil expressed in that interview. Reading the lie, the wind, the temperature, the way the grass was laying, how accessible the pin is, all that stuff.

Some players are a little bit more "intuitive" about it, but I think all good players factor that stuff in.

I once read a story about Phil being upset about getting a mudball in college. Maybe he asked his opponent if his ball was embedded so he could clean it or something. The opponent said no, and so it ticked Phil off, and he hit a huge hook into kick-in range and tapped in for birdie, and the opponent's coach said "Look, if Phil Mickelson wants relief, you give him relief." Or something to that effect. That whole story is from memory, but I think I got the gist of it. If you add the words "Manny Zerman" to the search in Google you'll find the same stories I just found. The one I just read said he holed the shot, not hit it to kick-in range.

[Steve Lang]

   Speaking of Phil and mud balls, i seem to remember him once describing how a ball with mud on it's side would react... "mud on right, ball would go left" I believe.. but most fun I ever saw in person was him stymied on a bunker face at The Memorial, doing that full undercutting swing and sending it backwards back into play..  how can you not like that?

[Tom Allen]

Another thing Phil has going for him is that he is so generous with his time.  He will hang around after a round and sign autographs, and enjoy doing it.  He's kind of like Rickie Fowler and Arnold Palmer in that regard.

[Garland Bayley]

...But by far the funniest segment in the first part of the interview was when Feherty asked him about hitting spectators, to which Mickelson replied that if you stand in the left rough 280 to 320 out while he's hitting a tee shot, you have nobody to blame but yourself if you get hit.
...

I have never understood why people stand there. Very hard to see the ball coming off the tee. I choose 150, where I can see the ball start, follow it in the air, and watch it land. Plus, the ball never endangers me.

[Jim_Coleman]

FIGJAM

[Mike Nuzzo]

Jeff
I disagree.

That interview looked like Phil's resultant shots are more feel with a keen awareness of his numbers.
He doesn't look at his lie and compute variance yardage for moisture, time of day, grain direction, temperature, stance, loft, elevation... then add them all up (+1, -2, +.5, -2.5, +1, +0, -.5) and figure out the net distance...
He looks at his lie, his caddie says he's 148 out from his target and he knows based on all his inputs it is a _____ type of shot.


Seve can know the yardage and still execute based on feel/judgement.


some do assume because I have an aerospace engineering degree I must be very calculated, especially with my design work
so while I may be aware of the elements and principles you describe (here on GCA like drainage, green slopes...), they don't calculate to an answer, they help to form my opinion, then the design can head in any direction I feel is worthy - sometimes in the opposite direction. na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na


cheers

[Steve Lang]

  Mike,


Kinda like picking  v-neck or crew neck sweater for that walk in the park, eh?

[Jeff_Brauer]

Mike,


Of course you would.....I would need a sense of your tone of voice on that last line to process what you are trying to tell me, though.


In any event, not a scientist, but when I hear words like precise, process, etc., they all suggest some pretty hard math. And, perhaps oddly enough, with much less precision than Phil, I sort of do that +10, -3, etc. when I select my clubs.  (however, always favoring the longer club, because I know my chances of pure contact are slim)


The other math term I didn't hear from Phil was "angles." I gather that once you are sure of your distance to within a few yards, why not aim at the pin?


For that matter, I agree with you that it is probably somewhere in between pure math and some intuition.  I don't think they can measure exact wind speed, for instance.  And, perception.  When I read Pelz short game bible, which isn't as precise as Phil, I thought to myself, I would have titled it "There is no such thing as feel."


BTW, I spent one morning at the 1995 Ryder Cup following Seve, who was benched in those sessions, through a practice round trying to recover his swing.  It would be interesting if he had ever documented some of his thoughts on how he approached the short game.  My guess is he thought about like Phil, but did rely on more intuition as well. Not sure if there are two separate approaches, or if a sign of the times.  The data driven golf game has taken quantum leaps since JN measured golf courses precisely.  For that matter, it might be interesting to hear Jack opine on how deeply he delved into that info his caddies gathered?


Or, hear from a pro who relies on his caddy to think it out.  I would guess those types prefer to be a machine with no thought, trust the number and make the swing types, but who knows?

[Mike Nuzzo]

if you are authentically asking about my tone in the last sentencena-na-na-na-na-na is in the tone of Chevy Chase from Caddyshack
cheers

[Tim Gavrich]

I think both Phil and Seve are/were performing the same general sorts of calculations when calibrating how far a given shot "plays" vs. the raw distance they understand it to be. It's just that there are differeny mythologies constructed around both men.


The notion that Phil's analysis somehow makes him less creative, or somehow constitutes a less soulful form of golf (and therefore that Seve "playing by feel" makes his approach to golf superior), could not be more ridiculous.

[Jeff_Brauer]

Tim,


I agree.  While many here harp on creativity and feel, in some romantic notion, it seems pretty clear to me that the way to build a more consistent game is to try to standardize the swing, adjusting only for effective carry or roll you might expect.


Between club distances?  Phil knows you lose 3 yards per inch of choke down on the grip.  Same swing, 1-2" choke down on the grip.  Much easier than swinging 94.7% of a full swing.  (I did note Phil says he has two swings, but no more!)


For that matter, I recall a Seve article on working the ball. IIRC, he used the same swing and simply adjusted his grip.  Maybe same swing and slightly open stance, too, for a bigger cut.  But, same swing is key.