Opinion & Analysis

Making the case for putting instruction

Published

11 years ago

Feb 25, 2013

For most golfers, the thrill of the game is hitting the ball high, far and straight. I would go so far as to say that some players would rather set their hair on fire than spend an hour on the putting green three days a week. But most avid players would also give up something important to break a major scoring barrier like shooting in the 80’s for the first time. For the majority of golfers, whose time is limited but who still hope to play the golf of their dreams, putting lessons and proper putting practice are without doubt the most efficient way to spend practice time.

I should tell you that I am a certified instructor with the SeeMore Putter Institute and therefore have an interest in promoting putting instruction. However, the reason I became a putting teacher was that as a tournament player I know how much value there is in working on that part of my game. I also know I can help my students improve and enjoy golf more through putting instruction and putter fittings because putting involves a shorter, less complicated motion that they can practice at home, the office and at a golf course. So, first I am going to discuss some statistics that show why putting is so important for great scoring and overall golf enjoyment. Then I’ll address why you should spend your precious time learning how to putt from a qualified instructor.

Avid golfers know that a scorecard treats putting with the same importance as the long game. On a regulation par-72, 18-hole golf course with four par 3 holes, four par 5’s, and ten par 4’s, the scorecard allocates as many strokes for putting as for full shots from the tee and fairway. Because most of us miss a significant number of greens per round, the average golfer generally takes 45 percent of his strokes on the green. However, putting tops the list as the skill that determines overall scoring performance.

The PGA Tour’s Strokes Gained-Putting statistic is great at showing just how important the flat stick is. Columbia University Business School Professor Mark Broadie created the method of gauging putting performance, which measures the putts a player takes from a certain distance relative to the PGA Tour average “taking into account the initial putt distance on each green.” So, if a player makes a 35-footer, and the PGA Tour average from that distance is 2.0 putts, then he picked up a putt on the field. The number of times the player either gains or loses a stroke to his competitors during a round determines his ranking.

In 2012, Brandt Snedeker led the strokes gained category with an average of 0.860 strokes over 81 rounds, meaning he gained almost an entire stroke on a field of the best players in the world every time he teed it up. He won the Farmers Insurance Open, the Tour Championship and the $10 million FedExCup race, which is a test of consistency over the entire season. Despite being short and crooked compared to the rest of the TOUR (ranking 108^th in driving distance, 106^th in driving accuracy, and 126^th in greens hit in regulation) Snedeker finished the season third on the money list behind only Tiger and Rory and won $4,989,739, and he’s off to an even better start in 2013. Luke Donald led the Strokes Gained-Putting category in 2011 on the way to topping the European Order of Merit and the PGA Tour money list titles. To those who say that golf has become strictly a “bomb and gouge” game, I say look at the numbers.

There is also a hidden message in these statistics that many folks who have spent time around golf already know. If two of the shorter hitters on TOUR were able to overcome that deficit with stellar putters, good putting must instill the type of confidence and grit no other part of one’s game can. The inverse is also true — strong ball striking and weak putting lead to the frustrated feeling that no matter how well a player hits the ball, he will never reach his full scoring potential.

Look at the number of wins and career money Boo Weekley, Kevin Sutherland, John Senden and Joe Durant have collected. These fine players have led or been near the top of the greens-in-regulation statistics for the past five years, but with all due respect, they would probably tell you that they wished they were better putters. The fact is that strong putting leads to the kind of good feelings that a player cannot get from hitting towering drives and laser-like approaches. Putting well reinforces that it is OK to take certain risks since a strong putter feels he can get up and down from 80 yards or from a tough lie on the short side of a green. Good putting controls momentum and confidence during a round of golf. Many golfers know this, but the vast majority of players do not do what is necessary to become consistently effective once they are on the green.

Putting a golf ball well is not an innate talent that some players are simply born with. Like other golf skills, putting takes some hand-eye coordination but it can be taught and improved with practice. Most players don’t really know where to start. Should the stroke be straight back and straight through, travel on an ellipsis, or from inside and then down the line? Like the full swing, there is so much conflicting information out there that it is hard for even a very good player to know what advice is best. If a player somehow finds the advice that is right, reading a book or magazine article does not guarantee that player is properly executing what he or she reads. We all need a qualified pair of eyes to give us feedback and guidance.

Enter the trained putting instructor

Compared to the general population of golf pros, trained putting teachers are rare. According to the PGA, only 6 percent of golf lessons include putting instruction and that does not mean the entire lesson was dedicated to putting. There are probably two reasons for this:

Most golfers choose to focus on the long game when they hire a teacher, and many golf pros just do not feel comfortable teaching putting.
To find a good teacher to help you with the most important part of your game, you will need to do a little research.

The SeeMore Putter Institute is a great place to start, but so are a number other great teachers who focus on the flat stick. Regardless of whom you learn from, the lessons and the practice should center around promoting pre-shot mental focus, and sound, neutral fundamentals — grip, alignment, posture and ball position — because that will facilitate repeatability in your stroke even with a limited practice schedule. If you work on these things for 20 minutes at home every other day and practice your putting for an hour once or twice a week on a putting green, I promise you will see long-term scoring dividends, and enjoy the game more.

Your Reaction?

LIKE6
LEGIT6
WOW4
LOL0
IDHT0
FLOP0
OB0
SHANK0

19th Hole

Vincenzi’s 2024 Zurich Classic of New Orleans betting preview

Published

4 days ago

Apr 22, 2024

Matt Vincenzi

The PGA TOUR heads to New Orleans to play the 2023 Zurich Classic of New Orleans. In a welcome change from the usual stroke play, the Zurich Classic is a team event. On Thursday and Saturday, the teams play best ball, and on Friday and Sunday the teams play alternate shot.

TPC Louisiana is a par 72 that measures 7,425 yards. The course features some short par 4s and plenty of water and bunkers, which makes for a lot of exciting risk/reward scenarios for competitors. Pete Dye designed the course in 2004 specifically for the Zurich Classic, although the event didn’t make its debut until 2007 because of Hurricane Katrina.

Coming off of the Masters and a signature event in consecutive weeks, the field this week is a step down, and understandably so. Many of the world’s top players will be using this time to rest after a busy stretch.

However, there are some interesting teams this season with some stars making surprise appearances in the team event. Some notable teams include Patrick Cantlay and Xander Schauffele, Rory McIlroy and Shane Lowry, Collin Morikawa and Kurt Kitayama, Will Zalatoris and Sahith Theegala as well as a few Canadian teams, Nick Taylor and Adam Hadwin and Taylor Pendrith and Corey Conners.

Past Winners at TPC Louisiana

2023: Riley/Hardy (-30)
2022: Cantlay/Schauffele (-29)
2021: Leishman/Smith (-20)
2019: Palmer/Rahm (-26)
2018: Horschel/Piercy (-22)
2017: Blixt/Smith (-27)

2024 Zurich Classic of New Orleans Picks

Tom Hoge/Maverick McNealy +2500 (DraftKings)

Tom Hoge is coming off of a solid T18 finish at the RBC Heritage and finished T13 at last year’s Zurich Classic alongside Harris English.

This season, Hoge is having one of his best years on Tour in terms of Strokes Gained: Approach. In his last 24 rounds, the only player to top him on the category is Scottie Scheffler. Hoge has been solid on Pete Dye designs, ranking 28th in the field over his past 36 rounds.

McNealy is also having a solid season. He’s finished T6 at the Waste Management Phoenix Open and T9 at the PLAYERS Championship. He recently started working with world renowned swing coach, Butch Harmon, and its seemingly paid dividends in 2024.

Keith Mitchell/Joel Dahmen +4000 (DraftKings)

Keith Mitchell is having a fantastic season, finishing in the top-20 of five of his past seven starts on Tour. Most recently, Mitchell finished T14 at the Valero Texas Open and gained a whopping 6.0 strokes off the tee. He finished 6th at last year’s Zurich Classic.

Joel Dahmen is having a resurgent year and has been dialed in with his irons. He also has a T11 finish at the PLAYERS Championship at TPC Sawgrass which is another Pete Dye track. With Mitchell’s length and Dahmen’s ability to put it close with his short irons, the Mitchell/Dahmen combination will be dangerous this week.

Taylor Moore/Matt NeSmith +6500 (DraftKings)

Taylor Moore has quickly developed into one of the more consistent players on Tour. He’s finished in the top-20 in three of his past four starts, including a very impressive showing at The Masters, finishing T20. He’s also finished T4 at this event in consecutive seasons alongside Matt NeSmith.

NeSmith isn’t having a great 2024, but has seemed to elevate his game in this format. He finished T26 at Pete Dye’s TPC Sawgrass, which gives the 30-year-old something to build off of. NeSmith is also a great putter on Bermudagrass, which could help elevate Moore’s ball striking prowess.

Your Reaction?

LIKE8
LEGIT3
WOW1
LOL1
IDHT0
FLOP3
OB1
SHANK2

19th Hole

Vincenzi’s 2024 LIV Adelaide betting preview: Cam Smith ready for big week down under

Published

4 days ago

Apr 22, 2024

Matt Vincenzi

After having four of the top twelve players on the leaderboard at The Masters, LIV Golf is set for their fifth event of the season: LIV Adelaide.

For both LIV fans and golf fans in Australia, LIV Adelaide is one of the most anticipated events of the year. With 35,000 people expected to attend each day of the tournament, the Grange Golf Club will be crawling with fans who are passionate about the sport of golf. The 12th hole, better known as “the watering hole”, is sure to have the rowdiest of the fans cheering after a long day of drinking some Leishman Lager.

The Grange Golf Club is a par-72 that measures 6,946 yards. The course features minimal resistance, as golfers went extremely low last season. In 2023, Talor Gooch shot consecutive rounds of 62 on Thursday and Friday, giving himself a gigantic cushion heading into championship Sunday. Things got tight for a while, but in the end, the Oklahoma State product was able to hold off The Crushers’ Anirban Lahiri for a three-shot victory.

The Four Aces won the team competition with the Range Goats finishing second.

*All Images Courtesy of LIV Golf*

Past Winners at LIV Adelaide

2023: Talor Gooch (-19)

Stat Leaders Through LIV Miami

Green in Regulation

Richard Bland
Jon Rahm
Paul Casey

Fairways Hit

Abraham Ancer
Graeme McDowell
Henrik Stenson

Driving Distance

Bryson DeChambeau
Joaquin Niemann
Dean Burmester

Putting

Cameron Smith
Louis Oosthuizen
Matt Jones

2024 LIV Adelaide Picks

Cameron Smith +1400 (DraftKings)

When I pulled up the odds for LIV Adelaide, I was more than a little surprised to see multiple golfers listed ahead of Cameron Smith on the betting board. A few starts ago, Cam finished runner-up at LIV Hong Kong, which is a golf course that absolutely suits his eye. Augusta National in another course that Smith could roll out of bed and finish in the top-ten at, and he did so two weeks ago at The Masters, finishing T6.

At Augusta, he gained strokes on the field on approach, off the tee (slightly), and of course, around the green and putting. Smith able to get in the mix at a major championship despite coming into the week feeling under the weather tells me that his game is once again rounding into form.

The Grange Golf Club is another course that undoubtedly suits the Australian. Smith is obviously incredibly comfortable playing in front of the Aussie faithful and has won three Australian PGA Championship’s. The course is very short and will allow Smith to play conservative off the tee, mitigating his most glaring weakness. With birdies available all over the golf course, there’s a chance the event turns into a putting contest, and there’s no one on the planet I’d rather have in one of those than Cam Smith.

Louis Oosthuizen +2200 (DraftKings)

Louis Oosthuizen has simply been one of the best players on LIV in the 2024 seas0n. The South African has finished in the top-10 on the LIV leaderboard in three of his five starts, with his best coming in Jeddah, where he finished T2. Perhaps more impressively, Oosthuizen finished T7 at LIV Miami, which took place at Doral’s “Blue Monster”, an absolutely massive golf course. Given that Louis is on the shorter side in terms of distance off the tee, his ability to play well in Miami shows how dialed he is with the irons this season.

In addition to the LIV finishes, Oosthuizen won back-to-back starts on the DP World Tour in December at the Alfred Dunhill Championship and the Mauritus Open. He also finished runner-up at the end of February in the International Series Oman. The 41-year-old has been one of the most consistent performers of 2024, regardless of tour.

For the season, Louis ranks 4th on LIV in birdies made, T9 in fairways hit and first in putting. He ranks 32nd in driving distance, but that won’t be an issue at this short course. Last season, he finished T11 at the event, but was in decent position going into the final round but fell back after shooting 70 while the rest of the field went low. This season, Oosthuizen comes into the event in peak form, and the course should be a perfect fit for his smooth swing and hot putter this week.

Your Reaction?

LIKE12
LEGIT3
WOW1
LOL1
IDHT0
FLOP1
OB1
SHANK1

Opinion & Analysis

The Wedge Guy: What really makes a wedge work? Part 1

Published

1 week ago

Apr 18, 2024

Terry Koehler

Of all the clubs in our bags, wedges are almost always the simplest in construction and, therefore, the easiest to analyze what might make one work differently from another if you know what to look for.

Wedges are a lot less mysterious than drivers, of course, as the major brands are working with a lot of “pixie dust” inside these modern marvels. That’s carrying over more to irons now, with so many new models featuring internal multi-material technologies, and almost all of them having a “badge” or insert in the back to allow more complex graphics while hiding the actual distribution of mass.

But when it comes to wedges, most on the market today are still single pieces of molded steel, either cast or forged into that shape. So, if you look closely at where the mass is distributed, it’s pretty clear how that wedge is going to perform.

To start, because of their wider soles, the majority of the mass of almost any wedge is along the bottom third of the clubhead. So, the best wedge shots are always those hit between the 2nd and 5th grooves so that more mass is directly behind that impact. Elite tour professionals practice incessantly to learn to do that consistently, wearing out a spot about the size of a penny right there. If impact moves higher than that, the face is dramatically thinner, so smash factor is compromised significantly, which reduces the overall distance the ball will fly.

Every one of us, tour players included, knows that maddening shot that we feel a bit high on the face and it doesn’t go anywhere, it’s not your fault.

If your wedges show a wear pattern the size of a silver dollar, and centered above the 3rd or 4th groove, you are not getting anywhere near the same performance from shot to shot. Robot testing proves impact even two to three grooves higher in the face can cause distance loss of up to 35 to 55 feet with modern ‘tour design’ wedges.

In addition, as impact moves above the center of mass, the golf club principle of gear effect causes the ball to fly higher with less spin. Think of modern drivers for a minute. The “holy grail” of driving is high launch and low spin, and the driver engineers are pulling out all stops to get the mass as low in the clubhead as possible to optimize this combination.

Where is all the mass in your wedges? Low. So, disregarding the higher lofts, wedges “want” to launch the ball high with low spin – exactly the opposite of what good wedge play requires penetrating ball flight with high spin.

While almost all major brand wedges have begun putting a tiny bit more thickness in the top portion of the clubhead, conventional and modern ‘tour design’ wedges perform pretty much like they always have. Elite players learn to hit those crisp, spinny penetrating wedge shots by spending lots of practice time learning to consistently make contact low in the face.

So, what about grooves and face texture?

Grooves on any club can only do so much, and no one has any material advantage here. The USGA tightly defines what we manufacturers can do with grooves and face texture, and modern manufacturing techniques allow all of us to push those limits ever closer. And we all do. End of story.

Then there’s the topic of bounce and grinds, the most complex and confusing part of the wedge formula. Many top brands offer a complex array of sole configurations, all of them admittedly specialized to a particular kind of lie or turf conditions, and/or a particular divot pattern.

But if you don’t play the same turf all the time, and make the same size divot on every swing, how would you ever figure this out?

The only way is to take any wedge you are considering and play it a few rounds, hitting all the shots you face and observing the results. There’s simply no other way.

So, hopefully this will inspire a lively conversation in our comments section, and I’ll chime in to answer any questions you might have.

And next week, I’ll dive into the rest of the wedge formula. Yes, shafts, grips and specifications are essential, too.

Your Reaction?