Sam Burns won the Sanderson Farms Championship last week.
Not only was Burns in my top picks to win, but I was 9-5-2 in my singles matchups.
This week the Tour comes to Las Vegas for the Shriner's Childrens Open. Not sure why they dropped 'hospital' from the title...
Last week I discussed how The Sanderson Farms Championship is starting to grow on Tour veterans. The Shriner's Childrens Open is one of the more favorite Tour stops on Tour.
A large subset of the Tour lives in the Palm Beach/Jupiter Florida area, Orlando, Scottsdale, Sea Island Georgia and the Dallas area. But a growing number of players live in the Las Vegas area as it has a major airport, good winter weather and private clubs that will cater to their every need and basically leave them alone.
TPC Summerlin is a fair track and doesn't beat up their ego too much and since it's Vegas, there's a lot of big moneyed people with a lot of power and influence along with the high rollers. It's also endorsed by Justin Timberlake so it has the celebrity vibe going on as well.
As a course, it's very much about iron play, particularly from 150-175 yards. Players typically will hit 70%+ of the greens. And it's a good thing because it's one of the top-3 most difficult courses to get up-and-down from 10+ yards. It yields a lot of birdies, but a mistake by missing a green puts the player at high risk of making bogey or worse.
Having said all of that, in recent years it has favored some of the more 'all-around' players on Tour like Webb Simpson and Martin Laird. The data leads to the winner being an all around player who has the best week on Tour from 150-200 yards.
3JACK'S FAVORITES
Viktor Hovland +2,000
Abraham Ancer +2,200
Brooks Koepka +2,200
Hideki Matsuyama +2,500
Paul Casey +3,300
3JACK'S DARK HORSE PICKS
Joaquin Niemann +4,000
Russell Henley +6,600
Emiliano Grillo +10,000
Joel Dahmen +15,000
Doug Ghim +15,000
Since there are so many tournament matchups for this event, I put them into Google Sheets. You can access them by following this link:
After a move, dealing with virtigo, a job change and some other stuff going on I took some time away from the blog this past season. Now with the 2021-2022 season coming upon us I thought I would re-start the What To Look For posts on the blog with the new feature at looking at the head-to-head matchups features on the bovada.lv Web site.
I have grown to get excited about the Sanderson Farms Championship because it's becoming a tournament where veteran players can save their careers and young players can start their careers.
The Sanderson Farms Championship is played att Jackson CC. Most players I've talked to think the course is just fine. It's a heavy ballstriking course, particularly from the Red Zone (175-225 yards). Last year, Sergio Garcia came away the victor:
Projected Winning Score: -19
3JACK'S FAVORITES
Sam Burns +1,600
Will Zalatoris +1,800
Sungjae Im +2,000
Sergio Garcia +2,000
Corey Conners +2,200
Charley Hoffman +2,800
Keegan Bradley +3,30
3JACK'S DARK HORSE PICKS
Carlos Ortiz +5,000
Luke List +8,000
TOURNAMENT MATCHUPS
Matchups in the images below. Lowest score for tournament wins. The odds are below each player's name.
Players highlighted in yellow are projected winners. Players highlighted in turquoise are heavy projected winners. Click on image to ENLARGE
And client Joel Dahmen got his first PGA Tour victory at Corales Puntacana.
A big congratulations to Joel and his team including teacher Rob Rashell for all of their hard work and dedication and making my job very easy. I look forward to continued success and more victories.
If you're a Tour player or Tour caddie and would be interested in my statistical services please e-mail me at progolfsynopsis@yahoo.com
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This week the Tour comes to San Antonio for the Texas Valero Open at TPC San Antonio.
TPC San Antonio has been very good to me as in 2019 I had Corey Conners as one of my picks to win at 150/1 odds. Then the previous year in 2018 I had Andrew Landry, also at 150/1 odds, as one of my picks to win the event. I've also had a few clients that have continually performed well at TPC San Antonio.
It's generally a fairly difficult course because of the wind. Outside of my clients performing well there it's not that well received as a course because of some quirky design features and sometimes the wind and design are not properly matched up. It's a Pete Dye design and while I don't hate Dye designs I always thought his biggest weakness was creating designs that matched up to typical weather patterns.
But this is very much a ballstriker's course. Driving has an impact here, but it's more about accuracy, particularly avoiding waste areas, than hitting it long. From there it's a lot of long iron and short wedge play.
Thomas was 44th on my list of projected winners. He has not played up to his standards this year with struggles off the tee and from the Red Zone which is unusual for him. However he got back to his old ballstriking self on the weekend and came away with the victory.
Meanwhile...as the Bryson watch continues...DeChambeau showed some real skill this week on a course that usually neutralizes long hitters. This was a display of Bryson being patient and utilizing the best strategy for the course by laying up off the tee and taking his chances that he could hit his layup clubs as far as the field average, but much more accurately and then take advantage on the holes he could use the driver.
***
This week the Tour comes back to Palm Beach Gardens for the Honda Classic
PGA National is one of the more well known courses on Tour due to the famous 'Bear Trap' nickname for the holes on the back nine and it is open to the public. Having said that, most Tour players I've talked to are not a big fan of the course due to the difficulty.
It's generally a tournament that players get into because the Palm Beach/Jupiter area is a popular residence for Tour players. They can spend Monday and Tuesday working on their games at their home courses like The Bears Club, Old Marsh, The Dye Preserve, etc. and then play the pro-am on Wednesday. It's also a good sized purse with a good fan turnout.
This is primarily a long iron course. Even driving the ball well does not gain a lot of strokes compared to long iron play.
The final critical hole is the par-3 17th hole.
The difficult part to this design is the green shape is diagonal sloped to the right. For right handed golfers the natural shot dispersion is to miss short on shots that miss to the right and long on shots that miss to the left. The short right miss is the most common miss for righties and that plays
The hole can play from 148 yards to 178 yards. If the pin is back right, the players will need to be around 122-126 mph ball speed with ~8,500 rpm of spin. Typically the issue is they don't generate enough spin on this hole while keeping the face fairly square to the path. That means the ball will either fly further than they needed or they are hitting open face flares that end up in the drink.
Bryson DeChambeau wins the Arnold Palmer Invitational at Bay Hill:
DeChambeau was one of my picks to win as he was at 12/1 odds for the week. I also got the winning score correct. I was at Bay Hill on Friday and got to see DeChambeau tee off on the famous 6th hole. There were about 5 rows deep at this hole alone despite the course being far less busy due to COVID restrictions. For years I wanted to see a player with Long Driving Distance speed and carry to play Bay Hill because of some many of the doglegs but instead they would put those players like Sadlowski at more restrictive courses like Colonial CC. Here we got to see a close facsimile and it made for a fun and exciting tournament.
Westwood was 21st on my list of projected winners which was higher than I expected and he came so close to winning. The weather conditions started to hurt Bryson on Friday as the course started to firm up, but the Saturday rain with the wind shifted the advantage back to Bryson and he won. And really the shot of the tournament was probably the approach shot on #18 from the right rough. That area is D-E-A-D. There were 93 approach shots coming from the right rough on 18 in the event and only 13 of them found the green. On Saturday, 14 shots came from the right rough and only 1 other player (Patrick Rodgers to 32-feet) found the green. DeChambeau hit his approach to 18'9".
***
This week the Tour comes to the '5th Major' for The PLAYERS Championship at TPC Sawgrass. I remember it was this time last year that it appeared that COVID-19 was going to be a problem and I went to the Wednesday practice round to work with some clients and they ended up playing the first round anyway, without any fans. Tommy Fleetwood recorded an ace on the famous 17th hole in the practice round. I also remember many players being pissed that they were going to play the tournament while the NBA had decided to shut down.
Anyway, last week I discussed how weather conditions can affect what type of advantage long hitters have vs. short but accurate hitters. And it played out precisely as I discussed with Bryson gaining the advantage when the course softened up from the Saturday rain and the wind picked up.
This week I wanted to discuss how course design can play towards helping long hitters vs. short but accurate drivers of the ball. This is because Sawgrass is probably the best course on Tour in negating the advantage that long, but inaccurate players can have on the course.
If a designer wants to take out the advantage long hitters have on the course they need to take away where the long hitters have the advantage.
1. Wide open fairways, particularly on straight away holes
2. Don't allow for players to carry it over the dogleg (as we saw the advantage Bryson and Rory had on the par-5 6th hole at Bay Hill.
3. Lengthen the rough on the par-5's (nobody on Tour likes hitting a 3-wood or long club from the rough).
TPC Sawgrass features 7 dogleg lefts and 7 dogleg right holes. And Pete Dye took away players cutting over the doglegs by either building tall enough trees or by having water too close by with a more obtuse dogleg angle.
Thus long hitters are not getting to use their length to their advantage. They are either relegated to laying up off the tee on many holes or they have to hit driver too close to the water for comfort.
The rest of Sawgrass is mostly about longer iron play and short wedge shots. The 17th hole gets all of the attention and for good reason as it has increased its importance in the tournament over the years. But the par-3 that plays a larger role in the event will be the 13th
(Click to Enlarge)
This is generally not a difficult hole when the pin location is left, but when it is a front pin location or back right it is very difficult to get the ball close and very difficult to putt to.
Collin Morikawa wins the WGC Workday Championship at The Concession Golf Club:
I didn't release picks for the Workday since the Tour had never played there. But it appeared to be a very heavy approach shot course (I have yet to run the numbers) which is typical for a Nicklaus design. It also appeared to feature lots of opportunities to make triple bogey or worse.
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This week the Tour comes to Bay Hill for the Arnold Palmer Invitational.
The API is my favorite non-major of the year. Not only due to it being my 'home tournament' (it's less than 1 mile from my home golf club), but it's the fan friendliest event I've ever been to. It's a fairly easy course to walk, they have bleacher seating right behind the driving range (some of the seating is indoors with A/C), the fans can get right close to the players on the putting green and the parking is pretty good.
For the practice rounds and pro-am, one can park for free just off the 6th hole. During the event they prefer you park at Universal Studios and take a shuttle over, although I recommend parking at one of the strip malls and taking an Uber of Lyft over.
But Bay Hill is just a good, solid golf course with some beautiful holes and it closes out well with a eagle-able par-5 16th hole, perhaps the best par-3 on Tour (sans majors) in the 17th hole and then the beautiful 18th hole where so many iconic moments have happened.
And it's pretty much a course with 'standard' PGA Tour features. That's why the weather often dictates the winner.
A lot of readers ask me what type of conditions and designs favor long hitters vs. short hitters and how to curb long, but reckless drivers have on a golf course.
The answer is basically in the math...
In order to favor the shorter, but more accurate hitter one needs to reduce the standard deviation in driving distance and increase the standard deviation in fairways hit. I will go into design features next week at Sawgrass that can cause that to happen. But for Bay Hill we'll talk about the weather. Because Bay Hills has about average length of a Tour course and average width fairways and about average length rough...when it gets dry the course actually favors the shorter, but more accurate hitters. The longer hitters have to lay-up more in order to find the fairway and still have issue doing that. That lowers the standard deviation in driving distance while the standard deviation in fairways hit increases.
But when the opposite happens...the course playing soft...it favors the longer hitters. Mainly because it's easier to find the fairways and with the doglegs (there's essentially 9 doglegs on the course) the longer hitters gain a sizable distance advantage due to geometry.
Here's a look at the weather for this week (click to enlarge)
So this could be very odd. It's been very dry and hot by Orlando standards for the past 12 months. My home club is dry, but not at the 'crusty' stage, yet. A lot of it depends on the rain on Saturday. But my predictions is the scores will be a little higher and in the end the course will favor the longer hitters on Sunday.
Speaking of longer hitters, it could be interesting to see how Bryson DeChambeau plays the course. Particularly the par-5 6th hole which doglegs around the water and plays to 590 yards according to the scorecard.
However, it's 'only' 345 yards of carry from the tee to the front fringe.
A couple of years ago I saw Cameron Champ attempt it over in a practice round, but didn't really come close due to his low launch, low apex height ball flight pattern. Bryson hits the ball much higher than Champ and if the wind is right and the stars align, he could reach this green in 1 shot and be putting for an albatross.
My prediction is that if the wind isn't a factor, he'll play more to roughly 320 yards carry and put himself roughly 70 yards to the front edge of the green. However, that will still given him nearly a 160 yard advantage to what would be considered a 'very good' drive and more like 180 yards advantage over an 'average' drive for the field.
Other than that, Bay Hill is a mid-to-long iron play course. If it gets crusty out there, then shots from 10-20 yards become more important because there is some legitimate difficult on those shots at Bay Hill.
Most of the Tour players I've talked to really enjoy Bay Hill. Some don't like it when it gets wet there because it can play ultra soft at times as holes #2, #3, #6, #7, #8 and #11 all sit in a bowl. But the greens have been some of the best on Tour over the last 5 years since they switched to TifEagle and there's always a good turnout of fans. Prior to Covid-19, it was also a very festive atmosphere in the houses surrounding the course.
Berger was at 14/1 odds to win and his victory marks my first projected winner of 2021, after very close weeks at Waialae, Palm Springs, Torrey Pines and Scottsdale. A few years ago Berger was one of my 'Players on the Rise' in my annual GolfWRX column, but had an unimpressive season. It appears that he's finally starting to rise to the projections I had for him.
***
This week the Tour heads to Riviera CC in Pacific Palisades for the Genesis Open.
This is one of my favorite events on Tour and some year I would like to head out there for the week for the event. The LA area is a haven for incredible private clubs like Riviera, Bel-Air, Wilshire, Sherwood, etc. and the Pacific Palisades area was recently rated the best place to live in Los Angeles.
It also marks the end of tournaments played on different courses which means better television coverage and less of a hassle for statisticians like myself. And another biggie is that traditionally performance at Riviera correlates to performance at the Masters as it's a heavy Red Zone play course that can be difficult to avoid 3-putts on.
This course is considered one of the best on Tour by the Tour players. The only thing they don't like about the event is the heavy traffic, but with COVID-19 I'm guessing the traffic will be much better.
As I mentioned earlier, this is very much a Red Zone course. A significant amount of strokes can be gained off the tee by the more effective drivers on Tour who are long off the tee. Effective drivers on Tour that do it thru driving accuracy are not likely to gain many strokes off the tee.
The 18th is the last critical hole on the course, but the 10th hole will be the most notorious hole.
The play on this hole should be to hit driver regardless of pin location. The target is just left of the green. However, the pin locations do play a major role in how this hole plays.
The middle pin location (#2) and the back pin locations (#1 and #4) will likely play to over par for the event. For players that miss the green off the tee to the left, if they don't feel comfortable with a flop shot over the bunker to pin locations #1, #2 and #4 they should just chip to the front-center of the green, 2-putt and make par and go to the 11th hole and still gain some strokes on the field.
The problem became about 6 years ago when Riviera's greens were about as receptive as my driveway. This made the hole play completely different because even trying to chip a ball 20 yards to the front-center of the green was difficult and hitting a flop from the rough to pin locations #1 and #4 was impossible. In that scenario, players were better off laying up off the tee to locations #1 and #4.
In that scenario they wanted a target that is at the left corner of the left fairway bunker and to hit a shot that is 225-240 yards.
This is what the golfers that lay-up on #10 should be trying to do. However, unless the pin locations are at the back-right and the greens are cement hard, the best play is to 'go broadway' and hit driver.
The Tour comes to Pebble Beach for the ATT Classic:
Due to COVID-19, the Pro-Am will not take place and the event will be played at only Pebble Beach Golf Links and the Spyglass Hill Golf Course.
Like many of the multiple course events, the predictive values are a bit low here. Generally the Tour pros I have talked to like Pebble Beach, but the weather, the schedule and the Pro-Am are not to the liking of a lot of players. Playing 6+ hour rounds and catching a cold before you hit bigger purse events like Riviera, the Honda Classic, etc. is not appealing. However, the course has really improved its conditions over the past 5 years and the greens have been much improved. Typically Pebble has the lowest make percentages on the greens on Tour, but now it's progessing towards the mean.
Pebble is a shining example of old golf course design theories with the greens being roughly half the size of modern course green complexes with most of the greens having some tilt from front to back which penalizes approach shots that miss long or to the side and very undulated greens with slower green speeds.
It's more of a mid-iron and putting course, although Dustin Johnson has destroyed the course thru superior driving and he just 'gets' the course. But he's not playing this week as he withdrew for the event.
The final critical hole is the classic 18th hole.
This was designated the toughest driving hole on the course last year. Tee shots on average were only traveling 266 yards. Most golfers will try to put the tee shot left of the trees on the right side of the fairway.
It also ranked as the most difficult green to putt on the course.
At one point I had picks of Ortiz (125/1), Im (40/1), Hovland (25/1), Finau (18/1), Schauffel (12/1) and Rahm (7/1) all in contention on the weekend. Reed was ranked 38th on my list of likely to win. He has not had an impressive season thus far, hamstrung by awful Yellow Zone (125-175 yards) play (191st) and has been a so-so Red Zone (175-225 yards) player (122nd) along with decent driving off the tee (99th in Driving Effectiveness). But he putted lights out at Palm Springs despite missing the cut and one has to give the guy credit...Reed has an incredible amount of faith in himself as he can play poorly for long stretches at a time and then suddenly catch fire and look like the best player on the planet.
This week the Tour heads to Scottsdale for the Waste Management Phoenix Open.
The Phoenix Open started in 1932 and is mainly known for the 16th hole which is a rather non-descript golf hole, but is one of the most famous holes on the Tour. What started off as a lovefest of golf and booze from Arizona residents turned into a must-go social event in the area with 'stadium golf.' In many ways, I think this prompted the invention of Top Golf and the Golf Shack, massive driving range centers that feature food, alcohol, games and a stadium golf atmosphere.
The course was re-designed in 2014 by Tom Weiskopf. Most of the players I've talked to generally dislike the course and the re-design didn't help matters any. The re-design made the fairways narrower and implemented some waste areas that are in odd positions that are not to the players' liking. However, the re-design gave players who are not bombers a chance to win there as the old design was becoming almost exclusively a bomber's track. Many of the bombers are not playing here due to playing the Saudi International which features exorbitant appearance fees that are too much money for most players to turn down.
TPC Scottsdale is more of a ballstriker's course now, requiring skilled driving, long iron play, and precision on the par-5's is where most of the strokes will be lost/gained. The final critical hole is the 18th.
The 18th is the final critical hole on the course. Most players use driver and have this line off the tee.
The data suggests that laying up with 3-wood is the better play because it takes the bunkers out of play and thus greatly eliminates double bogey or worse. The hole usually plays around 4.03-ish from a stroke average perspective. Players that lay-up off the tee are not likely to make birdie, but a 2-putt par should garner them some strokes on the field. In the end, it's a hole one should use driver if they feel they need a birdie or lay-up off the tee if par is sufficient.
Projected Winning Score: -17
3JACK'S FAVORITES
Jon Rahm +650
Xander Schauffele +1,000
Rory McIlroy +1,100
Bubba Watson +3,300
Will Zalatoris +3,300
Si-Woo Kim wins the American Express in Palm Springs:
Kim's victory was fitting given Palm Springs is one of the most unpredictable stops on Tour and Kim is one of the least predictable players on Tour. But this week the Tour goes to Southern California to play Torrey Pines.
Torrey Pines is another split course tournament where each player plays 1 round on the North Course and those that make the cut will play the final two rounds on the South Course. The South Course is where they play when they hold the US Open or PGA Championship at Torrey Pines. It is usually the longest course they play all year on Tour tipping out at 7,765 yards.
Torrey Pines is a municipal course where San Diego residents get to play for only $45. Non-resident fees change depending on time and season, but they usually go for around $230. On the weekends it is a first come, first serve booking basis.
Both courses feature narrow fairways. The field average for fairways hit will be around 50%. The North Course is much shorter and the green countours are a little flatter which makes for lower scoring. The green contours on the South Course are some of the hilliest of any on Tour and they aver slow. Typically the South Course will have the second loest make percentages on Tour next to Pebble Beach. But as Pebble Beach's greens have improved in recent years Torrey may end up having the lowest make percentages on Tour.
There has been some talk in recent months from Tour players, particularly Kevin Kisner, about how short hitters won't win at Torrey Pines. I think that's a bit of a misnomer given victories from shorter hitters like Brandt Snedeker and Ben Crane not too long ago. In fact, Rocco Mediate was 170th out of 197 golfers in driving distance in 2008 when he faced Tiger Woods in a playoff to win the US Open.
Certainly, distance helps here. And it helps a little more at Torrey Pines than say Bay Hill, but short hitters can win here...particularly if the course is playing tough. This is usually due to the green complexes favoring better putters which have a tendency to be shorter hitters
Nonetheless, from the Tour players I have talked to over the years it's a polarizing course. Many love the course and the backdrop of the ocean. The entire experience is pleasant as if you're coming from LA, once you get on I-5 South around San Clemente it's one of the most pleasant and beautiful driving experiences I've ever had in this county.
But others avoid Torrey Pines at all costs. They can't stand the length and the extreme green complexes with 24-yard wide fairways and there's not enough good views of the ocean for them to consider it a top course on Tour.
This course is usually won thru long iron play and quality driving. The final critical hole is the 18th a par-5.
The American Express tournament has a cut after 54-holes. Each player plays one round at La Quinta CC, one at the Jack Nicklaus Tournament course and then 1 round at the PGA West Stadium Course. Then the final round is played again at the PGA West Stadium Course.
This is usually the biggest birdie-fest on Tour. It's mainly due to the lack of length and very receptive greens. Usually the proximity to the cup on Yellow Zone shots is the shortest on Tour and the same with shots from 10-20 yards. But in general most strokes are lost and gained from the Yellow Zone here.
The problem is that it's such an easy layout of courses projecting winners or top finishers is extremely difficult.
Last week, Harris English won at Kapalua at 33/1 odds.
I had English ranked 8th most likely to win, but only selected 6 picks due to a limited field (really, I did :) )
This week the Tour heads to Waialae for the Sony Open
I've always been a fan of the Sony Open. Maybe it's my fascination of Hawaii, it being the first full field Tour event of the year or the unknown Tour pros that pop up and make money at the event, The Sony Open is one of my favorite events on Tour.
Waialae CC is a private club on the Eastern shore of Honolulu. It was built in 1927 with Seth Raynor as the architect.
Despite my love for The Sony Open, it's not a favorite of most Tour players. It's an expensive trip over to Hawaii and the purse size of $6.6 million is in line with the Sanderson Farms Classic. The course design is not all that well liked either. Typically, Waialae gets a few votes for 'worst course on Tour' by Tour players.
Raynor's designs usually feature a lot of lay-up tee shots and he has that at Waialae due to sharp turning doglegs.
A few years ago they widened the fairways a bit as Waialae would usually yield one of the lowest hit fairway percentages on Tour, usually less than 50%. However the field hit 65% of their fairways last year due to the widening of the fairways. This should likely help out the better drivers of the ball. Prior to the widening of the fairways, finding the fairway often boiled down to luck and the standard deviation in both driving distance and fairways hit was low. Now the deviation in hit fairways is slightly higher and that projects to help out the superior skilled drivers to a small degree.
Most of the shots gained/lost should come off the tee and on mid-range and short-wedge range shots.
The last Critical Hole on the course is the par-5 18th hole.
The 18th is the easiest driving hole on the course and should play well under par for the event (think of a scoring average ~4.3 strokes). And if a player can hit a tee shot of 290+ yards that finds the fairway, they are highly like to make at least birdie.
I suspect the target for most players on 18 will be on the right edge of the first left fairway bunker.
If the wind is in their face, they'll need to move the target to the right of the first left fairway bunker.
What makes this an easy driving hole is that typically it's playing with a tailwind off the shore from the east. The general shot dispersion for a Tour player has then hitting it further on misses to the left than to the right. So in this case shots that miss the target to the left play nicely into the dogleg and should carry the left fairway bunkers, easily.
The start of the 2021 year of PGA Tour golf comes to us with the Sentry Tournament of Champions at Kapalua Plantation in Hawaii.
Kapalua is on the northwest shore of the island of Maui and is owned by the publicly held corporation, The Maui Land & Pineapple Company.
They have two courses at Kapalua Resort...the Bay Course playing at 6,600 yards and the Plantation course playing at a par-73 at 7,500+ yards. The tournament is on the Plantation course and some of the longest drives all season will be hit here due to the hilly terrain and wide open fairways.
Most strokes will be gained and lost on long approaches and short 1/2-3/4 wedge shots. Expect about 70%+ of the GIR to be hit by the field, but if the wind picks up then some short game around the green shots will be a factor because it's a very difficult course to get up-and-down and there usually is a high standard deviation in scrambling percentage.
The course itself is generally well liked by the Tour pros, but not so much the caddies because it's so hilly. But it's a very limited field, big purse and no cut and you're in Maui...so who can complain?
It's tough to complain about views like this:
The final Critical Hole at Kapalua is the 360 yard 16th hole.
What makes the hole has such a large deviation in score is that it's a short hole, but the fairway is practically split in two with by the 3 fairway bunkers. This is where Bryson DeChambeau should have a large advantage as carrying those bunkers should be a piece of cake.
Sergio Garcia won the Sanderson Farms Championship
Sergio put in a dominating performance from tee to green. Here's how he ranked at Sanderson Farms (out of 144 players):
Driving Effectiveness: 2nd
Green Zone (75-125 yards): 12th
Yellow Zone (125-175 yards): 37th
Red Zone (175-225 yards): 15th
I feel these alternate field events should be considered by more full-time Tour players. It's a good way to take advantage of weaker fields and gain valuable FedEx points and at least get into a groove early into the season. And if you win, like Sergio did, you've solidified a spot at Kapalua which is usually a 30-man event which greatly increases your odds of finishing in the top-5 and there's no cut so it's an automatic pay day.
And this may make Sergio a good pick for the Masters in November.
***
This week the Tour heads back to Las Vegas and TPC Summerlin for the Shriners Hospital for Children Open:
The inaugural event occurred in 1983 as the Panasonic Las Vegas Pro Celebrity Classic which was won by Fuzzy Zoeller. It was a 90-hole event held at Las Vegas Country Club. Since then it moved to other venues but has stuck with TPC Summerlin since 2001.
TPC Summerlin is a private club designed by Bobby Weed. Weed has designed numerous courses in Florida and personally I've enjoyed his designs. Most of the players' opinions I've heard on the course are positive, but I'm sure that is partly due to many Tour players either residing in the Las Vegas area or in nearby Scottsdale. Las Vegas has become a common residence for Tour players in recent years because of the weather, lack of state income tax and the tremendous private courses and facilities offered to them.
The course plays to a par-71 for the tournament at 7,255 yards at 2,700 feet above sea level. Driving does have its importance here, but most strokes are gained and lost on mid-length approach shots. TPC Summerlin usually has the most difficult or one of the most difficult short game shots around the green on the entire Tour schedule.
The projected final Critical Hole on the course is the par-4, 442 yards, 12th hole.
There's not a lot to this hole other than approach shots can land in the water. The drive isn't even that difficult, but if a player finds the fairway bunker off the tee they can be looking at bogey/double bogey scenarios compared to a good drive down the middle that looks at birdie/par scenarios.
Hudson Swafford wins the Corales Puntacana Club & Resort Championship:
That makes for Swafford's 2nd career victory on Tour. Unfortunately, Corales Puntacana does not have ShotLink so we cannot further dissect his victory.
***
The Tour heads to it's second 'alternate field event' with the Sanderson Farms this week:
The Sanderson Farms Championship has been a tournament on Tour, under different names, since 1994. In 2014 the event moved to the Country Club of Jackson, a John Fought design.
Fought supposedly designed the course with a Donald Ross flavor to it. Ross designs are known for usually making the golfer use every club in their bag which calls for some lay-up tee shots. But most of the stress is on approach shots and short game around the green when the greens are missed.
The course gets decent, but nonplussed reviews from Tour players I've talked to. Statistically it does stress longer approach shots and tee shots. Since they started playing the event at CC Jackson the winners have been Nick Taylor, Peter Malnati, Cody Gribble, Ryan Armour, Cameron Champ and Sebastian Munoz. So the winner's of the event haven't exactly become premier Tour players, although Champ and Munoz show a lot of promise.
The final critical hole is the 331 yard par-4 15th hole.
This is a reachable driving hole. You will get a lot more players laying up off the tee in the first two rounds than one would expect, but the the play is to go for the green and the target should be the center section of the front left part of the green.
Bryson DeChambeau won the US Open with a dominating performance on Sunday:
Here's how my picks finished at the US Open:
3JACK'S FAVORITES
Dustin Johnson +800 (t-6th)
Jon Rahm +950 (t-23rd)
Justin Thomas +1,200 (t-8th)
Collin Morikawa +1,600 (MC)
Webb Simpson +2,500 (t-8th)
Daniel Berger +2,800 (t-34th)
Patrick Cantlay +2,800 (t-43rd)
3JACK'S DARK HORSE PICKS
Tony Finau +3,300 (t-8th)
Tyrrell Hatton +4,000 (MC)
Brian Harman +25,000 (t-38th)
A lot has been made out of DeChambeau only hitting 41% of the fairways, but that was actually higher than the field average. So when some people discuss that Bryson 'played the math correctly' the main factor was that he not only hit the ball further, but didn't lose anything to the field in terms of accuracy off the tee.
But where the math really played out in Bryson's favor had more to do with the typical penalty for missing the fairway at Winged Foot. Unlike a TPC Sawgrass or a Harbour Town where missing the fairway could result in a shot in the trees or a shot that ends up in a hazard, the penalty for missing the fairway at Winged Foot was very deep rough. But it was deep rough for anybody who missed the fairway and the field missed the fairway the majority of the time. Combine that with a low standard deviation in hit fairway percentage (meaning that there wasn't a large variance in fairways hit throughout the field), Winged Foot could favor long hitters if they could somehow manage to find only 19 fairways for the entire week.
When they missed the fairway, they were no more likely to take a 2-shot penalty than the shorter hitters in the field. And thus the longer hitters were gaining considerable strokes on the field when they found the fairway while losing minimal amount of strokes when missing the fairway.
I had Bryson as the 12th best pick for Winged Foot. He was hurt a bit by his short game around the green play and short game around the green was a factor at Winged Foot. Even for Bryson who may have had the best performance of his career around the green. But when he was hitting it so long and still finding more fairways than the average player in the field and putted well, he was using the Power-to-Putting Principle perfectly to a tee and it provided him with a great advantage. And since Bryson's biggest weakness is from 100-150 yards (188th last year) and Winged Foot didn't feature many of those shots the course very much played into his hands because he allowed it to do so.
***
The Tour is playing an alternate field event this week with the Corales Puntacana Resort & Club Championship in the Dominican Republic. Graeme McDowell won the event last year.
Corales Puntacana is a Tom Fazio design playing to 7,600+ yards for the tournament tees. I haven't heard a lot from the pros on how they feel about the course, but usually Fazio courses are well received. The other part of Fazio's designs is that he doesn't put himself in a box in terms of what he favors unlike other designers (Nicklaus stresses approach shots, Dye stresses the tee ball, Donald Ross stresses iron play and short game, etc).
The wind will likely play a major factor here and thus the course is about keeping the ball in play off the tee, hitting quality approach shots from long and short distance and because the average GIR % to winning score is low, there are plenty of important short game shots around the green.
The last critical hole on the course is 501 yard par-4 18th hole:
Most players in the field will play the hole like this off the tee:
A Bryson DeChambeau or Cameron Champ type could play it like this:
Of course, the direction of the wind will impact everything on that tee shot which is why it's the last critical hole on the course.
The US Open comes to September and the return of Winged Foot:
The club was founded in 1921, by a group largely made up of members of The New York Athletic Club, and opened in June 1923. Winged Foot's name and logo are taken directly from a sculpture in the lobby floor of the New York Athletic Club in Manhattan.[3]
Winged Foot was designed by AW Tillinghast and is just another masterpiece in his collection of designs. The West Course will play to 7,447 yards...but at a par-70.
The feedback I've received from the players is that they respect the course and it's a great course, but they wouldn't want to play it more than once a year due to the incredible difficulty. And the course conditions are not ridiculous either.
The big thing about the course as like Bethpage Black, the fairways are very narrow. They usually run about 67-70 feet wide. A typical PGA Tour stop will have most fairways at 84-90 feet wide and on the LPGA it's closer to 90-99 feet wide. Combine that with heavy rough that makes getting from tee-to-green very difficult.
But then you have the wicked greens which they renovated back in 2017 as shown in the video above. Making the +5 over par winning score in 2006 look very optimistic.
I get into debates with golfers on what courses and what conditions favor certain types of players. Typically, dry and firm courses favor short hitters and soft courses favor the long hitters. But, as with anything in life, there's always exceptions.
For instance this year Muirfield Village was so firm and fast, but it still favored long hitters. The reason being was that many of Muirfield Village's fairways were so wide that it was still easy for a long hitter to find the fairway either with the driver or laying-up. And then they could use their ability to produce more spin with longer approach shots to their advantage.
But the other part of the equation was that there were some holes at Muirfield Village that had such a low hit fairway percentage that finding the fairway off the tee was more luck than predictable skill. And thus even short, but accurate golfers were still finding the rough and thus the advantage went more to the longer hitter.
From gathering data at Winged Foot the course is more biased towards the latter scenario. One can benefit by having superior driving skill, but much of the time the ability to find the fairway will come down more to luck, particularly if the course gets firmer. If the course gets softer, then better drivers of the ball who do it thru accuracy, will be at the advantage.
Having said that, this is a 2nd and 3rd shot course. Lots of greens are likely to be missed and those that can avoid missing greens are at an advantage, but that advantage can be taken away if they cannot get up-and-down when they do miss greens. And my theory is that this even will likely be won by a player that is better than the tour average in Strokes Gained - Putting.
Putting is the least reliable metric when it comes to projecting a winner on Tour. But the courses where putting skill tends to carry over into tournament play are places like Pebble Beach and Torrey Pines...both very undulated green complexes just like Winged Foot.
The final Critical Hole will the the 498 yard par-4 16th hole, appropriately labeled 'Hells Bells':
It's a dogleg with a fairway about 72-feet wide with a tree on the left that helps block the green. Golfers are forced to hit driver for the most part.
Michael Thompson won the 3M Open at 125/1 odds last week:
This week the Tour returns to Memphis to play the most underrated course on Tour (according to Billy Horschel).
TPC Southwind is well respected by the players. It's a course that stresses versatility in the iron play and the ability to get up-and-down when greens are missed. The field usually averages around 60% of fairways hit and about 62% of greens in regulation hit.
The 18th hole is the final 'critical' hole of the course.
18 is an interesting hole because those that can hit a driver that finds the fairway will find the green about 80% of the time. But if you miss this fairway the GIR% drops to ~35%. And there's also water on the left that comes into play on both the tee shot and approach.
The data shows that the average player in the field should utilize a target that is about 2-3 yards left of the last fairway bunker.
What was interesting about The Memorial was that normally firm courses favor the shorter, but more accurate golfers. In this case, the longer hitters prevailed. Here's a look at the top-10 finishers and their ranking in Driving Distance with the Driver (adjusted for schedule - out of 227 golfers).
Jon Rahm (21st)
Ryan Palmer (71st)
Matthew Fitzpatrick (144th)
Matt Wallace (38th)
Jason Day (74th)
Mackenzie Hughes (86th)
Henrik Norlander (143rd)
Tony Finau (6th)
Kevin Na (174th)
Luke List (17th)
Patrick Reed (81st)
Xinjun Zhang (111th)
Typically the firmer courses favor the shorter, but more accurate golfers because they can find the fairways and reduce the variance in approach shot yards to the hole because the bombers now have to lay-up off the tee more often. And because the shorter, but more accurate golfer is now in the fairway they can use that to their advantage and generate more spin on their approach shots and get the ball to hold the green in regulation.
But at Memorial it was a different story due to the more generous landing areas off the tee at Muirfield Village. When the greens are firmer, it actually favors the longer hitter because they are likely generating far more spin than the shorter golfer. But that is *if* all things else being equal. Meaning, their lie and yardage being the same or closer to the same. If they are both hitting from the rough, firm greens favor the longer hitter. The same goes if they are both hitting from the fairway or tee box. It's just that when the greens are firm, typically so are the fairways. And the average Tour fairway is about 28 yards wide and thus the shorter, but more accurate golfer can create an advantage on firm courses because they have an advantageous lie compared to the longer, but less accurate golfer.
This past week at Muirfield Village, the tee shots either ended up being 1 of 2 types:
1. Generous landing areas that made the fairways very easy to find.
or
2. Nearly impossible fairways to find and finding the fairway was more about luck than skill.
Much like the 18th hole which only saw 27% of the field find the fairway on Sunday and 34% of the field found the fairway on all 4 rounds.
Thus the approach shots were 'more equal' and the firm greens started to favor the bombers. Even a player like Matthew Fitzpatrick who does not hit the driver very long, still generates 115 mph club speed. His lack of distance with the driver is more due to his steep attack angle, but he generates good ball speed and spin rates with his irons.
***
The Tour comes to Eden Prairie, MN at TPC Twin Cities for the 3M Championship. Last year Matthew Wolff won.
Unfortunately, there's only 1 tournament of data to use for TPC Twin Cities, but it appears that the course is about versatile ballstrikers. Many strokes are gained/lost off the tee and with long approach shots and short approach shots.
Since they only played TPC Twin Cities last year, I have not heard opinions from pros on the course. It's an Arnold Palmer design with help from Tom Lehman. I always found that Mr. Palmer was probably the most underrated designer in golf which is sort of an oxymoron given his worldwide popularity. The big thing that Palmer's designs usually feature is keeping the ball below the pin on approach shots.
This leads us to the last critical hole being the 596-yard, par-4 18th hole.
The fairway is about 80 yards wide, but it's still important to not hit the tee shot too far left because the player will have too long of a distance to reach the green in two shots.
Projected Winning Score: -22
3JACK'S FAVORITES
Dustin Johnson +1,100
Brooks Koepka +1,400
Paul Casey +2,000
Matthew Wolff +2,200
Harris English +2,800
3JACK'S DARK HORSE PICKS
Bubba Watson +3,300
Will Gordon +6,600
Scott Stallings +8,000
Scott Piercy +12,500
Joseph Bramlett +15,000
Collin Morikawa wins the inaugural Workday Charity Open Championship.
Last week's What To Look For went over Muirfield Village and pondered how shortening the course and making the greens slower would impact the course. The course played pretty much the same as it always does in terms of it being an approach shot centric course. But more players were able to hit greens and thus short game around the green did not play much of a factor.
With the tees moved back the course should feature more long approach shots and that will translate to more missed greens and short game around the green playing a slightly larger factor.
The 18th hole should still be the most critical hole on the course as it was at the Workday Charity Open where Justin Thomas bogeyed the 72nd hole to drop into a playoff with Morikawa.
