I miss the green, for example, I'm already upset. When I find my ball in the bunker, I'm really upset.
And when I find my ball in a brid Egg Friday Egg, the dreaded Frida Egg Friday, Frida Egg Bride Egg Lie, I'm about ready to run off the golf course. Ladies and gentlemen, welcome back to another edition of the Frida Egg Podcast. We have a second podcast this week and excited to bring on Jake Nichols. Jake is the head of Intelligence at the Fifteenth Club, which is a golf analytics company that helps players kind of analyze and
look at their stats to play better. Some of their players they have a lot of European tour players are Danny Willett, Darren Clark, Lee Westwood, Matt Fitzpatrick, Juice Luton, Torborne Ollison and many more. Jake, thanks for coming on.
Thanks a lot, and I appreciate you having me.
Yeah. Yeah, I'm excited to kind of get into, you know what, what everybody needs to know about the saber metrics of golf. I you know, to kick things off. I'd love to hear a little bit about how you got into it in your background.
Yeah, sure, so I was always a golf fan more than more than anything. I played a little bit when I was younger, but but I was always much more of a fan. And then in college really started to get into looking at sports in a statistical way. So baseball and basketball were the two big ones back then. And after a year or two of you know, reading blog posts and books and whatever was available in those sports, I started to wonder why golf didn't have very many
people operating it. And this was before Mark Brody and strokes Gan got big, before his book came out, and so there were only a handful of people really in the corners of the Internet who were analyzing golf with with data. So I just picked it up as a side hobby in college and it's grown into full time job with Fifteenth Club for the last two years.
That's cool. Did you do anything else before you got into that and in the working world.
Nope, This was pretty much straight out of college after a little bit of loafing around the house.
That's cool. So tell us a little bit about like what's a day in the life for you, Like what do you what do you do on a daily basis with like golf numbers, and how does it work.
So it could be really anything. Right now, when we're on a report for one of our players, basically a check up for him, he's all for a few weeks now, so he's looking for a you know, a breakdown of his game. How's he trending over the first few months of the season. So it could be that it could be working on a consulting project for one of our clients. We've gotten involved in a lot in the last six months to twelve months, and just how can how can
golf organizations use their data better? So it's analyzing data, it's working on software tools to help the players capture their data better, to help these organizations track their data better. So a lot of numbers, a lot of coding, a lot of data visualization which I which I really enjoy, and then you know, just figuring out how best to communicate insights to the players, caddies, other clients.
So you know, we've seen like this sabermetrics boom and baseball and bat basketball, where you know, they've kind of completely revolutionized the sport. And you know, the philosophy is behind the sport. How you assemble teams, how you how you even you know draw plays in basketball. How far behind is is golf from that?
So I would say when I think about using data in like the sports arena, I think there's kind of three phases. The first is someone decides to start tracking all this stuff. So the PGA Tour installed shot link cameras over a decade ago, so now they have all this data to play with. So the second stage is kind of convincing people that that data can be used to create insights, that we can learn from it, that it can help players play better, it can help the tour,
you know, organize events better. It can you know, do all this, do all this stuff, uh, basically what we're doing right now.
And then the final.
Stage is it's fully accepted. And I think in baseball it's fully accepted. All the teams use it, everyone talks about it, it's on the broadcast, it's in the studio shows. I really think golf is still kind of in that second stage where we're still trying to convince some people out there, some stakeholders in the game, some players, you know, of of the of the validity of the results, how it can help them out and really get everyone comfortable
with talking talking about data. So I really think it's you know, it's behind baseball for sure, but it's also a little bit easier than like applying analytics to basketball, where you have to track the ball and ten players, and in this court you can, you know, kind of only focus on where's the ball positioned at each time or one player swing. So it's a little bit easier of a problem than basketball or hockey or football.
What would you say is the biggest pushback that you get, like what's the most regular kind of feedback against the analytics and using them to kind of try and you know, analyze performance.
I would say there's a few things. The first is a lack of understanding of how this is, uh, this is different strokes gained.
It takes a while to really.
Understand it intuitively. I think you can't really understand it in totally. I mean, so I think there's a little disconnect. How can you know this is better than just looking at the stats that I've looked at for ten years or twenty years, or maybe don't look at all. And the second one is when it conflicts with what the player or the caddy or the coach is seeing with
their eyes. Try telling a player who you think his iron game is merely average that and he might think it's you know, top twenty five in the world because maybe he's getting the consistent contact that he's looking for, you know, his swing feels great, but maybe the results just aren't there, or the strategy in the shots just aren't there. So there's it's it's difficult sometimes where there's some resistance to what the data is telling you.
So with when you guys start working with players, you know, what kind of stuff do you does that encompass? Obviously it's you know, looking at their stats. You know, does it go into you know, you touched on strategy, does it go into how to play the course and in different tendencies and stuff like that.
So the initial state that most of our clients come to us with is I just want to track my performance, track how I've been playing in all these different areas. So we have a tool, a software tool that they can enter their data into. It tracks their data over time. They can you know, slice and dice it. However they like to look at it, and that kind of data is really used to influence everything else we do with them in terms of reports and strategy and you know,
everything else. So that's kind of the initial thing is someone will come to us and say, you know, I'm just looking to improve, looking to get better. How can you help me track my performance and you know, and figure out what's the one or two things that I need to work on to you know, become a top fifty player, top twenty five player, top ten player eventually.
And then once once we have that sort of data, once they're in degraded into that sort of software tool, then some of them are more interested than others in in things like one course strategy. So we have a few guys who we help prepare for some of the big events and some guys who are interested in it week to week just what can you tell me about the course? What can you tell me about you know, what should I be working on in the last three
weeks of practice before the Masters? What sort of shots am I going to face at the at the tournament
that I should be preparing for. And then at the end of the year, there's some clients who are interested in scheduling, you know, what's the one or two courses that I should play this year that I don't normally play that that whether it's something about the field or something about the course fitting my game that I can really get an edge and maybe outperform my normal level of play at that course.
Interesting. So with the you know, the specific courses, is there you know, how much is like the horses for courses, is it you know, overplayed or how real is it?
Uh, it's definitely a factor for sure. I've seen some people dismiss it because if you look at just the thing is, if you look at just results of players at a course, So this guy's going to Sawgrass his last five times and he's had four top tens, it's not really telling you that much because it might be that that player is just really good. You know, if that's Henrik Stenson and he's top ten four times out of five, well maybe that's pretty close to what you'd
expect there. So the actual it's it's difficult to tease horses for courses out of the data. I don't think you can just look at a you know, look at a sheet that gives you his results for the last ten years and there's more to it. It's more about how, you know, how does that player's game fit with the course statistically and if we and if we can figure
that out. Then we can go to tell Matt fitz Fitzpatrick or Danny Willett, who have never played a lot of the PGA Tour courses, and we can say, well, our numbers say your game fits well at Colonial, or your game fits well at at the Travelers, et cetera.
That's it. It's interesting. So with regards to kind of you know, how how you guys wait things, And obviously with Mark Brody's kind of strokes gained book, he you know, he put a big discount on kind of putting, and you know, just preaching about how you know, tee to green was so much more important, and anything inside of
fifty yards was relatively you know, everybody's the same. What would you say is the biggest difference between say you're, you know, top fifty player and number like two fifty in the world range, Like, you know, somebody that's kind of like a fringe tour guy, whether it's European Tour or PGA Tour, kind of bouncing between the web dot Com or the Challenge Tour and the and the Big Tour.
I still would think it's sort of ball striking stats for sure. I would say probably a combination of long game and also driving ability. So I imagine there's a lot more guys in that sort of churn area between the Web and the and the big tour who can
hit it a mile but can't control it. And there's a lot of guys in that top fifty in the world range who who maybe don't hit it as far as those big hitters, but they're really controlling it, they're putting it in play, and that kind of above average distance plus you know, average accuracy is really really what sets players apart. So yeah, definitely, definitely long game is kind of still the separator at that level.
And I'm curious, you know, something I look at is I kind of think that the world rankings and the PGA Tour is a byproduct of the golf course as they play. You know, a couple of weeks ago at Harbortown, you see like a distinctly different leader board than you do week over week of the PGA Tour, And I think there's a few courses that kind of fit that mold.
Do you think that, you know, the golf courses that the PGA Tour plays, the tPCS, the you know, the courses that really value you know, kind of do you think the courses diminish what a player's skill inside one hundred yards as much and then promote the long game, or do you think it's in terms of your every day golf that long game is more important.
See I think I think there's definitely rewards based on the change in the game over the last fifteen years, the ball change and the distance change. There's rewards to making the courses fit that sort of elite PGA tour player. But I don't really think that they diminish talent inside one hundred yards sort of short game. Right now on tour the average course you hit driver about ten times around or so, which I think is a pretty reasonable
middle ground. It doesn't give the best hit like best drivers in the world, the ability to hit driver on every single hole, and it also doesn't really take get out of their hands for ten holes around. Yeah, I think the rough is definitely more playable than maybe is fair towards really to promote letting those big hitters out of jail when they when they rip off a loose one.
Okay, so because I think a lot of it. You know, obviously, conditioning to firm and fast conditions, how do you guys. See, you know, like conditions play a play a factor, like whether a course gets rain soaked and it's soft versus you know, firm and fast.
Is it it?
Does it? Do you see? You know, differences within the same golf course, say like a Riviera where it was soaked this year versus you know when it's played firm and fast in the past.
I've never actually looked at it, but you can, I imagine if you look at the scoring, you can definitely see see it come out in the scoring and see it come out and really all the other stats.
We saw it at the match.
Play this year where the faraways were basically concrete and the balls were just running out three seventy five. And also when the when the greens slowed down. You definitely can can notice it in the in the punting stats.
I think it was at Innisbrook a few years ago where they had reseated the greens or changed something with the green surface and everyone was leaving the putt short and it was we we like to look at this stat like how how often did you get it to the hole or just past the hole with your putts? And that that course was like breaking our scale. That that year just because the players weren't just weren't used to putting on the surface. So conditioning can be a huge factor with putting for sure.
I remember that it is their brand new g and yeah everybody left it short. So with that stat getting into the hole, like, what are some other stats that you guys look at that you know, aren't you know? On PGA tour dot com.
A few of the core specific ones that I like to look at week to week is what kind of
trouble can you get into off the tee? So if we compare how a player scores from the rough or the fairway bunker to how they score from the fairway and then just average that for all the different players at each hole, you can get a Basically, you can get the value of how much it costs you if you don't hit the fairway, and that can range at Salgrass, East Lake, I think Mierfield Village they're near about half a stroke penalty average is somewhere around point three or
point three and a half, and then on the low end you get your Augusta Nationals or Riviera. I think this week's TVC Louisiana is low somewhere down point two, So that kind of gives you an indication of you know, how much how much does it pay to be a straight hitter this week versus versus another week.
So you know, there's always a lot of debate with Augusta and like, you know, does putting matter, like what does a right to left ball flight matter? Like in your estimation? What are the most important stats there?
So definitely distance since the course got lengthened, that's most years that stands out as something that really predicts scoring. And that's there's a few reasons for that. Number one is it gives you the ability to attack some of those holes like thirteen and fifteen. Number two, if you can get it around the corner, number ten. And the second one is most big hitters also are a little
wild off the tee. So at Augusta, if you miss if you miss the fair way, either you're in the second cut, which is basically nothing, or you're in the trees and you can normally play a shot out towards the green. There's very little penalty for being wild. So if you're a big hitter who hits it twenty yards past the field and maybe uncorks, really one poor shot around at Augusta, that one poor shot isn't really costing
you like it is elsewhere. So I would say those are the big things, and that kind of played out this year. Sergio is a big hitter. Justin Rose is a big hitter.
It seemed like Sergio was hitting it further than he usually does. I don't know just from the naked eye, was he, like, I mean, was that an extraordinarily long performance for him?
It's definitely above average. Sergio is one of those guys who I kind of have the same reaction to you. He's he's sneaky long in some of these events where he's hitting it. You don't really think of him as somebody who's a big hitter, but he definitely was at Augusta.
He was right up there with.
Not maybe not quite Rory, but with hanging with the next tier guys.
So with you know, kind of the world golf rankings, like what how do you view the world golf rankings? And if you're if you're kind of opposed to them, how would you change the rankings to better really gauge who's the best player in the world at a time.
Okay, so there's there's two things. One is.
Numerous people have found they're a little biased against PGA Tour players favoring players from other tours, which is which is definitely valid.
It's easier for.
Because the official World Golf Ranking has something called a minimum points, So these really weak events on the European Tour, the Japanese Tour, the Asian Tour are fixed that they have to award at least a certain number of points. And what happens is these events have quite weak fields compared to PGA Tour events, but they're still awarding the minimum number of points. That makes them look stronger than
they really are. So there's a few players every year who are benefiting from from going perhaps to the Hero Indian Open and winning an event that maybe it should
award twelve points, but it awards twenty four. And the second thing is the World Golf Rankings really award or reward accomplishment, So finishing number one is always better than finishing number two in a comparable event, and that I mean it makes sense as something that they're really designed to decide who gets into these big events, and accomplishment the golf world has decided is the best way to to, you know, figure out who gets to be in these events.
It's completely different if you're trying to judge who's performing better, who's playing better, who the better player is. You know, if you put them out on the course for eighteen holes and that you look at that numerous cases throughout the year where someone wins a tournament, maybe they only beat the field by twelve shots the field average over the week, which is comparatively small. And then you have another you know, the extreme example of this is Stenson
and Phil at the Open Championship last year. Phil Mickelson had probably the second best performance in a tournament in the last fifteen or twenty years. Yeah, and he only got fifty world ranking points or sixty World ranking points, whereas in any other event if he had produced that performance, he would have, you know, he would have won.
And then you know, so if I understand what you're saying, like a guy that you know, like just as like a top twenty machine is kind of hurt by it, you know, because they aren't awarded as many points as say, well,
I think Kevin Chappel's kind of a good example. You know, this year he hasn't been playing very well, but he just started kind of found something I feel like the last couple of weeks, and you know, then he wins, you know, probably not by that big of a margin, but he jumps twenty points in the world rankings.
Yeah, just for winning, just for winning one tournament. So yeah, I definitely agree if you the fact is, if you've finished in twentieth place, I'd love to be able to quickly run the numbers for you, but but I can't. If you finished in twentieth place every week on tour, you'd be one of the best players out there. But your world ranking, I don't think it would be very good.
You might be in the in the hundreds, maybe just because you wouldn't have like the My intuition is that you wouldn't have enough points to challenge challenge at the top.
That's interesting. But then it also comes down to like definition of what the best players? Is it consistency or is it wins? You know, like, you know, how do how how would you go about valuing you know, say a player, like when you start to look at you know, greatest players of all time and and their scope of their career, you know, how do you weigh you know, dominance and wins versus a guy a consistency factor.
I think I rely a lot more on results like wins major championships as the time.
Skill gets longer.
So if I'm judging a player's full career, maybe like Tiger versus Jack, then yet I think it's fair to look at you know, majors and events one and those sort of things over a year. I think if you're judging who's the best player by who has five wins and who has three, then I think that will not lead you to the best player as often as looking at you know, more performance based metrics.
So it would be more like in the Strokes game department and everything like and kind of those stats, less so on wins.
Yeah, exactly. Like at fifteenth Club we have a stat called Performance Index, which basically rates every player in the world against each other based on you know, adjusts for the strength of the fields that they play and the difficulty of the courses, and and weighs recent play more all those things. And I think this week Rory is the number one player over anyone else. And I'm not so sure anyone right now would say Rory is the
best player in golf. People would probably say DJ. But even before DJ fell down, the Stairs a few weeks ago. Rory was very close to DJ in our numbers, enough that one week could have changed things if DJ didn't play that well at the Masters. And I think anyone in their right mind right before the Masters would have said, you know, DJ is the best player in the world, and it's not really close because he had accomplished so
much in his last really I guess nine months. But Rory, you see him week to week is just's He's in the top ten every single week and he's often in contention and really right there with with DJ.
Who would he on that list on your guys's rankings? Like, who are some surprises? I'm assuming obviously you've got you know, Speace up there, and Ram is probably up there really highly based off of his recent success, But you know, who are some kind of I guess, like I'm just kind of curious.
Now.
Yeah, so until Rom won, I think we had Rom when he won in San Diego. He was rated in the teens in Performance Index before he won, and I think he was where was he in the world ranking, maybe.
Fiftieth or fortieth or something like that.
Yeah, okay, he was, he was outside the top hundred before he won and then he was forty sixth after he won. So that's a good example of where the world rankings kind of screws a guy like him who's just absolutely dominant for his first twenty events on tour, but it kind of pushes him back Malinori as a guy who's who we have as a top twenty player right now. Again, he's extremely consistent. He's always, you know,
just outside the mix. He's rarely missing cuts. Rapha Coberabeo was like that for most.
Of last year.
Yeah, he kind of took it maybe into the Ryder Cup and maybe still isn't kind of popping up on people's radar, but he was. He was rating as a very very good player last year. And it's again because you know, week to week he was playing so consistently well.
So if you were gonna say, like, you know, this is a guy that's going to break out, that maybe not a name that's not on everybody's radar, like who could be the next you know, Thomas Peters type breakout player, who would it be? Based off of numbers?
That's stuff I'll have to give me.
Give me about ten minutes and I can come back to you with an answer, I'll do some searching on the sidelines while we talked, so.
In terms of in terms of the you know, kind of players that you're working with now, is it's very European, too ur heavy, you know, Is there any guys that you look at and think like, I'd really like to work with this guy because I know we could make him, you know, a better player, Like if so, Like who would be some names that you'd love to kind of work with and and talk about, you know where there might be some you know, deficiencies that could you know, greatly improve play.
Well.
I'd love to work with Bryson just to experience what that would be like for a week, just to get inside of his head and see see what crazy theories he's he's come up with on his own.
So that's one.
An interesting one who is way off the radar is jj A Henry.
A lot of our stats, a lot of the stats.
When I look at him, he pops up as someone who plays very conservative golf. He lays up off the tea a lot. When we measure aggressiveness in terms of hitting the shots into the green, he always comes up as very conservative. I think if putting numbers are conservative in terms of he's not really giving himself the chance to make putts sometimes, why not getting into the hole.
So I think if we could could sit down with him and have him buy in and maybe play a little more aggressive golf, then he could, you know, maybe he could improve. So that's kind of one off the off the radar.
Kind of amazing that that's like, you know, one of Trone's like whipping boys, and.
You can absolutely see why it's his whipping boy because he does I would say he babi's the ball around the course so that he can you know, make a cut and cash a check for fifty place.
Who today is the most miscast, you know, whipping boy of tron.
Oh, I think it has to be Brendan Steel. Brendan Steele is a big numbers a big guy that numbers love. I'm not sure how into numbers he is, but but the numbers really like the changes he's made to his game.
He's really improved how he drives the ball in the last few years and and he went from being completely ineffective off the tea, not long and not straight to being a pretty big hitter who can really control his ball and and really really gains strokes in the long game now, so just in terms of golf ability that that gets unnecessary abuse from Tron, I would say, I would say it's Brendan Steel.
I've always wondered that too, because he does like he rips it and he plays pretty aggressive. But you know, you get on the wrong side of Tron. I mean, I'm shocked that you brought up JJ Henry.
He's He's someone who has always always stood out in that sort of aggressiveness data that we whether we've looked at. So anytime I anytime I run a new stat, JJ Henry is one of the first people I check where he isn't it? And normally he's sticking out in some different direction.
Unbelievable. So do you do? You say, like, I'm a web dot Com tour player and I have you know, they don't really have like the shot link data and everything. How how would I work with the fifteenth club and you guys like, how how would you guys go about that? Would it be manual stats? They'd have to keep.
Yes.
So so right now, most of our clients on the European Tour will have their caddy track the data during the round. Since the caddy already pretty much knows the length and lie of each shot. Just write that information down and input it into our app at the end of the round.
It's it's really simple.
It takes ten minutes and you can immediately get feedback on how you played that day if you're interested in it. But yeah, it's manually tracked, and that is because the European Tour doesn't have a shot link esque system. Neither do any of the other tours. So that's really designed to be a solution for LPGA players, Web dot Com players, European Tour players, you know, anyone who doesn't have someone tracking that for them already.
It could be you know, even amateurs like me.
Huh, yeah, absolutely, it's it's in discussion for an amateur product, there's a lot more competition in that space.
But yeah, I think about it because I play in you know, am stuff and mid am stuff, and I'm always curious about my game, and I kind of like, I'm probably the exact person that you hate because I'm like, well, I think I hit my wedge as well, but it could have been you know, terrible wedges. What would you say to like the you know, every day gofer like, say I wanted to get into thinking more analytically, what should I do?
I would say, first, start collecting data, no matter whether you use you know, a product or a spreadsheet of your own. I would say, start tracking objectively tracking data on your game. Uh, maybe if it's even one part. If you if you think, say you think you're putting is very poor, take detailed notes of the thirty rounds you play this summer.
And how you put and and.
That really, I mean, really we're I say this to a lot of our clients all the time, is we really need data to help you out. You know, we're not a we're not a but we're not using our eyes, we're not using feel we're we're judging based off data. And if you're an amateur, who's you know, who's looking to improve, rigorously track your data, however you can and
really judge where you are. And then maybe you maybe you spend all summer tracking and you're putting and you're actually not that bad, and you can move on to something else. But maybe it reveals that you're you know, that you're really poorer outside of forty feet with your putting, or really poor inside of ten feet with your putting, and that's something that you can then you know, whether it's taking a lesson or looking for instruction, you can you know, look to improve.
So if I wanted to go all in, I'm diving in. I'm going to collect the data, like how deep do you go? Do you say I hit a t shot? I hit it two d and eighty five yards to the right center? That is it? Is it to like the specific side, say I missed a fairway? Like how detailed would you go?
In our basic in our basic app that tracks player data, it's it's a simple amount of data just to get the to get their strokes gained, calculation out. You need the lie of the ball, you need the distance it is from the pin. Tell me if it's a impeded shot. Are you behind a tree? Because that changes things? Are you behind the loop of a bunker? And what's the what's the club you used? And where did you miss relative to your target?
Excuse me? So, if you're aiming.
Ten feet right of the pin and you put it sixty feet right of the pin, then that's a miss to the right. And just that's the basic level of tracking data.
Interesting, So I imagine that one of the biggest things people mess up is how many feet away they are when they're putting, because I always feel like people underestimate how far away they are. They'll be like, oh, I missed a five footer, but they were really like eight feet away.
Or if they make that five footer, it turns into an eight footer.
That's true, it's it's a and then you know, like a it's It's really interesting because I talked to USC's coach and they and they started to do strokes gained, and something he said to me that I found like really interesting was that they have above tour average ball strikers, but none of their players are above tour average putters. And that's the number one team program in the in
the country. So like this is where my kind of bias where I say, like putting really does matter because these guys are or is it that all these guys are so good at putting that it's diminished.
Yeah.
So, so I think one of the things that's come out of Mark Brodie's work is is how important the long game is, and people have kind of stuck with that as the message, and that message is that it's the most important, not the only thing. That matters, and
I think that kind of gets lost sometimes. But definitely if you look at at the spread between what the best and the worst putters are doing, it's smaller than the spread between what the best and the worst drivers and best of the worst approach out players are doing. So really that that is it on the on the pro tour, I have no idea how the USC results are coming out like they are. If they do really have tour level ball strikers in that program, that's incredible.
Yeah, you know, I found it pretty interesting that like not even their best putter was in a plus strokes gained player. But you know, I mean they do have, like, you know, some of the best players in the country. You know, I think they've got to Walker Cuppers and they've got that, They've got that kid that played in the Masters like last year, who's a freshman who from China change in. So I mean they have elite you
know kids. But that's so that's a good question. What would you say, is you know, kind of the the barrier for you know, like young kids when they come up, like is there a common skill that they usually lack, you know, when they're young and on tour.
Yeah, I would say without having study that that closely short game would would be one course, management would be another. Maybe you maybe you step on the tour and you can hit it long and you your ball striking is okay, but you know, you're really inconsistent with a wedge. You don't chip that girl right, you can put well inside ten feet, but maybe when you lag it, you're you're awful. And those are just sort of the kind of things that you can solve by putting yourself into better places
around the green. Maybe you don't play so aggressively in certain danger spots. So I would say those are the things that kind of separate I feel like the best players.
It's so much reps too, you know, because oh absolutely yeah, And like the mental side of it, Like I think about myself like you know, in amateur tournaments when I was twenty four versus now when I'm thirty one, and I think completely different, I play completely different I play, so, you know, like I'm just smarter, And I imagine that's a lot of like the maturation. Like I think Dustin
Johnson's a good example with this wedge thing. It's like it's not that he just started practicing he might have learned, you know, stuff in along the way. It's not like he just started practicing wedges, right.
Yeah, No, absolutely, I think you're spot on with that.
You just learn, you learn how to be a better player, You learn how to attack different courses because you've seen them before. I think that's a big thing. I was listening to to No Laying Ups podcasts with Harold Varner, and Harold Varner said that, you know, he doesn't think Tiger even practices that much at the course because he's seen everything. And that's true. He's seen everything for twenty years.
You know, he doesn't need to be out there grinding, whereas you know, maybe Harold Varner, a rookie or a second year player, you know, they do need to be out there grinding and learning these courses.
I was kind of surprised when he said he shows up to tournaments on Wednesdays.
Yeah, I mean that's a it works for him. I don't know how it works for him right now, but but if that's if he likes to fly home every week, that's what you gotta do.
Yeah, how what would you say, is like the disadvantage of a rookie. I mean, obviously they already have the chips stacked against them with regards to like the schedule and and the ranking system, but playing these courses for the first time versus the veterans like they have seen them for years. Like what what would you say is like, you know, first time course, Like disadvantage is it half a shot around.
Or I don't think it's that big. I don't think it's that big at all. I think the disadvantage is really that a rookie is not going to be as good of a player. If you put a if you put put the tour players in two different groups, rookies and non rookies, the rookies are going to be just worse players, just just because it makes sense. You know, these veterans have been on tour for for longer, they're
normally more skilled players. So I think that's that really drives much of the disadvantage rookies face, as they just aren't as good.
So like, how good is Jon Rahm from? Like from a strictly numbers standpoint, Like where what are you saying? Like I've I've said for a long time, he's he's got number one written all over him. And you know, I think now everybody's saying that, but like, is he a generational player?
I think he could be right now.
I think he's he's already in that that like second tier of players in terms of you know, for fifth, sixth, seventh, best in the world. And just because his his skills so far seemed to be he drives them all extremely well and he hits his irons.
Well.
That's the kind of that's the kind of template that Rory and DJ have really written to the top of the game, you know, as they've fixed slowly fixed flaws in their game and gained a tenth of a stroke here in a quote of a stroke there. Uh, he's exactly. John Ram is the exactly the kind of guy I can see tweaking a few things and and being, you know, the next new number one player in the world.
We're you know, like, who would you say is kind of like the outlier of stats? Is there anybody that just like, you know, based off of your numbers and then but the performance is like the complete opposite of what your numbers would suggest.
There's a handful of guys who are are quite inconsistent with how they play. They'll have weeks where they look like look outstanding and they'll contend in tournaments or win, and then they'll have a lot of weeks where where they where they're missing cuts and missing cuts badly. I think Thomas Peters was a guy like that for for a long time, basically up until like last fall, and now he's you know, whatever that Lee was in those weeks, he's kind of fixed that and he's so much better
for a player. So yeah, a lot of those young, mostly young and inconsistent players are really the ones where where stats don't tell as accurate of a story because it's measuring their average week, which isn't very good, instead of their best weeks when they're contending and winning.
Yeah. I think that's and so much of that could be just adjusting to you know, life as a PGA tour player, traveling, being on your own, all that stuff.
Absolutely, Yeah, all that sort of stuff that we discussed about ten minutes ago, the adjustment to the tour life. You know, you go from being in a college campus or in a you know, your national team's training facility for most of your time and practicing with the same people and now you're you're spread around twenty countries around the world or all over the United States and you're expected to perform or you lose your card. Yeah, that's a tough life.
So, you know, with this week being a new format, and I'm kind of interested to hear how you would do this, Like how if you were playing and you know or say, you have a player that you know is in this event, how would you advise them about going to pick their partner? Because you always hear, oh, they'll be a great. Their games compliment themselves at each other so much like they'll be a great, Like what what would be your formula? And how cliched is the current one?
Well, the current one, I don't think it's fully thought through in our In our Ryder Cup work, we delved into sort of what makes a good foursomes pairing, and what it really is about is player A and player B both have things they do well and both have things they don't do well. And it's kind of about putting player A in situations where they're not going to be causing player B to hit one of their bad shots.
So if you have someone who struggles with their short game, pair them with someone who's just hitting greens relentlessly so they're not so they're hitting a forty foot pot instead of a twenty yard chip that they might that they might screw up.
So Graham to Let, you'd pair with like the best ball striker in the world.
Yeah, I'd put pair of gram to Let with with Graham to Let. So we'll see how that works this week. Without grand Let hitting his approach shots into the green.
Oh man, I didn't even think about that. I wish I would have thought about that before. What So what else do you what else do you look at?
Okay, So I took a look at this this morning. Unfortunately, I was disappointed that we didn't have any players choosing to play this week, because I do think it's an interesting intellectual exercise. So we kind of identify key shots throughout the course, and these are shots where the difference between how players perform on them is really wide, so that they can either hit a good shot that gets really rewarded or they can hit a poor shot that
gets really punished. And a good example of that type of hole is like seventeen at Sawgrass. It's only a short wedge. If you hit a good shot, you're gonna make birdie. If you hit a poor shot, you're dead. And you're in for double bogie. So we can do that for all holes on tour, and we can break it down even to look at key shots.
So maybe on.
Eighteen at Sawgrass, the drives a real key drive because you can get wet very easily, but maybe the approach isn't as important. So when we look at Zurich, there's a few holes that stick out, and it's like the closing stretch. The key holes all set up for one one type of player to play one of them. If they play the odd tees, it sets up nicely for one group, and the guys playing the even and teas
it sets up nicely for another. So basically it's like, if you have a really good ball striker on your team, have them play one set, and then if you have somebody who's you know, an accurate driver, good short game putts, well then they're better at playing the other holes.
Interesting, so you're just gonna like watch tomorrow and laugh at all the teams that mess this up.
Oh, if you don't think I'm going to criticize people, I might keep it off Twitter, but they will be silent judgment for sure. Sean Sean Martin at PGA Tour had had a good article where he touched on some of the strategy guys are using. He mentioned that there's you know, three par threes that are that one set of players will have the tee off one and the par threes here are really long. A couple of them are similar holes you know with water to the left
that they do set up for for one guy. If you're a great ball striker, Lake Graham to let you know the awful those and and you get an advantage of that that way.
So if you were going to pick one team, who would you be going with this week? In a in a one and done, like you know, you had to pick one.
See.
I think Stenson and Rose are pretty generically solid in terms of how their games match up, both being elite ball strikers. I kind of do like how how Spieth and and Ryan Palmer set up. Ryan Palmer is a pretty effective driver, he has a decent long game. Jordan Spieces is also you know, he's very solid around the board in terms of his his skill sets, So I
think they can fit well together. Palmer's are really poor putter and have a great short game sometimes, so that's not really that much for a sleeper.
But yeah, he didn't really give me give me any any sleepers.
Yeah, I haven't really haven't really dug into the player matchup.
That's fine. I'm kind of curious since you guys advised Lee Westwood and then you're probably really familiar with Terrell Hatton. I keep whenever I watch him play Hatton play, I think I feel like he's very similar to Lee Westwood when he was younger. Is that a good comp for him?
I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm still not sure exactly what Tyrrell Hatton does great out there. I'm not terribly familiar with his game in general. I know he's been putting out of his mind recently.
Yeah that's one.
Thing, crazy ascension in the last eighteen months. But yeah, he I I just think it might be his build and a swing that that always makes me think of Westwood. But you know, it's interesting with Lee Westwood. Do you still think he can win a major? I mean, I might be crossing some client here privilege, but I still do. I've got like an ongoing bat with DJ Paiowski about it.
Yeah, I absolutely think he can. You see him put himself in the position often enough. The main challenge for him is just his ability is deteriorating slowly, just age related to decline. So he's gonna run out of opportunities where he's you know, firing.
On all cylinders.
But in terms of do I think if he puts himself in the position he can get it done. I absolutely do, especially since so many of the major courses fit his game. So many of the major courses fit that sort of ball striking oriented drives it well, hit his irons well sort of games.
That's a formula that works pretty much everywhere.
Yeah, absolutely, for sure.
It's but uh, I forgot what what you were researching? What was that? What? What do we what did we ask the.
I can't remember the breakout player?
Yeah? Yeah, who's your who's your breakout player? If you know, they could be outside the top fifty or I don't know where where you would term it.
See, I didn't do my homework. I just too engrossed in the conversation.
It's okay, No, it's fine, it's as so here let's talk about a breakout player. Then let's like, have you looked in in depth and Adam had win it all? I have?
I've looked at his game great putter ball striking is better this year. And that's one of those things that for some guys it comes and goes season this season, you'll see a lot of guys I had a nice breakout with the Irons one season and then you know, whatever change the next year and they they kind of lose it. But he's a candidate where the rest of his game is good enough if he can, you know, if that skill proves a little sticky and stays around.
You know, I put him on a list that I did at the beginning of the year of breakout players, and I put him on there just like strictly because like I saw him in contention like twice last year, and like, how you know, is that a pretty good indicator, Like for a guy that gets into contention, you know, the younger guys that get into contention relatively depending it doesn't matter really how they play on Sunday, But like just getting into contention, is that a good indicator?
I mean, anytime you're at the top of the leaderboard on a Sunday or near the top, you're playing great golf. So yeah, if someone's popping up in seventh place or ninth place, a couple of times over the summer. Then yeah, wow, that's always a good sign.
Yeah, so I want to dive into some Twitter questions. We got some good ones here. Sean Reehorn wanted to know with all the data accumulated, like what surprised you the most?
Ooh, what always amazes me is the narrow margins shot by shot between players. How if your average proximity to the green is thirty two feet versus thirty six feet, you're one of the best ball strikers in the world, and thirty six your average. You know that that kind of thing. All of these advantages magnified over hundreds and hundreds of shots produced the Tiger Woods. I've always found that incredible.
See. That's something though that like is astounding to think is like thirty two feet average proximity and like because like I this is like what we talked about with like learning how to play the game more is like understanding when you have a five iron in like twenty feet left is like a really good shot and not you know, necessarily firing at the pen. And like when the average proximity is like thirty six feet, that's you know, most golfers would probably think it's like twenty.
Yeah, absolutely, because the all they're shown on TV is somebody sticking a wedge in from one hundred yards, uh with to get an eight footer for Birdie.
How do you when you go to a tournament in person? What do you do? I'm kind of curious.
If I'm going as a fan, I'll normally just follow a group, follow a player, you know, if there's one or two guys I'm interested in, I'll follow them around and just if I've never been to the course before, try to walk eighteen holes and get a lay of the land. If I'm going there with a client, you know, to work with clients, you know, you'll go on a practice days mostly and and be in meetings and on the range and not really get to see much of the course.
Yeah, I kind of prescribed by the same theory you do when you're going as a fan. Is like I always tell people, pick you know, a group, don't pick you know, like pick an off the Beaten Path group that like still has like really good players in it, like you know, like and just watch them play all eighteen holes because they'll have less fans. It's easier to get around and you get to see, like how they play a golf course.
Yeah, absolutely, I like to go to the Travelers in Connecticut and that one there's normally some high profile players who play there, and but the other groups, if the high profile groups are on the back nine, the front nine is desolate. You know, you can follow a group and be one of five people who are walking with them and you just get to see every shot they hit throughout the round.
You know, I'm kind of curious he brought up the Travelers and it spurred my memory to Patrick Cantley, and I wanted to get your kind of take. I know this limited stats, but like, what do you see from Patrick Cantley? And you know, obviously everybody I think hopes he stays healthy, but what what kind of in his game is you know popped? And why he's played so well and so few starts.
Yeah, well, he's he's my answer for the breakout player, even though he might have already broken out already by the numbers through his first four or five tournaments back he's you know, he looks incredible, looks like he's going to you know, pick up easily and you know, finish as like a top twenty five or top fifty player in the world.
Once he gets enough, once he gets enough.
Starts, Yeah, I mean he used to. I mean, he was unbelievable in college. It's it's unbelievable that he he kind of the whole thing that's happened. And you know, he overshadowed beef in college, which is crazy, you know, and how good?
Oh exactly.
Yeah, And those guys, those guys who are number one, number two players in the world for a few years in college and as amateurs almost always turn out to be at the very least top fifty guys.
In the world.
That's what I said to Tron the other day. He he but like, because like I still kind of I still am in on Casey Wittenberg. You know, I think he's gonna make it.
It might feel a little long for Casey Puttenberg, but hey, I'm in on it.
I haven't sold my property yet.
Yeah, No, we'll see, all right.
Sean Martin wants to know what's the next frontier for golf stats, and you know, how will they more accurately depict what occurs on the course? What's in the next frontier? He asked, like three questions in one.
Yeah, Sean got a little greedy with that on, Yeah, I would say, just really create so we have strokes gained, which is which is fantastic and really helped us understand why players are getting it done and why they aren't.
So I think that's great.
The next step is to dig into maybe more granular examinations, sort of like that missfair Way stat I talked about earlier.
There's a there was a.
Great piece I can't remember who wrote it from last year or the year before about what makes Jordan Spieth such a great putter, And it's because he always gets it to the hole.
He always gives it a chance. So I think a stat like that.
Like who are the guys who are always giving it a chance versus the ones who are trying to diet into the hole? Just really these these new stats to help us understand the parts of a player's game. Uh,
And that's what we've seen in other sports. Baseball has this this radar system which tracks everyone in the field now and so you can you can tell how far a player ran to catch a ball, and so they rank, you know, who's the fastest outfielder, you know, who makes more catches, who you know hits the ball the hardest and all those sort of stats are are you know, getting people more comfortable with these, It just gives you more tools for for someone like for someone like Sean
to tell a story about a player, and you get fans interested in the broadcast can can use these things just just to tell the story a little bit better. So when Sam Saunders is out there, it's not just well he's Arnie's grandson. We can actually talk a little bit about a little bit about what makes him a good player.
Yeah. I think that's you know, it's the out of the backs narratives are just awful. It's a you know, at least put some context behind why he's a professional golfer rather than he's, you know, our grandson of Arnold Palmer or friends with Jordan Speed. It's uh, the stats
can fill that void. This kind of relates to what you were just talking about, And I think this is interesting, Like do you have currently had the ability with stats to tell who performs better on a back nine in a major or other bit like a nerve stat.
Yeah, we do calculate a round basically looking at how someone plays in contention under like stressful rounds. We call it uh, and that just looks at if you enter around within a shot or two of the lead, how do you play with the lead versus how you normally play? So if you're so, if you're Rory mcilroyan, you normally beat the field by x amount? Then how do you play under pressure? And vice versa? If you're if you're six back going into the fourth round, how do you play?
How do you play when there isn't as much to play for?
Yeah?
So, yeah, and there's a lot of work to be done in that area. We just just in the last few weeks we've rolled out a basically a win probability model where we're going to be tracking with more exact numbers. How people if you have a forty percent chance by our model on the tenthal the final round, you know, how do you play going in from there? So I think the data is out there, it's just a matter of, you know, putting it together.
Who would be who's like the best in contention by your metrics?
So neither of these guys have been in contention very often. I think only about a dozen or fifteen times. But Thomas Peters and Matt Fitzpatrick pretty much always have gotten the job done. When they're in contention, or at least when I say got the job on, they've played better than they normally play in other rounds.
I'm a big fan of Fitzpatrick. Do the stats prove out, you know, like is he a really you know, like tell us a little bit about like what makes him so good?
His ball striking's excellent and his putting is excellent, and those are two pretty decent cornerstones to build your game around.
Comparison for him.
I think Jordan Speith is a longer hitter than him, and I think I think.
Fits might be a little bit better of a ball striker. Speith kind of.
Has these good years in these bad years, But I think overall that's not a bad comparison for what for what Matt could be if he added some more distance to his game. That's sort of like a you know, a high high target for him to reach.
Yeah, I mean, like I imagine if he could have like some sort of like a Justin Rose like renaissance like that. What that guy did with to his game, it like is unbelievable to me, with like how he added like thirty yards, Like it's not easy to add thirty yards to your t shot.
Oh yeah, absolutely, And there's been a handful of guys who've on that. Brendan Steel, like I mentioned earlier, but Justin Rose is a completely different player than he was even eight or ten years ago. So yeah, I think that's definitely in play for for fits. And when he already comes in here putting extremely well and ball striking is great, he could has a really high potential.
Okay, I got I got a quick question for you. And next first time winner Major winner, who's it going to be?
Uh So, who among the leak guys have one? One Fowler, Aduckie and John Rahm.
Yeah, and then you've got a ton of young guys. You've got you know, you've well, you've got Paul Casey's right there, Justin Thomas. You've got Norrin Hatton Coocher. Yeah.
So so I can't say Coocher, I'm like get blocked on Twitter by some people.
No, that's fine. You're in a you're in a safe haven here. We there's not as much hate on I kind of.
I would say the next next Major winner is probably rom first time. I think his game sets up well for Aaron Hills. I think it sets up well for Quail Hollow too, so I think he'll be in serious contingent of both of those.
It is interesting. So we I had this talk with Starson and Tron and and DJ after them, and I was talking about how I'd probably take if I was if it was a major and I had three guys, I think Justin Rose would be in my three, like with you know, probably Dustin and and Rory? Who would be your Dustin and Speth? Who would be your three that you'd pick if it was every major championship, you get your top three and it you know, regardless, you know, knowing the courses, Yeah.
I think I would pick speF because his game kind of travels to a lot of different courses.
H uh.
And then DJ and Rory because they're the best. So that isn't very exciting.
But so I'm off base going with Rose.
I mean, Roses Rose is a great player. He's right up there in terms of ball striking travels.
So, okay, all right, we're gonna get you out of here. You've been more than gracious with your time and listening to my stupid questions, So let's go. Let's go with our tradition of overrated underrated. So you just you know, you got to decide if there're you know, no middle ground here.
All right, Oh I'm ready.
Yeah, all right. Practice rounds.
Underrated as long as you do them right.
What what do you have to do to do them right?
I we don't really work with players in terms of practice round type stuff, but I'd like to turn a few guys into some guinea pigs and figure.
Out how to do them right. Well, that's that's where I'm coming from.
I'll do your I played practice rounds for these tournament What would you do if you were me in a practice round?
So if you play a course that the pros play every year, I think we would just walk around and pick out maybe eight key shots in the realm and really talk through caddy stat geek and player and really talk through uh strategy in terms of those shots, you know, bringing data and you know how comfortable a player is hitting a certain shot and and all that.
Sort of stuff.
Yeah, that's a that's a good point. It's like because like when you're uncomfortable, that's usually when you hit bad shots.
Yeah, that's why I try not to stray too much into criticizing players for laying up or you know, whatever during tournaments is they might not be super comfortable hitting that particular shot in that particular win to that particular green that day. Yeah, and that the solution to that is just, you know, realize that that shot might be coming in and try to prepare for it.
Interesting, all right, The like the equipment transition period when you change equipment overrated, I think so too. It's so similar. Do you do you what do you guys see like that? I'm turning all these quick questions in.
The long one. Yeah, it's not something that I know too much about. I can't give you that much of an informed opinion.
Laying up.
Overrated, all right, So be aggressive, be aggressiveness.
Jet lag and international travel.
Oh wow, this is definitely properly rated. I think people really get it, though, I would say, let's say underrated, because you still see guys who are flying back from Asia to playing tournaments the next week, which is crazy to my mind.
Doing it this week, Yeah.
Buba's doing it. There are a few guys who played in the European Tour event in India the week before the match play, and that's basically flying around the world.
We saw, at least.
Anecdotally what happened to speak a year ago. Yeah, I think underrated in terms of how players make their decisions.
Yeah, I'm curious. You know. The last question now is Bubba and the golf ball. Has there been like a statistical change since he switched to the putt put both?
Yeah, he's terrible now. The ball strikings bad.
His wedge play is bad, which makes sense if you're gonna play a you know, if that's an inferior ball, if it's something he isn't used to. But who knows who has any insight into that head?
So do you think JB and them are going to use the Volvic during alternate shot?
I hope not for their sake. I can't imagine what it would be like to for JB. Holmes to use a to use an orange or a pink ball that he's never hit before and for nine holes or even eighteen.
I remember I one time hit my mom's like women's ball and the way it launches with like a nine iron is insanely different. Yeah, Like I couldn't even imagine playing something like that and like trying to get used to it.
Yeah, I think that's.
To play overrated, underrated on the ball thing I think it seems like it would be something that I'd at least want my partner to spend some time with it the week before and in practice arounds getting used to it.
So, like the million dollars a year he gets paid by them, I think personally that he's losing that inn course earnings.
Oh, if he's playing like he is now, he's losing more than that. He's like a he's like a five million dollar player. If he plays like he is the last few years and playing like this, he's you know, he's gonna make three million dollars less probably if he can't figure something out.
Yeah, good smart decision making.
But he knows he might turn the round and make us look at Lake idiots for criticizing him.
But yeah, the Vulvic Revolution is happening. He just has to get used to it. Yeah, he could just start painting the ball too, you know.
Yeah, do the what was it Tiger used to do that? Yeah?
Have somebody paint the Nike's the Swish one ya. Yeah, I think he might just I might want to just go to title list and say, hey, can you can you put some paint on these balls?
Yeah? Well, we'll get out on the Bubba Talk. Thanks for coming on and uh, if anybody doesn't follow Jake, Uh, it's a great Twitter follow. If people are interested in Fifteenth Club, I guess you just find a out of contact for him.
Yeah, we have a contact form on the website and also just follow us on Twitter and we're you know, we're happy to talk on there.
It's at Fifteenth Club
And always you can reach out to me too, So awesome, happy to talk golf.