"The Four Foundations of Golf" by Jon Sherman

[iacas]

Discuss “The Four Foundations of Golf” by Jon Sherman here.

Buy it here:

[Chris Brooks]

Thanks for creating this thread @iacas.

I’m nearly done with a first read of the book. Just starting the Mental Game section.

I’m a big fan of Jon Sherman and Practical Golf. I also listen to The Sweet Spot podcast and appreciate what he and Adam are adding to the community. 

My initial take: about 80% of what is covered in this book is in Lowest Score Wins. And in many cases, LSW covers it more effectively by giving succinct actionable advice. There’s a theme and flow that both books use:

1. Use information at hand to manage expectations
2. Pick better targets (for driving and approach play)
3. Learn how to drive the ball further
4. Incorporate random practice to supplement blocked practice

LSW does a better job IMO of helping steer the reader towards effective use of practice time by introducing the concept of “Separation Value”.

Four Foundations is going to help folks that haven’t read LSW. I found myself finishing several chapters with “is that all???”, hoping Jon would provide more details and actionable advice. For example, Jon advocates becoming a “one trick pony” and limiting your menu of golf shots. I think he could have gone further to help players analytically arrive at an appropriate “sub-menu”.

So unless you are just a golf book junkie like I am, if you’ve read LSW I don’t think you’ll find much new here.

[Shindig]

Thanks, @Chris Brooks.  I heard the interview on some podcast that is in my feed and my regular thought throughout was "wasn't that in LSW?" 

[WillieT]

Just finished my read of the book and I agree, his book parallels "Lowest Score Wins".   His approach is more generalized and would appeal to the golfer who is wanting to get away from the swing thought of the day blitz.  I love how he keeps the chapters relatively concise and concludes each with a "Big Ideas" section.  This book along with LSW will be on my reference shelf for many years to come.  I am planning to reread it soon, more to absorb and reinforce what Erik covers in LSW.      

[WillieT]

On 7/19/2022 at 8:29 PM, WillieT said:

Just finished my read of the book and I agree, his book parallels "Lowest Score Wins".   His approach is more generalized and would appeal to the golfer who is wanting to get away from the swing thought of the day blitz.  I love how he keeps the chapters relatively concise and concludes each with a "Big Ideas" section.  This book along with LSW will be on my reference shelf for many years to come.  I am planning to reread it soon, more to absorb and reinforce what Erik covers in LSW.      

Also wanted to say Jon includes at end of the book special access to his website (much like Erik did with LSW) - guess imitation is truly the most sincere form of flattery. 

[Hugh Jars]

Love the book. What has enhanced my appreciation of it is that he refers a lot to tracking statistics and he references Shotscope a lot. I have over 80 rounds of data recorded with my V3.

Biggest things I've taken from it that have had a positive effect on my game:

- the idea of becoming competent at using driver off the tee. Stats don't lie - proximity to the hole after your tee shot has a very marked correlation to score. Practicing getting good at driving the ball is likely to have the biggest impact on your game.

- Greens in regulation also has a very close correlation to score across all handicaps. Increasing greens in reg is the key to lower scores. And being closer to the hole after your tee shot ties into this strongly.

- This has been huge for me. Clubbing up on approaches to the green. Playing the back of the green yardage and swinging easy. Its led to many more green in regs for me personally. Putting the ego away and even gripping down on longer irons to approach greens with a nice, easy swing.

- Understanding that being 20 feet from the hole or 40 feet really has little difference on scoring. There isn't a real trade off with pin hunting on approach shots versus aiming for the middle of the green. Even the pros don't achieve amazing proximity on average on approach shots. And, the reality is a pro and a high handicapper are both statistically unlikely to one putt from outside 8 feet so taking risks to get the ball close on approach just doesn't pay off. Gains can be made by high handicappers, like myself, in working on speed control with putts. Just getting the ball within two putt territory and avoiding 3 putts.

- Scoring better is not about more birdies. rather they are a product of playing the percentages where occasionally things will go your way. Instead, scoring is about culling double bogeys and worse. "Fighting the war on double bogeys" as Sherman puts it.

[iacas]

@Hugh Jars makes me understand why all the previous reviews mentioned LSW. 🙂

[Hugh Jars]

1 hour ago, iacas said:

@Hugh Jars makes me understand why all the previous reviews mentioned LSW. 🙂

I see his book as a meta-analysis of sorts of works related to statistics based golf analytics. He references you, Marke Broadie and Scott Fawcett consistently through the book. Any point he makes he reinforces with data. I think it’s extremely sound. Similar content covered in LSW, perhaps more detailed on the mental game, a little less technical.

[HankBlue]

Just started reading this book...  lovin' it so far! 

[DaMoose90]

On 7/26/2022 at 12:49 PM, Hugh Jars said:

I see his book as a meta-analysis of sorts of works related to statistics based golf analytics. He references you, Marke Broadie and Scott Fawcett consistently through the book. Any point he makes he reinforces with data. I think it’s extremely sound. Similar content covered in LSW, perhaps more detailed on the mental game, a little less technical.

I just finished this book. A meta-analysis is a good way to describe it. I found his perspective as an amateur that improved his game to a higher level (as opposed to a professional) an interesting and different perspective. This book does offer more on the mental game than others. However, having read most of the source material he referenced I didn't find much new information (as some other people have posted). In fact, most of the things he references do a much better and more complete job at explaining the concepts themselves. It kind of bothered me that the whole book seemed to be just summarizing everyone else's work. I guess if you haven't come across any of the other material he references yet then it is a good starting point but even then I'd probably just skip it and read "Every Shot Counts" and LSW. Also an easy quick read on the mental game that I found helpful was Ray Floyd's book "The elements of scoring" as well as the sections in Sieckmann's short game books which explain everything this book talks about and more.

[Hugh Jars]

6 hours ago, DaMoose90 said:

I just finished this book. A meta-analysis is a good way to describe it. I found his perspective as an amateur that improved his game to a higher level (as opposed to a professional) an interesting and different perspective. This book does offer more on the mental game than others. However, having read most of the source material he referenced I didn't find much new information (as some other people have posted). In fact, most of the things he references do a much better and more complete job at explaining the concepts themselves. It kind of bothered me that the whole book seemed to be just summarizing everyone else's work. I guess if you haven't come across any of the other material he references yet then it is a good starting point but even then I'd probably just skip it and read "Every Shot Counts" and LSW. Also an easy quick read on the mental game that I found helpful was Ray Floyd's book "The elements of scoring" as well as the sections in Sieckmann's short game books which explain everything this book talks about and more.

Its much more in depth. LSW and Every Shot Counts don't discuss the mental game or go into as much detail on practice or how to manage expectations. Its from a more balanced, rational and relatable perspective for the average golfer. 

The Four Foundations is simply the best golfing book I have ever read.

[DaMoose90]

5 hours ago, Hugh Jars said:

Its much more in depth. LSW and Every Shot Counts don't discuss the mental game or go into as much detail on practice or how to manage expectations. Its from a more balanced, rational and relatable perspective for the average golfer. 

The Four Foundations is simply the best golfing book I have ever read.

I respectfully disagree with this- which is fine you are entitled to your opinion and I'm glad the book helped you. I read this and LSW (for the third time) and this book back to back and I can tell you that aside from the mental game aspect almost everything that is covered here is in LSW and additionally they present concepts of their own (SV shot zones etc) along with actionable advice. As far as the mental game the material he presents in this book is almost entirely from Ch.8 of Sieckmann's book, DECADE, Ray Floyd's book, and even Bob Rotella's work from many years ago. Very few new or original ideas are presented in this book. It is a good summary of what is current but it would be a mistake to credit the author for these ideas.

People can read the book and form their own opinion but personally I would have a hard time calling this book the greatest golf book ever since it is almost entirely a summary of the work of others with very few original ideas from the author.

 

[iacas]

Thanks, @DaMoose90. I wouldn't give @Hugh Jars much attention (and I haven't), as he's made a "@Hugh Jars" out of himself a few times here on the site. I'm not sure he has even read LSW, and a quick look back over his history here reveals a fairly clear picture of his attitude, biases, whatever… Though I do find it funny that many of the same things many here were saying back when he was posting in 2018/2019 and he was fighting against, he now fully embraces: the importance of the driver, hitting greens, etc.

And to all, this topic is about Jon's book, not my own. That doesn't mean you can't mention my book, ESC, etc. But keep the topic mostly about TFFoG.

[iacas]

Oy.