John Senden- Best Ball-striker?

[CG031]

Senden turned pro 17 years ago and has career PGA earnings less than $9 million and finishes in the Top 10 less than 10% of the time. He's not a good ball striker.

Actually, he's a helluva ball striker, but the fact of the matter is the PGA Tour is really a putting contest. All the guys can strike it pretty good, it's who's rolling in the putts...and John Senden doesn't do that very often.

You should rephrase your statement to "he's not a good putter."

[Dr. Manhattan]

...remember Sergio Garcia won the Vardon Trophy last year.. that is pretty solid too since you can only win that with the lowest scoring average on the PGA Tour.

What I remember is the guy with the best scoring average by far only played half the year and thus didn't qualify for the Trophy.

[Awsi Dooger]

That's an ignorable category. I remember when Tim Simpson was touting himself as the best ball striker on tour for a few years in the late '80s and early '90s. It was vague and didn't translate to anything exceptional so I decided it didn't mean squat, and I've never had reason to change opinion.

Drive it long and make the putts and I'll pay attention.

[Dr. Manhattan]

That's an ignorable category. I remember when Tim Simpson was touting himself as the best ball striker on tour for a few years in the late '80s and early '90s. It was vague and didn't translate to anything exceptional so I decided it didn't mean squat, and I've never had reason to change opinion.

Woody Austin believes he's the best ballstriker in the world.

[bunkerputt]

Senden has a nice swing for sure.  His transition is incredibly rhythmic and generates a ton of lag.  The ball also sounds murdered.  I say we just rig up a club to tell you how close to the sweet spot you hit it.  Then we just hand that club to the guys we think are the best and see how many times they can hit it.  Then make them hit a bunch of different trajectories and shot shapes and see how well they hit those.  Then put that into the context of a course where they need to hit those shots like the Copperhead course at Innisbrook in the Florida swing and see how they do.  Or we could just save time and take the ballstriking stats from the ballstrikers courses to get an idea.  That being said, I'm generally more in favor of just using something like GIR to approximate it.  That way the pressure, shot shape, and contact quality and course management is already built into the number somewhat.  With the exception of watching driving range exhibits, striking the ball isn't important to us except that it help us score.

[Zeph]

How do you define a good ballstriker?

Hitting a lot of greens?

Hitting the ball on the sweet spot all the time?

Being a big hitter?

Being able to shape the ball as intended, within the shot cone?

There are so many things you can put into the term ballstriking, finding the best at it would be hopeless. The stats doesn't say anything about where the shot was played from, how far, if he was going for the flag or a safer part of the green. You can't measure every strike on the ball. Jim Furyk is according to Trackman one of the most accurate players on tour, does that make him the best?

I honestly don't see the point with calling someone the best ballstriker. Senden hit 0.18% more GIR in 2009 than the next guy and 0.53% in 2010. Bubba is leading that stat so far this year.

[Rika85]

Surely a lot of the attention Senden draws for his quality ball striking is the result of his poor putting. It always makes for a more interesting story and attracts more attention when someone excels in one element yet has some sort of deficiency in another. Obviously in Senden's case, leading the GIR stats on Tour is countered by his poor putting and further leads to people highlighting his ball striking skills. It creates the classic 'what if' and 'if only' scenarios regarding his putting and the impact it could have had on his career.

In Australia, Senden rarely gets much attention and invariably when he does, i.e. if he is leading after the first round etc, attention is drawn to his GIR stats over the years and his inability to get it done with the flat stick. I for one hope he manages to find some sort of putting stroke so that he racks up a few victories on Tour and the attention can move towards celebrating his game rather than being tainted by these negatives connotations regarding one crucial facet of his game.