Improving Most Quickly

[iacas]

You're entitled to your opinion there, Butch (or whoever). I'll stick with the short game and putting. I guess all those idiots like Dave Pelz just don't know what they are talking about when they say the quickest way to lower scores is through improving the short game. Guess they are full of it , too.

Dave Pelz doesn't teach the full swing. Ya think he might have a little bias?

Butch's (not his real name but he's done that on purpose) point was supported with some decent math. Yours is based on what seems to be your hunch and the thoughts of a guy who only works on the short game - and a guy with bunk crap like SBST and the 17" rule. The simple gist of Butch's post is that improving your short game can only do so much, but a small improvement in ball striking has far greater effect.

I disagree that good ball striking inerently leads to better misses and better leaves though. If only ball striking improves, without any improvements in the short game/ putting or course management, the player might be firing at sucker pins and short siding themselves on a regular basis.

Yes, they're all intertwined, but the point I'm making and that Butch is making there is that ball striking can leave you in better spots because they're more predictable spots.

The guy who doesn't know whether he'll miss a green short, left, right, or long is at a serious disadvantage to a guy who basically always hits his 7-iron 163 yards but who misses a little right from time to time. That guy can plan where to miss simply by better ball striking alone (with a dash of course management) - if the trouble starts at 165 and goes to the back of the hole (say, the green slopes severely back to front), he can hit that club, aim a tad left to guard against his right shot, and be somewhere below the hole leaving an easy putt or a chip if he comes up short. If the trouble's all in the front, he can take a 6-iron. The better your ball striking the smaller your pattern of misses, and that is why it's easier to improve your short game because of an improvement in your ball striking - by leaving yourself in better positions because your shot pattern is more predictable. Again, yeah, a bit of course management to recognize that and consider it, but the foundation is the improved ballstriking. Without that, you can plan all you want but if you don't know where you might miss it's pointless.

[sean_miller]

Again, yeah, a bit of course management to recognize that and consider it, but the foundation is the improved ballstriking. Without that, you can plan all you want but

That one little nugget is why I voted for ballstriking even before reading any posts - once a new player has the ability to keep the ball in play, getting it nearer the hole every time out, the handicap can begin to drop like a stone.

[Chief Broom]

I vote ball striking because it encompasses every aspect of the game. Improve your ballstriking and you will also improve your short game at the same time. Becoming a better ball striker means you improve upon your ability to hit the ball in the club's sweet spot while also ingraining proper swing mechanics. Those skills effect your entire game including putting.

[JetFan1983]

Question: Isn't chipping the basis for the entire full swing? You want your weight left and a flat wrist when you chip, no? So mastering that "impact" move would thus improve your ball striking. I know they're all intertwined but maybe the answer here is chipping specifically, not lumping that in with pitch shots and putting i.e. the overall short game.

It's true though that good ball strikers get so many opportunities to score well. Once a player gets to that point, their potential for scoring well goes through the roof. I'm trying to improve my ball striking right now but I'm doing that mostly through half swings/long chip shots. One of my many problems is that I tend to flip the club head over the plane on the downswing. So for me specifically, the answer seems to be chipping. I don't think I would be improving my full swing as efficiently if I wasn't working on impact through chipping drills.

Or is chipping a bit of a different animal because the takeaway is different from the full swing? Or are they the same? Sorry if this is off-topic and if so, could someone PM me with the correct information? Thanks.

[DavidFehertysBike]

Obviously all three are intertwined, but if i had to pick one it would be short game and putting. Even the most skilled ballstrikers still miss a thrid of the time or maybe even more. Whatever the skill level, i think shortgame/putting is the most important aspect of any players game. You cant score your at your best without it.

[sean_miller]

Question: Isn't chipping the basis for the entire full swing? You want your weight left and a flat wrist when you chip, no? So mastering that "impact" move would thus improve your ball striking. I know they're all intertwined but maybe the answer here is chipping specifically, not lumping that in with pitch shots and putting i.e. the overall short game.

Jetfan, it takes like 2-days to improve 1000% on chipping - the learning curve on chipping is basically an 89 degree slope upward. If that's your reasoning, I see your point. Somebody can hit chip shots well even though they've never taken one single full swing at the ball. I've seen people who are good at min-golf who can barely hit the ball out of their shadow with an iron or wood.

To compare mastering a chip shot and mastering contact during a full swing is like . . . I'm struggling for the proper metaphor . . . apples and oranges are too close. Apples and pumpkins perhaps?

[Zeph]

Question: Isn't chipping the basis for the entire full swing? You want your weight left and a flat wrist when you chip, no? So mastering that "impact" move would thus improve your ball striking. I know they're all intertwined but maybe the answer here is chipping specifically, not lumping that in with pitch shots and putting i.e. the overall short game.

Chipping is very related, but many find it difficult to make the move from chipping to full swing. If you get the ballstriking down, your chipping will improve, or you will see what you are doing wrong. It's not as easy to go the other way around. Weight forward and head still are two important factors for both full shots and chipping and is what lots of players fail at. Working on chipping is easy. It's a short swing, you control everything. The full swing is so fast, you don't have the same control. That's why the transfer from chipping to full swing is so hard.

I found (with help) the reason to why I was hitting it fat with my irons. I applied the same changes to my chipping stroke and it went from chunking to hitting the ball first and improving the results immediately.

[shaun]

Easy question. Ball striking. Why even list a poll - you know the answer, Erik. Pros might "make their money" on the short game but they've already got their ballstriking to the place they need it to be.

I agree with all of this. I voted for ballstriking too.

Most golfers don't realise just how badly they strike the ball. They're terrible; not even close to hitting solid shots. I'm not trying to discourage anyone here. On the contrary, once this fact is appreciated, it's a good thing: if it were true that the average golfer was struggling to break 90 while hitting the ball like a pro, then we'd have to conclude that improving at this game is really hard -- and, when I say "really hard", I mean it would be "it's-time-for-the-clubs-to-go-on-ebay"-type of hard. Fortunately, it's not. Most of the guys I see just don't understand how much better their ballstriking could be with a bit of (admittedly, painstaking) work.

[halcon]

Ball striking. It is impossible to get a good score with 2 OBs, 3 waters and 2 hazards per round .

[misty_mountainhop]

I think I'd put them in the order listed in the poll i.e. striking first followed by short game and lastly mental side. This with the proviso we're talking beginner. At some point there's a cutoff where I would put short game higher than ball striking but where that is depends on the player I guess.

[zeg]

Honestly, I think this question is too simplistic to be very enlightening. What you need to improve most depends on where you are and what handicap you are starting from. Also, given that ballstriking is a component of short game, that sort of loads the question. I think a fairer way to get at this is to ask whether it's full strokes or short game. After all, I can't count the number of tips I've seen to work on chipping to improve your ball striking, so it's not really either-or.

In my case, I voted for short game. My reasoning is that while I've got plenty of room to go on ballstriking, I can already get to "short game" distance in 2 under par most of the time, yet I still average around double bogey. To get to bogey, then, I need to find about one stroke every hole. Given my pace of improvement, it's going to take a lot longer to pick up that stroke with ballstriking than it will with the short game. The room for improvement is there in my short game, and it's the low-hanging fruit.

So my real answer is that no one aspect is universally the place to focus, you have to have a balanced game. All else being equal, focus on the aspect that you can improve the most quickly and is the weakest in your particular game.

[iacas]

Honestly, I think this question is too simplistic to be very enlightening. What you need to improve most depends on where you are and what handicap you are starting from.

It says "in general." It's NOT specific to one particular golfer. That's the entire point...

Also, given that ballstriking is a component of short game, that sort of loads the question.

Nobody really takes it that way. Nobody says "that guy's a great ballstriker" because he hits a beautiful greenside bunker shot. The good ballstriker isn't in the greenside bunker.

FWIW.

[andyh]

I think it is short game and putting. The thread was improve "quickly". Putting you can learn very fast, as you can chipping. Poor putters who 3 and 4 putt all the time can drop to 1 and 2 putts very quickly with a few months of practice. If all parts of your game suck, then learning to putt and chip will lower your scores the quickest. "ball striking" is a longer process and I don't think your scores will drop as fast or as quick than they do with putting and chipping. Not to say this is not important.

[jschen]

Well, from the point of view of possibly the worst player on the forum, it's ball striking. No amount of short game will help with total inconsistency in trying to get to the short game distance in the first place. On days when my ball striking is way off (topped shots, big slices and hooks), no amount of short game skills or course management will save me. On days when my ball striking is pretty good, I find myself wishing I was a better short game player. Given a choice between those two, I'd take the latter any day.

[Alex B]

I selected "improve short game/putting," but Erik's and Butch's posts have swayed me to "improve ballstriking." Nonetheless, I primarily agree with zeg.

Honestly, I think this question is too simplistic to be very enlightening. What you need to improve most depends on where you are and what handicap you are starting from.

It says "in general." It's NOT specific to one particular golfer. That's the entire point...

That may be the entire point, but the question is still ill-defined. What does it mean to be a "golfer" anyway? Suppose being a golfer means playing at least one round a year. In that case, the average golfer likely couldn't break 110. (Remember that though the average of all rounds played is somewhere in the 90s, the average of the average score of all once-or-more-a-year golfers is much, much higher --

there are many people who play golf just several times a year , and it's fair to assume that almost all of them most of them are total hackers.) Now suppose being a golfer means playing at least ten times a year. The distribution is very different, with most golfers able to break 100. So the question doesn't tell us whether or not to factor in the large number of infrequent golfers who couldn't break 150 (if they were honest) from the red tees, or other subsets of golfers (such as children) that might affect the answer. Maybe the answer to the question is the same regardless of how we define "golfer." Still, until we do so, we're basically asking "What is x squared?" knowing only that x is between 4 and 6.

[zeg]

Nobody really takes it that way. Nobody says "that guy's a great ballstriker" because he hits a beautiful greenside bunker shot. The good ballstriker isn't in the greenside bunker.

Yeah, I looked back and realized there was just one post that seemed to take it that way and I guess it stuck in my head. My bad.

I think it is short game and putting. The thread was improve "quickly". Putting you can learn very fast, as you can chipping. Poor putters who 3 and 4 putt all the time can drop to 1 and 2 putts very quickly with a few months of practice. If all parts of your game suck, then learning to putt and chip will lower your scores the quickest. "ball striking" is a longer process and I don't think your scores will drop as fast or as quick than they do with putting and chipping. Not to say this is not important.

I agree with this. For most golfers, I'd certainly agree that ultimately you'll improve your score the most when you can hit well enough that you're hitting GIRs or narrowly missing them. But, at least in my experience, improving your long game to that point is a long journey. Pitches, chips, and putting, on the other hand, improved a lot (for me, at least) pretty quickly after I started working on it. My striking improved, but it took a lot longer to turn that into score improvements.

If you can't get the ball off the ground, then things are obviously different---you need to get the rudiments of ball striking in right away before you can really "play." But most golfers I see on the course hit well enough that they're up around the green quickly enough that I think they'll pick up a stroke every couple holes with better pitches and chips, even if they'll ultimately improve more by not needing as many of those.

[soon_tourpro]

Depends what handicap the player has.

Ball striking is key at the lower levels.
Then as the mid and low handicaps comes along the short game takes over.
Then the mental game.

Consistency is a desired trait as this allow the player to shoot scores based upon their current level of skill.
Ballstriking helps there.

[dblbgy17]

I think it is short game and putting. The thread was improve "quickly".

i agree with andyh. if you're looking to improve "fast" then i think it's in the short game/putting. improving in this area leads to being a better ball striker. if you start to get up and down better than your ball striking is getting better and you can transfer the 3/4 swing of your pitch shots to the full swing of your mid irons. it's like bill murray says, "baby steps".

Nobody really takes it that way. Nobody says "that guy's a great ballstriker" because he hits a beautiful greenside bunker shot. The good ballstriker isn't in the greenside bunker.

i disagree. good/great ball strikers end up in the bunker too. and they're able to hit out near the flag and drop the putt b/c their short games are good. most of the best ball strikers are the best out of the sand also, you have to be a good ball striker to get out of the sand. that's why you see the weekend warriors throwing the ball out of the sand after 3 failed attempts to blast it out. granted, bunker play is definitely a separate skill, but it starts with good ball striking.