The Stat Thread

[Stretch]

There was a post the other day where a member solicited feedback based on his statistics and got some good advice about working on the weaker areas of his game. Thought it might be useful to have a dedicated thread for that kind of general discussion. Also fun to track how (if) they change with practice. Am happy to go first in dropping my own drawers. Last 5 rounds:

Fairways 80%
GIR 42%
Scrambling 17%
Sand 20%

Putts per hole -- 2.04
Putts per GIR -- 2.30

Scoring: Bogey 50%, Par 40%, Double+ 10%. Score average +13.5.

Clearly I am foremost a terrible, terrible putter right now. As my playing partner helpfully suggested yesterday: "Why don't you just use your driver on the green, man?"

[Gerald]

Clearly I am foremost a terrible, terrible putter right now. As my playing partner helpfully suggested yesterday: "Why don't you just use your driver on the green, man?"

That reminds me of the time we learnt the monkey to hit 200 yds with a 5 iron, we took him with us to a 200 yds par 3, when it was his turn to play, he hit the ball 3 ft from the hole, we gave him a putter to make his birdie and he hit the putter another 200 yds.........

I have seen posts over stats at several forums many times, and the outcome is always about the same...... too less fairways, too less GIR, very poor scrambling, too many putts, etc...... Stats are more for you personally to know yours weaks and strenghts, but even before you start making stats, you (most of us) allready know what to improve to lower the handicap ..... it is allways the same, improve the fairways hit, improve GIR, improve scrambling a terrible lot, improve putting a terrible lot. So why are we not improving, just very simple, we like to play rounds with our buddies, we arrive just in time to walk the course, we don't plan a scrambling week, to improve that, we don't stand 2 hours a day at the putting green, we don't take lessons for scrambling, we never took a putting lesson, we focus on hitting straight 180 yds with a 5 iron and above all we focus is buying the next better driver..... etc. It is so easy, and only the guys (and girl) investing time, time, time will reach scratch ...... and they are not from Mars, they are nothing better than you, but they know they will hit the ball 138 - 142 yds, when it needs to be 140 yds..... Tracking stats is a waste of time, to figure out what you allready know and the answers you will get here are directing you in no way other than you allready knew. Just my $.02

[soloredd]

Agreed. I think stats such as this pretty much tell the tale, shouldn't take much for you to look at your stats and figure out where to improve. For me, I have a lot of putts but I know from my experience is more because of my short game - I leave chips too far, requiring 1 too many putts. I look at my fairways and realize I'm scrambling more than I would like.

I look at your stats, I see the same thing: your scrambling is 17%. For us that is crap, it leads to taking too many unnecessary putts.

[Stretch]

... you (most of us) allready know what to improve to lower the handicap ..... it is allways the same, improve the fairways hit, improve GIR, improve scrambling a terrible lot, improve putting a terrible lot.

"Want to get better? Easy, just fix everything."

I disagree that tracking stats is a waste of time. It's precisely because -- as you point out -- practice time is limited for most of us casual golfers, that using stats to break down the strengths and weaknesses of your game makes sense. Then you can spend that time wisely, on the areas that are likely to produce the largest relative improvement. Of course the numbers themselves, out of context, certainly don't tell you everything. Let's say you don't hit a lot of greens, but still manage to get the ball up inside of six feet most of the time. Then you miss most of those putts. Your scrambling stats will suck, but does that mean you need to be spending more time chipping and pitching?

[JJLinn]

Here's mine just for the hell of it:

Fairways: 30.5%
GIR: 4.4%
Putts per Hole: 2.37

Per Round
Birdies: 0.2
Pars: 0.5
Bogeys: 5.0
Doubles: 4.8
Over: 7.5

Stroke Averages
Par 3's: 4.9
Par 4's: 6.7
Par 5's: 7.5

[Shripe]

Figured I'd do this just for the heck of it, though the numbers mean absolutely nothing... First of all, I haven't been intensively tracking my rounds... and I've only managed to get out on-course twice so far, at my pitch-putt par 3 (once with stats). I've more been working on my swing.. eventually I'll build up the courage to go (it's hard without golf buddies!).

My only tracked round: Par 54, 1154yds.

GIR: 2/18 - 11.1%
Bogey scramble (since regular stat is zero!): 5/16 - 31.25%
Putts/hole: 2.0 (2 3's, 2 1-putts, rest 2)
Putts/GIR: 2.0 (so close to getting my first birdie.. but these were my first pars too!)

Scoring:
Par: 11.1%
Bogey: 27.7%
Double: 33.3%
Over: 27.7%

Ouch... hehe

[Gerald]

"Want to get better? Easy, just fix everything."

I doubt if you have so little time to practice, it is fair to expect that you will improve much...... not even if you would practice at your weakest .....

Besides that if you play regularly .... you will know what are your weak spots, even without keeping stats. Stats mean little ..... look at you example ...... you get missed green chips within 6 feet and then miss that putts ....... in the stats will be a poor scrambling, while this isn't the case and your putting will show an average of close to 2.00 ...... while it is actually the short putts that need your focus....... so the example you put down here actually is proof of you personally know what to work on, while the stats actually show a weak scrambling ......

[jamo]

My stats for the year:

Score: 72.82
GIR: 60.13%
Fairways: 66.82%
Putts: 31.59 per round
GIR Proximity to Hole: 24.3 ft
Scrambling: 48.65%

Birdies: 13.07%
Pars: 59.15%
Bogeys: 27.12%

Everything can be found here: http://jamo1358.webs.com/index.html# Under Stats.

[Gerald]

Here's mine just for the hell of it:

Ar hc 36.4 ..... lot's to improve ofcourse ..... and if I were you, I wouldn't even think of keeping stats, you will just have to improve all, but your putts per hole are at 2.37 which isn't too bad at your hc ..... problem is that it is taking you about 2.6 stroke to reach the greens at your par 3's ....... maybe it is best to focus of your mid irons to reach the par 3's mostly in one stroke ....... you will profit from this aswell in your par 4's and 5's

Maybe it is better to switch to a ball taking less spin (like a DT Solo), the NXT might take to much side spin at your level of play, thus punishing more than helping you.

[Stretch]

Ar hc 36.4 ..... lot's to improve ofcourse ..... and if I were you, I wouldn't even think of keeping stats, you will just have to improve all, but your putts per hole are at 2.37 which isn't too bad at your hc ..... problem is that it is taking you about 2.6 stroke to reach the greens at your par 3's ....... maybe it is best to focus of your mid irons to reach the par 3's mostly in one stroke ....... you will profit from this aswell in your par 4's and 5's

Sound advice based on his stats, which there's no point in him keeping.

[JJLinn]

Sound advice based on his stats, which there's no point in him keeping.

Haha, I just keep them to track the progress I'm making. Once (if) I improve it'll be cool to see how far I've actually come.

[SeanMcFarlin]

Mine are,

Average GIR- 6
Average FIR- 6.2
Average Putts- 38
Best Score- 66 ( par 32 course played twice )
Average Score- 84

Scores
Eagles- 0 (0%)
Birdies-13 (4.5%)
Pars- 96 (33.3%)
Bogeys- 101 (35%)
Double Bogeys+- 78 (27%)

[Gerald]

For what it is worth, I also kept scores for about 10 rounds last month :

Score: 78
GIR: 48%
Fairways: 65%
Putts: 32 per round
GIR Proximity to Hole: 33 ft
Scrambling: 56%

Birdies: 11%
Pars: 51%
Bogeys and worse: 38%

Hard to tell where to improve from here, but not in the charts is that I miss most fairways on the right (fade, slice and push), GIR is a bit poor, but I am great at scrambling but from the sand I rarely have a save (allthough getting out the sand is no problem at all) and I am bit too far off the pin on mid irons.

I am currently working on my mid irons accuracy and I am allways working at scrambling and putting....... I am thinking of cutting 1" from my driver shaft (starting with 0.5") in the hope to improve accuracy from the tee...... it is mostly more effective to improve what you are good at, then try to fix a weakness.

And since I changed from Ping i15 to Mizuno MP-57 I am a bit more accurate on my good hits, but also a bit shorter on mishits ..... hope to see an improvement on dispersion within a few months.

[stricklerlee]

My stat for today:

Score: 41
GIR: 5/9 55%
Fairway: 3/7 42%
Putts: 16 ---- 1.777
Scrambling: 1/4 25%
Bogey Scrambling: 2/4 50%

[Shripe]

Before anyone questions it, looking back at my stats and scorecard I noticed my bogey scramble stat was off. So, forget that one... now that I'm using a site for score/stat inputs, I'll be better off figuring it out there rather than the little job I attempted during my first post. :P

[stricklerlee]

My stat for today:

Score: 83
GIR: 6/18 33%
Fairway: 5/14 35%
Putts: 30 ------- 1.66667
Scrambling: 6/14 42%
Bogey Scrambling: 12/14 85%

[Gerald]

My stat for today:

Easy to say what should be improved, but you are a great putter !!!

What does "Bogey Scrambling" mean ? ...... or is it missed GIR, then a chip or pitch or sand shot + 2 putts ????

[stricklerlee]

Easy to say what should be improved, but you are a great putter !!!

Thank you. What's weird is that I have a great iron swing, but I was never a good GIR golfer for some reason. Probably lack of confidence.

Anyway, yes, that's what bogey scrambling is.