Strokes Gained Putting

[MEfree]

How could Tiger have 1 putted the first green today and LOST a fraction of a stroke in this category?  Is it because of some sort of adjustment they use?  Seems weird in that it is not possible to do better than a 1 putt (as a chip in should not affect this stat)

STATISTICS

	ROUND 1	ROUND 2	ROUND 3	TOTAL	RANK*
EAGLES	--	--	--	0	N/A
BIRDIES	4	7	--	11	T13
PARS	13	11	1	25	T66
BOGEYS	1	--	--	1	75
DOUBLE BOGEYS	--	--	--	0	N/A
OTHER	--	--	--	0	N/A
DRIVING ACCURACY	64	71	0	65.5	T30
DRIVING DISTANCE	276.0	306.0	--	291.0	12
STROKES GAINED - PUTTING	0.487	2.911	-0.008	1.649	T12
PUTTS PER ROUND	32	30	1	21.0	T7
PUTTS PER GIR	2.000	1.706	--	1.839	53
GREENS IN REG	78	94	0	83.8	3
SAND SAVES	100	--	--	100.0	T1
*Ranks are computed at the end of each round.

http://www.pgatour.com/golfers/008793/tiger-woods/scorecards/#!/r009/2012

[brocks]

Strokes gained is not about how many putts you make, it's about how you compare with the field from the same distance. So if Tiger makes a one-footer, he's probably not going to pick up any strokes from the field on that. As for why he lost a tiny fraction, it's probably just a rounding error. If a lot of guys have already finished their round, and he's only played one hole, and the overall average for the field has to come out to zero, then guys who have played fewer holes are going to have slightly inaccurate numbers. I'm surprised they even report that stat for a player who hasn't completed his round.

[Beachcomber]

Can someone explain to me what this stat is?  Or how it is calculated?  I'm going to do Aimpoint this weekend, and I know this is a stat that the Aimpointers like to discuss.  So figured I should understand what it is before I go to this clinic.

[x129]

http://www.pgatour.com/r/strokes-gained-putting-questions/index.html

Quote:

How is the new statistic computed?

First, the average number of putts a TOUR player is expected to take is calculated from every distance, based on ShotLink data from the previous season. The actual number of putts taken by a player are subtracted from this average value to determine strokes gained or lost.

For example, the average number of putts used to hole out from 7 feet, 10 inches is 1.5. If a player one-putts from this distance, he gains 0.5 strokes (1.5 - 1). If he two-putts, he loses 0.5 strokes (1.5 - 2). If he three-putts, he loses 1.5 strokes (1.5 - 3).

For the final statistic, a player's strokes gained or lost putting is compared to the field. For example, if a player gained a total of three strokes over the course of a round and the field gained an average of one stroke, the player's "Strokes Gained Against the Field" would be two.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Beachcomber

Can someone explain to me what this stat is?  Or how it is calculated?  I'm going to do Aimpoint this weekend, and I know this is a stat that the Aimpointers like to discuss.  So figured I should understand what it is before I go to this clinic.

[Beachcomber]

x129.  Thanks for the response.  So Strokes Gained Putting is taking Shotlink data from the previous year.  Is that on all courses?  Or just the data for that particular course/tournament, that particular week?

[x129]

My understanding is that that they take last years values (all courses).   They also do strokes gained against the field (strokes gained- strokes gained on average by the field).

Originally Posted by Beachcomber

x129.  Thanks for the response.  So Strokes Gained Putting is taking Shotlink data from the previous year.  Is that on all courses?  Or just the data for that particular course/tournament, that particular week?

[RandallT]

Anyone know how we can easily calculate our own "Strokes Gained"? I'm not sure what I'd want my baseline to be- others with similar handicaps? Pros? Either way, as long as it's consistent I suppose. http://strokesgainedcalc.com/strokes-gained-calculator/ Found this link but I'm on my phone. Will have to review when I get home.

[MEfree]

I just plugged my last round into the calculator you provided- I think it is pretty good, but there are limitations.

The least accurate, IMO, is the Recovery category.  Certain recovery shots are much easier than others, so it is hard to come up with an expected PRO shot total just based on distance.

Things like wind, uphill/downhill, altitude, green speed, pin location, green quality, lie in the bunker, amount of tree interference, forced lay-ups etc. are also not factored in, so keep this in mind.

Here is what they say regarding limitations:

With all that being said, there are a few location specific limitations that I would like to address so that you don’t run into any big problems.

Tee Shots(t) - There is no data available for holes <100* yards or >600* yards, so keep your tee shot distance #’s in that range.

Fairway(f), Rough(r), and Sand(s) - There is no data available for shots <10* yards from any of these locations.

Recovery(x) - These are shots where you are in serious trouble and either have to hit a miracle shot or pitch out. There is no data available for shots <81* yards from this location.

Green(g) - Remember, this is the only surface where distances are measured in FEET, not yards. The green is also the surface where recording as accurate of a measurement as possible is very important, especially inside 20 feet where 2-3 feet can make a relatively large difference. Always use whole number(no decimals) and the range of data available is 1* foot up to 100* feet.

*If you put in a distance from a location and there is no data available, the calculator will put a “0″ in the PGA Strokes column and your results will be skewed incorrectly. Just do the best you can to make sure all your starting distances/locations have data associated with them. If you have a 5 yard pitch shot from the Rough(r) you are just going to have to put 10 yards in the calculator. If you have a Recovery(x) shot from 50 yards you are just going to have to put in 81 yards in the calculator.

It appears there is at least one bug in the program in how it handled a 270 yard tee shot for me.  On the total above, it had my score correct at 76 which it said was 8.76 worse than the ave PGA Tour Pro who would shoot 67.24.  However, on the various yardage categories, it appears to have double counted the 270 tee shot in both the Tee Shot category and the 226+ category and come up with a total of my round being 11.06 worse.

STROKES GAINED CALCULATOR V1.3

T

F

R

S

X

G

Course

Score

TOT STK

Tee

Fairway

Rough

Sand

Recovery

Green

67.24

76

-8.76

PUTTING

TEE SHOTS

226+yds

176-225yds

126-175yds

50-125yds

31-50 yds

10-30 yds

BUNKER

OVER15

5 TO 15

UNDER5

RECOVERY

TOTAL

-4.42

-2.06

-1.07

-0.23

0.2

-0.88

0.06

-0.05

-1.57

-0.15

-0.81

-0.09

-11.06

TEE SHOTS

-4.42

APPROACHES

-3.16

SHORT GAME

-0.87

PUTTING

-2.53

[RandallT]

Anyone interested in a Mac Numbers "Strokes Gained Putting" worksheet?  I'm going to polish up something I've been thinking about since I saw this tweet:

https://mobile.twitter.com/SwashPutting/status/558183245221621760

By simply logging the distance of 1st, 2nd, (and hopefully not 3rd putt), a wealth of information can be had.  The rest of the post below shows some graphs and summary data. Apps like Game Golf, ARCCOS, and others should be able to implement this EASILY, but they don't yet. I don't know why not. It's not rocket science.

Ok, so away we go. First enter your data:

You need to only enter the stuff in the Putt 1/2/3 columns. The rest calculates itself. Including the little "grading" feature, with weakness and strength.

The calculations were made from Mark Brodie's analysis found on page 4 of his 2011 paper on the topic--> http://www.columbia.edu/~mnb2/broadie/Assets/putting_strokes_gained_20110113.pdf

If the data changes year to year, we can just edit this chart below (a separate table in the spreadsheet). I've interpolated some data to make it go foot by foot:

For every putt's initial starting distance, you gain or lose strokes based on the average the PGA player takes to putt from there. Nothing fancy so far.

The fun comes in looking at multiple rounds. Here are several rounds combined in graph form:

For this next graph, I plot strokes fewer than 30 against strokes gained putting by round.  For my sample data, there's a correlation, but I don't think one necessarily exists. I used "30 putts" arbitrarily," so if you have 36 putts, that's a -6 value. If you putt 27, that would be +3 obviously. My data is made up, but I'll try to go back and enter real data from last season later.

Here's another one showing putts per round, average proximity from the hole, and length of putts made (again, sample data only- don't read anything into it):

Lastly, I'm working on showing more detail for each range of putt. For 8-10 feet, for example, just by entering that simple data above, you can get all of this information:

Make percentage from each range. Average miss (in feet) for each range- and miss % for each range, obviously. For each range, you'll know your average Strokes Gained Putting, so that you can see which ranges you are weak.

The trick with analyzing strokes gained putting by range though is that you can hit good distance putts, but if you stink at the 4-5 footers, it shows in the long range Strokes Gained Average as well. You have to temper the Strokes Gained Putting averages for each range, with the percentage makes at each range.

Since we have the Percent Made at each range for the pros, that can also be added to the graphs of your performance by range for comparison.  Cool stuff.

This spreadsheet will be obsolete once the various tools out there start incorporating it. Why don't they do it now???? I see a huge benefit in benchmarking your own performance.

Send me a PM if you want a copy of the spreadsheet as is. I'm constantly tweaking it to add new graphs and functions, so it changes daily, bit by bit.

There's a grade assigned on the first page of the spreadsheet- in case you wondered how it worked, here's the reference table that you can configure (this template started from the "GPA" template in Mac Number, and I didn't take some of it out yet- I thought the GPA thing was cool actually):

[Barking Weasel]

pm sent.

looks interesting. not sure how crazy I am about stepping off all of my putts on every round but I'd sure try it.

[RandallT]

pm sent.

looks interesting. not sure how crazy I am about stepping off all of my putts on every round but I'd sure try it.

I just eyeball it for my tracking. I'm sure I'm off half the time, but if it's 16 ft, not 14 ft, oh well. 25 ft, not 22 ft.  I figure it's better than nothing, and will at least give you a good sense of where you stand. I think I'm AT LEAST 6 strokes worse than pros every single round. I can't wait to put in my last 10 rounds.

As we discussed in PM, TST doesn't allow spreadsheets to be sent within the PM attachment, so I'll find a public dropbox area and PM anyone a link, if they reach out to me.

Randy

[iacas]

As we discussed in PM, TST doesn't allow spreadsheets to be sent within the PM attachment, so I'll find a public dropbox area and PM anyone a link, if they reach out to me.

Dropbox is good because you can update the file and the link stays the same.

If you .zip the file you can send it via a PM, btw.

I'd like to host this on http://lowestscorewins.com/. Let me know.

[RandallT]

Quote:

Originally Posted by RandallT

As we discussed in PM, TST doesn't allow spreadsheets to be sent within the PM attachment, so I'll find a public dropbox area and PM anyone a link, if they reach out to me.

Dropbox is good because you can update the file and the link stays the same.

If you .zip the file you can send it via a PM, btw.

I'd like to host this on http://lowestscorewins.com/. Let me know.

Great, thanks!  I've got a good dropbox link that people can buzz me if they're interested. I sent you the link earlier, Erik, so I hope that works.

I'm gonna crank out a few more things with it by the end of the week, test out various extreme conditions, and then declare it's ready to be seen by more people, if they're interested in the thing. Posting on the LSW site would be cool, if you think it's worthy. That reminds me I haven't checked out that site in too long!!!

[RandallT]

For those interested, these are the end results of the spreadsheet. (plus some other pie charts and stuff).  This was totally eye-opening for me. I knew I didn't sink many putts, and that I three-putted more than I should.... but.... geez.  (yes, this is my real data for 1.5 seasons)

At the top, you can select "Career", "Last 20", "Last 10", or "Last 5" and the chart dynamically updates from the history you've entered in. My percentages are worse than I had thought.  The cells in the table highlight the worst problem areas (either percentage against the pros, or worst strokes gained performance per round, or average misses being outside 3 feet).

Now, where is that next Aimpoint class?

Again, if anyone interested in the Putting Strokes Gained spreadsheet on Mac, just PM me.

[Zihao]

Hey Randall I'm interested in trying out the calculator. However when I tried to PM you the system said you can not receive messages. Maybe you can send me a link to the dropbox? thank you

[boogielicious]

8 hours ago, Zihao said:

Hey Randall I'm interested in trying out the calculator. However when I tried to PM you the system said you can not receive messages. Maybe you can send me a link to the dropbox? thank you

Calling @RandallT!

Welcome to the site @Zihao. If you type the "@"symbol and the users name, it will notify them you are mentioning them and they will usually get an e-mail notification.

[RandallT]

11 hours ago, Zihao said:

Hey Randall I'm interested in trying out the calculator. However when I tried to PM you the system said you can not receive messages. Maybe you can send me a link to the dropbox? thank you

Hi!

If you've purchased Lowest Score Wins, the "official" version is published on the book's website, and the instructions are in the book as to how to get access to the site.

My policy for sharing any spreadsheets is to do it with "close friends" here. If you post lots and become a good contributor here, I'm glad to go offline and share ideas on golf stats tracking. Otherwise, I don't get bogged down in handling special requests. Sorry. Life just too short to go down that road and do email exchanges with tons of people I don't really "know." 

There are other places on the internet to find good strokes gained spreadsheets. Mine are decent too (there are tons of approaches to data input, and graphic output), but it's mostly personal preference. My best versions are in Mac Numbers, which very few people have. A version on Google Docs (Sheets) is close to being finalized, but there's no telling when I'll get around to polishing that off. I'm lazy. My Excel version is a mess right now.