✨ Roll Out The Red Carpet
Canadian Open Review & U.S. Open Preview | Stats, Trends & More!
Walk it off, Nick Taylor! Oh my, 71’ for eagle to win your national championship?! I dig it. The only way to follow that up would be with another national championship so aren’t we lucky?!
Los Angeles Country Club is about to blow your freaking mind. This place is insane and I will be out there on the grounds all week. If you see me, give me a holler.
Good luck!
Rick
🏆 Last Week’s Optimal Lineup
Nick Taylor: $8,100 | 128.5 Points
Aaron Rai: $7,600 | 117.0 Points
Tyrrell Hatton: $10,200 | 114.0 Points
Tommy Fleetwood: $9,600 | 112.0 Points
CT Pan: $7,100 | 110.5 Points
Mark Hubbard: $7,300 | 96.0 Points
TOTAL: $49,900 | 678.0 Points
🌹Rose Resurgence
Justin Rose fell short on Sunday in Canada but it doesn’t make his resurgent 2023 any less impressive. Rose is in the midst of his best approach season since 2015, his best around-the-green season since 2019 and his best putting season since 2019.
In total, it’s his best overall season since 2018 — a season where he had (8) Top 10s in 20 starts including a win and four other podiums.
👕🎩🏁 Giveaway: US Open SWAGGGG
SWAG — Stuff We All Get. I’m a sucker for merch and I’m a sucker for giving things away. It’s a tiny little thing I can do to giveback to a community that has given me so much.
So here it is — US Open Swag Box that includes things like a polo, hats, blanket, pin flag mugs, whatever else I could find.
If you’re subscribed to this newsletter, you’re already entered. If you’re not, just enter you email address below — that’s it. Sign up for a free newsletter that gives you weekly golf stats. Sounds pretty good for everyone.
🏢LACC Monday Report
I spent the day at LACC on Monday and was able to feast my eyes on this course for the first time. I don’t plan on making an big conclusions so early in the week, considering the atmosphere is more of a pillow fight than a sparring match.
These are simply a few observations:
The fairway rough is more uniform than the rugged rough around the bunkers, but it can still be penal with how thick it is.
Example: Xander hit a near perfect tee shot on 14 which slowly rolled into the rough. Do you even see a ball here? He hit wedge, could hardly advance it and still had 197 into the green.
No. 15 is siiick. It’s a short par-3 that played 120 on Monday. The pin was in the “tongue” (?) which gives so little wiggle room on being able to land AND stop the ball. Here’s the side view.
Sam Burns hit two shots — first short into the bunker. Second landed on the green and bounced into the thick rough.
There was a bit more wind than I anticipated, especially on the higher areas of the back nine. It felt like it was swirling, especially on no. 12. Guys had trouble adjusting.
This course is visually demanding. There was a lot of discussions around proper lines off-the-tee. Half the battle with the driver will be committing to the line without being able to see where you’re going.
❓ Trivia!
This will be the 15th U.S. Open held in California across five different courses. Name the four other — listed with their years below:
6 Times — 2019, 2010, 2000, 1992, 1982
5 Times — 2012, 1998, 1987, 1966, 1955
2 Times — 2021, 2008
1 Time — 1948
Name them.
(Answer at bottom of the email)
🎈 Elevate Your Game
Major Championships are a different beast than the weekly grind on the PGA TOUR. Some guys are capable of elevating their play to the biggest stage and I wanted to be able to quantify who those golfers are.
Below are the biggest gainers in Major Championships versus their non-Major Championship baseline dating back to the start of 2018.
How to read this: Brooks Koepka is 1.697 strokes better in Majors than he is in non-majors.
This is fine, but does it really matter if Francesco Molinari is 1,466% better in Majors than his baseline if his baseline is very low?
Here’s the same list but now filtered for golfers who have the highest baselines.
Patrick Cantlay and Justin Thomas and the two golfers who gain 1.5+ strokes per round normally but are worse in Majors Championships.
Collin Morikawa is essentially twice as good in Major Championship than he is in non-Majors.
⏲️ Xander Is (over)Due
It’s difficult to describe Xander’s Major Championship performances as great or elite or anything coming close to those adjectives since he has exactly zero wins — but it’s true. Schauffele has played in 22 Majors in his career, with his first coming at the 2017 PGA Championship.
In those 22 Majors, he’s gained 10+ strokes to the field on eight different occasions. Since Xander’s Major Championship debut, only Brooks Koepka (10) and Rory McIlroy (9) have gained 10+ strokes to the field more often.
There are ten golfers who own 66 performances of 10+ SG during that period. Those ten golfers account for 11 victories. Xander, Rory, Rose and Spieth are the ones who failed to capture a trophy.
🔦 Spotlight: Mito Pereira
Since Mito plays on LIV, we don’t have a full stat profile available but it’s easy to assume that he’s one of the better ball-strikers in the world right now. He has eight measured rounds in 2023 — his two starts at the Major Championships.
In those eight rounds, he’s gained 17.36 strokes ball-striking which is the fourth best of anyone who has played both majors (Scheffler, Koepka, Cantlay).
Since the Presidents Cup, he has four measured events (16 measured rounds) — where he’s gained 32.19 strokes ball-striking. Two strokes per round is an insane clip.
He has (4) Top 10 finishes in seven LIV events this year.
✅ Accurate Drivers + SG APP
Los Angeles Country Club connects approach play to off-the-tee play like few other golf courses in the world. The result of your tee shot will greatly determine the difficulty of your second shot. That sounds simple, but let me give you some examples.
The tee shot on the tenth is best played up the right side of the fairway. That’s the ideal angle to come in from, but there’s bunkers up there causing concern. If you hit the middle of the fairway, your ball rolls left — significantly below the surface of the green. You’re now playing a blind shot up the hill to the pin. The difference between good and bad drives here is just a few yards or even a few RPM of side spin. There’s a bunch of situations like this around the course.
I want elite ball-strikers but I really want elite driving accuracy and elite approach play with accuracy likely being more critical than distance off-the-tee this week.
Here are the most accurate flushers (accuracy rank + SGAPP rank) in the last 50 rounds.
🎡 Big Boy Golf
There are six (!!) different par-4s that will play over 480 yards this week including each of the last three (16-17-18). Here are the best players on Long Par 4s in the last 50 rounds.
Trivia Answer:
6 Times — 2019, 2010, 2000, 1992, 1982: Olympic Club
5 Times — 2012, 1998, 1987, 1966, 1955: Pebble Bleach
2 Times — 2021, 2008 Torrey Pines
1 Time — 1948 Riviera