Kapalua: These 10 have the hybrid game to win there
By Bill Felber
2. Collin Morikawa
Since before his victory at the 2020 PGA, the strength of Morikawa’s game has been his precision approach game. During the just-concluded season, he gained an average of better than 1.2 strokes against the field by that skill alone.
They don’t do skill data at The Brit, but since Morikawa also won that one – by two strokes last July – it’s a pretty good assumption that his facility with irons hasn’t gone anywhere.
In fact Morikawa had nearly a three-tenths stroke advantage on everybody else on Tour last season. Only one Tour player – DeChambeau off the tee – gained a bigger advantage on the full Tour through any single aspect of his game.
On the tee, Morikawa isn’t in Dechambeau’s class. But his +0.281 average pickup on the field at least ably supports his massive edge in the approach game.
Since Kapalua favors players who can do both things, that combination makes the defending Open champion a serious title contender this week.
1. Jon Rahm
Nobody on Tour better combined both the driving and approach game aspects during 2020-21 than Rahm. That’s why he finished the season as the world’s No.1 ranked player and the Tour’s leading money winner.
As a driver, Rahm picked up +0.834 strokes per round last season. Only DeChambeau did better.
Approaching greens, Rahm more than made up the difference on DeChambeau. There he averaged +0.717 strokes gained, the season’s eighth best showing.
Considering the full Kapalua field, only Morikawa, Thomas and Berger ranked ahead of Rahm in Strokes Gained Approaching the Green last season, and none of them can boast his iron game.
Granted, Rahm’s irons did not perform up to their usual standard during his only fall Tour appearance, at last September’s Fortinet. Largely for that reason, he missed the cut, his first such failure since the Wells Fargo last July.
But that was pretty obviously an aberration. In 19 starts last season where skill-set data was kept, Rahm’s approach game produced positive results all but twice, among them his victory at the U.S. Open, his all-but-victory at the Memorial, and his five other top fives.
If anybody is a good bet to be around at the finish Sunday, Rahm is that guy.