The 2023 PGA Tour season: Approach, as always, is key to success
By Bill Felber
Putting
Over the course of the full season, putting skill is annually over-rated, and 2023 on the PGA Tour was no different. The strength of the correlation is only -44.8, making it the weakest of the four major skills.
That’s not new. It’s the 14th time in the Strokes Gained era – and the eighth in succession since 2016 – that Strokes Gained Putting correlated least strongly with overall score.
That correlation did strengthen in 2023, rising from -.391 a season ago. It’s the strongest correlation between putting and score since 2014; when the measurement also worked out to -.448.
This is the area where most of the game’s stars lag. Scheffler, Rahm, and McIlroy, the three stars of the 2023 season, rank 150th, 35th, and 65th in Strokes Gained Putting respectively.
Viktor Hovland, the Tour Championship winner, ranks 51st.
With one or two exceptions, the 2023 Strokes Gained Putting top 10 is a bunch of guys who drain putts to compensate for their weaknesses in all other areas of the game.
Here’s that top 10.
- Maverick McNealy (1.058)
- Taylor Montgomery (0.884)
- Denny McCarthy (0.752)
- Xander Schauffele (0.668)
- Justin Suh (0.635)
- Andrew Putnam (0.628)
- Max Homa (0.621)
- Harry Hall (0.607)
- Tyrrell Hatton (0.597)
- Sam Ryder (0.587)
Next. Iron Play Rules All During 2021/22 PGA Season. dark
This is not a bad list, it’s just not an overly distinguished one.
None of the 10 ranks lower than 81st – that would be Hall, but five are 40th or lower. Among that top 10, Schauffele, No. 4, Hatton, No. 8, and Homa, No. 10, also rank top 10 in stroke average; the group average is 38th.