It is always more fun to watch an event when I have played the course AND when bogeys are more common than birdies as was the case in this week's Valspar Championship. I find myself anguishing along with the contenders over the difficult drives, approaches, short game shots - how about those buried lies - and putts. Speaking of putts, I cannot remember seeing greens as slow in a PGA Tour event. 10.5 was mentioned but they looked more like 9 and Justin Leonard said 9 on the telecast after his round. So what effect did the slow greens have on the field? What would you expect?
Fewer 3-Putts?
Since one does not have to worry about their lags getting away from them this would make sense. YES! 3-Putt Avoidance was 19% better for the Valspar field than the 2016 Tour average (2.2% vs. 2.79%). This says that the Valspar field 3-Putted on 2.2% of their greens of 1.6 times in 72 holes vs. the Tour avg. 2.0 3-Putts in 72 holes.
More 1-Putts?
Players can be more bold? Also YES but not by as much as one might think. The Valspar field
1-Putted 40.1% of their greens vs. the 2016 Tour average 38.5%.
There was ONE major difference in Distance control:
Lag Putts (20+ ft.) holed or hit past the hole. The 2015 Tour average for this distance control stat was 67% of lag putts had a chance to go in and, on average, 7% found the hole. The Valspar field only got 47% of their 20+ ft. lag putts to the hole and only 5% went in. That is a major difference.
With the majority of lag putts left short, the % 3-Putts from 20+ ft. was exactly the same as the 2015 Tour average - 8%.
Finally, the dramatically slower greens did not produce a single 4 or 5-Putt.
