Scratched golfists are good. But in golf, “good” is always relative. If you think the next step from scratch is turning pros, it is more than just a small jump. The gap between the scratch and the tournament level golf is wider than most people understand.
Before any scratch player becomes protective, consider this mirror, not criticism. Use data from Stretch To see where your game can still come out.
For me, the most surprising change is the proximity of the access. The pros do not only hit the greens, they hit it near.
The result gap is larger than it looks (and from a shorter course)
The average scratch golf is playing from a course of about 6200 yards. Tournament players are playing closer 7200 yards. This 1000 yard is a big difference, and the average note is at least three shots.
The average golf of golf shoots around 74, and the average tour professional is closer to 71.4.
This means that if we were to take the average scratch golf player and moved them back to 7200 yards, the marking gap of about three strokes would be expanded.
The closeness of the approach is very different
The shots of access are the other performance gap we have examined. The average proximity for tour players for all access shooting is about 37 meters. For a scratched golf player, it is close to 65 meters. That extra thirty legs adds a few strokes across the round.
If you look at standard access shots from 175-200 yards, Tour Pro usually hits their goal in 60% green of time. For a average scratch golf player using The goal data shotis only 37% of the time.
The long accuracy of the game (especially from 200+) is a hidden killer
Golf player, scratch or professional, will tell you that the greens become more difficult to hit further you get from the holes. However, tournament players can often hit the greens and leave the wells themselves when they are playing from that yard distance 200-225.
Scratch golfists are leaving themselves 78 to 102 meters from the hole and just hitting the green 25% of the time. Only only half more often than professionals, and of course not enough to think about marking saving your outcome.
Short game and setting are close but anyway a trench
Interestingly, the gap between scratch players and professionals in the short performance of the game is smaller than in other parts of the game. This matches the tips that most amateurs hear: improve your short game, and your results will fall. For scratch players, it already has.
Pro PGA Tour rises up and down about 60% of the time, compared to 54% for scratch players. One-putt percentages are 40% in tours and 34% for scratch players-not a mass change.
An area where scratch players still fall shortly short is sand savings. Pro Tour convert nearly 58% of their bunker shooting; Scratch players are about 37%.
Final thoughts
Scratched golfists are great players. It is not easy to become a scratched golf player but the tournament players are in another dimension. Whether it’s scoring in a longer course, hitting it closer to 200+, or making a clutch more up and down, everything adds.
office Pro vs Golfer Scratch: Supreme statistics that highlight the skill gap first appeared in MygolfSSS.
