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What Matters More: Tee to Green (Driver+Approach) or Short Game

I think it depends on how good a player you are. Tour players spend most of their practice time on the short game, 100 yards in and putting. A twenty handicap is going to improve more by becoming a more consistent ball striker.

There is no right answer to the question.
 
Canadan said:
exceptionally bad? Putting it off the green.
Pretty bad? Having a 10 foot comeback putt.
Somewhat bad? Having a 5 foot comeback putt.
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I would say putting it off the green and into a hazard would be the real equivalent. Just putting it off the green…not so much.
 
stryper said:
I would say putting it off the green and into a hazard would be the real equivalent.
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Ill Allow It GIF
 
I struggle to get off the box with lost balls on drives. My iron game and short game save me a lot. I’d say short game is the most important for a lot of players.
 
stryper said:
I would say putting it off the green and into a hazard would be the real equivalent.
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Oh that would be brutal.

I’d happily pump tee balls into a lake in front of my buddies before doing that
 
This is actually a tough question because now that I’m reading thru the thread and not thinking about my own game i definitely see both sides of it. Thinking more specifically about it being a blanket statement, the tee and approach game argument might hold more merit. I think back to all the rounds that I play as a single getting paired up.

I don’t mean this to sound conceited in anyway it’s just factual but I am significantly better off the tee and on approach than almost everyone I get paired up. For people that don’t get to play and practice a lot hitting the ball further introduces the potential for more issues. Sure I may hit one OB every so often but I’m not losing a half dozen balls + a round.

So I think it’s a cop out but like everything else in golf it’s personal and relative to your own game. We can’t make a blanket statement and have it hold up with everyone.
 
stryper said:
I would say putting it off the green and into a hazard would be the real equivalent. Just putting it off the green…not so much.
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OK, but does anyone really ever putt it off the green into a hazard ? I think that would be bad wedge work, right ?
 
Canadan said:
would you give up 10 yards of carry on driver to average less than 30 putts a round?
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In a heartbeat! As someone who averages around 34-35 that would be huge for me. It has been getting better since the putter fitting at the Grandaddy and I seem to be in the 31-33 most of the time now and I’m extremely happy with that
stryper said:
Right, but OB off the tee pretty much takes birdie off the table. And even decent drivers of the ball lose those shots occasionally. But unless you’re just a ham-handed gorilla you’re rarely piling up strokes once you get to the green.
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I see a lot of beginners who are pretty ham-handed around the green and can take 3-4 shots just to get on the green from inside 30yards. Especially when I would go help out the high school kids. Those folks can make the biggest gains just by learning to get in the green in 1 shot from that range.
 
Driver and approach , there’s many books and stats to back it up. Best short game in the world won’t save you from penalties and missing every green.
 
Paulsack said:
OK, but does anyone really ever putt it off the green into a hazard ? I think that would be bad wedge work, right ?
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Kinda looks like a possibility at the Cognizant, doesn’t it?
 
Paulsack said:
OK, but does anyone really ever putt it off the green into a hazard ? I think that would be bad wedge work, right ?
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I did it at GreyHawk. :cry:
 
Short game.

In 18 holes, you have to hit 18 tee shots, no option to avoid or change that.

In 18 holes, you have to hit 18 approach shots, no option to avoid or change that.

The only place you can control the number of shots you take is in the short game.
 
I think it was Gary Player who said "Take an average 15 handicap. Give them my short game and they are a 3."
 
DiscipleofPenick said:
Short game.

In 18 holes, you have to hit 18 tee shots, no option to avoid or change that.

In 18 holes, you have to hit 18 approach shots, no option to avoid or change that.

The only place you can control the number of shots you take is in the short game.
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If your tee and approach game are really good, you don't need to worry about short game.

If your short game is really good, you still have to worry about tee and approach.
 
For me and other high handicaps I’ve played with the driver and approach shots are more important. Having <30 putts doesn’t matter when most of them are for doubles and triples because you can’t get off the tee and you’re chunking/thinning every approach. A good short game is pretty useless if it takes 5 strokes to get within 20 yards of the green
 
I think there's some context involved. For a high handicapper, I think your scores come down fastest by keeping the ball in play and in front of you. For lower handicappers who already have that part of the game at least reasonably under control, shaving those last few strokes comes down to closer proximity, a better up & down percentage, and eliminating 3-putts.

It doesn't do much good for somebody with an erratic tee to green game to have a good short game, because it's pretty irrelevant that you can masterfully get up and down for a double bogey after it took you 4 strokes to get near the green. Conversely, you're not doing yourself any favors if you can bomb it off the tee and get close to the green in 2, then waste 4-5 strokes chipping and putting to get the ball in the hole.
 
They both matter, but driving and approach shots matter more. To spitball it, it's probably weighted 70:30.
 
for me personally..short game..I would say slightly more than half my strokes would be short game/putting
 
For me it’s the short game…chipping and putting.
 
Tee to Green in my opinion and it's not that close. Keep in mind the hard part of short game imo is chipping, far more than putting. If your tee to green game is good, you're chipping or in sand rarely cause your making GIR's. So then were comparing putting to all tee shots and all fairway shots? If I'm making fairways and greens on any given day, I'm most likely scoring a handicap round that day. I can have a great day of short game but it's still tough to make up a bad day of no fairways and girs. Penalties don't exist in the same way greenside either. I still think the variance within the short game is far less and can be practiced so much easier than tee to green.
 
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