WEBVTT - Kevin Moore on Tournament Course Setup and Analytics-Driven Strategy 0:00:00.600 --> 0:00:03.800 Welcome back to another edition of the Frida Egg Podcast. 0:00:04.160 --> 0:00:07.680 Today's episode is powered by tdum or Trade. Every stroke 0:00:07.720 --> 0:00:10.720 counts on the scorecard and every penny counts in the market. 0:00:10.920 --> 0:00:13.880 That's why tedom Arior Trade is committed to straightforward pricing 0:00:14.000 --> 0:00:17.000 with no surprises, so you're free to swing with confidence. 0:00:17.480 --> 0:00:21.760 Visit tedomiror trade dot com slash Frida Egg member SIPC. 0:00:23.320 --> 0:00:27.080 We are back with another edition of the Friday Egg Podcast, 0:00:27.160 --> 0:00:30.760 and I am joined with Garrett Morrison Man, the editor 0:00:30.800 --> 0:00:33.000 of The Friday Egg. Hey, hey you're back. 0:00:33.479 --> 0:00:33.960 I'm back. 0:00:34.840 --> 0:00:38.920 Successful podcast debut with Bob Crosby got a lot of 0:00:38.920 --> 0:00:42.000 great feedback. I was, I don't know where I was 0:00:42.120 --> 0:00:44.160 a lot of people are telling me they loved it though. 0:00:45.240 --> 0:00:48.200 That's great to hear. Bob was an awesome guest, and 0:00:48.320 --> 0:00:50.200 so it's all downhill from here. 0:00:51.000 --> 0:00:54.160 Hey, you know a least see you'll have those the 0:00:54.200 --> 0:00:56.319 glory of your first time, that's right. 0:00:56.520 --> 0:00:58.040 Yeah. 0:00:58.080 --> 0:01:01.400 So today we've got Kevin More coming on. He is 0:01:01.480 --> 0:01:08.319 a University of Georgia mathematics professor also runs a business 0:01:08.720 --> 0:01:12.200 doing golf course strategy. So I think this was inspired 0:01:12.240 --> 0:01:17.479 by Rory's comments about setup and strategy this weekend from 0:01:17.560 --> 0:01:21.080 the Dunhill Links. So Garrett, you've got more on Kevin 0:01:21.160 --> 0:01:23.399 and kind of the basis for this conversation. 0:01:24.200 --> 0:01:29.000 Yeah, sure. I mean, Kevin is just a really good 0:01:29.040 --> 0:01:32.560 and unique thinker about golf in general. He sort of 0:01:32.560 --> 0:01:37.000 has a foot in both camps where he's a competitive 0:01:37.000 --> 0:01:41.240 golfer with a real pedigree and he advises competitive golfers 0:01:41.280 --> 0:01:44.720 on how to manage their games. But at the same 0:01:44.760 --> 0:01:48.000 time he's a lover of golf course architecture, so he 0:01:48.040 --> 0:01:52.920 should be a really interesting person to talk to. So, 0:01:53.280 --> 0:01:56.880 you know, in addition to being a professor of mathematics 0:01:56.960 --> 0:02:01.360 education at at Georgia, the founder of the course management 0:02:01.400 --> 0:02:04.880 company you talked about, Squares to Circles, he's also involved 0:02:04.920 --> 0:02:09.679 with a new club and finally he'll be a participate 0:02:09.840 --> 0:02:14.280 a participant in our roundtable at the Thoroughbred, which takes 0:02:14.320 --> 0:02:17.680 place on Saturday, October twelfth at Ach and Golf Clubs. 0:02:17.760 --> 0:02:22.640 So that should be a really interesting discussion as well. Yeah, yeah, 0:02:22.639 --> 0:02:23.400 that should be fun. 0:02:23.440 --> 0:02:26.600 We'll have Kai Goldby there too, so an architect, so 0:02:26.760 --> 0:02:31.280 that should be it'll be an interesting discussion about design 0:02:30.480 --> 0:02:35.480 and strategy with those two. And Kai was a great 0:02:35.480 --> 0:02:39.080 player in his own regard. He played in college, he's 0:02:39.600 --> 0:02:44.640 cousins with the Hosses, and his father won the Masters. Yes, 0:02:44.960 --> 0:02:47.800 so he knows a little pretty decent competitive golf. 0:02:48.360 --> 0:02:51.960 Yeah, all right, so here we go. Here's our conversation 0:02:52.160 --> 0:02:52.960 with Kevin Moore. 0:02:53.440 --> 0:02:57.000 The Frida egg requires a different technique. What you need 0:02:57.040 --> 0:03:00.400 to do is actually square the face so they'll down 0:03:00.560 --> 0:03:04.000 underneath that bad lie and propell that ball right out 0:03:04.000 --> 0:03:06.120 onto the green. Here's the take. 0:03:06.200 --> 0:03:08.639 Playing out of a buried lion of bunker is completely 0:03:08.639 --> 0:03:11.200 different than playing out of a nice clean lion of 0:03:11.240 --> 0:03:14.839 green side bunker. You need to be aggressive on any show, 0:03:14.919 --> 0:03:17.480 whether it's sitting cleanly or it's a Friday egg. 0:03:18.000 --> 0:03:21.800 Well, we've all faked the dreaded Friday. Not to be 0:03:21.880 --> 0:03:22.320 feared though. 0:03:22.360 --> 0:03:36.240 It's actually a pretty easy shot to hit. Kevin, how 0:03:36.280 --> 0:03:39.400 are you Andy? I'm doing good. How are you? Oh? 0:03:39.760 --> 0:03:43.440 Just swell, you know, just a swell, wonderful day here 0:03:43.480 --> 0:03:47.040 in Chicago. What's the new? What's the down in Georgia? 0:03:47.080 --> 0:03:49.040 How's the how's the golf season going? 0:03:49.840 --> 0:03:53.560 The golf season is ninety five and hot. We haven't 0:03:53.560 --> 0:03:55.360 got that fall break yet, but that still means we 0:03:55.360 --> 0:03:57.960 can play a lot of golf. Uh, Unlike you all, 0:03:57.960 --> 0:03:59.720 we don't have to worry about our season running out. 0:03:59.760 --> 0:04:03.040 So I'll keep on playing through the entire year while 0:04:03.080 --> 0:04:04.960 you suffer through that Chicago winter. 0:04:05.160 --> 0:04:07.880 That seemed like an unnecessary swipe there, you know. 0:04:08.760 --> 0:04:10.200 I mean, we got to take it where we can 0:04:10.200 --> 0:04:12.560 get it. You know, we struggle all summer, so we 0:04:12.640 --> 0:04:14.440 have to we have to bask in the glory of 0:04:14.480 --> 0:04:16.240 our November, December and January. 0:04:16.920 --> 0:04:20.240 Yeah, luckily my golf game is uh is making me 0:04:20.480 --> 0:04:25.479 long for a hiatus playing lovesy golf, So it's about 0:04:25.520 --> 0:04:27.279 time to hang him up for a while. 0:04:27.920 --> 0:04:29.640 I'll get to see it in person on Thursday. 0:04:30.480 --> 0:04:32.680 It's true. Right around the corner. 0:04:32.720 --> 0:04:34.120 Yeah, I'm not going to get to hang it up 0:04:34.520 --> 0:04:38.400 that that's soon. Right, we're all woods. 0:04:38.960 --> 0:04:42.080 He's just walking me into a hustle. Right there is 0:04:42.080 --> 0:04:42.640 what he's doing. 0:04:43.560 --> 0:04:47.719 I got, I got two way mess gone, so I'm 0:04:47.720 --> 0:04:49.920 not hustling anyway. 0:04:50.560 --> 0:04:53.040 Welcome to the Then you're not you're not my you're 0:04:53.080 --> 0:04:55.440 not my teammate. Then if you have that going, yeah, 0:04:56.240 --> 0:04:58.400 it's uh so Yeah. 0:04:58.440 --> 0:05:02.599 Anyways, this weekend, big comments from Rory McElroy when he talks, 0:05:02.640 --> 0:05:07.000 everybody listens. And he went after the European Tour for 0:05:07.640 --> 0:05:11.080 set up and saying, is SAT separating the good players, 0:05:11.440 --> 0:05:13.920 you know, SATs separating good and bad shots or good 0:05:13.920 --> 0:05:19.039 and bad shots enough, and then went into some strategy piece. 0:05:19.040 --> 0:05:20.760 So we figured he'd be better to talk to you 0:05:20.839 --> 0:05:21.560 than Kevin Moore. 0:05:22.880 --> 0:05:25.640 Yeah, you're right when he talks, I typically listened with 0:05:25.920 --> 0:05:28.240 just nodding along. But these ones are a little perplexing 0:05:28.279 --> 0:05:30.800 in some points, a whole lot to unpack with some 0:05:30.839 --> 0:05:31.680 of the things that he said. 0:05:32.960 --> 0:05:34.159 What did you find perplexing? 0:05:36.160 --> 0:05:37.760 Yeah, I mean, Rory what he's been one of the 0:05:37.760 --> 0:05:41.360 biggest I guess in terms of professional golfers, proponents of 0:05:41.560 --> 0:05:44.600 you know, those of us that are are hearkening back 0:05:44.640 --> 0:05:46.159 to some of the older days and like to just 0:05:46.200 --> 0:05:49.360 play with the thought experiments of what what older technology 0:05:49.400 --> 0:05:52.800 look like. And he's spoken, you know, his message off 0:05:52.839 --> 0:05:55.200 and reverberates with that. But you know, this one he 0:05:55.240 --> 0:05:57.600 went in on course set up and he sort of 0:05:57.720 --> 0:06:00.560 conflated two things he doesn't typically conflate in terms of 0:06:01.120 --> 0:06:05.200 mixing strategy and shot making along with course setup, which 0:06:05.240 --> 0:06:07.880 has really made it a sort of a jumbled mess. 0:06:07.880 --> 0:06:10.280 If I'm being honest, I think a lot of it 0:06:10.400 --> 0:06:14.760 was in reaction to unhappiness with display and everything. Obviously 0:06:14.880 --> 0:06:18.039 is a very articulate and very intelligent golfer. But yeah, 0:06:18.120 --> 0:06:20.880 just in terms of the comments that were there, there's 0:06:20.920 --> 0:06:24.479 just a whole lot that was meshed together, right. 0:06:24.480 --> 0:06:29.600 And he said at one point that you play with 0:06:29.680 --> 0:06:34.800 more strategy at PGA Tour courses, or that the soft 0:06:34.880 --> 0:06:39.320 setups on the European Tour demand less in the way 0:06:39.320 --> 0:06:43.839 of strategy than American courses on the PGA Tour do. 0:06:45.720 --> 0:06:48.160 I'm wondering what do you think he means by strategy? 0:06:48.160 --> 0:06:50.919 There as somebody who works with, you know, elite golfers, 0:06:50.960 --> 0:06:54.640 really good golfers, on how to approach a course tactically. 0:06:55.480 --> 0:06:56.760 What do you think he means by that? 0:06:58.320 --> 0:07:00.680 Honestly, that's a hard question to answer because there's a 0:07:00.720 --> 0:07:03.440 lot of different directions we could go with that. You know, 0:07:03.480 --> 0:07:06.080 we could look at the different setups across the European Tour, 0:07:06.120 --> 0:07:08.679 which I see a wide variety of golf courses, probably 0:07:08.920 --> 0:07:12.160 arguably much wider than the PGA Tour sees, right, but 0:07:12.240 --> 0:07:13.920 they have a lot of courses more in line with 0:07:14.000 --> 0:07:17.000 the Trinity Forest than we have one trinity for us 0:07:17.840 --> 0:07:21.280 where they also range into their tree line, dog leg, 0:07:21.440 --> 0:07:24.000 bunkered courses as well on the European tour that we 0:07:24.040 --> 0:07:29.040 see all across the PGA Tour. So maybe, I mean, 0:07:29.040 --> 0:07:31.000 he definitely could have been speaking just relative to his 0:07:31.040 --> 0:07:34.280 recent experiences what he spoke to with Renaissance in the 0:07:34.320 --> 0:07:38.000 Old Course in Carnoustie as well as Kings Barns. They 0:07:38.000 --> 0:07:40.440 didn't see the toughest conditions. So you run into those 0:07:40.480 --> 0:07:43.000 courses and it's not a very penalizing game. There's not, 0:07:43.520 --> 0:07:46.880 honestly for a pro tour player on those courses under 0:07:46.920 --> 0:07:49.240 those conditions, there's not a whole lot of thinking going 0:07:49.280 --> 0:07:51.400 on in a lot of cases, so you just hit 0:07:51.440 --> 0:07:53.720 it out there. You know where line you're taken, hit it, 0:07:53.760 --> 0:07:56.280 find it, hit it again. We're certainly on a more 0:07:56.280 --> 0:07:59.240 penal style golf course, like the typical PGA Tour course 0:07:59.280 --> 0:08:02.720 where they're bunker at two seventy two ninety three ten 0:08:03.400 --> 0:08:07.040 playing into greens that are decently bunkerd possible water hazards. 0:08:07.080 --> 0:08:09.200 There's some thinking going on where okay, there's a if 0:08:09.200 --> 0:08:11.720 I missed this shot by five to ten yards, there's 0:08:11.760 --> 0:08:14.960 a decent penalty to be paid paid. And it's also 0:08:15.000 --> 0:08:17.160 an aerial game, so there's a little bit more control, 0:08:17.240 --> 0:08:20.560 where on his most recent experiences, where it's a little 0:08:20.560 --> 0:08:21.840 bit more of a ground game, you have a lot 0:08:21.920 --> 0:08:23.600 less control, so you know where you're hitting it in. 0:08:23.720 --> 0:08:27.000 From there, it's just take the rubbit of green and 0:08:27.040 --> 0:08:31.160 go from there. So maybe you know, maybe he was 0:08:31.280 --> 0:08:33.240 tainted a little bit by his recent experiences and not 0:08:33.280 --> 0:08:36.120 really thinking about the whole landscape of the European Tour 0:08:37.280 --> 0:08:39.160 could be one case, but it's certainly the case in 0:08:39.200 --> 0:08:41.880 the PGA Tour. There is thinking that goes involved just 0:08:41.920 --> 0:08:44.120 because of or along and a round, just because of 0:08:44.120 --> 0:08:46.880 the penalties that exists across most golf courses there. 0:08:48.280 --> 0:08:51.120 What do you think that thinking consists of typically on 0:08:51.160 --> 0:08:54.520 a PGA Tour course, because it doesn't seem like it's 0:08:54.880 --> 0:08:58.640 thinking in the sense that golf course architecture nuts are 0:08:58.679 --> 0:09:01.680 accustomed to thinking about it. What type of thinking goes 0:09:01.720 --> 0:09:04.280 into it? Is it? Is it club selection? Primarily? 0:09:05.520 --> 0:09:09.480 Certainly club selection? I mean teeing decisions is a huge one, right, 0:09:09.520 --> 0:09:11.000 what do I take off the tea and what's the 0:09:11.040 --> 0:09:14.640 thinking that goes into that? And there are a lot 0:09:14.640 --> 0:09:17.000 of the decisions. Okay, how much is if I push 0:09:17.080 --> 0:09:18.760 up a driver because I'm always going to start there. 0:09:18.800 --> 0:09:21.040 That's start with driver off the tee and think about that. 0:09:21.720 --> 0:09:23.480 Is there a penalty in play? If there's not a 0:09:23.480 --> 0:09:26.840 penalty in play, the decision's done. All right, we're sending 0:09:26.920 --> 0:09:29.760 driver and we're going to play off that. Now, if 0:09:29.760 --> 0:09:32.600 there is a penalty on in play, well housing that penalty. 0:09:32.640 --> 0:09:34.600 How much of a corridor do I have where the 0:09:34.640 --> 0:09:38.400 penalty area exists? And if there's enough there, then it's like, okay, 0:09:38.480 --> 0:09:41.040 let me step back a club and say what where 0:09:41.120 --> 0:09:42.800 does that club put me? And go from there? Right, 0:09:42.840 --> 0:09:45.920 The objective is with today's game, with the way the 0:09:46.000 --> 0:09:50.160 rough is, the aerial in the and supporting an aerial 0:09:50.240 --> 0:09:52.000 game in the greens, get it up as far as 0:09:52.000 --> 0:09:54.480 possible as much as possible, you know, And that's ninety 0:09:54.520 --> 0:09:57.439 percent of the golf courses they play. And then obviously 0:09:57.440 --> 0:10:01.360 playing into the green. It depends on the length playing 0:10:01.400 --> 0:10:04.520 into it, but typically these players are hitting mid irons 0:10:04.520 --> 0:10:07.200 to short irons in so it's a it's a pretty 0:10:07.320 --> 0:10:10.560 aggressive game even from there with the softness of the greens, 0:10:10.559 --> 0:10:13.360 which again that was perplexing when he talks about firmness 0:10:13.400 --> 0:10:15.839 where a lot of the a lot a decent amount 0:10:15.840 --> 0:10:18.240 of the court course condition on the PGA tour is soft. 0:10:18.280 --> 0:10:21.160 Now you do have your exceptions. Murfield gets pretty firm 0:10:21.679 --> 0:10:24.080 as one example, when they can get it there. This 0:10:24.120 --> 0:10:26.280 past year was definitely not that with the rain, but 0:10:26.320 --> 0:10:28.120 you know, Jack likes to firm that up. I'm sure 0:10:28.120 --> 0:10:30.839 a lot of his renovation that's going to happen. It's 0:10:30.880 --> 0:10:33.280 going to be geared towards always having that the conditions. 0:10:33.360 --> 0:10:36.280 But a lot of the courses, the greens are soft 0:10:36.400 --> 0:10:39.400 enough that you know, pins are pretty accessible even when 0:10:39.440 --> 0:10:41.319 they're tough, and that worse, you're just going a couple 0:10:41.400 --> 0:10:44.120 feet inside of them, you know, five to ten feet 0:10:44.200 --> 0:10:46.120 inside of a pin towards the bat side of the 0:10:46.120 --> 0:10:49.240 green and playing from there. So a little bit of 0:10:49.240 --> 0:10:51.840 thinking on that, but not a ton yeah. 0:10:51.840 --> 0:10:55.040 That to me, it seems like the one of the 0:10:55.040 --> 0:10:58.719 courses I hear the most talk about strategy on is 0:10:59.520 --> 0:11:04.640 the YOUGC Mexico course Chapoltepec, which is all kind of 0:11:06.000 --> 0:11:10.760 do you hit driver And to me, just from my observation, 0:11:10.880 --> 0:11:15.080 it seems like that for the professional golfers is when 0:11:15.080 --> 0:11:18.640 it when it impacts the t shot. That's how they 0:11:19.040 --> 0:11:22.480 what they feel like strategy really is. That's kind of 0:11:22.520 --> 0:11:27.320 the way they think about strategy versus an architecture nut 0:11:27.360 --> 0:11:29.680 who thinks about angles and different things. 0:11:30.000 --> 0:11:33.280 Yeah, I think that's completely accurate. And you know, I 0:11:33.320 --> 0:11:36.040 have that architect nut as well as strategy and math 0:11:36.120 --> 0:11:38.120 nut inside of me, and it drives the architect nut 0:11:38.280 --> 0:11:41.280 inside of me crazy. Right that the best way to 0:11:41.360 --> 0:11:43.680 challenge a tour player thinking off the tee is to 0:11:44.440 --> 0:11:46.760 have penalty areas you know, call it trees, call it 0:11:46.800 --> 0:11:48.560 bunkers or whatever, all the way up and down the 0:11:48.600 --> 0:11:50.920 hole to force them to make a decision of how 0:11:51.000 --> 0:11:54.040 aggressive they want to play. And Chapolo Peck is a 0:11:54.040 --> 0:11:56.760 great example of that, where you know, we know from 0:11:56.800 --> 0:12:00.440 dispersion driver three wood, two iron, it does doesn't matter 0:12:00.520 --> 0:12:03.280 that much left the right, you're still getting pretty wide 0:12:03.760 --> 0:12:06.880 with all three of those clubs that say, so, now 0:12:06.920 --> 0:12:08.840 you have the situation where, well, all three of them 0:12:08.880 --> 0:12:10.640 are going to bring in trees. So what do I 0:12:10.720 --> 0:12:13.160 decide to do? How much do I take into that account? 0:12:13.520 --> 0:12:16.520 And we saw a very different play down at Mexico 0:12:16.640 --> 0:12:21.760 into to be supportive of that, we saw a nice 0:12:21.840 --> 0:12:24.640 variance in leaderboard in terms of how people played the course, 0:12:25.520 --> 0:12:27.000 you know, maybe a little better than we'd see in 0:12:27.040 --> 0:12:29.760 other tournaments. So obviously still still privileges pushing up a 0:12:29.760 --> 0:12:31.920 lot of cases, but we saw some nice variety there, 0:12:32.640 --> 0:12:34.720 more so than maybe other tournaments. 0:12:35.160 --> 0:12:39.600 And yet at CHAPULTAPEC the winners have generally been bombers, 0:12:39.760 --> 0:12:43.439 but you saw variants in the kind of top tier. 0:12:45.120 --> 0:12:47.880 Yeah, I think. I mean everybody, I mean everybody that 0:12:47.960 --> 0:12:50.240 works in the strategy business will admit this, right, It's 0:12:50.600 --> 0:12:53.079 you're never going to get around it being a bomber's paradise, right. 0:12:53.120 --> 0:12:55.160 Bombers are all that's going to be a skill set 0:12:55.160 --> 0:12:58.960 that's always well, especially with today's technology, is just going 0:12:59.040 --> 0:13:01.320 to be rewarded and maybe someone will crack the code 0:13:01.360 --> 0:13:04.560 of how to really break against that. But you're going 0:13:04.640 --> 0:13:07.480 to see that. So you know, that's just where we're 0:13:07.520 --> 0:13:09.320 at in terms of a game, and you're gonna expect 0:13:09.400 --> 0:13:11.720 to see a bomber as a winner probably more often 0:13:11.760 --> 0:13:14.960 than not. But yeah, really what's important is looking at 0:13:14.960 --> 0:13:17.200 the top ten, the top twenty, right, because let's face it, 0:13:17.280 --> 0:13:20.760 like the guys winning tournaments, they're all around great players, right, 0:13:21.000 --> 0:13:23.599 most weekend week out. Yeah, we get a couple of 0:13:23.640 --> 0:13:26.559 crap shots that come out and they just win a tournament, disappear, 0:13:27.040 --> 0:13:29.280 or they get hot. You know, this point's been made 0:13:29.320 --> 0:13:32.000 with Cameron Champa, and Andy's made this point several times 0:13:32.000 --> 0:13:34.319 that he's that type of player that will probably get 0:13:34.320 --> 0:13:35.680 hot for a couple of weeks, and if he does 0:13:35.679 --> 0:13:38.120 that every year, he'll probably get a victory as well, right, 0:13:38.160 --> 0:13:40.560 because he's got enough of a game and the distance 0:13:40.640 --> 0:13:43.439 is privilege that he'll get there. But by and large, 0:13:43.480 --> 0:13:46.080 the winners are just great golfers, you know, and the 0:13:46.120 --> 0:13:49.360 week they win, yes, distance helps put them in position, 0:13:49.440 --> 0:13:52.000 but they also are maybe outliers in the putting or 0:13:52.080 --> 0:13:55.600 outliers and approach relative to their normal game, so they're 0:13:55.600 --> 0:13:57.520 at least making it up in other areas and then 0:13:57.640 --> 0:14:01.000 across the top ten or top twenty and see variance there. 0:14:01.160 --> 0:14:04.120 I mean, that's just more compelling pro golf. Right if 0:14:04.160 --> 0:14:06.600 at least we're seeing everybody up on the leaderboard be 0:14:06.640 --> 0:14:09.880 a little different, it's a little bit more watchable, at 0:14:09.960 --> 0:14:11.920 least to some of us that pay attention to that stuff. 0:14:12.320 --> 0:14:15.320 Yeah, I think that's a misconception of is like the 0:14:15.600 --> 0:14:17.960 you know, Hey, like this guy won because he hit 0:14:18.000 --> 0:14:21.520 it far. But like, one of the things with distance 0:14:21.960 --> 0:14:26.120 is that it's a constant skill, Like almost every other 0:14:26.200 --> 0:14:29.480 skill on golf is variable. Like you might put bad today, 0:14:29.600 --> 0:14:33.200 put well tomorrow. You know, you might be really accurate 0:14:33.240 --> 0:14:36.960 with your driver today not tomorrow. Same with your irons. 0:14:37.000 --> 0:14:40.760 But with the distance you have that every single day 0:14:40.760 --> 0:14:42.960 you go to the golf course, which is something that 0:14:43.080 --> 0:14:47.720 I think some people like tend to and that's always 0:14:47.760 --> 0:14:50.640 going to be a huge advantage if you're long, But 0:14:51.200 --> 0:14:54.800 it seems to me that it's become more and more 0:14:55.000 --> 0:14:59.840 advantageous as you know, as players have gotten longer. In accuracy, 0:15:00.200 --> 0:15:02.480 you know, it's to keep it on the plan. There's 0:15:02.560 --> 0:15:05.160 less downside to hitting it far today than there used 0:15:05.200 --> 0:15:08.760 to be or hitting it hard, So to. 0:15:08.720 --> 0:15:12.960 Say, oh, yeah, I mean the hitting it far is 0:15:13.000 --> 0:15:15.320 one comment we could expand on. But then just hitting 0:15:15.360 --> 0:15:18.120 it hard as another one. Right, that brings into technology 0:15:18.160 --> 0:15:20.840 issues and what the technology enables us to do in 0:15:20.920 --> 0:15:24.960 terms of maximizing and optimizing the way we hit the 0:15:24.960 --> 0:15:27.200 ball and what the ball spin ray does. Right, that's 0:15:27.200 --> 0:15:29.600 the big question. Well, if we went back to say 0:15:29.640 --> 0:15:33.200 per Simmon and a wound ball, Well, what would hitting 0:15:33.200 --> 0:15:35.880 it hard look like? Could you act? What would optimizing 0:15:35.960 --> 0:15:38.120 everything look like? And would it be manageable in a 0:15:38.160 --> 0:15:40.080 way that you could still play the game at a 0:15:40.200 --> 0:15:43.640 very competitive level. Because to your point, like in terms 0:15:43.680 --> 0:15:46.120 of hitting it far, you know, when we look at 0:15:46.120 --> 0:15:47.920 the strokes gained it and I don't know what it's 0:15:47.920 --> 0:15:49.680 say over the last two years, but you know it's 0:15:49.720 --> 0:15:52.680 basically approach where it's basically trended to where like to 0:15:52.680 --> 0:15:55.840 be a top player, it's almost forty percent approach and 0:15:55.920 --> 0:15:58.320 forty percent driving. You know, maybe you could argue thirty 0:15:58.320 --> 0:16:01.000 five percent thirty five percent just in a sort of 0:16:01.080 --> 0:16:04.600 upper echelon area, And question is is that good for 0:16:04.680 --> 0:16:08.680 the game? Right? Like is you know, if I just said, okay, 0:16:08.800 --> 0:16:11.800 from a mathematical standpoint, what would be Like Rory's comment 0:16:11.880 --> 0:16:14.280 was what a complete player? I think, well, what would 0:16:14.280 --> 0:16:16.720 be a complete player? Be the best players in the 0:16:16.800 --> 0:16:19.560 world we or the like their trends would be okay, 0:16:19.640 --> 0:16:22.680 twenty five percent strokes gain attributed to putting, twenty five 0:16:22.680 --> 0:16:26.400 percent strokes gain attributed to around the green, twenty five 0:16:26.440 --> 0:16:29.400 percent approach, twenty five percent driving, or you can match 0:16:29.400 --> 0:16:31.840 the percent just to the number of strokes played from 0:16:31.880 --> 0:16:36.640 those positions, right, So like if you play thirty percent 0:16:36.640 --> 0:16:38.960 of your shots from around the green or on it, well, 0:16:39.080 --> 0:16:43.440 thirty percent of a winner's category should come from those areas. 0:16:43.960 --> 0:16:46.880 You know. Maybe that's something you know, that's fun to 0:16:46.880 --> 0:16:48.320 think about in terms of what would we want a 0:16:48.320 --> 0:16:50.320 complete player to be and what we how would we 0:16:50.320 --> 0:16:51.120 want that privilege. 0:16:51.800 --> 0:16:55.040 It's it's Rory's comments too when you talk when you 0:16:55.080 --> 0:16:57.520 talk about complete player, and I think this gets lost 0:16:57.560 --> 0:17:00.760 sometimes when everybody talks about Rory is like he is 0:17:01.480 --> 0:17:05.080 one of the you know, albeit sometimes he struggles on 0:17:05.119 --> 0:17:08.120 the green, he is as complete of a player as 0:17:08.240 --> 0:17:10.440 you get. On the PGA Tour last year he ranked 0:17:10.440 --> 0:17:13.440 in the top twenty five in every strokes game category, 0:17:13.640 --> 0:17:15.400 and I think he's the only player that did that. 0:17:15.440 --> 0:17:19.320 Adam Scott was close, but nobody else, you know, nobody 0:17:19.359 --> 0:17:22.360 else really was close outside of Adam Scott to doing that. 0:17:23.160 --> 0:17:27.360 Yeah, I mean going back to Rory's comments, right, It's 0:17:27.400 --> 0:17:29.679 good that he's speaking out, and I would love to 0:17:29.760 --> 0:17:31.840 know how much of it comes from a place of 0:17:31.920 --> 0:17:37.320 him acknowledging and understanding that if there was ever such 0:17:37.359 --> 0:17:40.280 a cal rollback, we're just stopping where we're at like 0:17:40.320 --> 0:17:43.200 that only benefits him, benefits a player of his caliber 0:17:43.240 --> 0:17:46.240 or someone like Adam Scott, the Tiger Woods of people 0:17:46.320 --> 0:17:49.480 right that have the complete games, and I mean Ricky 0:17:49.560 --> 0:17:51.480 I think Ricky Fowler is a great example as well. 0:17:51.480 --> 0:17:54.240 That's someone that all around is a good player, does 0:17:54.240 --> 0:17:56.000 a lot of things really well, can hit a lot 0:17:56.000 --> 0:17:58.480 of golf shots, and sees a lot of golf shots. Right. 0:17:58.520 --> 0:18:01.640 Those guys seagull shots more than other guys in terms 0:18:01.680 --> 0:18:04.160 of just feeling comfortable in a golf course and seeing 0:18:04.200 --> 0:18:07.720 a shape and how much they would benefit from something 0:18:07.760 --> 0:18:10.359 that brought back more shape into the game and what 0:18:10.440 --> 0:18:12.840 we would how would we see that correlay or associate 0:18:14.000 --> 0:18:17.639 with different strokes, gained data in the statistics behind things. 0:18:18.800 --> 0:18:21.240 So one of the things that became pretty clear from 0:18:21.280 --> 0:18:27.280 Rory's comments is that he is thinking of strategy primarily 0:18:27.320 --> 0:18:30.639 in terms of what we talked about earlier, what club 0:18:30.680 --> 0:18:33.520 you play off the tee? Should you hit driver every time? 0:18:33.600 --> 0:18:36.760 He seems to think that on European tour course setups 0:18:36.760 --> 0:18:39.639 that there's not much of a question on the tee 0:18:39.800 --> 0:18:42.720 as to what you're going to do, and that means 0:18:42.760 --> 0:18:47.120 that he's thinking of strategy primarily along the vertical axis, right, 0:18:47.160 --> 0:18:50.280 the why axis of a hole. How deep into the 0:18:50.280 --> 0:18:54.120 hole should I push the ball in order to get 0:18:54.119 --> 0:18:57.920 the best results. Architecture geeks, on the other hand, tend 0:18:57.960 --> 0:19:01.360 to think of strategy more laterally along the X axis. 0:19:01.560 --> 0:19:03.439 What side of the fairway do I want to be 0:19:03.480 --> 0:19:05.280 on in order to open up a view of or 0:19:05.320 --> 0:19:10.160 an angle into the green. Now, as somebody who has 0:19:10.520 --> 0:19:13.200 a foot in both camps and the analytics camp as 0:19:13.240 --> 0:19:19.120 well as in the golf architecture geekery camp, I'm curious 0:19:19.119 --> 0:19:22.479 what you think about the claim that a lot of 0:19:23.200 --> 0:19:28.840 analytics driven course management folks make about hunting angles and 0:19:28.880 --> 0:19:31.639 the fact that that's not something that anybody should do 0:19:32.359 --> 0:19:34.879 on a golf course, right, That you shouldn't be trying 0:19:34.920 --> 0:19:37.640 to get to a particular side of the fairway, that 0:19:37.800 --> 0:19:42.120 you should just sort of pick a target that makes 0:19:42.119 --> 0:19:45.240 it least likely that you're going to find yourself in 0:19:45.280 --> 0:19:49.920 a penalty hazard, and that essentially lateral strategy as architecture 0:19:49.960 --> 0:19:54.280 folks have thought about it for over a century is irrelevant. 0:19:55.000 --> 0:19:58.560 Do you agree with that? And could you explain that position? 0:20:00.000 --> 0:20:02.080 Man, I'll put my best academic hat On and say 0:20:02.080 --> 0:20:04.879 I don't agree or disagree with that, right that there's 0:20:05.160 --> 0:20:07.880 it's sort of the position that we that we take 0:20:07.960 --> 0:20:10.240 of all the different things we can go here, like 0:20:10.280 --> 0:20:12.240 what do we want golf to be? How do we 0:20:12.320 --> 0:20:15.760 perceive playing golf at what level? Is a sport raging 0:20:15.840 --> 0:20:19.240 from a game? Like I thought your interview with Robert Crosby, 0:20:19.240 --> 0:20:21.520 Bob Crosby's phenomenal, and you got into the sense of 0:20:21.560 --> 0:20:24.000 like golf is a sport versus golf as an adventure, 0:20:24.040 --> 0:20:26.520 and we could go down all those rabbit holes as 0:20:26.600 --> 0:20:29.240 much as possible, But I'll start with just to think about, like, okay, 0:20:29.240 --> 0:20:32.920 in terms of the pro game on the typical TPC 0:20:33.160 --> 0:20:36.439 golf course, angles and that sort of stuff, even on 0:20:36.480 --> 0:20:39.000 a even on a soft trinity for us, that's say 0:20:39.760 --> 0:20:41.560 some of that's not super firm and the ball's not 0:20:41.560 --> 0:20:44.920 getting away. Angles don't matter. I mean, it's an aerial game. 0:20:45.000 --> 0:20:47.360 They they're playing along the y access they know how 0:20:47.359 --> 0:20:51.639 far their ball carries. Picking up, you know, trying to 0:20:51.880 --> 0:20:54.399 move over to an angle, but then having some of 0:20:54.400 --> 0:20:57.560 your shot dispersion play into a bunker. That's just that's 0:20:57.560 --> 0:21:00.000 not smart, right, You're better keeping that entire shot dispers 0:21:00.160 --> 0:21:03.120 an out of the bunker and playing to the lowest 0:21:03.800 --> 0:21:07.080