Rory McIlroy Looks Good for the WGC-Accenture Match Play

MARANA, AZ: The World Golf Championships-Accenture Match Play Championship starts tomorrow (see the tee times, US Mountain time, here).  On Monday, I followed Rory McIlroy on the back nine at the Dove Mountain Golf Course. He eagled the par 5 in the video above after a great 300+ yard drive (in the video). Rory had a small staff of photographers following him, video-taping each shot from different angles. I asked one of the photographers how he thought Rory was playing right now and the answer was "Great!" as you can see from his swing and the drive in the video above. Rory tees off at 11:25 am Mountain Time against Boo Weekley and we should expect him to play well for the week.

Being from Wisconsin, I have a horse in this race and plan to follow Steve Stricker who has an 8:05 AM match against George Coetzee from South Africa. Steve has not played a professional tour event for 5 months and I will be interested to see how he plays in this match.

If you hit the PLAY ALL button in the video you will also get to see video of Kiradech Aphibarnrat of Thailand who I also followed on Monday. Tomorrow he has a 12:05 PM Mountain Time match against Henrik Stenson, the highest ranked player in the field. Kiradech is the lowest ranked player in the filed and got in to the tournament when Tiger Woods, Phil Mickelson and Adam Scott chose not to play in the event.

In case you want to handicap these matches:

Rory McIlroy PGA Tour Statistics
Boo Weekley PGA Tour Statistics
Steve Stricker PGA Tour Statistics
George Coetzee PGA Tour Statistics
Henirk Stenson PGA Tour Statistics
Kiradech Aphibarnrat PGA Tour Statistics

The Golf Swing That People Will Be Copying in the Next 30-40 years.

On the President's Cup telecast yesterday, commentator Johnny Miller repeated a comment he made in 2010 (here):  "...I said that this might be the swing that people will copy in the next thirty, forty years." The audio is a little hard to hear but here are some of the other comments:

• A swing with not a lot moving parts
• Quiet hands
• Nice hip turn
• Good shoulder turn to 90 degrees
• Swing stops well short of parallel
• Flat left wrist, stays down on it

Another more detailed analysis of Steve Stricker's golf swing can be found here.

The Steve Stricker Pitch Shot

Steve Stricker only tied for fourth in today's finish to the BMW Championship and he still has a chance at the FedEx Cup since he is currently ranked 6th in the points total (Zach Johnson won the BMW and moved from 27th to 4th place in the standings, Tiger Woods goes into the tournament as the first seed).

In prior posts (here) I described a variation on Stricker's chipping style. At iLoveScottsdaleGolf.com, Brandel Chamblee reports (here) watching Stricker practicing his short game before the BMW and was fascinated by what he saw. Here is how he described Stricker's approach to pitching (video example above):

Stand up tall, but not rigid, grip the club with a slight arch in your wrists at address and make no effort to set the club in the take-away, just turn the club back with your upper body and let the weight of the club tell you when to cock your wrists. That takes care of the back swing and now the moment of truth, when so much can go wrong. As you begin the downswing, make no effort to turn your lower body on these shots, as that will cause an increase in the angle of your wrists and on pitch shots that’s the last thing you want. Think instead of your left upper arm(assuming your right handed) and your chest initiating the forward move, keeping your lower body quiet, and turn your left shoulder behind you while your forearms rotate counter clock wise. This will put the bottom of your swing more forward, or right at the ball and you will be able to use the bounce of your pitching wedge and in todays, closely mown world of pitch shots, using the bounce is more important than ever.

Whether we could do this or not, Stricker's short game is pretty impressive and worth a close look.

Should Steve Stricker be Hitting the Golf Ball Further?

Golf professional and Wisconsin native Steve Stricker recently made a big decision. He decided to forego an elk hunt vacation for a shot at winning the $10 million Fed-Ex Cup. Stricker has played a limited schedule of about 10-12 tournaments this year yet he is at the top of the Fed-Ex Cup standings and has a chance of winning the Tour Championship in Atlanta and $10 million. Stricker is also currently ranked 8th among the PGA money leaders. His official world ranking is 10 and his scoring average is 69.46 strokes. His official earnings this year are about $3.5 million and this does not include endorsements (see Steve's hilarious "The Professionals" Avis commercial below).




So, it takes a great deal of chutzpah for golf instructor Clay Ballard (the Rotary Swing Lag Doctor) to suggest that if Steve Stricker followed Ballard's advice, he could hit the ball further. Ballard suggests that by getting more "lag" in his golf swing, Stricker (driving distance 285.3 yards and ranked 7th in driving accuracy) could be hitting the ball as far as Bubba Watson (304.2 yard average, ranked 141st in accuracy), Sergio Garcia (289.7 yard average, ranked 78th in driving accuracy) and Tiger Woods (292.7 yard average, ranked 74th in driving accuracy).

What Mr. Ballard does not discuss is that Steve Stricker used to have a lot of lag in his golf swing and he was hitting the ball all over the place. What Steve Stricker learned in the trailer (he hit balls in a heated trailer at the Cherokee Country Club during the off-season until he worked his way out of a horrible slump between 2004 and 2006) was that less lag produced greater accuracy (which is obvious from his current performance statistics) and that greater accuracy produces better performance. Lag Doctor indeed!