It is quite common to see athletes live off a certain reputation that is far from reality. While I am as big of a fan of Derek Jeter as anybody, his reputation provided him with Golden Glove awards that he was not worthy of. Michael Jordan’s defense became a liability in the latter years of his career, and it seems like anytime Bill Belichick uses a new scheme, he is credited as the inventor of that scheme.
On the PGA Tour, misconceptions about the abilities of certain golfers may be more prevalent. It surprises me that there are often so many misconceptions in a sport like golf — a game that has far fewer moving parts than a team sport. But I think a lot of these misconceptions have to do with people struggling to accurately quantify different parts of the game. There is also such a large discrepancy between a PGA Tour player and an amateur golfer that amateurs tend to overestimate the abilities of touring pros when they see them play in person – they think pros are incredible at every facet of the game simply because they are better than anybody they have seen before.
One of the myths I labeled in 2012 Pro Golf Synopsis as the “Mayfair Effect.” It occurs when a player has such an unorthodox swing or putting stroke that it is assumed that the player must be a good ball striker or putter because they are on Tour with that unorthodox motion. I called it the “Mayfair Effect” because of Billy Mayfair’s strange putting stroke. Because of its uniqueness, many golf fans and reporters labeled him as a great putter. The reality is that Mayfair was a very good ball striker who was held back by his struggles with the flat stick.
Perhaps the biggest myth on Tour today is the prowess of Sergio Garcia’s ball striking and his ineptness with the putter. No other player today quite gets the accolades of being the best ball striker of our generation like Garcia does.
Tiger gets praise for his ball striking, and the statistics show that Tiger is indeed an elite iron player. He just tends to struggle with his driver, and we acknowledge this. However, from what we hear about Garcia’s ball striking abilities, we would think he was the second coming of Ben Hogan. But the stats show this to be far from the truth.
Sergio has been a very average driver of the ball for the past three years on Tour. As far as his Zone play goes, the Safe Zone (shots from 125 to 175 yards) is his best part of his game, but his performance from that distance is just above average. And the Zone that matters the most on Tour is the Danger Zone (shots from 175 to 225 yards), which outside of 2011 he has been downright mediocre.
This does the raise the question of “How is Sergio still successful on Tour?” Well, he is a much better putter and short-game player than he is given credit for.
At one point in his career, Garcia was an elite ball striker on Tour and one of the Tour’s best putters. While those days appear to be behind him, he has become a much better putter and short-game player than most people realize, which has been a key for him in 2013.