BlogFarmers Insurance Open Preview and Picks

The Buzz:

*He’s back, this week marks the return of Tiger Woods as he goes for an unbelievable 8th Farmers title and tying his mark of 8 titles at the Arnold Palmer invitational and WGC-Bridgestone.  Now if you were to look at by course, Tiger has won 8 professional titles at Torrey Pines, he also won the 2008 U.S. Open.  Here is an interesting piece of trivia, if you took the money at just three courses, Torrey Pines, Bay Hill Club and Firestone C.C. Tiger has earned $26.6 million dollars which would place him 25th on the PGA Tour career money list.

Now many folks ask me the reasons why Tiger has won so much on these three courses, frankly it’s like Babe Ruth at Yankee Stadium. These three courses just fit Tiger’s eye perfectly like it did Ruth at Yankee Stadium.  As for Torrey Pines, the two courses fits his eye, in 51 rounds during the Farmers he is 173 under par, a 68.61 scoring average.  In his 51 rounds he has been in the 60s 35 times and only been over par three times.

Look at Tiger’s performance charts for all of his rounds at the Farmers:  The one thing he dominates is the par 5s.  He is 134 under, playing 174 par 5 holes which is overpowering.  Now another stat to look at is putting.  He has ranked in the top-ten six times but the chart below shows an important element to his putting experience at Torrey.

Here is a look at the six Farmers that Tiger won (2003, ’05-’08 & 2013), looking at his three rounds on the South course which the PGA Tour did shotlink data from:

Years        Putts inside 3 feet           Putts inside 5 feet        Putts inside 10 feet

2003              25 of 25                            35 of 35                  44 of 45 (97.8%)

2005              28 of 28                            37 of 37                  43 of 51 (84.3%)

2006               33 of 33                           45 of 46                  51 of 58 (87.9%)

2007               37 of 37                            41 of 43                 49 of 57 (85.9%)

2008                29 of 29                          35 of 36                   46 of 53 (86.8%)

2013                38 of 38                          43 of 44                   48 of 55 (87.3%)

Totals      190 of 190 (100%)        236 of 241 (97.9%)            281 of 319 (88.1%)

Now the totals are incredible since Woods missed only five putts inside 5 feet and just 38 on putts inside 10 feet.  He seems to know every part of every green which some say are the toughest to putt because they are Poa Annua which tends to be bumpy and hard to learn.  Since Tiger grew-up in Southern California and most courses had Poa Annua that could be the key for Tiger doing well at Torrey.

*Another person that has done well at Torrey is San Diego native Phil Mickelson who will be playing in his 25th Farmers.  He made his PGA Tour debut in this event as a 17 year-old back in 1998.  He shot 74-71 missing the cut but that was the beginning of his Hall-of-Fame career.  He has played this event every year since 1991 and won three times, in 1993, 2000 and 2001.  He was runner-up in 1996 and 2011 and has a total of 10 top-ten finishes.  The only negative is that Phil has never liked the Rees Jones revamping after his third win in 2001.  The city of San Diego,  which own the course, had a gentleman’s agreement with the USGA to stage the 2008 U.S. Open if they made some serious changes to the course to get it back to the level it was in the 70s when it was one of the toughest courses on the PGA Tour.  Even though Jones didn’t change the routing of the course he did redo all the bunkers, rebuilt all of the greens and changed four holes moving greens on the third, fourth, fourteen and fifteen holes.  He also added over 600 yards with new tees and brought the toughness back.  The revamp was considered a big success, scores went up and the USGA held a very successful U.S. Open on the course.  It seemed everyone was very happy with the exception of Mickelson, who thought that Jones ruined what was a great course.  To this day it seems that Jones is very high on Phil’s dislike list.  Despite that Mickelson has finished in the top-ten, five times since the remodeling so maybe he is use to it and will do well.  He is coming back from a successful trip to Abu Dhabi were he was runner-up, so look for a good week out of him.

*The hottest player in the game right now has to be Zach Johnson, who won the Northwestern in December, at Hyundai, they finished T8th at Sony and T3rd at Humana.  After the Humana he told media that he is taking some time off and won’t be back until WGC-Accenture Match Play in four weeks.

“I am going to have a meeting with my guys and see what’s the best way to maintain where I’m at, if not improve on it,” Johnson said after he shot 62 in the final round of the Humana. “I will practice, but I will take some time off too. The first couple of weeks will certainly be a lot of down time with the family. The last two weeks coming into Tucson, I will get the clubs out again and start working, try to get back into that mode and certainly that posture.”

Too bad but it’s probably the right thing to do.  If you look at Johnson’s record the last 8 years  it shows that this is a great time to take a month break.  Just look at what he is missing out on, events he hasn’t done well at. In four starts he hasn’t finished better than 24th at the Farmers, has not finished any better than 12th in Phoenix, 29th in two AT&T Pebble visits and 17th in nine Northern Trust starts.  So it’s a great time for a break and start getting ready for some big events like the two WGC events before the Masters.

*Talking about Johnson not playing the Farmers Insurance Open is one of those gems of an event that unfortunely tends to scare away a lot of guys.  Yes Tiger Woods and Phil Mickelson are playing but historically top ranked players have a tendency of not showing up.  Some of it is Qatar, which is drawing a good field but a lot of top-ranked players like Adam Scott (never played), Justin Rose (last event 2012), Matt Kuchar (last event 2008), Steve Stricker (last event 2007), Luke Donald (last event 2010), Jim Furyk (last event 2008), Webb Simpson (last event 2011), Ernie Els (2012) and Sergio Garcia (2006) seem to avoid this event.

*Saw an interesting stat on rookies.  This is the first rookie class that has come out of the Web.Com playoffs.  People will be looking and scrutinizing if this was a good move, thus dropping the qualifying tournament.  It may seem hard to believe in mid-January, but with nine events already played the 2014 season is almost a quarter of the way through.  So here are some results that may show that we aren’t getting the same amount of good players off the new playoff system.

Last year after the Humana, which then was the third event of the season the PGA Tour had already seen five rookies finish in the top-ten in either the Humana or Sony Open:

• Russell Henley won Sony Open
• David Lingmerth was T2nd at the Humana
• Scott Langley was T3rd at the Sony Open
• James Hahn was T4th at the Humana

But in the 2013/14 wrap around season things aren’t as favorable as only three rookies have managed a top-10 finish in the 9 tour events this season.

• Chesson Hadly T5th Shriners Hospital
• Hudson Swafford T8th Sony Open
• Will Wilcox T8th Sony Open

Of course this isn’t a rock solid result so we shouldn’t be worried, but many will be watching to see if a more open system with open qualifying produced better players than the closed system in which you had to be a member of the PGA Tour or Web.Com Tour in order to compete for a tour card.  If you ask me, I would still have open qualifying and instead of giving 25 cards give out seven to ten, that is my opinion and of course not one that Ponte Vedra believes.

Course information for Torrey Pines:

Played at the two courses at Torrey Pines in La Jolla, California

South Course (Home Course) – Par:  72 / Yardage: 7,698

North Course – Par: 72 / Yardage 7,052

In 2013 the South course was the 16th hardest course on the PGA Tour playing to a 72.655 average.  The North Course was the 35th hardest course, playing to an average of 70.667

Both courses were designed by Billy Bell Jr. and opened in 1957.  In the 80s both courses were revamped with all new greens with the work done by the city.

The south course opened first on June 19th, with Paul Runyan, Ralph Duldahl, Olin Dutra and a local pro, Don Gollett the first to play it.  Five months later the North Course opened.  Hard to believe that since the courses opened over 57 years ago, over 13 million rounds have been played on both courses.

The two courses were the brainchild of Leo Calland, then director of San Diego’s park and recreation department. He pushed hard to change an old World War II camp into a golf course.  When he got permission, Bell came in and covered over the blacktop and was able to use the excess concrete to achieve rolling fairways on what was a flat site.  The lure of both courses after they opened was the views of the ocean on every hole.  Both courses sit atop of bluffs overlooking the Pacific and these views were seen a couple years later nationally when Challenge Golf filmed one of there matches with Arnold Palmer, Gary Player, Sam Snead and Doug Sanders.

A decade later, the San Diego Open was looking around for a home.  Since the tournament was first played in 1952 it never really found a home.  It was played on several different courses but in 1968 it was about to embark on a big change.  It decided to copy several west coast tournaments by getting a headline celebrity to host the event getting Andy Williams who at the time was one of the biggest stars on television with a weekly show.  They also needed financial support and asked the city for the use of Torrey Pines free of charge.  It was a match made in heaven.  The course proved very popular not only with the pros but the TV audience that watched it.

Since then Torrey Pines has been the home of the tournament, even though every year rumblings are heard that it is may be replaced with a TPC course. Those rumblings ended with the economic downturn in 2008.

After the 2001 Buick the South course went through an extensive revamping process.  With the chance of getting the 2008 U.S. Open, $3.3 million was spent with Rees Jones adding a lot of length to the course.  Now the course can stretch to 7,700 yards although the PGA Tour plays it below that figure.  Even though Jones didn’t change the routing of the course he did change redo all the bunkers and changed four holes moving greens on the third, fourth, fourteen and fifteen holes.  With all of the changes it brought some bite back to a course which 20 years ago was considered very difficult by the touring professionals.  Average scores were up almost two shots compared to past years and the winning score of 275 was along with two other years the highest winning score in 20 years.  The revamp proved such a big success with the players, media and fans that the USGA gave the 2008 U.S. Open to Torrey Pines.

The North Course is two shots easier than the South but in some people’s minds the North is more scenic.  There’s a reason the par-3 sixth is still the most photographed hole at Torrey, and the red sandstone cliffs on the northern edge provide as much beauty as anything else.  Now the course was suppose to undergo renovations, but those plans never materialized. <p>

Golf’s DL injury report

• Hideki Matsuyama, who won the order of merit leader in Japan and has a PGA Tour card for 2014 is in the field this week.  He withdrew from the Sony Open due to a wrist injury but has been saying that it’s getting better, we will see this week as he is playing.
• Russell Henley is playing this week in San Diego. He was sick at the Sony Open with food poisoning but is feeling fine and ready to go again.
• Tim Clark withdrew from the Sony during the second round, was suppose to play at the Humana but withdrew.  So you have to think there is more to his tendinitis problem in his right arm than he says, in 2011 Clark also had problems and basically didn’t play for the rest of the year, hopefully that won’t be the case with this injury.  Clark isn’t playing in San Diego, but that isn’t a big deal since he hasn’t played the event since 2008.
• Boo Weekly another player that has been prone to injury in his career may have another one.  Last week Weekley withdrew after eight holes in the first round, with a knee injury.  It may be more serious than first thought, he has played in San Diego six of the last seven years and isn’t in the field, so we will just have to check back next week and see if he is playing in Phoenix, another event he has played in past years.
• Dudley Hart returned to the PGA Tour for the first time since the 2012 AT&T Pebble Beach.  He may of missed the cut with rounds of 72-69-75, but there wasn’t any news to indicate any problems.  He has 11 starts on his medical extension to earn $504,000 which would allow him to play the rest of the year.
• Also returning at Humana and missing the cut was John Mallinger who shot 75-67-70.  He isn’t playing this week in San Diego but when he returns he has 12 starts to earn $458,000 to retain his card for the rest of the year.

Here are some of the secrets of what it takes to play well at the Farmers Insurance Open:

Key stat for the winner:

The South course can be stretched to over 7,600 yards but don’t look for that length even though some tees will be back.  Driving will play an important role this week.  Look for those that do well in total driving stat, the one that combines both distance and accuracy together.  In the past couple of years the course has pride itself with heavy U.S. Open rough but that won’t be the case this year as the area has had very little rain so look for the bombers to prevail.

Here are some more key stats to look to for this week:

• Course was revamped and toughen a decade ago and now has a “U.S. Open feel” to it.  In past years this course had the reputation as the course that major winners are victorious on as between 1992 and 2008 all the champions also had major victories except for one, Peter Jacobsen in 1995.  Nick Watney broke things up in 2009, Ben Crane in 2010 and Bubba Watson wasn’t a major winner when he won in 2011.  Brandt Snedeker kept the streak alive in 2012 but it was broken last year when Tiger returned to the winners circle. One record still in tack, don’t look at a newcomer winning, the last rookie champion was in 1991 with Jay Don Blake.
• One interesting thing to note, of the winners since 2000 all of them did well in previous Farmers starts.  Of course we know about Tiger’s record, but look at the other non-Tiger winners going back to 2000:

1. 2012 winner Brandt Snedeker –  finished T2nd in 2010 & 3rd in 2007
2. 2011 winner Bubba Watson –  finished T4th in 2007
3. 2010 winner Ben Crane –  finished T7th in 2009
4. 2009 winner Nick Watney –  finished T9th in 2007
5. 2004 winner John Daly –  finished 4th in 2003
6. 2002 winner Jose Maria Olazabal –  finished T13th in 2001, first time he played in event
7. 2001 winner Phil Mickelson –  finished Won in 2000
8. 2000 winner Phil Mickelson –  finished 2nd in 1996, 3rd in 1994 and won in 1993

The point is, it may be smart to look at guys like Rickie Fowler, Charles Howell III, Bill Haas, John Huh and Hunter Mahan as good prospects for this week.

• Greens that will be classified as “bumpy” may play a role in determining the champion.  Now people that have played it in the last couple of weeks say they are perfect, but anything could happen.  Even though the South greens were redone in 2001, Poa Annua have crept back in to almost 95% of the area of the greens.  With that if it tends to get foggy in the morning the greens will be inconsistent and drive players a bit crazy.  Again, patience will be the key here.
• Look at the list of champions shows that scramblers have done very well in this event.  Look for the player that is able to get it up and down to win.
• Before Ben Crane, Bubba Watson and Brandt Snedeker won this was a great bit of Farmers trivia.  Before Crane’s 2009 victory 15 of the previous winners had “California ties”  going a step further, 25 of 61 winners have either been born, raised, gone to school or live in California,  You may wonder why this stat is important?  Poa Annua is a grass found mostly in California which gives those that play and know the grass a special advantage, so that’s why it’s important.
• The good news, bad news is that the weather will be perfect this week with zero chance of rain and very little wind.  Now for the folks of Southern California which is suffering the worst drought in the history of the region, that is bad.  For for those in the tournament it’s great news as everyday will have overcast skies in the morning, because of the marine layer, but look for temperatures to be an average of 75 degrees which is par for La Jolla.