BlogDeutsche Bank Preview and Picks

The Buzz:

So it’s the second leg of the FedEx Cup playoffs, and six exempt players are not participating.  For some like Dustin Johnson (rehab), Jason Dufner (injury), Graham McDowell (wife had a baby on Monday), Paul Casey (wife due this week), these are valid reason for not playing.  But what about Sergio Garcia and Justin Rose, both say they need some time off, which we all shake our heads.

One thing about the schedule, last year and next year there is an open week between the Deutsche Bank and the BMW Championship, this week its four straight weeks.  That’s because there is a week between the Ryder Cup and the Tour Championship.  So in a way it’s understandable, four weeks in a row is a grind.  Plus we had the British Open, WGC Bridgestone and the PGA Championship in a four-week grind with a week inbetween the FedEx playoffs.  So also counting the Ryder Cup that’s eight big events in a span of 11 weeks, yes that is too much.

Still the fact that players need time off is a bit crazy.  But with the way the FedEx Cup plays out, both Garcia (15th in rankings) and Rose (20th in rankings) will still have a good chance to make it to the Tour Championship and once there  have a chance to win the title, so for these two it makes sense.  Frankly that’s why my system that I talked about last week in having the playoffs spread across the year makes sense.

Anybody surprised by the spilt between Tiger and Sean?

From day one back in 2010, many asked what the shelf life of this Tiger Woods, Sean Foley partnership was.  In a way it was like the Mariah Carey/Nick Cannon marriage or any marriage between two of the games top stars in their field.  Both Butch Harmon and Hank Haney experienced the demands and the job, both realized that it was an impossible task.  I can only bet that Sean Foley realizes that today.  Other than maybe Jim Furyk with his relationship with his father who is his swing coach, there is no teacher that has just one client.  They take on others and frankly that just doesn’t work for Tiger.  He demands 24/7 devotion from a coach.  For Butch Harmon, he had Tiger in the early years when Tiger was willing to fly to Butch in Las Vegas to work with him.  But with Haney and Foley, they both had to go to Florida when Tiger needed them.  Tiger is also more demanding and that was the reason for his departure from Foley, Tiger never achieved the day to day consistency and win ratio that he had with Butch and Hank.  Was this Sean’s fault, yes and no.  But the methods that Sean had Tiger doing just never materialized into greatness.

I for one shake my head on the thought of Tiger needing a swing coach.  Yes, everyone needs a set of eyes to look at them from time to time.  20 years ago when having a swing “guru” became the norm on the PGA Tour I asked Jack Nicklaus his thoughts on this.  As he said he only worked with one true swing coach in his career, Jack Grout.  Nicklaus said he worked a lot with Grout since taking up the game as a kid and going on tour.  In the year before Nicklaus turned pro, Grout told Nicklaus that he had to “own his swing,” that he had to realize the bits and pieces of it and be able to diagnosed problems and know how to fix them because Grout wouldn’t be on Tour with Jack.  Of course, you can’t do that all the time, sometimes you get screwed up and Grout was always there for Nicklaus, but the older Nicklaus got, the less he needed Grout.

So in a way Tiger has never learned how to “own his swing,” a term in which a player can feel at ease with things.  What has always amazed me about Tiger, in his career he has gone through four different changes of his swing, once when Butch Harmon took over in 1993, another with Butch after his 1997 Masters win, again under Haney in 2004 and again under Foley in 2010.  With each change, it seem to grow harder for Tiger to grasp it, the one with Haney took about two years, and there were times early in 2005 that many question what Tiger was thinking.  We have all question what Tiger was doing with Foley, the only difference was that he was injured so many times that we all thought is was just a band-aid swing to get over the physical problems.

So now Tiger has a tough decision.  He will be 39 at the end of the year and if he goes with another “prominent” coach that requires another swing change, does he have the mental toughness to endure this?  I have had a lot of open talks with Butch Harmon over the years on what he was achieving with Tiger and the important element that Butch had going for him was Tiger’s youth and his father/son relationship.  Tiger was willing with no argument to do what Butch asked him to do.  It’s sort of like having your 10, 12-year-old son do everything that you ask him to do, they will do it without thinking.  But once your son gets to 16, 17 and 18 they start getting a mind of their own and resist doing what there told.  That was one of the reasons for the Butch/Tiger spilt up, Tiger just didn’t buy into what Butch wanted to tell him all the time.  That was a problem with Haney and Tiger, again Woods was smarter and on some things resisted some of Haney’s ways of doing it.

I can only imagine some of the talks and practice sessions Tiger and Foley had, this is one of the reasons Tiger never achieved the greatness because there was a lack of confidence with things and it never got better, even in 2013 when he won five times.

So what does all of this mean?  Your guess is as good as mine.  I have to think that Tiger is really screwed up right now in the way he is swinging and thinking, he lacks conviction and confidence.  So the question is, can he do it on his own and figure it all out?  The last thing he needs is another “great” coach to show him that “great” coaches swing theories.  What Woods really needs is someone that is willing to be a pair of eyes and tell Woods what inconsistencies creep up.  If I was to choose a person for that job it would probably be Butch, honesty he is more about giving encouragement and experience to the player over swing changes.  Butch could probably talk Tiger into a better game than change his swing.  But the odds on this happening are very slim.

First there is a rift that only Butch and Tiger knows about that caused the problems in 2002.  Tiger is also very selfish and doesn’t want anyone that coaches him to work with others.  Also, Butch won’t get on a plane to work with Tiger in Florida, Tiger would have to come to Las Vegas to work with Butch.  Lastly, Tiger is very, very cheap and you would be surprised at how little he pays these guys.  Butch is very private on this other than saying that he made more working with Phil Mickelson in their first two months than the 8 years he worked with Tiger.  To look at it the way Woods thinks, he feels that someone working with him reaps the benefits of this and it replaces the money he needs to pay.

But if Tiger wants Butch this time around he can’t be cheap.  Butch will want a very healthy retainer along with a percentage of Tiger’s future earnings.  As much as Butch’s ego is (which is really big) and would love to make Tiger a great player again, Butch will be 71 years old this week and is slowing down.  He has a great list of players that he works with and he knows that working with Tiger could possibly screw this up.   So a player/coach relationship would probably not work.

What wouldn’t surprise me happening is that Butch and Tiger find some peaceful ground, Tiger spends like a month with Butch in Vegas to get not only the basics down, but have Butch stoke his confidence.  So I see a  “relationship” in which  Butch will only be a pair of eyes and won’t “officially” be Tiger’s 24/7 coach.  You ask Butch, and he will agree in Jack Nicklaus thinking that you have to own your swing and work things out yourself.

One last thing in writing this, who knows maybe someone like Nicklaus would spend some time with Woods as a pair of eyes and get Woods back on track.  If Woods would just commit to one small series of modifications on his swing, he could probably get back to the level that he use to be.  It has always stunned me that Tiger Woods is one of three top players of all time (Nicklaus & Ben Hogan), and he has had to change his swing with Haney and Foley.  In my mind that has been a big waste and one of the reasons for his problems.

One last item:

This is the last week for Tom Watson to make his final three wild card picks for the Ryder Cup.  Odds are that Hunter Mahan got one of those picks with the win at the Barclays, but the two other picks are wide open.  Have to think that if a Ryan Moore, Keegan Bradley, Webb Simpson, Brandt Snedeker win or even place in the top-three this week it will help put them on the team.

Tournament information:

• This is the 12th annual Deutsche Bank Championship. Initially created with the help of IMG, the Tiger Woods Foundation, and the PGA Tour, the Deutsche Bank Championship’s main goal was to raise money for the Tiger Woods Foundation.
• As the tournament is held over Labor Day weekend, it has the distinction as being the only tournament on the PGA Tour to conclude on a Monday.
• Though the event lacks history, its short stint on the PGA Tour has produced some monumental happenings. Most notably: the rivalry between Vijay Singh and Tiger Woods. In 2004, Tiger and Vijay battled down to the final hole. Ultimately, Singh’s 69 was enough to give him the tournament title and the World’s Number One ranking, dethroning Woods after five years of dominance.
• In 2006, the rivalry was renewed, and this time, Woods was not to be denied. Singh shot a course record 61 in the third round going into the final round with a three-shot lead over Woods.  Despite shooting a 68, he was still a loser as Woods shot 63 to overcome a three-shot deficit and win the title.
• The 2007 event is also memorable with Phil Mickelson holding off the challenge of Tiger Woods, Arron Oberholser and Brett Wetterich.
• In 2008 Vijay Singh shot a final round 63 and cruised to a five-shot victory which paved the way for him to win the FedEx Cup.
• Since the start of the FedEx Cup, it’s been the second playoff event.  Of the four, this and the Tour Championship are the only events played each year on the same course.  Over the years, it’s grown a nice following as players love the course and location and the week.

Course information:

The TPC of Boston was opened in June of 2002, it was formerly used for charcoal production for the jewelry, brick and iron industries as well as lumber for ship construction.  Arnold Palmer designed the course, it is your typical TPC layout, very long and pretty generous off the tee.  There are several doglegs that can be carried by long hitters so again advantage to those that hit it long.  The greens are large, and several have multiple tiers making putting more challenging.  But over the years the course has changed dramatically.

As players matriculate back to Boston each year for the Deutsche Bank Championship, they were met with changes made by Gil Hanse and Brad Faxon.  In 2009 changes to the green area and mounding around the 2nd hole.  In 2008 players saw changes to the 4th, 7th and 16th holes.  The changes weren’t as big, mostly cosmetic like mounds being added to the right side of nine.  Also, changes were made to the chipping areas around No. 1 and No. 10 greens. Bunkers also were altered in shape at the fourth and 11th holes. At the latter, a 230-yard par-3, and island of turf was installed in the middle of the large front-right bunker.

The changes made for the 2007 event was well received by the players, most of them liked making the 4th hole a possible drivable par 4. It’s a step in the right direction because in previous years they have been very luke warm on the Arnold Palmer design course.

There are no real major changes to the course for this year.  The course has pretty much been the same for a couple of years now.

Still the course is for the taking, last year the course played to a 69.207 average and was the 39th toughest of the 43 courses used.  So you can see, you have to go low to survive this week.

Here are some of the secrets of what it takes to play well at the Deutsche Bank Championship:

Key stat for the winner:

• Now in past years it was obvious that this course was a long hitters haven.  Last year we had Henrik Stenson who is in the middle of all driving distance stats but in 2012, we had Rory McIlroy, in 2010 we had Charley Hoffman.  In 2008, it was Vijay Singh while in 2007, it was Phil Mickelson and Tiger Woods in 2006, all very long hitters  Still don’t rule out the short hitters, just look at 2009 winner Steve Stricker, the same with Webb Simpson in 2011.  But he isn’t the only one, the 2005 champion Olin Browne is one of the shorter hitters on tour and 2003 runner-up Rocco Mediate is also short.  In the same breath, it’s safe to say that accuracy doesn’t pay on this course.  In it’s 11 years of being played, of the 140 players that have finished in the top-ten in driving accuracy, only 30 have been in the top-ten.  One more key driving accuracy stat, of the 43 courses used on the PGA Tour it ranked 36th in driving accuracy that means that you can be wild on this course.
• Looking at the stats from its ten-year history, look for those with sharp iron games to produce the best score.  Look for a smart player that doesn’t attack the holes but plays placement golf to win.  Of the 11 winners, three led the greens hit category (winner Henrik Stenson led in 2013) while the first eight of nine winners were in the top-ten.
•  Since the event doesn’t start until Friday, players will have an extra day to get use to the course.  Look for those that are starting to practice on Tuesday to rule the roost.
• The greens are 6,000 square feet, which is about average on the PGA Tour. They have a lot of undulation in them, and that could be one of the reasons why winners haven’t dominated the putting stats.
• There are only three par 5s on the course. In looking at the winners Adam Scott in 2003 was 13 under par, Singh in 2004 was 9 under par, Browne in 2005 was 5 under, Woods in 2006 was 9 under, Phil Mickelson in 2007 was 10 under  in 2008 Vijay was 12 under while in 2009 Steve Stricker was 10 under, in 2010 Charley Hoffman was 9 under while Webb Simpson was 7 under in 2011, Rory McIlroy was 5 under while Henrik Stenson last year was also 5 under so being low on the long holes has plenty of benefits.
• Interesting to note that Vijay Singh, Tiger Woods and Rory McIlroy won the Deutsche Bank the month after taking the PGA Championship.  It’s also interesting to note that Deutsche Bank winners Woods, Singh and Adam Scott have also been runner-up here.  As for this year’s PGA Champion Rory McIlroy, you have to think he is chomping at the bit for Friday’s opening round.
• In conclusion, look for those that have been playing well the last couple of weeks to do well this week.  Of course, we know the track record of Rory McIlroy. Usually the defending champion doesn’t play good, so don’t expect a good week out of Henrik Stenson, who has not had the type of summer he had last year.
• Lastly, the outlook for the tournament couldn’t be any better if this was a Sunday finish.  But the long range forecast calls for great weather, until late Sunday when clouds will move in and could see some rain on Monday.