TPC Southwind Key Fantasy Stats

FedEx St. Jude Classic

June 7th – 10th, 2018

TPC Southwind

Germantown, TN

Par: 70 / Yardage: 7,244

Purse: $6.6 million

with $1,188,000 to the winner

Defending Champion:
Daniel Berger

by Sal Johnson

Founder, Chief Data Officer, GOLFstats

E-mail me at:
sal@golfstats.com

This is based on the most important stats for the TPC Southwind, based on data from last year’s FedEx St. Jude Classic and using data from all the players in the field with stats from 2018.
Last week we told you how Muirfield Village had lost its reputation as the course to get ready for the U.S. Open. With wet conditions, the course was not what the Tour or Memorial officials wanted as the course played to a 71.396 average and was the 21st hardest of 35 courses in 2018. With the advent of wet conditions in Columbus 3 of the last 4 years, we can’t say that Muirfield Village was a good test to get ready for next week’s U.S. Open. However, this week we have a course that is a perfect place to get ready for Shinnecock Hills, that is the TPC Southwind, which has always been one of the toughest courses on the PGA Tour. Just in the last eight years, it’s never been higher than 15th on the list of toughest courses of the year, in 2015 the course played almost a shot harder than it’s par of 70 and it’s 70.93 average ranked it 9th. In 2016 the course played to the same 70.93 average and ranked 10th. Last year it again was over par at a touch over a half a shot a round with a 70.63 average making it the 15th hardest course of the year. So why is that happening? The course is very tight with very difficult Bermuda rough. Also weather, it’s usually been dry which makes the course run more, thus getting players in more trouble with drives rolling into rough and tough greens to hit. This year the weather will continue to be dry as each day will be hot and dry, except for Sunday which could see scattered Thunderstorms
So getting it in the fairway is critical and the course has always been demanding in greens hit. As an example, TPC Southwind ranked the 11th hardest course on the PGA Tour to hit fairways. In the last six years the highest it’s ever been was 11th last year and in 2014, and it’s been in the top-ten three of the last six years. The same with greens hit, last year 55.68% of the greens were hit as it ranked the 6th hardest on tour. Over the course of the last seven years, it’s never been higher than 9th. So you can see why more and more players should be playing in this event as a warm-up, but the sad fact is that the good players don’t show up. Example of this, last year only two top-15 players, Rickie Fowler and Adam Scott were in the field. This year there are three top-15 players, Dustin Johnson, Brooks Koepka and Henrik Stenson. Even worst only 8 of the top-50 are in Memphis.
This has been the norm for this event since 2000 only eleven years have seen more than one, top-15 players. In between 2007 and 2010 they got good fields to this event, in 2007 & ’10 six top-15 players were in the field. However, including this year the pickings have been slim, only one top-15 player attended the 2015 & ’16 FedEx St. Jude Classic. Here is a fantastic stat, since 2000 only three U.S. Open champions played the week before in Memphis. Last year Brooks Koepka finished T-37th the week before he won at Erin Hills, in 2016 Dustin Johnson finished 5th in Memphis before winning at Oakmont, and in 2011 Rory McIlroy was T-29th the week before he won at Congressional.
On the other end of the spectrum, doing well in Memphis hasn’t helped the following week in the Open. Last year Daniel Berger won but missed the cut at Erin Hills, the year before Berger also won but finished T-37th at Oakmont. In 2015 Fabian Gomez won, in 2014 Ben Crane won and in 2013 Harris English won in Memphis, but all three didn’t even make it into the field for the U.S. Open. So maybe playing in Memphis isn’t the way to get ready for the U.S. Open, but the fact is TPC Southwind is a very demanding, tough course.

In looking at our four categories, our first for TPC Southwind are strokes gained tee-to-green. Last year the course ranked 3th while winner Daniel Berger was 1st (He also was 1st in 2016). In 2015 the course was 6th while 2015 champion Fabian Gomez ranked 1st. Next significant is one putt percentage, TPC Southwind ranked 45th last year and 47th in 2016, meaning that players had many one-putts. Berger ranked T-55th last year while in 2016 he was T-52nd while Gomez ranked T-2nd in that stat in 2015.
Our third important stat is scrambling; players will miss greens and have to get it up and down. The course ranked 32nd last year, Berger was 38th last year, T-24th in 2016 and Gomez was 8th in 2015. Our last category is birdie average last year it ranked T-10th, it was 14th in 2016, and 2015 was 11th which means it was hard to make birdies as in the field the average was 3.11 last year, 3.16 in 2016 and 3.15 in 2015. For Berger he averaged 4.75 last year which ranked T-5th, in 2016 was 5.00 and was T-1st while Gamez averaged 5.00 and was T-2nd in 2015.
So yes TPC Southwind can be considered a shotmaker type of course, and we will probably get a shotmaker winner.

*Strokes Gained tee-to-green: Course may have only been the 15th hardest course on tour, but you need to hit it long and straight along with hitting lot’s of greens as it ranked 3rd in this category last year. So this is important to find a player that will do this

*One-Putt Percentage: The figure that shows how many times a player one putts a green.

*Scrambling: The percent of the time a player misses the green in regulation, but still makes par or better.

*Birdie Average: Average number of birdies made over the course of a round

The 123 of the 156 players from this year’s field with stats from 2018:

Click any column title in the table header to sort columns.