Congaree Key Fantasy Stats

Palmetto Championship at Cngaree

June 10th – 13th, 2021

Congaree Golf Club

Ridgeland, South Carolina

Par: 71 / Yardage: 7,655

Purse: $7.3 million

with $1,314,000 to the winner

Defending Champion:
First year event

by Sal Johnson

Founder, Chief Data Officer, GOLFstats

E-mail me at:
sal@golfstats.com

Back in March, when it was announced that the country of Canada couldn’t accommodate the RBC Canadian Open, the PGA Tour went into action to find a replacement course. Last year when the John Deere couldn’t be played, the tour added another tournament at Muirfield Village, the week before the Memorial. Back in early January, when it became know that the PGA Tour couldn’t be played in Mexico, they found a great course just outside of Sarasota and Bradenton, Florida and the WGC-Workday Championship at the Concession turned into a great event. Both events were placed in towns that had the infrastructure to handle a PGA Tour event.
But when the PGA Tour announced the Palmetto Championship at Congaree, the course was not in a big city, a matter of fact, Congaree Golf Club is in rural South Carolina. The course is “officially” located in Ridgeland, South Carolina. The town is in Jasper and Beaufort Counties, with a population of 4,036. But in reality, the course is about 9 miles up the Grays Highway just outside the unincorporated community of Gillisonville, South Carolina, which was nearly obliterated by order of Major General William Tecumseh Sherman during the Civil War. In reality, the course is 50 miles north of Savannah and 40 miles north of Hilton Head.
Still, the course is one of the best in the world. It is the vision of its two owners, in which one is dead. Dan Friedkin and the late Bob McNair had a philanthropy image of the course on a natural surrounding to help complement the low country landscape. They brought in renowned architect Tom Fazio who transported gigantic oak trees and created hills, ridges, and lakes that appear like they’ve been there for hundreds of years, and routed a superb design around those features. Both Friedkin and McNair paid the price tag that was reported at least $45 million for the course.
Friedkin, as owner, is technically the club’s only member. Congaree’s mission is to help financially strapped golfers get a college education. The club runs weeklong golf academies in which youngsters worldwide are also given intensive training that involves life-skills lessons and sessions with an athletic counselor who matches students with colleges. Friedkin has been able to talk to Mark O’Meara, Tom Watson, Morgan Pressel, and business leaders as Jim Crane, Jim Pallotta, and Dermot Desmond to get involved as ambassadors.
When the coursed opened in 2017, it was voted as Golf Digest’s “best new private course.” The course has the look and feel of two courses, the first Shadow Creek, the course Fazio built 30 years ago in Las Vegas. The other course it looks like is Pine Valley in New Jersey, one of the most famous courses in the world in which the fairways are like ribbons of grass placed in between natural wasteland of sand and sagebrush. One other course that people say Congaree reminds them of is Augusta National. While Augusta has Magnolia Lane leading to its clubhouse, Congaree has two roads flanked by live oaks, not magnolias, and they weren’t transplanted. They’ve been “Oak Lanes” since the plantation started sometime before the Civil War. Other than Friedkin, the club has “ambassadors” who, just like Augusta, are invited to join Congaree. They pay annual dues of $12,000 and make considerable contributions to the Congaree foundation.
This is going to be a special treat for players. Not many of those in the field have any prior knowledge of the course and how hard it will play. The course will be at 7,655 yards and to a par of 71. So the course is long, but this time of year, the course is very firm, which means the ball will go a long way. So could this be a bombers course? In looking at pictures, you can probably tell that the course is pretty tight, and if you miss the fairway, you’re on sand or brush or in the trees. There are six lakes on the course that will come into play on 10 holes. The greens are 6,150 square feet and had some undulation in them, so hitting greens will be essential. On top of looking like Shadow Creek, Pine Valley, and Augusta, course architect Fazio and the two owners envisioned a curse that plays firm and fast, similar to the sandbelt courses in Australia.

Since we have no data to base our conclusions for our four categories, we will take an educated guess on which stats will be needed to succeed this week at the Palmetto Championship at Congaree. The First will be Accuracy off the tee. Remember a year ago when they held an exhibition match with Phil Mickelson, Tiger Woods, Peyton Manning, and Tom Brady at the Medalist Golf Club? That course was challenging because they tunneled 18 holes through dense forest, and there was no bail-out. You either hit it in the fairway or die in the forest of problems off the tee. The same with Congaree, there is no bail-out on any hole, so driving accuracy will be necessary. In a way, the course is a lot like Concession Golf Club, which played the WGC-Workday Championship at The Concession in March. That course too, was very tight off the tee and led to a lot of high numbers. So our first category is Total Driving. The course is not only an excellent driving course but demands great shotmaking to the greens as it takes precious iron play. The course has the same values as Augusta National or Concession Golf Club, in which you have to put the shot on the green but in the correct quadrant, so our second category is Greens in Regulation.

Of course, the greens have lots of mounds and changes in elevation and will be challenging but won’t break any players because of them being impossible. All 18 greens are well guarded, mistakes will be made, and that puts many skills in getting it up and down from just off the greens. So our third category is Strokes Gained Around the Green. This combination of all skills in getting it up and down from the short grass and the bunkers around the greens, which have sand and waste areas all around them.
Our last category is Strokes Gained Putting. Remember how tricky the greens are, I have a feeling that a lot of pros will go crazy with their severe nature of them. So Strokes Gained Putting is an excellent way in determining how a player does overall on the greens, and since putting will be a key to winning at Congaree, I don’t see any stat better to end this stat look with.

*Total Driving: It adds up the Driving Distance and Driving Accuracy rank to come up with a total rank. This will determine which players will hit it long and straight, two items essential for the week.

*Greens in Regulation: Number of greens hit from the fairway or rough.

*Strokes Gained Around the Green: This is a combination of all skills in getting it up and down from not only the short grass but from the bunkers around the greens.

*Strokes Gained Putting: This is an excellent way in determining how a player does overall on the greens by determining the length of the putt and calculating the percentage the player should make the putt, and coming up with a stroke figure.

The 108 of the 156 players from this year’s field with stats from 2021.

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