East Lake Key Fantasy Stats

Tour Championship

September 2nd – 5th, 2021

East Lake G.C.

Atlanta, GA

Par: 70 / Yardage: 7,346

Purse: No Purse

Defending Champion:
Dustin Johnson

by Sal Johnson

Founder, Chief Data Officer, GOLFstats

E-mail me at:
sal@golfstats.com

This is based on the most vital stats from East Lake G.C., based on data from last year’s Tour Championship, and using data from all the players with stats from 2021.

This is a classic Tom Bendelow design that Donald Ross completely reworked, a course that favors the shot maker and one that hits lots of greens. The course was considered one of the best in America in the 20s and 30s, but with changes in the community in the 50s and 60s, things changed. The course held the 1963 Ryder Cup on it, and George Cobb made some changes. The club fell into some tough times in the 70s and 80s, and it took Tom Cousin, an important real estate developer in Atlanta, to bring the course back from its low point. Ress Jones did the restoration in 1994, but the goal was to get it back to the changes that Donald Ross made, which he did correctly.
What makes the course a gem is that each hole is tree-lined, so you have to drive it reasonably straight. The most crucial aspect is hitting greens, in the 20 times the course has held the Tour Championship, only two champions have been out of the top ten in greens hit (Bill Haas in 2011 and Tiger Woods in 2018), and seven of the winners led that stat. The greens are also hard to putt, and since most of the greens are built up, you miss a green, so scrambling becomes key. The bottom line, this isn’t a course for the power hitter, short hitters have as much chance of doing well as long hitters.

Now we have to spend a moment talking about the new format that went into effect in 2019. In previous years it seemed as if there were two events in one, which created confusion. In the 12 years of the FedExCup between 2007 and 2018, 8 times the FedExCup winner and the Tour Championship winner were the same. When Xander Schauffele in 2017 and Tiger Woods in 2018 won the Tour Championship but didn’t win the FedEx Cup, it became a noticed thing. Just the excitement of Tiger winning the Tour Championship drowned out any excitement of Justin Rose winning the FedExCup playoffs. So the PGA Tour decided for the 2019 Tour Championship to try a new format. They made a new format in which the winner of the Tour Championship was also the winner of the FedExCup playoffs. They did that by taking the points after the BMW Championship and give the players based on their finish a point advantage to start the Tour Championship. The winner would start the Tour Championship at 10 under, the person 2nd in the FedExCup standings would begin at 8 under and the player in 3rd, starting the Tour Championship at 8 under par. They staggered the start in a way that if you finished 6th in the FedExCup list you started the Tour Championship at 4 under and worked down the list that those players between 26th and 30th on the points list started at even par, ten shots back of the leader of the FedExCup points race. So statically speaking the person 30th in the FedExCup race could still win but to cover ten shots and slip past 29 players is a tall order.
So for this year, Patrick Cantlay who leads the FedExCup points list will begin the week at 10 under, with Tony Finau at 8 under, Bryson DeChambeau at 7 under, Jon Rahm will start at 6 under, and Cameron Smith at 5 under par. The next five, (Justin Thomas, Harris English, Abraham Ancer, Jordan Spieth, and Sam Burns) will begin at 4-under, regressing by one stroke per five players until those ranked Nos. 26-30 start at even par. Now for those players that are 20 and below in the FedExCup and will find themselves 9 or 10 shots back of Patrick Cantlay will be like entering the Indy 500 in a Prius. It’s hard enough to cover ten shots over any player, but to at the same time jump over 20 of the best players in the world is an impossible task.
In 2019 the first year the format was used, Justin Thomas started at 10 under but was caught and passed by three other players. The winner was Rory McIlroy, who shot 267, which was ten shots better than Thomas. So despite having a 5 shot lead over McIlroy, he only was 3 under par, so he finished 13 under par. McIlroy, who shot 13 under, started the week at 5 under so he was 18 under. Xander Schauffele began the week at 4 under par, and with his 270 score was 14 under and took 2nd. Brooks Koepka started the week at 7 under and, with his 274 total, ended at 13 under to T-3rd with Thomas.
Last year was different as Dustin Johnson was the leader of the FedExCup and thus started out at 10 under. He shot 11 under, 269 and won by three shots over Xander Schauffele and Justin Thomas. Schauffele was remarkable as he started at 3 under but with his 265 total was able to take 2nd place but he wasn’t good enough to catch Johnson.
When the new format came about many people weren’t happy. Many said it was taking away from the Tour Championship and no money was won. It was ok in the first year when Rory McIlroy not only won the tournament after making up the five shots over Justin Thomas, but he was the low score at 267. Last year Xander Schauffele was the low scorer at 265, but Dustin Johnson shot 269 to hold onto the tournament and become the first leader on Thursday morning to lead after 72 holes.
After two years everyone is in agreement that the new format is good and does bring out both the Tour Championship and the FedExCup race. Even playing on Draftkings it’s weird that some players have an advantage, but that is reflected upon the price of the player. One hint for those in Draftkings, look at the birdie average and par breakers list to help make picks.

So in looking at our four categories for this week, we see how much driving and getting the ball on the green makes a difference. So we pick Strokes Gained Tee-to-Green because at East Lake putting the ball in play off the tee is very important, probably one of the essential items on this Donald Ross course. Last year East Lake was 14th in Driving Accuracy. In looking at Dustin Johnson, who won last year he was 3rd in Strokes Gained Tee-to-Green while he was 28th (out of 30 players) in Driving Accuracy. Rory McIlroy, who won in 2019 was 1st in Strokes Gained Tee-to-Green, while he was T-3rd in Driving Accuracy. The year before, Tiger Woods won, and he was T-3rd in Driving Accuracy and 7th in Strokes Gained Tee-to-Green. Then getting the ball on the greens is essential, and we all know how hard it is to hit a Donald Ross greens. Last year East Lake ranked 12th in Greens in Regulation and Dustin Johnson was T-5th. The year before in 2019, McIlroy was T-5th in Greens in Regulation. In 2018 Tiger Woods won and was T-14th in Greens in Regulation, which was the worst finish in any East Lake Champion stat. Still, it shows that anything can happen. That is why next up is scrambling because the greens are hard to hit when you miss the green, you have to get it up and down to win. Last year East Lake was ranked 27th in scrambling, and in winning Dustin Johnson was T-13th getting it up and down 14 of 22 times. In 2019, McIlroy was 5th as he got it up and down 68.18% of the time. The previous year Tiger was 1st in scrambling, getting it up and down 70.83% of the time.
Last and a vital stat for those playing a Donald Ross golf course is putting, last year, the course ranked 36th on the PGA Tour. In Strokes Gained Putting, last year Johnson was 12th while in 2019 McIlroy was 11th and in 2018 Tiger Woods was 2nd

One last thing, this week’s format will make it hard to judge who could win as half the field has been eliminated. But if Patrick Cantlay, Tony Finau, and Bryson DeChambeau falter early, it will open up many more players’ chances and make the event very interesting. The one thing about this format, on paper, it looks great, and many think that we can put Patrick Cantlay’s name on the trophy. But after seeing what happened to Justin Thomas in 2019, having the lead for 72 holes is a challenging proposition. It’s also going to be great weather, and the course could dry up and play very fast, making for more excitement.

*Strokes Gained Tee-to-Green: Looks at the combination of length off the tee and accuracy, then getting the ball on the green so it determines who is best at all of these items.

*Greens in Regulation: Players that hit the most greens in regulation

*Scrambler: Who gets it up and down after missing a green.

*Strokes Gained Putting: The number of putts a player takes from a specific distance is measured against a statistical baseline to determine the player’s strokes gained or lost on a hole.

Of the 30 players in the field, 30 have stats on the PGA Tour for 2021:

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