Muirfield Village Key Fantasy Stats

Memorial Tournament

June 2nd – 5th, 2022

Muirfield Village G.C.

Dubin, OH

Par: 72 / Yardage: 7,533

Purse: $12 million

with $2,160,000 to the winner

Defending Champion:
Patrick Cantlay

by Sal Johnson

Founder, Chief Data Officer, GOLFstats

E-mail me at:
sal@golfstats.com

So after last year’s changes, the course is now settled in and ready to go. As we saw with the way the course played, the changes made in 2021 were more cosmetic than making the course harder. All Nicklaus wanted to do was make the course as perfect as possible. He realized that since he turned 80, he didn’t have much more time to make the course what he wanted. Nicklaus may have made many changes, but they are all cosmetic in nature. It’s as if 40 years after he painted the Mona Lisa, Leonardo da Vinci decided to make some “improvements” to that perfect picture.
The course is always “perfect,” and in Jack Nicklaus’s mind, he has made Muirfield Village as good as possible.
We saw that the course changes had nothing to do with making the course “hard.” Last year the scoring average was 72.97, it was the 10th hardest course on the PGA Tour in 2021. Compare it to 2020, when the scoring average was 74.01, and it was the 2nd toughest average for the year. In 2021 the course was soft. It rained on Thursday and for parts of Sunday. The winds were normal, 10-15 mph, but the course was perfect for low scores. Not the case in 2020. The weather was terrible over the weekend, with lots of wind, one of the reasons it was 74.01 for the week. In 2019 the scoring average was 72.08, and it was the 13th hardest course of the year. I bet that is what Nicklaus is looking for this year. Again Jack didn’t make the changes after the 2021 Memorial to make the course harder, just more enjoyable to play. One thing that we saw last year, part of the changes was that tournament officials could control the moisture in the fairways and greens. With the sub-pumps under the course, they could make the course firmer in wet conditions. But of course, we have seen a lot of rain and storms in the years the Memorial has been played. This year is no different as rain will hit Wednesday and Thursday, but it will be dry for the rest of the tournament.
The good news for the players, the winds will be below 10 mph each day.

In looking at our four categories and knowing the course is 100% perfect, our first for Muirfield Village is Strokes Gained Tee-to-Green We get this by combining two stats. Last year, Muirfield Village was 31st in Driving Accuracy, 16th in Driving Distance, and 7th in Greens in Regulation. So our choice of Strokes Gained Tee-to-Green makes sense when you see that last year’s winner Patrick Cantlay was 1st in Strokes Gained Tee-to-Green, while in 2020, the winner Jon Rahm was 3rd. Going even further, 2019 champion Patrick Cantlay ranked 2nd, 2018 champion Bryson DeChambeau ranked 12th, 2017 champion Jason Dufner ranked 1st, 2016 winner William McGirt ranked 7th, and 2015 champion David Lingmerth ranked 9th. So this is a great first choice.
The next important is putting inside 10 feet. Muirfield Village has some great greens, they are only 5,000 square feet but have a lot of undulation, and the bentgrass is easy to read. Still, with the greens running at 12 on the stipmeter, you will do very well if you make a lot of putts in this distance. Last year the course ranked 5th easiest, so many folks did well, so to keep up, the winner needs to do well in this category. Last year’s winner Patrick Cantlay wasn’t that great, ranking 61st as he made 59 of 70 putts in this range. Jon Rahm did a lot better the year before as he was 11th, completing 65 of 71 putts. 2019 winner Patrick Cantlay was 19th making 64 of 71 putts. You have to putt well to score well at Muirfield Village. Last year the field made 88.83% of the putts in that distance, so look for players that make lots of putts.
Our third important stat is scrambling, players will miss greens and have to get it up and down. The course ranked 11th last year, 1st last in 2020, 7th in 2019, 11th in 2018, 2nd in 2017, 14th in 2016, and 13th in 2015. Last year Cantlay ranked 6th in scrambling, while Rahm ranked T-3rd in 2020. In 2019 Cantlay ranked 5th, DeChambeau ranked 1st in 2018, Dufner in 2017 was 30th, McGirt was 6th in 2016, and Lingmerth was T-9th.
Our last category is birdie average. Last year it ranked T-16th, it was 5th in 2020, and it was T-28th in 2019. In 2018 it ranked 42nd, in 2017, it ranked 29th, in 2016 it ranked 48th and in 2015 was 43rd, which means a lot of birdies were made with the average number of birdies by players being 3.30 average last year, 2.99 average in 2020 and 3.77 in 2019. For the year 2018, it was 4.02. In 2017 it was 3.61 and 4.24 per round in 2016. So how did our winners do, Cantlay made 20 birdies ranked 3rd, in 2020 Rahm made 18 birdies, and that ranked T-3rd. In 2019 Cantlay made 25 birdies, in 2018 DeChambeau was T-7th, Dufner was T-2nd in 2017, averaging 5.25, McGirt was at 5.00, which ranked T-16th and Lingmerth averaged 5.50 and ranked T-6th.
So we can see that there are many ways to win at Muirfield Village, but you still have to hit the fairways and stay out of the rough. You then have to hit the greens, and if you’re a good putter, you will do well at the Memorial.

*Strokes Gained tee-to-green: The per round average of the number of strokes the player was better or worse than the field average on the same course & event minus the players’ strokes gained putting value.

*Putting inside 10 feet: Very easy, counts every putt from ten feet in to see who makes the most.

*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 107 of the 120 players from this year’s field with stats from 2022:

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