Strokes Gained Analysis for the BMW Championship

Every fantasy sport has its set of data that helps to try to project what’s going to happen. In professional golf, that’s done by a metric called Strokes Gained. Created by Mark Broadie, a professor at Columbia, it measures a golfer against others on a shot-by-shot basis. That’s compiled then for daily, weekly, and yearly stats, or however long your database goes for. The database we will be working with for PGA DFS covers about 18 months’ worth of tournaments. While making PGA DFS picks is typically about recent form, we like to understand players’ strengths and weaknesses to better understand where they might perform best. Let’s dig in.

Strokes Gained Analysis

Strokes Gained Total (Average: 4.2 since the restart)

Criteria for Screener: Number of Starts Over 2.0 and/or Percentage of Starts Over 1.5

• Entire Dataset: Bryson DeChambeau, Rory McIlroy and now Webb Simpson have reached the double-digit mark in terms of starts that ended up with at least two total strokes gained. Simpson’s done it in an astonishing 71% of his starts.
• Last Eight Weeks: Only four golfers have gained over 1.75 four times in the last 10 weeks: Jason Day, Xander Schauffele, Harris English and Kevin Kisner. 
• Graphic: Simpson, much to the dismay of people that constantly fade him, has gained an average of 2.12 total strokes per start. English, Daniel Berger and Jon Rahm aren’t far behind, all averaging over 1.9 in their starts. Twenty-one total gofers have averaged over a stroke, with the average total strokes gained by the 70 golfers in the field being 0.53.

Strokes Gained Tee to Green – Combination of Off the Tee, Approach and Around the Green

Criteria for Screener: Number of Starts Over 1.75 and/or Percentage of Starts Over 1.0

• Entire Data Set: Hideki Matsuyama and Justin Thomas are the only two golfers that have gained more than 1.75 strokes tee to green in 10 or more tournaments. Both DeChambeau and Collin Morikawa missed the cut last week and lost strokes tee to green, so Matsuyama and Thomas held as the lone golfers to accomplish this.
• Last Eight Weeks: Russell Henley, a somewhat surprising name to see here, is the only golfer to have gained at least 1.25 strokes in five starts over the last eight weeks. Jason Day has done it four times, with a whole host of others doing it three.
• Graphic: Even after Thomas’s mediocre week, no one is within a couple tenths of a stroke in terms of average strokes gained tee to green. Russell Henley slots in at No. 2, while Dustin Johnson, Daniel Berger and Viktor Hovland round out the top five.

Off the Tee

Criteria for Screener: Number of Starts Over 1.0 and/or Percentage of Starts Over 0.5

• Entire Data Set: It was another start where Bubba Watson, Correy Conners, DeChambeau and Cameron Champ all gained over a stroke off the tee, thus making four golfers that have gained at least one stroke off the tee in double-digit starts.
• Last Eight Weeks: Watson and Conners are joined by Scottie Scheffler with golfers that have gained at least 0.25 strokes off the tee in at least six starts over the last eight weeks.
• Graphic: It is absolutely no surprise to see DeChambeau leading the way per start, almost a half a stroke better than Champ. Others in the top five include Watson, Matthew Wolff, Rahm and Schauffele.

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Strokes Gained on Approach

Criteria for Screener: Number of Starts Over 1.0 and/or Percentage of Starts Over 0.5

• Entire Data Set: Morikawa and Simpson are now the only golfer’s in the field that has gained at least one stroke on their approaches at least 10 times. In fact, there are only two others that have done it nine times: Henley and Thomas.
• Last Eight Weeks: Henley continued his strong iron play last week, gaining at least a half as stroke for the fifth time in the last eight weeks. Simpson leads a host of others at four, including Joaquin Niemann, Talor Gooch, Mark Hubbard and Matsuyama.
• Graphic: Thomas is gaining a lot of strokes tee to green, here due to his approaches, which is a good sight. Tiger Woods joins Ryan Palmer, Niemann, Hovland and Henley in the top five.

Strokes Gained Around the Green

Criteria for Screener: Number of Starts Over 1.0 and/or Percentage of Starts Over 0.5

• Entire Data Set: Dylan Frittelli is now the only golfer in the field to gain over a stroke around the green at least seven times. Byeong Hun An and Brian Harman each have six.
• Last Eight Weeks: Harman has been one of the most consistent golfers in this category, gaining at least 0.25 strokes five times over the previous eight weeks, as have Day and Scheffler.
• Graphic: Harman maintained his half as stroke lead in terms of average strokes gained around the green over the last 10 weeks. Thomas, Rahm Charles Howell III, Patrick Reed and Mackenzie Hughes round out the top five.

Strokes Gained Putting

Criteria for Screener: Number of Starts Over 1.25 and/or Percentage of Starts Over 0.25

• Entire Data Set: Billy Horschel and Gooch are the only golfers in the field that have gained over 1.25 strokes gained putting at least seven times. Kevin Na and Sungjae Im have done it six.
• Last Eight Weeks: Over the previous eight weeks, Hughes has undoubtedly been the best putter and is the only golfer to have gained 0.25 strokes at least six times. Horschel, Kisner and Adam Long have all done it five times.
• Graphic: Well, I guess Hughes hasn’t quite been the best, as Matthew Fitzpatrick is actually averaging more per start than Hughes, but I’ll take Hughes’s performance at this point.

For more info on this, check out my “Fit & Form Podcast,” which should be out by 4 p.m. EST Tuesday. I analyze this information and so much more! It is a great way to get introduced to the strokes gained metric if you haven’t already.

The Strokes Gained Sheet

Click here for the full sheet

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