This is getting beyond my knowledge base, but could the long approach shots difficulty be an angle of approach issue across the board? Hitting long irons and woods off a tee might correct for problems with too steep of an AoA that can't be hidden off the turf?
I've discussed long shot approach difficulty with some very knowledgeable people. One of whom worked for NASA recently.
My conclusion about why long approach shots are difficult is that you have a few factors.
1. Ball FlightBecause we are hitting more club into the long approach shots, the ball's angle of descent into the ground combined with a lower spin rate means that the ball will likely careen off the ground more. Thus, if the golfer is a little off, this turns a shot that would normally stay on the fringe if you're hitting a wedge versus it going into a bunker if you're hitting a 4-iron. Or a shot that stays on the green with a 9-iron goes into the deep rough with a 4-iron.
2. Air mass and yardage travelOne of the things I originally thought when I started to notice the impact that Danger Zone play had on success on Tour was that 'the longest hitters must be the best Danger Zone players.' But, when you look at the math, the correlation isn't substantial enough to draw any conclusion. IIRC, the correlation coefficient, even if you take out putting is around +0.2 when it comes to distance and/or club head speed and Danger Zone play. So there is some correlation there, but nothing one could really use for regression analysis.
I think part of this is that whether you're hitting a 8-iron from 200 yards or a 3-iron from 200 yards, the ball still has to travel 200 yards. There are factors such as wind that can come into play and essentially I believe that small changes in spin loft, spin rate, etc. become amplified from longer distances and cause changes in the result. In other words, if you're long enough to hit 8-iron from 200 yards, you still have to be very precise with your impact conditions in order to be a good long approach player. Where I think distance helps is with the ball's descent towards the ground.
3. Distance and GeometryHere's an article that Erik Barzeski wrote about 'angles of error':
thesandtrap.com/b/the_numbers_game/angles_of_errorSo part of it is purely geometric.
What I have founds is that what separates the best Birdie Zone players from the worst is not directional control...it's distance control.
But as they start to move further away, we start to see that it becomes more about directional control and in the Danger Zone it becomes a split of part direction and part distance control.
As far as the impact on Tour, it's a bit different from the average amateur.
Where I find commonalities between what matters on Tour and what matters for any golfer is shot variance. Variance rules the roost when it comes to golf. The more consistent you are, both from an accuracy and distance standpoint, the better you will play. And for Tour golfers, they use that consistency to their advantage as they have a very good idea of what type of shot they are going to hit.
For Tour players, there's a fairly large variance off the tee. But with amateurs there is an enormous variance off the tee. Putting is a bit different because the end result is final.
Anyway, what I've found is that all things being equal, the difference between the #1 player in the Danger Zone on Tour versus the average Danger Zone player on Tour is worth roughly about 0.4 to 0.45 strokes per round.
That may not seem like much, but that is worth about 40-60 spots on the Money List.
Where the big difference comes into play is when the Average Danger Zone player misses the green.
The best on Tour will average about 36 feet to the cup. The average is 42 feet to the cup.
So if both hit the green, there is almost a negligible difference in expected score.
However, we start to see major advantages going to the best DZ player when the average DZ player starts missing the green. Furthermore, the best DZ is going to hit more greens than the average DZ player. And considering that the average Tour player has 4.5 DZ shots per round, that's where it starts to tally up.
3JACK
