Matthew Wolff is an American professional golfer. He was an NCAA All-American at Oklahoma State University. He won the 2019 NCAA Division I individual championship.
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2. MAMARONECK, N.Y. — The conventional wisdom is that isn’t supposed
to work this way. Winning the U.S. Open requires hitting the fairway and
then hitting the green from there. The guy who keeps his ball out of the
gutter is the guy who will survive the test the best.
But on Saturday, free-swinging wunderkind Matthew Wolff shot 5-under
65, the best round of the day by two shots, to leap into the 54-hole lead,
also by two shots. Oh, and he hit two of 14 fairways in the process.
Corey Pavin, he ain’t.
Lee Westwood, who is 10 shots behind, marveled at Wolff’s performance
— in a backhanded way. “12 fairways after 54 holes,” he wrote on Twitter.
“That is incredible to be -5 after 3 rounds. This tournament used to be
about hitting fairways and greens.” We know it did, Lee. Westwood has hit
20 fairways of 42. The field is hitting only about 40 percent of its fairways,
so his mark is quite good. These fairways are tough to hit.
Quick, let’s check out the “accuracy” leaderboard!
There’s Brendon Todd, lapping the field with 30/42 fairways hit. He’s T21.
Then comes Lucas Glover, who has hit 25/32 and sits T11. Three players
have hit 24/42: Hideki Matsuyama (T4), Rory McIlroy (7th) and Viktor
Hovland (T8). Hitting the fairway seems to generally be a good thing.
But let’s look at the bottom of the fairways-hit leaderboard, too, where
you’ll find Wolff (12/42, 1st place) Xander Schauffele (13/42, T4) and
Patrick Reed (13/42, T11). Those guys all seem to be doing well without
hitting fairways!
What do we make of it? What do we know, definitively?
3. First, we’re reminded that fairways aren’t everything. Hitting the fairway is
essentially shorthand for “giving yourself the best chance to hit the green,”
right? Well, guys like Wolff and DeChambeau are finding another way to
give themselves that chance: by hitting the ball very far. It’s much easier
to hit the green with a wedge from the rough than a 7-iron from the rough,
and they’re taking full advantage.
Matthew Wolff hits his tee shot on the 15th hole at Winged Foot Golf Club on Saturday.
GETTY IMAGES
Second, the setup matters. The rough at Winged Foot is graduated; it’s
shorter near the fairway and then gets longer. The short rough is quite
playable; Patrick Reed actually hit a wood from the rough on No. 9 on
Friday, while DeChambeau and Wolff have each made a bunch of birdies
from the same stuff. It’s not a binary between “fairway” and “rough,” even
though the stats make it look that way.
Third, Winged Foot itself may actually be uniquely situated to cater to
fairway-missers. There are very few forced carries on approach shots,
and you can run the ball up onto nearly every green on the course. If
you’re strong enough and have a clear line to the front of the green,
you’ve got a chance to hit that green.
4. The leaderboard and setup raises a fascinating question: If the fairways
are this difficult to hit, does that end up neutralizing the advantage of
accuracy and ultimately favor big-time bombers? In other words, would
slightly wider fairways actually favor more accurate golfers? It’s hard to tell
for sure, because bombers always have an advantage. But as golfers
continue to hit it longer and classic U.S. Open courses continue to try to
protect par with tight fairways and long rough, it’s a debate that will
continue.
If you ask Matt Wolff, though, he’s in the lead because there are missed
fairways and there are missed fairways, and on Saturday, his 12 missed
fairways were the latter.
“I feel like even though I missed the fairway, there was a lot of times I was
in that graduated rough that’s a little shorter,” he said. “There’s a lot of
holes out there that maybe people would try to hit it in the fairway or
maybe take the safe play because it is a U.S. Open and they know that
pars are a good score, but I don’t really like to think of it that way. I like to
go out there and do what I feel comfortable with, rip dog and see how it
goes from there. I feel comfortable with every part of my game so I don’t
like to shy away from things when I’m feeling confident, and I’m probably
going to do the same tomorrow.”
5. He’s hit on the real lesson here, I think: We may have the dichotomy of
“risky” versus “safe” completely wrong. On the professional level, there’s
not much safe about hitting it short — even if you’re hitting it pretty
straight. Unless you can hit it as well as Brendon Todd, it’s actually far
safer to be a big hitter. But you have to be a big hitter and everything else,
too. That’s easy to forget.
When asked what’s working particularly well, Wolff made that clear.
“Everything,” he said. “I think my putting was by far the best it’s felt in the
last two or three months. I feel like I’m really hitting the ball well. My irons
were really good, and even though I only hit two fairways, my driver was
— it was just barely off, but that’s the U.S. Open.”
Wolff is second in the field in strokes gained around the green. He’s fourth
in strokes gained approach, even though he’s typically a Tour-average
irons player. And he’s gained 3.66 strokes on the green, too. In other
words, hitting fairways is unnecessary — as long as you drive it far, miss
those fairways in the right spot, scramble like crazy and ride a hot putter.
The bomb-and-gauge era is here! But that doesn’t mean it’s easy to bomb
and gauge.