Happy Sunday, golfers.

In last week’s premium post, I wrote about the 5 statistics that I believe will change the way you play golf. To my surprise, it ended up being my most successful post. So if you haven’t had a chance to read it yet, go check it out! I made it free for everyone.

Let’s get into it.

Today’s quote:

“Golf… is the infallible test. The man who can go into a patch of rough alone, with the knowledge that only God is watching him, and play his ball where it lies, is the man who will serve you faithfully and well.”

— P.G. Wodehouse

Ditch the Three-Foot Circle

I subscribe to the Golf Digest newsletter, and in it, they sometimes have a segment called the "2-Minute Clinic". In their latest edition, PGA Tour pro Ben Griffin shared a putting tip that really resonated with me, and I think you’ll find it just as valuable.

I’m sure at some point you’ve been told to try to finish your lag putts inside of a three-foot circle. Griffin challenges that advice. He says:

If you're thinking about getting the ball into a three-foot circle but then miss by two feet, now you've got to contend with a testy five-footer. But when you try to make it, you sharpen your focus, and the miss usually ends up in that three-foot circle for an easier second putt.

You’ve all heard the classic adage "aim small, miss small," and lag putting is no exception. A three-foot circle is a great zone to finish in, but it shouldn't be your target. Aiming at a precise point narrows your margin for error.

Brad Faxon preaches a similar mindset, emphasizing that he approaches every putt with the intention to make it:

Every putt, if you can match the speed and the line, has a chance to go in. The more you can downplay the importance of the putt, the better chance you'll have to make it.

But remember: trying to make long putts isn't a license to ram the ball five feet past the hole. You still need proper speed control and lag fundamentals. So stop with the vague three-foot circle target, and treat your lag putts with the same precise, deliberate aim that you treat your shorter putts with.

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First Hole Struggles

Nothing beats the anticipation of a round of golf. If you’re a psychopath like me, you might even find yourself visualizing the first tee as you’re lying in bed the night before. It’s a clean slate, a fresh start, and a chance to finally play the kind of golf you know you're capable of.

And then you get to the course and double the first hole…

Do you feel like this happens to you often? Well it probably does, but go easy on yourself. It happens to good players too. According to data from Lou Stagner at Arccos Golf, even college golfers consistently score worse on their opening hole. In fact, it typically takes them a few holes just to settle in and catch up to the field average.

There could be a number of different explanations — first-tee jitters, shotgun starts, cold morning air, just to name a few. But the fact remains: even D1 college golfers struggle right out of the gate. So if you’re a 15-handicap rolling up to the course five minutes before your tee time with zero warmup, cut yourself some slack and don’t panic when the first hole doesn’t go well.

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Waste Area or Bunker?

Have you ever found your ball 200 yards from the green sitting in sand, only to be told you can’t ground your club because it’s still a "bunker"?

Well, hold on a second. Depending on the course you’re playing, you might be hitting from a waste area, which means the standard bunker rules don’t apply!

The USGA recently released a video on waste areas and why you’re allowed to play them just like regular fairway shots. Check it out below:

The USGA didn't actually explain how to spot the difference between a bunker and a waste area. But don’t worry, that’s what I’m here for.

Here’s a quick cheat sheet to help you figure out whether traditional bunker rules apply or not.

TL;DR: Just look for a rake.

That’s it for today. Thanks for reading.

Hope you all have a great week and get out and play!

-Tommy

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“No F*cking Double Bogeys” — The Power of Bogey Avoidance

The Power of Choking Down

Welcome, golfers.

As we approach the one-year anniversary of The Scoring Letter, I’ve been reflecting on all the content I’ve put out and all the lessons I’ve learned along the way. I started this newsletter with a simple goal: to help amateur golfers shoot lower scores through smarter play.

Each week, I dive into topics that spark my curiosity and share …

Read more

Happy Sunday, everyone. Hope all of you living in cold-weather states are getting your last licks in. I’m fortunate to live in a year-round golf climate (Southern California), but I’ve been hearing rumblings of golfers prepping for the off-season now that we’ve entered October.

Anyway, let’s get into it.

Today’s quote:

“Golf is a game that is played on a five-inch course—the distance between your ears.”

— Bobby Jones

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Strategies For Breaking 80

Golf Digest put out an article last week on 13 data-backed strategies to break 80 (you can check it out here). A lot of them are pretty obvious — like “don’t chase birdies” or “try to avoid three-putts.” But two of their points I thought were genuinely helpful and went beyond the surface-level break 80 advice you normally hear.

The two strategies are listed separately in their article, but I think they actually go hand in hand. Let’s break them down first, and then I’ll explain why I think they’re related.

1. Beware the 150–200 zone

According to their data, a 10-handicap playing an approach shot from 200-plus yards out has a 20 percent chance of making double bogey. Remember: double bogeys are our mortal enemies! Now look at their next tip.

2. Play for GIR+1

GIR+1 is a stat created by Mark Broadie. It’s when you either hit the Green in Regulation OR hit the Green in Regulation using one extra shot. It’s basically if you’re greenside and have a chip for birdie. They basically make the case that for a lot of golfers trying to break 80, you should sometimes treat this GIR+1 as a win.

How I Think They’re Related

So let’s say you’re faced with the nightmare long approach shot from close to 200 yards. I think it’s important for you to remember that double is now creeping into play — but only if you try to play outside of yourself. My recommendation is to play for a GIR+1.

Select a club you trust to get you near the green. Reaching the putting surface isn’t required. You just need a decent chance to scramble for par. Even if you miss the par save, a bogey doesn’t ruin your card. But making a double because you went OB trying to hammer a club from a distance you have no control over, just to try to reach in regulation — that’s what we’re trying to avoid.

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Limit Your Time Over The Ball

I recently posted this clip to my X account of Phil Mickelson’s famous shot on the 13th at Augusta. What I’d never noticed before was how quickly he hit the shot after addressing the ball.

It took him just 5 seconds from the time he addressed the ball to make contact with it. Check it out:

It’s a good reminder for all of us that once you’ve committed to a shot, standing over the ball and letting your mind wander does you no good.

I’ll leave you with a couple of quotes:

Putting on Aerated Greens

I recently played a round at my local club two days after they aerated the greens. I was pretty disappointed, as many of you can understand, and the frustration from putting bled into other parts of my game. As you all know, golf completely changes on punched greens. The chips you hit, the putts you roll, the clubs you choose — it can be infuriating…

I recently saw a post from golf instructor @drakesmith_ on how he manages aerated greens, so figured I’d share them with you (partly to help me cope with my own round).

1. They will not break as much as you think they will.

2. The punched nature of the green causes variability in the way the ball rolls, so you need to focus on hitting each putt pure.

3. There is no use in getting frustrated. It is what it is, just keep focusing on striking the putts solid.

In my opinion, the last point is the most important: there’s no use in getting frustrated. Your score will likely suffer because of the greens, so just accept it and focus on what you can control.

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That’s it for today. Hope you all have a great week and get out and play!

If you have any questions, comments, or feedback, please don’t hesitate to email me at tourswingstommy@gmail.com. I read everything.

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Oh, swing thoughts. They’re an amazing thing. A quiet little voice in your head that somehow holds the power to influence your entire game. They’re personal in a way almost nothing else in golf is. I’ve carried some of the same ones for years. How would I operate without them? They’re my friends (Yes, I hear voices).

But how many swing thoughts is too many? Keep the left arm straight. Clear the lead hip. Maintain the triangle. Hold the lag. Release the lag. Hinge the wrists. Don’t hinge the wrists.

Golf’s not hard right?

In this week’s Scoring Letter, I wanted to see whether top players and coaches agree on how many swing thoughts you should allow in your head at one time.

We’ll also look at a couple of related studies to help us better understand the mind as it pertains to the golf swing.

Let’s get into it.

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Are Swing Thoughts a Good Thing?

Let’s start here: generally speaking, swing thoughts are a good thing — provided they actually help you play better. Most coaches and players support using them, not necessarily because they’re inherently “good”, but because they know they’re largely unavoidable. Since you can't escape them, you might as well make them count. As legendary golf coach Butch Harmon notes, the goal is to find the one thought that organizes everything.

In a 2007 study, Simon Jenkins looked at 113 players who played on the European Tour and found that each one of them reported having a swing thought for their full swing. In the study they refer to them at swing keys.

They also found that when a golfer is playing well, he reports having fewer swing thoughts. That sounds obvious at first, but it raises a chicken-and-egg question: Does playing well reduce the need to overthink, or does clearing your head lead to playing well?

Either way, coaches agree that there is a limit to how many swing thoughts a player can successfully hold. The question is how many?

Read more

Happy Sunday everyone. Hope you’ve been enjoying some President’s Cup action this weekend. If you haven’t, the above photo should get you in the spirit.

Let’s get into it.

Today’s quote:

“The reason the pro tells you to keep your head down is so you can’t see him laughing.”

— Bill Murray

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Always Practice Off of Grass

How many of you have ever had an amazing range session where you’re flushing one iron after another, only to find yourself chunking your irons the very next day on the course.

What happened?

Well, it could be any number of things, but maybe part of the reason is that you’ve become accustomed to hitting golf balls off of a mat.

A golf mat and the grass are not the same.

A mat allows the clubhead to slide or bounce off the firm surface. If you hit the ball "fat", the club still glides forward to launch the ball reasonably well.

Real turf allows the club to dig into the dirt (hence the divot). Hitting even slightly behind the ball on grass slows the club down significantly, resulting in everyone’s favorite shot — the chunk.

Obviously hitting off of a mat is better than not hitting balls at all. But if your local driving range offers grass and mats, please do yourself a favor and always choose the grass.

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Lining Up on the Tee Box

Most golfers I play with treat tee placement as an afterthought. "As long as it’s between the markers, it’s all pretty much the same shot, right?"

Wrong.

Where you choose to tee the ball up can have a significant impact on how well you hit the shot, and consequently how well you play the hole.

Below is a post from @drakesmith sharing some of his takeaways from his time caddying at Q school.

The scenario he uses is one where the players mistakenly set up on the side of the tee box that brings trouble into their vision.

I’ve written a lot about the power of vision in the golf swing. Where you look and what you see has a real impact on your golf swing.

So, the next time you walk up to the tee, step back for a few seconds and choose the angle that makes you feel the most confident. Just because you see tee markers, it doesn’t mean that every spot between them offers the same shot.

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Bad Golf and Good Scores

Are good golf and good scores correlated?

Yes, but maybe not to the degree you think they are.

Generally speaking, good shots translate to lower scores. But golf sometimes defies logic. I’ve had plenty of rounds where solid ball-striking yields bad luck, and vice versa — days where repeated mis-hits somehow produce a respectable score (don’t ask me how).

Ultimately, cut yourself some slack if you’re striking it well and the scorecard doesn’t reflect it. And vice versa: if your swing feels off, don’t panic or overthink. Push through, make smart decisions, and you might still walk away with a personal best lol.

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That’s it for today. Hope you all have a great week and get out and play!

If you have any questions, comments, or feedback, please don’t hesitate to email me at tourswingstommy@gmail.com. I read everything.

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Golf is a game of trade-offs. For any given shot, there are countless combinations of clubs to use and ways to use them. All with the same end-goal of getting the little white ball closer to the hole.

Every club/shot combination requires weighing its distinct pros and cons vs all of the other club/shot combination you could use for the same scenario.

As you improve, you unlock the ability to hit different shots and get more creative with each of the 14 clubs in your bag. Over time, you learn to use your clubs for more than just their “standard” intended use.

In this week’s post, I want to discuss perhaps the easiest of the non-standard club uses: putting with a hybrid.

I’m going to break down why I think you should learn the hybrid putt, the physics behind why it works, the data we currently have surrounding it, and most importantly, when to use it.

Let’s get into it.

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The Physics of the Hybrid Putt

Let’s start with this: a putter generally carries about three or four degrees of loft. A hybrid carries somewhere around seventeen to twenty-seven. Understanding this gap is really the key to understanding the hybrid’s effectiveness from just off the green.

Read more

Happy Sunday, everyone.

I have some big news! My first book The Game Within The Game is out and now available in eBook format.

You can get it on Amazon HERE.

The book brings my top Substack posts together into one neatly formatted, highly organized volume of 169 pages. My goal is for this to serve as your ultimate strategy/course-management resource that you can refer back to at any stage of your never-ending golf journey.

If you’re a premium subscriber, you can get it for free HERE.

If you’re interested in purchasing a physical copy, please enter your email below so I can get an accurate print count. If I get enough sign-ups I will produce a physical copy.

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Okay that’s enough about me. Let’s get into today’s bag.

Today’s quote:

“Golf is a non-violent game played violently from within.”

— Bob Toski

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Key Positions

There are dozens of positions in the golf swing, and golfers spend a lifetime chasing each of them to perfection. But what if focusing on just a few key checkpoints is all it takes to play high-level golf?

Take a look below at Eduardo Matarazzo from the Ole Miss golf team.

The first photo is at the top of his backswing. Looks pretty textbook.

Now take a look at the second photo as he is coming into impact. Textbook.

Now watch his full swing:

I share this to remind you not to obsess over every single position in your swing.

The golf swing is one motion. Not dozens of separate mini ones. There can be wild variation in that motion so long as you return to a semi-consistent impact position.

So don’t obsess over the technical imperfections of your swing. You only need to hit a few key positions consistently in order to play good golf.

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Bob Toski Tips

Legendary golf coach Bob Toski turned 100 years old last Friday. Golf.com re-released a piece from their 2013 issue where Alan Bastable sat down with Toski to pick his brain about the modern game.

During their interview, Tosksi was asked a number of different questions, which you can read here.

Two of the questions/answers stood out to me as particularly insightful, so figured I’d share them with you here.

1. What’s the biggest fix needed in golf instruction today?

You can’t teach golf the way they’re teaching it these days. Everybody says that the body controls the swing. The body doesn’t even touch the club — how can it control the swing? The swing starts in the hands. The minute you hold a club in your hand, you feel like you have control of something.

2. So control and precision have taken a backseat to the power game?

Exactly. Today’s players don’t know where they’re aiming and swinging. They’re swinging so fast that they can’t square the clubface. They are one-dimensional: Bomb it, find it, hit a wedge, make the putt. Teaching players to become three-dimensional is a lost art. Players can’t curve the ball anymore. They aren’t shot makers.

It’s never a bad idea to listen to golf instruction from someone who's been teaching the game at a high level for 70 years.

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Winning Putters

Putters are a deeply personal piece of equipment for every golfer. But that doesn’t mean it hurts to know what’s working for everybody else.

Golf.com released a piece last week on the winningest putters of the 2026 season thus far.

Here’s what you should know:

35 of the 38 winners used a mallet, and of those 35 mallet users, 7 of them used the Spider Tour X putter.

I don’t talk about equipment much in this newsletter, but my only goal is to help you play better golf. So if 7 of the 38 winners are using the same putter model, that’s not something to ignore.

That being said, if you’re in the market for a new putter or looking to make the switch from blade to mallet (I haven’t caved yet), it might be worth giving the Spider Tour X a look.

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That’s it for today. Hope you all have a great week and get out and play!

If you have any questions, comments, or feedback, please don’t hesitate to email me at tourswingstommy@gmail.com. I read everything.

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You stand over your ball on the tee box, staring down the ever-elusive fairway.

“Just hit the fairway,” you say to yourself. “Find the short grass, and the rest will take care of itself.”

It’s a natural instinct. After all, you can’t post a good score without hitting fairways... right? Well, what if I told you that simply hitting the fairway isn’t actually all that valuable?

I mean sure, all else being equal, a 300-yard drive down the middle beats one buried behind a tree. But that’s not the question. The question is whether you should prioritize fairways or prioritize distance.

It’s a question that’s been circling the golf analytics world for a while now. But today I’d like to take it one step further.

Strokes-gained data clearly shows that driving distance outweighs driving accuracy. But by how much? Does that advantage hold true for every skill level, or do other variables shift the balance?

In this week’s post, I want to dig a little deeper to see if the math is really as simple as "bomb it as far as you can."

Let’s get into it.

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The Data

If you’ve read my post on the highest ROI for your practice time, you’ll know that the long game (long approach shots and driving) accounts for around two-thirds of what separates good players from bad ones.

However, if you zoom in on the driving section, you’ll find that within driving, it’s distance, not accuracy, that does most of the lifting.

On the PGA Tour, Fairways in Regulation have a weak correlation with success — some seasons almost not at all. Driving distance on the other hand, correlates much stronger.

In fact, over the past 25 years, Fairways in Regulation have continued to decline.

If you take away anything from this week’s post it should be this:

The true scoring comes from greens in regulation. And hitting from the fairway is not always necessary for that to occur.

Let me explain.

Have a look at this chart below:

Read more

Happy Sunday everyone.

Let’s get into it.

Today’s quote:

“Discipline and concentration are a matter of being interested.”

— Tom Kite

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Distance or Accuracy?

Who would you choose in a match?

• Player A: drives the ball 200 yards and dead straight.

• Player B: drives the ball 300 yards but is wild off the tee.

This question comes from @DivotDoctrine on X who posted the below argument:

Is he correct?

The answer won’t surprise you if you’re familiar with strokes-gained data. But if you’re not familiar, I will hand it over to Arccos’ lead data analyst, Lou Stagner, to reveal the truth

Stagner was quick to reply to (and correct) the original post.

Since Substack cuts off the tweet earlier, here was what Stagner replied:

Of all the male golfers that average about 200 yards off the tee, I took the most accurate 5% of players from that group. I compared those short hitters to players that hit it about 300 yards off the tee, and I used the least accurate 10% of players from that long hitting group.

It wasn't even close.

Median Handicap Index:
▶️200-yard straight players: 11.3
▶️300-yard wild players: 5.1

CONCLUSION:
▶️The 300-yard player will have the better index 81% of the time.
▶️That means the 300-yard player is the better player 8.1 out of 10 times.

Maybe not the clearest “apples to apples” comparison, but strokes-gained data is pretty clear on this:

Hitting the ball further even if it puts you in the rough is generally more beneficial.

Obviously if there are hazards or OB, that changes the equation. But if there is no penalty risk, the data says to grip it and rip it.

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Tiger’s Tactics

I don’t often share golf stories, but this one was too good not to pass along.

Subpar is a golf podcast hosted by former PGA Tour pro Colt Knost. Last week the podcast spoke with another former PGA Tour pro, Brendon De Jonge.

In the episode, De Jonge shared what it was like the first time he got to experience playing in the final Sunday threesome with Tiger.

He described a crowd unlike anything he had ever seen. But the part I thought most fascinating, and why I wanted to share this, was how Tiger allegedly used his massive galleries to his advantage.

De Jonge says:

“I remember this so vividly, that for the first nine holes, he would putt it up there to about a foot away from the hole, and he’d mark, and he’d wait, because he knew as soon as he taps in everyone is going to take off [to the next tee]. He would mark, he was very courteous, he would let us try and putt. As soon as we got to No. 10, he putted up to a foot away, he’d walk up there and tap it in. As soon as he taps in, sure enough everybody takes off running. So you are standing over your putt and you are looking up, looking up, and all you see is just moving bodies all over the place. He played the game that day — he’d been in that position so many times he knew exactly how to use it to his advantage.”

I guess there are levels to this game…

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Greensides in Regulation

You’ve all likely heard of greens in regulation and fairways in regulation. But you probably haven’t heard of "greensides in regulation". That’s because it was invented last week by Golf Digest writer Sam Weinman.

Weinman recently wrote about one of his best rounds of the year. He realized that while he didn’t hit many greens in regulation, he consistently left himself simple, stress-free chip shots from just off the green to save par. So he decided to create his own stat called "greensides in regulation" to track how often he gets his approach shots into this comfortable scoring zone.

Weinman explains:

You're either on the green, or you’re at least close enough to chip it on and potentially save par. For mid-handicappers like me who don’t count on a lot of birdie putts, it’s probably the best indicator of a decent score, and in my case, it was.

It’s an interesting concept and a great perspective shift in course management. Good golf is about good misses. And a good greenside miss is one that leaves you with an easy recovery, such as an area with a clean lie, plenty of green to work with, an uphill chip instead of a downhill one, etc…

Pay attention during your next round to how many manageable greenside spots you actually hit. You might be surprised to find how often you are leaving yourself in positions where scrambling is impossible.

Playing well is missing well.

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That’s it for today. Hope you all have a great week and get out and play!

If you have any questions, comments, or feedback, please don’t hesitate to email me at tourswingstommy@gmail.com. I read everything.

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Welcome to the fourth installment of Lessons From a Vintage Golf Magazine.

If you’re new here, the idea behind this series is simple. We dig up golf instruction from an old magazine and hold it up against the game as we play it today. I’ve come to realize there’s more untouched wisdom sitting in past golf instruction than most of us realize.

For those who haven’t read the previous posts in this series, you can check them out here.

For today’s post, we’ll be looking at a piece called 17 Ways to Play Smarter Golf from the February 1980 issue of Golf Digest.

(If you want to read the original you can view it here)

It was introduced by longtime Golf Digest writer Dick Aultman, and it opens with a question every golfer has asked themselves at some point:

“How could I be so stupid?”

Aultman’s answer to that question was to hand it over to an entire roster of major champions and respected teachers, and let each of them take a crack at it. Collectively, the group had won 52 majors and roughly $13 million on tour at the time of writing. Each contributor was given a short, standalone lesson on managing your game, and yourself, a little better.

In total, there were seventeen lessons, but I picked out the six that I felt were most transformational for your game (and to save you a little time). I broke them into three categories:

1. Commitment

2. Diagnosis

3. Managing Yourself

Alright, let’s get into it.

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Commitment

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Happy Sunday everyone.

Let’s get into it.

Today’s quote:

“Of all the hazards, fear is the worst.”

— Sam Snead

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Spend Less Time Over Putts

I’ve talked about Brad Faxon more than once in this newsletter, and for good reason. He is a big proponent of simplifying pre-putt routines, and spending as little time over the ball as possible.

Christopher Powers over at Golf Digest shared a great video featuring a Brad Faxon lesson that improved his putting.

Powers writes, “Faxon is big on letting your natural athleticism take over when you putt, and I'm at my worst when I'm standing over the ball too long, thinking too much and getting too technical. This video might help solve that same issue for you.”

Here is the video:

“Look once. Set up. Look Twice. Go.”

Remember that.

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Fix Your Alignment. Fix Your Slice

If you’ve been a longtime subscriber of The Scoring Letter, you may remember my post on the power of vision in the golf swing. If not you can read it here:

The vast majority of golfers slice the ball, and most don’t realize a huge reason for it is their alignment—and more importantly, their vision.

I recently posted this picture of Chris Gotterup’s alignment as a quick fix for slicers:

Many amateur golfers simply slice the golf ball because they stand closed to the target and then swing left across their body because that’s where their target appears when they turn their head to look at it.

They incorrectly stand on their target line instead of their toe line.

If you stand on the target line, your vision will tell you that the flag is behind you. So you will swing across your body in order to compensate — hence the slice.

If you stand correctly, your target will look like it’s off to the right (for a right-handed golfer). It will feel like your vision is playing tricks on you, but you are actually aligned correctly.

Mike Malaska has a fantastic video on this topic that I think everyone should watch.

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Learn to Love Nerves

Every golfer knows the feeling of standing over a putt nervous, cycling through the relaxation checklist: deep breathing, visualization, whatever mental trick you have to calm the nerves, etc…

But what if trying to escape the nerves is a mistake?

In a recent Golf Digest piece, sports psychologist Dr. Carly Hunt argues that golfers shouldn't avoid nervousness or force confidence. Instead, she suggests actively seeking out the nerves.

She states “The next time nerves spike, stand tall, bring a slight smile or calm expression to your face, look up and around, and tell yourself, ‘I can hit the ball near the target even when I’m nervous.”

Instead of fighting to suppress anxiety, this approach flips the standard advice on its head: invite the nerves in so they lose their power over you.

Learn to love pressure.

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That’s it for today. Hope you all have a great week and get out and play!

If you have any questions, comments, or feedback, please don’t hesitate to email me at tourswingstommy@gmail.com. I read everything.

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Ah, backspin. Everyone’s favorite part of golf. The part of the game that always seems to get the loudest “Ooos” and “Ahhs” from the spectators.

The fans and SportsCenter love it. But the pros? They aren’t nearly as fond of excessive backspin.

Despite all of the electric highlight reels of the ball spinning back 50 feet into the hole, ask any high-level golfer what they think of excessive backspin, and they’ll tell you they do everything they can to avoid it.

If you read The Sunday Bag edition each week, you might remember me sharing this video of Jason Day discussing the concept of "flighted wedges”.

When you take a full swing with a wedge, the ball launches around 35 to 40 degrees. At that height, it becomes much more vulnerable to the wind, and at that speed, the backspin becomes much stronger — which can be unpredictable.

Tour players purposefully take less than full swings with their wedges in order to launch the ball around 25 to 30 degrees. These "flighted wedge" shots stay low, avoid the wind, and stop on a dime. By keeping the trajectory down, they’re able to eliminate these variables, maintaining control and consistency.

In today’s Scoring Letter, I’ll discuss the flighted wedge shot — why it’s so effective, how to execute it, and why I think it’s one of the most important shots to develop.

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What is a Flighted Wedge?

Let’s start with a short definition so we’re all on the same page.

A flighted wedge shot is a wedge played with a deliberately lower, more penetrating trajectory than your normal full-swing wedge. Instead of the ball climbing high and hanging (bad), it stays on a flatter, more controlled path (good), then lands and stops with a hop-and-check rather than spinning wildly backward.

Now let’s get into some of the physics to understand how the shot is hit and why it’s so effective.

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Dynamic Loft

I’m sure most of you carry an assortment of high-lofted wedges (50-60 degrees). But what if I told you that all of the loft on those wedges shouldn’t be used.

Let me explain.

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Happy Sunday everyone.

Let’s get into it.

Today’s quote:

“I don’t believe in luck. In golf, you get what you deserve.”

– Annika Sörenstam

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Slow-Motion Practice

I shared this video in last week’s premium post, but it’s such an important concept that I wanted everyone to see it here.

Practice in Slow-Motion!

Watch the video below of Tommy Fleetwood practicing:

I think it’s vital that you understand the value of slow-motion movement when trying to change your swing and learn new positions.

Motor-learning research shows that slowing a complex movement improves sensory feedback and error detection, which helps the brain encode new patterns.

I understand the urge to swing at full speed when trying to “feel” new positions. But a full swing is roughly 1.2–1.5 seconds, and at that tempo, the brain cannot consciously monitor sequencing, so your old habits dominate.

If you want to make lasting swing changes, you need to set aside 10-15 balls to dedicate methodical slow-motion movements.

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Driver’s Fade Bias

If you read my post from a couple of weeks ago on draws vs fades, you might remember me mentioning how most Tour professionals play a fade with their driver.

There were a few great threads on X last week explaining why modern equipment has a huge role to play in this. I've linked a couple of them below for those interested, but here are the main points:

• Toe-Biased Center of Gravity: Equipment manufacturers have shifted the center of gravity closer to the toe. The design caters to the common amateur miss (the toe).

• Higher MOI & Face Stability: Newer driver heads feature high resistance to twisting (MOI) around the hosel, making it significantly harder for a player to close the face dynamically through impact.

TL;DR: Modern drivers inherently promote a fade-bias. If a fade is your natural ball flight, forcing a draw is an unnecessary uphill battle.

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The Course vs The Range

If I had a dollar for every time I’ve played with someone who said “I don’t understand! I was hitting it so well at the range yesterday. Now I can’t seem to hit anything!”

Oh, you mean you were hitting it well when there was no one watching and you didn’t really care about the result? Of course you were flushing them…

Understand that the range and the course are two entirely different animals.

Your swing WILL be worse on the course. There are nerves, OB, bad lies, expectations, etc… the list goes on. That’s why I recommend you record your swing every now and again when you play just to see how severely you revert back to your bad habits when there’s something on the line.

This is why it’s important you use a mixture of blocked and randomized practice. I wrote about this concept below:

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That’s it for today. Hope you all have a great week and get out and play!

If you have any questions, comments, or feedback, please don’t hesitate to email me at tourswingstommy@gmail.com. I read everything.

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You can pre-order the digital version of my new book on Amazon HERE.

Social Media: Make sure to follow me on X here.

If you haven’t read them yet, check out some of the most popular Scoring Letter posts below:

Every golfer in their journey to improvement has hit that wall: you play more, but somehow you start playing worse.

It’s a demoralizing feeling. You’re left feeling both frustrated and confused, wondering if all those hours you’ve logged were just a big waste of time.

Last week, I posted on X about why I believe two rounds per week is the sweet spot for making progress. To my surprise, a ton of golfers agreed.

A few comments argued that 3+ rounds a week is the only way to truly improve. Others swore by playing once a week alongside dedicated range time. But most agreed two rounds is the sweet spot for making progress while still keeping the “golf spark” alive.

But still, it made me wonder: is there any research/data on the ideal number of times to play/practice to maximize performance without frying your passion?

Because let’s be honest: You can play too much golf.

Luckily for us, there is some data out there on playing time versus practice time, and what the ideal amount is. In today’s Scoring Letter, we’ll review the key findings, how to interpret them, and how you can ultimately improve more efficiently.

Let’s get into it.

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The Floor

Let’s start with the minimum number of rounds. While there haven’t been studies on the “floor”, the consensus appears to be that playing at least once per week is required for improvement.

While you can improve on one round a week, the ceiling for your improvement drops, and the process gets much slower.

One round per week tends to work best as maintenance more than improvement. Feel and timing fade quicker between rounds, and the lessons you learn become more about managing and maintaining your big misses rather than learning to fix newer ones.

Longer gaps (every other week or less) make meaningful scoring gains rare for most people.

Once-a-week players can still drop strokes over a year if they:

• Play with purpose (track stats, note specific miss patterns, improve their course management).

• Are hitting the range consistently each week and working on mechanics

• Review and dissect the round afterward to learn strengths & weaknesses.

  (I’ll go more into detail on these later in the article).

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  ---

The Ceiling

Alright, now let’s look at the maximum number of rounds suggested for improvement. The answer might surprise you.

The only data I could find that addressed this specific topic of # of rounds vs improvement comes from a year-long study out of Golf Insider UK, tracking roughly 250 golfers.

The short answer is this:

Once you get beyond 2 rounds per week, you start to experience diminishing returns.

Surprisingly, the study showed that golfers who played about 1.6 rounds a week versus 2.02 improved more. However, the improvement was self-reported, and the amount they improved was statistically insignificant according to the study.

But nonetheless, the direction of the trend is worth noting: Playing three or four times a week did not outperform playing once or twice.

And then there’s the mental side of things. If you’re anything like me, playing three rounds in a week is a fast track to burnout and sometimes wanting to quit entirely lol.

So that’s another factor to consider.

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The Ideal Number of Rounds

Okay so to answer the original question posed at the start of the article:

Is there any research/data on the ideal number of times to play/practice to maximize performance?

The answer is 1.5-2 rounds per week.

Anything less than one round and improvement stalls. Anything more than two and the gains plateau.

Now, this isn’t to say more rounds can’t be better. But purely playing more rounds of golf does not automatically correlate to lower scores. Which I will discuss more later.

But here’s the big takeaway from today’s post: Once you meet the minimum standard of 1.5-2 rounds per week, the biggest determining factor for how quickly you improve comes down to how you play and how you practice.

A golfer who plays just 1.5x per week with a clear plan and intentional focus on key areas will improve faster than someone who plays 3x per week with no specific strategy or goal.

For the remainder of this article, we’ll be discussing strategies for playing and practicing with purpose to accelerate your improvement.

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Happy Sunday, golfers.

Let’s get into it.

Today’s quote:

“A routine is not a routine if you have to think about it.”

— David Love Jr.

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How a Caddie Thinks

We talk a lot about pre-shot planning and strategy in this newsletter. But still, there are levels to this game, and it’s always a good exercises to see how detailed pre-shot planning truly can be.

The Carnoustie Caddie (a caddie with 30+ years of experience working at Carnoustie) posted a great thread on X reviewing the checklist he goes through before every shot.

It highlights how much calculation goes into a single decision from a high-level course management perspective.

An excerpt from the post:

Figured I’d give you another twenty things to consider before committing to your shots.

More info always helps right?

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Speed is Overrated

Open up Instagram, YouTube, or turn on the Golf Channel. You’re immediately flooded with swing videos that seem to defy human anatomy.

Unimaginable clubhead speed. Absurd lag. Flexion, extension, and every kinesiology buzzword in the book — all in the relentless pursuit of maximizing speed and distance.

But every now and again, it’s good to be reminded that those golf swings are not a requirement to playing high level golf.

Meet Barb Moxness.

A 73-year old ex-LPGA member who is teeing it up in this week’s U.S. Senior Women’s Open.

She has played in every single U.S. Senior Women’s Open, and last year became the oldest player in the tournament’s history to make the cut by shooting a 71 at the age of 72.

Here she is talking about her golf swing.

There’s nothing revolutionary about what she’s explaining. But what caught my attention was how unbelievably basic her motion looks.

She simply takes the club back and drops it behind the ball. No excessive lag or aggressive side bend. Nothing impossible to replicate. Just perfect tempo, balance, and face control.

Anyway, something I thought worth remembering the next time you start trying to smash driver like an ape in an attempt to pick up an extra 15 yards.

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Master the Fundamentals

The golf swing can be a complex and frustrating system at times. If you treat the symptoms rather than the disease, your progress stalls — or maybe worse, you regress.

This is why treating the root cause (the disease) is so vital to your improvement.

Ryan Mouque posted a great video on X last week where he compared the golf swing to a set of dominos.

You can watch the full video below:

In his post he states, “If you work on the root cause first, it’s very common that a lot of other “flaws/tendencies” will be fixed as a result of changing things prior.”

This is why the better I’ve gotten, the more I’ve obsessed over the most basic aspects of the swing — such as my grip or alignment.

Master the fundamentals and the rest of the golf swing begins to fall into place.

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That’s it for today. Hope you all have a great week and get out and play!

If you have any questions, comments, or feedback, please don’t hesitate to email me at tourswingstommy@gmail.com. I read everything.

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You can pre-order the digital version of my new book on Amazon HERE.

Social Media: Make sure to follow me on X here.

If you haven’t read them yet, check out some of the most popular Scoring Letter posts below:

When I first started playing golf around the age of 20, I came into the sport having played a lot of baseball. And like most baseball players who attempt the golf swing, I sliced the ball 280 yards off the course.

So for the next 2-3 years, I tried every possible way I could imagine to get the ball to turn over and draw. And I did it.

And then I hit a snap hook…

So then I spent the next 2-3 years making sure I never saw the ball draw ever again.

I eventually settled on a fade, and have had success with that shot shape for the last few years. But still, I sometimes wonder if I’d be better off trying to hit big high draws than run out an extra 20 yards. Besides, don’t pros work the ball both ways?

Well, not exactly.

You may be surprised to find out, a lot of the guys on Tour don’t really like to work the ball both ways. In fact, most of the best players in the world would prefer to own one shape and use the other only when completely necessary.

But still, I’ve always wondered:

What do the guys on Tour prefer to hit?

While there's no single shot shape that works for everyone, modern equipment has created a clear trend among top players.

In today’s Scoring Letter, I’ll review the most popular shot shape on Tour, and analyze the data behind draws and fades. We’ll explore whether shaping the ball both ways is necessary for scoring lower, and ultimately determine if one shot shape is superior.

Let's get into it.

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The Straight Ball Myth

Let’s start with this:

Nobody hits the golf ball straight.

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Happy Sunday, golfers. It’s a special Sunday for golf fans with two great events wrapping up today: the final round of the St. Jude Championship and the U.S. Amateur final.

If you’d rather skip today’s Sunday Bag and tune into the U.S. Am instead, I won’t blame you.

Anyway, let’s get into it.

Today’s quote:

“A good player who is a great putter is a match for any golfer. A great hitter who cannot putt is a match for no one.”

- Ben Sayers

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PGA Range Sessions

Starting this year, the PGA Tour began tracking every single shot hit on the driving range. Luke Kerr-Dineen at Golf Digest recently analyzed the data from a massive 250,000-shot session and shared 10 key takeaways (you can read his full article here).

A couple of those insights stood out to me as particularly useful, and possibly worth applying to your own practice sessions:

Irons and Wedges

On average, the players' two biggest chunks of practice shots came from their short-and-mid irons (shots from 130-190), and with their wedges (shots inside 130 yards). Those two categories account for more than 55 percent of players' range sessions.

I’ve written in the past about how approach play is the highest ROI for your practice time. It accounts for the largest share of your strokes gained data. You have to be able to get on the green from 170 yards and in consistently. Putting practice might make you feel good, but iron practice will drop your index.

Switching Clubs Constantly

The data shows that players average only two or three shots with the same club before moving on to a new one. I’ve written about this concept of randomized practice here.

There is a time and place to focus on hitting one club for an extended period of time, but in general, randomizing your practice and forcing your mind and body to adapt to new targets and distances is more effective training.

Anyone can find a groove hitting the same club over and over. The real test is how well you can jump straight from a full 5-iron to a partial 56° wedge.

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Jason Day Wedge Tips

This is something I’ve written about in previous Sunday Bag posts, but I think three-quarter wedge shots is a massively underutilized shot in the amateur arsenal.

Below is a clip from Jason Day’s YouTube channel where he explains why Tour Pros rarely take full swings with their wedges.

(You can watch the full video on his channel here)

He later goes on to explain why higher-spin clubs like wedges are more susceptible to wind, which is another reason why it’s so important to keep their trajectory lower.

I can’t tell you how many times I’ve taken a full swing with a 60° wedge, only to watch it balloon into the air and land 20 yards short. Learning to control the trajectory and hit these “flighted” wedge shots was a massive turning point in continuing to drop my index once I hit around a 5.

Getting from mid single digit down to scratch requires consistency from 100 yards and in, and I think flighted wedge shots are essential to making that leap.

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This Week’s Premium Post

This week’s premium post will be

A preview:

The golf swing is a constant balancing act of correcting, overcorrecting, and backtracking—a tug-of-war of opposing forces that somehow keep things in order.

Eventually, however, you have to pick a ball flight and commit to it.

Being able to consistently eliminate one side of the course is a confidence boost most golfers only dream of. Despite what your coworker or brother-in-law claims, he cannot reliably work the ball both ways.

In fact, a lot of the guys on Tour don't like to either. Most of the best players in the world prefer to own one stock shot shape, keeping the other in reserve only when absolute necessity demands it.

This post will be for premium subs only. If you’d like to upgrade, I offer a special discount for The Sunday Bag readers HERE.

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Playing More and Regressing

How many of you have experienced playing more golf, only to feel like your swing is somehow getting worse? I’ve felt this dozens of times, and it’s maddening.

Ryan Mouque shared a great post last week on this exact topic of “regression,” and it’s really helpful for understanding why this happens.

A lot of what I write about in this newsletter focuses on improving through smarter decision-making. I try to stay away from swing advice because the online instruction pool is already so saturated. However, completely ignoring your mechanics and only playing rounds of golf will ultimately limit your progress.

It’s important to understand that ingraining new motor skills requires repetition — something a round of golf doesn't provide the way a range session does.

I’m not saying the range is better than the course. But if you only play and never practice, you’ll slowly find yourself reverting to old habits, just like Ryan points out.

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That’s it for today. Hope you all have a great week and get out and play!

If you have any questions, comments, or feedback, please don’t hesitate to email me at tourswingstommy@gmail.com. I read everything.

Receive 10% off The Stack

You can pre-order the digital version of my new book on Amazon HERE.

Social Media: Make sure to follow me on X here.

If you haven’t read them yet, check out some of the most popular Scoring Letter posts below:

Legend has it that many years ago, a golfer roamed the fairways, carrying with him a golden set of rules.

Though he never spoke of them publicly, golfologists pieced together their existence through ancient caddie records and scribbled yardage books.

According to scripture, he originally forged these principles to dominate his competitors and capture major championships.

The strategy was simple: lower scores not by playing better, but by playing smarter.

And it worked. Brilliantly.

These sacred rules would come to be known as…

THE TIGER 5

*Insert lightning and thunder sounds

Okay, now that we got that out of the way, let’s get into exactly what this week’s Scoring Letter will be about.

Some of you may be familiar with “The Tiger 5”. Essentially, these are 5 stats that Tiger supposedly tracked in his own game, which he believed were most important for him to consistently shoot lower scores.

As hinted at in my dramatic intro, Tiger himself has never publicly spoken about these five stats. While Scott Fawcett of Decade Golf has popularized them in recent years, our knowledge of “The Tiger 5” relies on behind-the-scenes caddie interviews and reports from the peers during Tiger’s peak.

Here are the 5 rules etched in stone. I believe this was actually one of the tablets handed to Moses on Mount Sinai.

Most articles I’ve seen written on this subject just tell you what the five rules are and call it a day. I want to go one step further.

Below, I’ll break down each rule in detail, and then provide some actionable steps to give you the best chance of executing them.

Let’s get into it.

Before we continue:

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Rule One: No Bogeys on Par 5s

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Happy Sunday everyone.

Let’s get into it.

Today’s quote:

“If you are caught on a golf course during a storm and are afraid of lightning, hold up a 1-iron. Not even God can hit a 1-iron."

— Lee Trevino

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Rocco’s Chipping Tip

There are very few guys who can explain golf technique in a way that truly simplifies the game down to its most basic, bare-bones level. And in my opinion, Rocco Mediate is one of those guys.

For those who are on Instagram and don’t follow Rocco, do yourself a favor and follow him HERE. He regularly posts videos explaining his unique approach to different part of the game.

In one of his recent posts, he explains why chipping with a 60-degree wedge off an uphill slope is causing you to hit shots fat.

Watch the video below and then we’ll discuss:

I’ve written a number of times on why I think automatically grabbing your 60-degree around the greens is maybe not the best idea.

Rocco provides the perfect example of a situation where pulling a 60-degree is complete overkill. I think most of us reach for it because we want the spin. We want the high, soft, beautiful landing. But why introduce a razor-thin margin for error when you’re standing on a tight lie with an uneven slope?

Take out a pitching wedge, align your shoulders to the slope, and make a putting stroke.

No ego. No flash. No chunky chip shots.

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5 Things Worth The Money in Golf

If you’re on golf twitter, you might have seen the rend last week where everyone was posting the five things in golf they think are actually worth the money.

Here are a couple of my favorites.

So I figured I’d make my own list of 5 things worth the money. However my list is specific to golf performance — true to Scoring Letter standards.

Here they are in no particular order:

1. A quality rangefinder (this needs to become your best friend)

2. An official GHIN. Start tracking your scores officially. 18 Birdies and other apps are not the same. There’s nothing like the real thing.

3. Comfortable shoes to walk in (I love my Olukais. By far the most comfortable golf shoes I’ve ever worn)

4. Titleist Players golf glove (it’s just simply the best. There’s a reason everyone on Tour uses them)

5. Alignment sticks (no explanation needed)

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This Week’s Premium Post

This week’s premium post will be on The Tiger 5.

A preview:

Legend has it that many years ago, a golfer roamed the fairways, carrying with him a golden set of rules.

Though he never spoke of them publicly, golfologists pieced together their existence through ancient caddie records and scribbled yardage books.

According to scripture, he originally forged these principles to dominate his competitors and capture major championships.

The strategy was simple: lower scores not by playing better, but by playing smarter.

And it worked. Brilliantly.

These sacred rules would come to be known as…

The Tiger Five

This post will be for premium subs only. If you’d like to upgrade, I offer a special discount for The Sunday Bag readers HERE.

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First-Hole Blowups

Jordan Spieth made headlines during Thursday’s opening round of the Wyndham Championship after sending his first tee shot out of bounds—with an iron.

What made it unusual was that it’s a hole where players typically hit driver or 3-wood. So an iron off the tee for this hole is considered an extremely conservative play—and he still managed to go OB and score a double.

But the thing that I loved most about it all, was that following the opening hole, Jordan had one of the cleanest scorecards in the field.

The remaining 17 he holes he shot 4-under with 13 pars and 4 birdies.

The reason I’m sharing this is to remind you not to stress over blowups on the first hole.

Jordan wouldn’t have even made headlines if this happened on the second hole. But there’s a certain pressure when it comes to starting your round off right on Hole 1. We all feel it.

So try to remember that golf is played over 18 holes, and a double bogey on the first counts the exact same as a double bogey on the 13th.

Over time, I’ve learned to accept that bogeys (or worse) are simply bound to happen during a round. There’s no reason to panic just because a few of them happen to show up early.

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That’s it for today. Hope you all have a great week and get out and play!

If you have any questions, comments, or feedback, please don’t hesitate to email me at tourswingstommy@gmail.com. I read everything.

Receive 10% off The Stack

You can pre-order the digital version of my new book on Amazon HERE.

Social Media: Make sure to follow me on X here.

If you haven’t read them yet, check out some of the most popular Scoring Letter posts below:

It’s a Sunday afternoon and you turn on PGA Tour coverage. It starts with a clip of the leader draining a 20-foot putt to extend his lead. Then they cut to someone back in 10th place making an 18-footer. After that, they flash back to a highlight of a guy earlier in the day sinking one from 50 feet.

Wow. These guys are amazing putters. How could anyone draw any other conclusion?

Meanwhile, you’re stuck missing over half of your 6-footers. And putts beyond 20 feet? Good luck. Those only fall once in a blue moon.

If only you could improve at putting. And not just any form of putting — if only you could make long putts like the guys on TV. Then you’d finally break through to the next level.

Except for none of this is true.

I’m not saying pros aren’t exceptional putters. Of course they are. But the gap between you and them is not in your inability to make long putts.

“But I saw them making 30-footers on TV.”

Well sure, you did see the broadcast cut to highlights of the few guys who happen to be putting the best they’ve putted all season. Never mind the missed putts from the other 80% of the field that didn’t make the highlight reel.

If you’re looking for where strokes are being lost, it’s most likely not coming from making mid-range putts — at least not to the degree you think it is.

I’d also argue it might not even come from missing short putts. I will get into this later in the article.

In today’s Scoring Letter, we’ll go over all of the relevant data to show you how your putting actually compares to the pros. I’ll cover how many strokes you’re leaving on the table, where they are coming from, and which areas of putting you should focus on if you want to gain strokes. Finally we’ll end with some helpful drills and games that I believe actually help move the needle.

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Measuring the Gap

For the rest of this article, we’ll be comparing Tour pros to 10-handicaps. Partially because I think 20-handicap data is kind of useless for most serious golfers, but mostly because the majority of my readers are in the 10-handicap range.

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