The 2019-2020 PGA Tour season, complete with the big break and semi-miraculous resuscitation, it officially ended on Monday at the Tour Championship. It seems strange to say, considering that we still have two other majors in the 2020 calendar, but they are part of the “super season” 2020-’21 which starts Thursday with the Safeway Open. The rapid turnaround offers a brief moment to retrace the statistical feats and anomalies of the past final year and identify the group’s most intriguing numbers. The huge caveat, of course, is that our sample size is smaller than usual due to the three months cut off by COVID-19. This affects all stats, but non-cumulative ones, such as hits earned, least.
That said, let’s take a look at the most notable statistical feats of the 2019-2020 season, from massive to heartbreaking to weird.
1. Jon Rahm wins the crown of strokes earned in a bad year
Jon Rahm’s average shots earned against the court, in 57 measured rounds, was a very solid 1,823, leading up to Justin Thomas, Xander Schauffele, Webb Simpson and Bryson DeChambeau. But the interesting thing about Rahm’s total is that it’s the lowest number of wins since Steve Stricker was # 1 in 2010 with 1,818. Only twice in the last 10 years the hits earned / the total leader won with a number less than 2 (the average of the last 10 winners, including Rahm, is 2.22). It’s hard to know exactly why it happened; perhaps the tournaments canceled due to COVID-19 have gone a little easier. Either way, it’s Rahm’s first overall SG crown, and it adds a subtle reason why his fellow tour professionals might be considering him for the PGA Tour Player of the Year.
2. Bud Cauley creates the “2/3” Sand Rescue Club
It is one of the oddities of sports that for certain feats there are seemingly arbitrary numbers that prove useful in separating the good and the great, such as, for example, a batting average of .300. When it comes to sand saves, it turns out that anyone with an average better than 66.67%, that is, someone who does better than two out of three rescues, has achieved an elusive level of excellence. This is what Bud Cauley accomplished in 2020, going 69/103 off the sand for a rate of 66.99%. Before him, the list of those who beat the “2/3” in this millennium is short: Rickie Fowler (2017), KJ Choi (2013), Tim Clark (2007), Franklin Langham (2001) and Fred Couples (2000).
3. Martin Trainer and the year of the infernal approach
Since the PGA Tour began keeping SG / Approach stats in 2004, no player has ever averaged more than two hits. lost (as in -2) per round for an entire season. Until 2020, that is. Martin Trainer, who also died last on the 2019 list, lost 82,502 shots on the pitch in 39 measured rounds, for an abysmal average of -2,115. It’s a big reason he missed the cut in 19 of 21 starts, and makes his 2019 Puerto Rico Open win even more anomalous. This is a year he will be looking forward to forget, but as Brendon Todd showed us, twice, you’ve never really died in the game of golf.
4. Bryson DeChambeau hits sixth longest putt since 2003
DeChambeau has made a lot of news this year, but not a lot for his speech. However, on Saturday’s 18th hole in the PGA Championship, he did this:
The PGA Tour has longer putt stats that date back to 2003, and only five people have putted longer than DeChambeau’s 95 feet and five inches. The longest was Craig Barlow at the Buick Open in 2008, and it remains tragic for me that there is no footage of this. For what it’s worth, Bryson missed the top five by two inches: Nick Watney made a 95 foot, Seven incher in 2017.
5. Jason Kokrak is the four-foot prince of the millennium
Every year, there’s a group of players making every single three-foot putt – this year, there were 20, including Phil Mickelson, who went 419 for 419 – but once you get back on four feet, perfection is a tempting impossibility. Every year since 2003, when Shotlink distances were first measured, no player has made every four-foot putts in a season. The former always approach, only one or two are missing, but no one manages the table. This season, Jason Kokrak has led all arrivals, hitting 101 out of 102 four feet, for a percentage of 99.02. As it turns out, this is the second-best number ever, behind only Jim Furyk’s 99.12 (113 out of 114) from 2011. This is a point where COVID’s outage may have prevented him from all-time glory: a few more putts and he would push past Furyk.
6. Beau Hossler is the prince of the three-shot breakout of the millennium
This season, Hossler has made three putts just 16 times out of 1,206 total holes, for a three put rate of 1.33%. Like Kokrak and his four-footer, it was almost enough to secure the best rate of the 2000s. And like Kokrak, he only missed one performance from 2011, in this case Luke Donald and his 15 three putts in the same number of holes. Just one three putt less and Hossler would have shared the crown.
7. Jim Furyk tops the GIR list at age 50
Clearly the time he didn’t take hampered Furyk’s infuriating consistency, as he demonstrated this season with his tour leader’s 74.22% green-in-settlement rate. To find a better percentage, you have to go back to 2001, when Tom Lehman averaged 74.53%. Now, getting back to champion size, we have to note that Furyk only had 39 rounds, which is about half the attempts the typical leader in this category would post. Then again, when you are twice the age of some of your competitors, maybe you should be allowed to make your point in half the time.
8. Bryson DeChambeau joins an elite driving group
The big man again! Since 2004, when the PGA Tour began keeping hit-earned stats, there have only been four men who have averaged more than one hit against the field off the tee for an entire season. Three of them are evident: Dustin Johnson, Rory McIlroy, Bubba Watson. Fourth is Sergio Garcia, who squeaked with a number of 1,003 SG / off-the-tee in 2005. This year, Bryson DeChambeau became fifth in the +1 Drivers’ Club, with 64,417 strokes earned over 62 measured rounds, for an average of 1,039 per round. Clearly, at least from the tee, his mass routine paid dividends. Interestingly, Cam Champ came up as soon as shy, with an average of .999.
9. Webb Simpson wins the title on average scores
In beating Jon Rahm and Justin Thomas for best scoring average for the season, Webb Simpson did so by diving (albeit barely) in 68 territories with an average of 68,978 across 52 rounds. This puts him in a rather exclusive company. Over the past decade, only Luke Donald, Rory McIlroy, Tiger Woods, Steve Stricker, Sergio Garcia, and Jordan Spieth have all maintained an average below 69 in a single season. McIlroy had the lowest average in 2014, and if you’re wondering if anyone ever beat 68, the answer is yes: it’s Tiger, of course, in 2000 (67,749) and 2007 (67,794).
10. Denny McCarthy repeats himself as SG / putting champion and puts in the second best score ever
As with the other shot-earned stats we’ve seen so far, the PGA Tour SG / put rankings only dates back to 2004. In that time, only one man averaged better than a shot against the pitch for an entire season. , and that was Jason Day in 2016. This year, Denny McCarthy came terribly close, averaging 0.88 per round in another brilliant season, the second of all time. He also became only the third repeat winner since the statistic was retained, joining Luke Donald (2009-2011) and Ben Crane (2005-2006). Interestingly, those flamboyant McCarthy numbers were only good for four top-10s this season, highlighting his struggles elsewhere. For two years, McCarthy has been touring the equivalent of a one-trick pony, but he’s very good at that one trick.
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