{"id":2392,"date":"2014-02-21T15:21:59","date_gmt":"2014-02-21T15:21:59","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.shipsticks.com\/blog\/?p=2392"},"modified":"2023-12-01T01:28:48","modified_gmt":"2023-12-01T01:28:48","slug":"why-closer-isnt-always-better","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.shipsticks.com\/blog\/why-closer-isnt-always-better\/","title":{"rendered":"Why Closer Isn’t ALWAYS Better"},"content":{"rendered":"

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The title of this article isn’t “Why Closer Isn’t Better”. It’s “Why Closer Isn’t ALWAYS Better” (hence the word always). Most of the time, the closer you are to the hole, the easier your shot will be. However, there are a number of instances when this isn’t the case. Read up on them so you know when it’s appropriate to lay back and take the longer shot.<\/p>\n

On Heavily Sloped Greens<\/strong> – When you’re playing on a course with big pitching greens, you have to know where to leave your approach shot. Always try to leave your ball below the hole. You’re going to make more 8-foot putts straight up the hill than you are 4-foot sliders. Even if you have a 3-footer straight down the hill, you have to be extremely careful of hitting it too hard and running it by the hole. So next time you’re hitting into a sloping green, feel comfortable sacrificing some distance for position.<\/p>\n

When You’re in Between Clubs –\u00a0<\/strong>Being in between clubs is one of the most annoying things in golf. You can hit the best drive of your life but if you can’t decide what club to hit, you’re going to have trouble. If you’re too far away from the green to make it on, don’t just pull out the longest club you have and rip it. Instead, pull out a shorter club and try to get your ball into a position where you can hit a nice smooth wedge shot into the green.<\/p>\n

When You Need to Put Spin on the Ball –\u00a0<\/strong>The harder you hit the ball, the more spin it will have. If you have 40 yards into a green where the pin is tucked in the front, it’s going to be difficult to get it close to the hole. So if you’re playing a hole where this is the case, lay back and try to leave yourself at a distance where you can take an aggressive enough swing to throw the ball way up in the air and make it land softly.<\/p>\n

On Par 5s –\u00a0<\/strong>In the 2007 Masters, Zach Johnson made the decision to lay up on every single par-5 he played (a rather unconventional approach). He wasn’t long off the tee and he knew that if he tried to go for them in two, he was putting himself at risk of taking a high score. That week Zach birdied 11 of the 16 par 5s he played. Oh ya, he won the tournament as well. Par 5s are typically high-risk, high-reward holes. Most are designed to entice you to go for them in two so they put a lot of hazards in close proximity to the green. However, if you lay up you don’t have to worry about the trouble. So play it safe and take them out of the equation. It will reflect in your score.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

            The title of this article isn’t “Why Closer Isn’t Better”. It’s “Why Closer Isn’t ALWAYS Better” (hence the word always). Most of the time, the closer you are to the hole, the easier your shot will be. However, there are a number of instances when this isn’t the case….<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":2399,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"gallery","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[40,483],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2392","post","type-post","status-publish","format-gallery","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-golf-tips","category-tips","post_format-post-format-gallery"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.shipsticks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2392","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.shipsticks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.shipsticks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.shipsticks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.shipsticks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2392"}],"version-history":[{"count":14,"href":"https:\/\/www.shipsticks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2392\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8031,"href":"https:\/\/www.shipsticks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2392\/revisions\/8031"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.shipsticks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2399"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.shipsticks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2392"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.shipsticks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2392"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.shipsticks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2392"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}