Drive for show..........?

[Imurg]

Following on Dreamer's lament about his putting and the perennial "Drive for show, Putt for Dough", it's time we had another poll to answer this one.


I'm a "Find the Fairway" Guy.
No point in putting well if you're putting for a double because your driver went in the trees.

 

[wolfie]

Theres not much point being a great putter but finding the rough off every tee. Get it on the deck and go from there.

 

[StrangelyBrown]

Driving it as poorly as I have for the last couple of years makes it basically impossible to score. I don't care how well I putt, if it's taken me 4 or 5 shots to get to the green the putting is pretty much irrelevent.

 

[bobmac]

You can hit every fairway and every green in regulation but if you 3 putt them all, you're off 18
How many times do you not use your putter on a hole?
How many times do you not use your driver on a hole?

 

[Imurg]

You can hit every fairway and every green in regulation but if you 3 putt them all, you're off 18

OK, but if you 2 putt every hole but it takes you 4 shots to get there you're off 28+.....:ears:

I know which handicap I'd rather be off........:thup:

 

[timchump]

I agree, i think driving is a big part of scoring well, on a typical 350 yard par 4 a good drive is followed by a nice wedge or short iron on, a good chance of getting it close, a poor drive i'm normally hacking it out from a crap lie with a mid iron, with a slim chance of just holding the green.

 

[JT77]

I drive ok, and can normally advance my second shot to the green or in the direction of the green. So putt for dough for me. I agree it is no good nit hitting fairways but like bib said if u 3 putt every green it doesn't matter how many fairways u hit.

 

[noble78]

I would have to say putting is more important, obviously its best to be good at all parts of your game but if you can 1 or 2 putt then it can save you quite a few shots over the round.
Another point is there is always an alternative off the tee such as 3 wood if your struggling.

 

[bobmac]

OK, but if you 2 putt every hole but it takes you 4 shots to get there you're off 28+.....:ears:

I know which handicap I'd rather be off........:thup:

But how many times per round do you hit the driver?
And if it's taking you 4 to reach a par 3 green, you shouldn't be off 5

:ears: :ears:

 

[NWJocko]

Putting for me.My game is good enough to be on or near almost every gir. So putting dictates what score i can make.

 

[Imurg]

But how many times per round do you hit the driver?
And if it's taking you 4 to reach a par 3 green, you shouldn't be off 5

:ears: :ears:

:ears: to you too!!

Surely, how many times you use the club hasn't got much to do with it.
If you 1 putt every green, but hit 18 shots with the driver, but take another 4 shots with various clubs to get to the green then the amount of times you've hit each club is irrelevent. You've still shot over 100.
If you're a decent player then I think it's obvious that you would want to be a better putter than driver - you're able to get the ball to the green so a 1 putt or 2 putt at worst is going to give you a good score.
But if you can't get the ball off the tee without penalty, taking 4 or 5 to get there, then being the best putter in the world isn't going to get the job done.

 

[shewy]

How you drive determines how high your score will be,how you putt determines how low you can score.
Most low hcp'ers get it on the fairway,most mid/high hcp'ers miss the fairway,for me it's fairways all day. If I'm having a good driving day then I'm in the 70's if it's a bad driving day I struggle to break 90.

 

[Crawfy]

My driving is one of strongest parts on my game. Not massively long, but I dont miss too many fairways. That gives me a chance to be in a scoring position i.e GIR or even better being near with a chance of a putt. Its teh putts that are letting me down...and that' the 2012 target. Solid two putts, sink the odd birdie

 

[Crow]

I might have misunderstood the options, the way I read it is; 1. means a controlled shot with the intention of finding the fairway and 2. means smashing it with all you've got to advance the ball as far as possible, neither option was actually about your putting.

I voted 1.

 

[wull]

i'd want to be a better putter.this is why the pro's are much better than we are.

they rarely miss putts from inside 6ft and this is usually the distance they will leave themselves whilst trying to get up and down.

i also tend to leave myself no further than this depending on how difficult the chip/pitch shot is but if i could make most of them then i'd be more than happy.that is something i tend on working on this year.

i think finding the fairway is important as it gives you the best chance to find the green or be there abouts.usually a miss from the fairway will leave you not too far from the green,thus leaving you a good chance of getting up and down.

most of my misses with the driver are not that bad though,so my 2nd shots are never too difficult.every so often i'll hit a wayward drive that leaves me up poo creek with no paddle.........

 

[JustOne]

A decent score is made by putting the ball in play off the tee.

 

[Junior]

Went for putting.....All the low single figure players i've played with drive the ball similar to myself, Its their shortgame thats noticably better.

 

[Achilles]

I'd love to sit on the fence here. Is there a right answer?!

If I had to be forced to choose I'd rather be an awesome putter than a hit every fairway. Like Bob says, if you hit every green in regulation and 3 putt them all then you're not helping yourself. I think the number of times you use a club has everything to do with how well you should perform with it. If I halved the number of putts I had during a round then I'd be laughing. I'm pretty sure all of us would!

Saying that, I agree that you need to be decent off the tee to put yourself in a scoring position, but I believe a great putter can recover himself from a missed fairway as opposed to the other way around. So there

 

[jammag]

I have never understood this argument. I feel a lot of people miss out a key fundamental in the game when this discussion comes about. Iron/approach play is THE most important thing in the golf game. If you can stick the ball in close to the flag a lot of times then this should bring down the amount of putts you have. Plus having great approach play will probably get a lot of wayward tee shots out of trouble. Yes the tee shot can put you in trouble, yes having a rubbish putting stroke will also lead to more shots but if you can get good with your irons you will see a lot of shots drop off.

 

[Karl102]

All lower hc would prefere a red hot putter as their long game looks after itself! But like imurg said, if you chopping out sideways every hole then it's going to take you 3/4 shots to even get to the green!

Tell you what! I would like both! How's that