PGA Course Preview for the 2025 Rocket Classic: Scouting the Routing

Ian McNeill's free comprehensive course preview of Detroit GC for the 2025 Rocket Classic. Ian examines the course, giving key metrics and trends to help make informed decisions on the PGA betting board.

As the year's third Major and final elevated event hits the rear view mirror on the PGA Tour, the next month for golf on U.S. soil will turn to the race for the FedEx Cup Playoffs. With only 70 spots up for grabs in Memphis this coming August, the focus for many of the year's underperforming names will be to gather as many top finishes as they can to keep dreams of a FedEx Cup alive.

From established Major Champions like Matt Fitzpatrick, Gary Woodland, and Wyndham Clark, to a few of the game's brightest up-and-comers: Luke Clanton, Aldrich Potgieter, and Tom Kim, there is plenty to battle for in the coming weeks.

This piece will serve to break down every key trend and statistic I'm weighing to project a player's viability in the outright market and set our readers up to make the crucial decisions necessary on pre-week betting boards. Without further ado, here is my comprehensive scouting report on Detroit Golf Club Highlands and the 2025 Rocket Classic!

The Golf Course

Detroit Golf Club - Par 72; 7,370 yards

Past Champions

• 2024 - Cameron Davis (-18) over A. Rai, A. Bhatia, D. Thompson & M.W. Lee
• 2023 - Rickie Fowler (-24) over C. Morikawa/A. Hadwin (playoff)
• 2022 - Tony Finau (-26) over T. Pendrith, P. Cantlay, and C. Young
• 2021 - Cameron Davis (-18) over T. Merritt/J. Niemann (playoff)
• 2020 - Bryson DeChambeau (-23) over Matthew Wolff

Detroit GC by the Numbers (Off-The-Tee):

• Average Fairway Width -- 35.7 yards; ninth widest on the PGA Tour
• Average Driving Distance -- 297.0 yards; fourth highest on Tour
• Driving Accuracy -- 65.8%; sixth highest on Tour
• Missed Fairway Penalty -- 0.30; eighth lowest on the PGA Tour
• Strokes Gained: Off-the-Tee Difficulty: (+0.046); third easiest on Tour

With a near sub-70 scoring average and a winning score that sits routinely in the mid-20s, it's clear that Detroit GC isn't built quite to the same standard of difficulty as Ross's more famous layouts  -- and perhaps no aspect of the game is this course's straightforward nature better exemplified than off of the tee. Detroit GC features the ninth-widest fairways and the eighth-lowest missed fairway penalty on the PGA Tour; making it the third easiest course to gain strokes with the driver.

This combination of wide landing areas and very little in the way of hazard for misses has made Detroit a proverbial paradise for some of the games preeminent bombers, and in past RMC iterations, we've seen the likes of Bryson DeChambeau, Tony Finau, Cameron Young, Taylor Pendrith, and Wyndham Clark utilize their length to record top finishes here on the back of elite driving performances.

Admittedly, the last two years at the Rocket Classic have throw a slight wrench to this bombers-only approach: as shorter hitters like Aaron Rai, Rickie Fowler, Adam Hadwin, and Collin Morikawa have each recorded top-two finishes since 2023 and showed there are more ways to attack this golf course without a swing speed in the 120s. However, when you take a look at the top finishers last season in Strokes Gained: Off-the-Tee (Jake Knapp, Luke Clanton, Davis Thompson, Chris Gotterup), the narrative quickly comes back into focus: if you want to project the players most likely to separate themselves with their opening salvo, driving distance is far and away the greatest indicator.

Detroit GC by the Numbers (Approach):

• Green in Regulation Rate -- 72.8%; fourth highest on the PGA Tour
• Strokes Gained: Approach Difficulty: (+0.028); fourth easiest on Tour
• Key Proximity Ranges:
  • 200+ yards (accounts for 22.8% of historical approach shots)
  • 125-150 yards (17.9%)
  • 100-125 yards (14.2%)
  • 75-100 yards (11.2%)

While driving tends to steal the show on weeks like these with no discernible penalty against the game's biggest hitters, the past history at Detroit GC has proven that approach play remains the king of the two ball-striking metrics even at one of the more bomber-conducive tracks on Tour. Top five finishers at the Rocket Mortgage have gained nearly 2.5 times the amount of strokes with their iron play as opposed to off of the tee, and five of the six champions in Detroit have finished the week inside the top twelve in SG: Approach.

From a proximity standpoint, Detroit GC sits as one of the most wedge-heavy layouts on the PGA Tour. Only two of the 10 par four's here measure over 460 yards, and with the sight-lines off of the tee giving players very few impediments to pulling driver, even some of the longer holes within that set can easily turn into scoring opportunities. In fact, when looking back at past approach distributions here in Detroit, we've seen shots under 150 yards make up upwards of 49% of the week's total approaches.

Besides wedge play, players will be facing their fair share of long-irons around this Par 72 routing: as four very reachable Par 5s and two Par 3's measuring 207 and 213 yards respectively will test their ability to hold Donald Ross's classically small, front-sloping greens. I'll be weighing proximity/strokes gained splits from both <150 and >200 yards, along with more general approach metrics like SG: Approach and Birdie Chances Created.

Detroit GC by the Numbers (Around the Greens):

• Scrambling Percentage -- 62.1%; 4.6% above Tour Average 
• Sand Save Difficulty -- (+0.018); 12th easiest on Tour
• Up-and-Down Difficulty (Fairway) -- (+0.027); Ninth easiest on Tour
• Up-and-Down Difficulty (Rough) -- (-0.012); 10th toughest on Tour
• SG: Around the Green Difficulty: (+0.010); 15th easiest on Tour

Similar to long-iron play, short-game acumen at Detroit Golf Club only projects to play a significant role for players trying to get the ball up-and-down for birdie on one of the four par fives. Historically, the GIR % here at the Rocket Mortgage Classic sits at over 72% (and routinely sits over 80% for the fields most prodigious ball-strikers), so as I predict we'll say often over the course of this run of summer bentgrass birdie parties: those that will have to rely on their short game to routinely save pars are likely only looking to save their place in the pay order -- not in victory lane.

If you are looking to deep-dive specific short game metrics, I would look first and foremost at the toughest of the three around-the-green propositions at Detroit GC. The rough here can get as long as four inches in some spots, and while we don't typically associate this venue with a stiff missed fairway penalty, it has ranked as one of the 10 toughest venues to chip from out of its greenside rough. Recent venues with similar agronomy and rough length like TPC River Highlands, Valhalla, and Muirfield Village (TPC Deer Run and TPC Twin Cities fit this description as well), are perhaps the best angle we have at projecting the players best suited for navigating the largest greenside test of the week. In my own modeling, however, I'll have a much lower weight on short game than average -- utilizing Par 5 scoring as a stand-in and auxiliary around-the-green metric.

Detroit GC by the Numbers (Putting):

• Average Green Size: 5,150 sq. feet
• Agronomy -- Bentgrass/Poa Annua
• 3-Putt Percentage: 2.8% (0.2% below Tour Average)
• Strokes Gained: Putting Difficulty: (-0.004); 10th toughest on Tour

In direct contrast to around the green play, putting will continue to be a major component for success as winning scores and green in regulation rates climb into the stratosphere. Winners of the RMC have gained an average of 5.85 strokes to the field with their flat sticks (none have gained less than 3.1), and top-five finishers have gained a whopping 43% of their total shots on the greens.

As is fairly typical of Donald Ross designs, the greens themselves are far and away the biggest defense of Detroit Golf Club. Through five seasons, they rank in the top 12 on Tour in Difficulty from both 5-15 feet and >15 feet, and sixth in putting difficulty inside of 5 feet. Detroit GC also features a blend of bentgrass and poa annua on its greens that is quite common throughout the courses of the Midwest/Northeast, but considering the PGA Tour's apparent hesitance to host events outside of California, Texas, and Florida, this particular agronomy is a rarity at the professional level. TPC River Highlands (and this year's Canadian Open stop at TPC Toronto), are far and away the closest recent agronomic comps, but Major Championship venues like Oakmont, Brookline and Bethpage Black can also provide additional reference points. I'll be looking at both recent putting (weighing bentgrass splits slightly over Bermuda/western poa annua), as well as past splits around the comps I alluded to earlier.

Key Stats Roundup (in order of importance):

• Putting upside -- particularly on similarly poa/bentgrass green complexes (TPC River Highlands, Detroit GC, TPC Toronto, etc.)
• Wedge Proximity (Specifically <150 yards)
• Driving Distance
• Par 5 Scoring
• Birdie Chances Created, Birdie or Better %, Strokes Gained: Easy Scoring Conditions

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End of the Season Totals: @rotoballer @BettorGolfPod

2017 +54.26 Units
2018 +55.88 Units
2019 +27.743 Units
2020 + 37.015 Units
2021 + 68.846 Units
2022 +67.485 Units

Total Winnings: +311.229 Units

Total Outright Wins Since 2017: 36

H2H Totals Inside Thread… https://t.co/pNQrSK1rFE

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