RADIO
Hello and welcome to my official course and tournament preview piece for the 2024 Waste Management Phoenix Open. The goal each week is to provide a comprehensive and in-depth look at the specs of the golf course to help you best understand historical trends and stat profiles that have proven to be indicators of success at this tournament in the past. The golf course is the ever-changing variable week to week on the PGA Tour and it is pivotal to understand the specs in great detail while researching the tournament.
We have finally reached the point in the season where the PGA Tour ditches the amateurs and multi-course rotations. This tournament is easily the most exciting and fan-friendly event of the entire season each year, something the PGA Tour has been desperate to try and replicate. But nothing comes close to what they have built in Phoenix, it's become an electric viewing experience and makes for the perfect Super Bowl appetizer.
We have a solid amount of data and course analytics to properly make some assessments regarding advantageous player skill sets and course setup specifics. TPC Scottsdale, while not completely free of flaws, is still a masterpiece in terms of final stretch risk/reward holes that encapsulate the type of drama that makes the PGA Tour so exciting. Let's dig into some specifics of TPC Scottsdale in an attempt to isolate players best suited for success at the WMPO.
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An Introduction to the Course
The most exciting hole in all of golf will be on display in all of its glory as the par 3 16th hole will once again jam-pack highly lubricated fans into the stadium surrounding at TPC Scottsdale. The golf course was designed originally in 1986 by the great Tom Weiskopf, a former player from central Ohio who won 16 PGA Tour titles between 1968 and 1982, which includes the Open Championship in 1973. He worked in conjunction with Jay Morrish on the initial design before coming back in 2014 for a modernization and update.
TPC Scottsdale is visually stunning, with bright green Bermuda grass fairways weaving through the starkly contrasted Arizona desert. The randomly placed cacti and rocks scattered throughout the desert-style rough are always a bit of a dice roll in terms of whether or not your ball is totally fine or completely screwed. The other defining mechanism of defense is the abundance of water, which comes into play on six holes and typically borders the left side of the hole. Weiskopf must have been a fader!
Without a doubt, what makes this course great is the drama that is injected with the closing stretch. Holes 15-18 typically showcase a wide range in scorable outcomes, creating an abundance of opportunities for those players chasing victory. The green surfaces are the seventh largest on Tour in terms of square footage and are twice the size as the greens we just saw most recently at Pebble Beach. They are lightning quick, on average running near 12 on the stimpmeter and I would imagine that number creeps toward 13 on Sundays.
This golf course allows players the ability to leverage their game Off-The-Tee much more than most courses, particularly much more than a place like Pebble Beach. Aggression is important if you want to score, as long as you can do so without diminishing control. In the last 13 years, seven winners have been priced below 28/1 on the oddsboard. The average betting price of the winning player during that stretch is 40/1. This is a course that lends itself to premier players, and those who have extensive course history will have a significant advantage as TPC Scottsdale ranks near the top in predictive course history, according to DataGolf.
Recent Winners
2023: Scottie Scheffler -19
2022: Scottie Scheffler -16
2021: Brooks Koepka -19
2020: Webb Simpson -17
2019: Rickie Fowler -17
2018: Gary Woodland -18
2017 and 2016: Hideki Matsuyama -17/-14
As you can see, the winning score over the last seven years has been consistently between -16 and -19 under par.
The Scorecard - TPC Scottsdale
Course Specs
TPC Scottsdale plays annually as par 71 at 7,261 yards. Both the par-3 and par-4 holes play slightly over par every year, while the par-5 scoring average is 4.59, which gives players some of the easiest par-5s on Tour. There are only three of the par-5s this week, but they are all reachable and feature pretty wide fairway landing areas that is properly hit, leaving players with simply a long iron into the green as they only average 550 yards in length.
The stadium-style par-3 16th hole will get the bulk of television coverage, but in my opinion, the drivable par-4 17th hole is one of the best on Tour. It plays 330 yards with little hills and bumps in front of the massive green that will either hold balls right in front or catapult them onto the putting surface. Water protects the left side of the hole and green, leading to disaster late in the round for any player who hooks their Driver off the tee. The green features several great pin locations, but none better than the back left notch that is typically used on Saturday where we have seen players actually putt it off the green and into the water in the past.
The chipping areas are tightly mown, and grabby Bermuda grass often gives players fits who don't play well on this type of grass. The greens are greased lightning and players will have to hit several hold-on-for-dear-life short putts where you just need to barely get it started on the proper line.
TPC Scottsdale, while appearing relatively flat to the eye on TV, plays at some of the highest elevation that we see on Tour. This allows some of the shorter hitters to pack a little bit of extra punch off the tee with a distance advantage slightly mitigated on average. You have to be accurate though with your Driver. In the 2022 edition of this tournament, nearly 24% off strokes gained at this tournament came OTT, significantly higher than the Tour average of 15%.
TPC Scottsdale Specs
- Design: 1986 Wieskopf and Morrish
- Par 71, 7,261 yards
- Fairways and rough: Bermuda with perennial rye and fine fescue overseed
- Greens: 7,069 sq. feet TifEagle Bermuda with Poa and Rye overseed
- 67 bunkers
- 6 Holes with Water in play.
Statistical Considerations
I would say that TPC Scottsdale has a muddy relationship with SG:OTT. I've looked at various models that would indicate the correlation to success is minimal, but my notes and recent leaderboard analysis show the two may be more linked than that. It's because most courses strongly linked to Off-The-Tee strokes gained data are courses that demand distance, and this is not one of those places.
Yes, it is a course where you hit a ton of Driver on as many as 13 holes, but the trouble and penalty that lurks along the left side of a ton of holes creates a better examination of accuracy. The elevation itself leads to every player in the field hitting it a good 10 yards farther, but you are going to need a solid combination of all elements OTT, which is why I suggest gearing toward Total Driving.
Ball striking is the number one thing that I will be most heavy on this week from a stats standpoint. Ball striking is a combination of total SG:OTT and Approach for a player. That is what this week consistently rewards as players will be tested from the 150-200 yard range with approach shots over and over again. The rough, should you avoid the water, and typically negligible Dormant Bermuda grass doesn't negatively impact players too much.
The greens provide us with another weird dilemma. They are such a unique blend of grass, which makes it hard to comp anything else in terms of looking for an edge. The one thing to definitely consider is the speed; TPC Scottsdale in my opinion has the fastest greens on the PGA Tour schedule. If you are able to filter in stat data using only hyper-quick greens, I would highly recommend going that route. They are fast, but also very true. 3-Putt percentage is right at Tour average.
The last variable has to be the atmosphere, which players face one week a year that is unlike any other event on their schedule. The only real way to quantify how a player will react to the environment is through course history. DataGolf has TPC Scottsdale ranked as one of the most predictive on Tour in regards to course history. For me, it is less about course knowledge and insights, and more about the pressure of playing in this type of environment, which is unusual. There is no doubt that certain players' baseline performance elevates in these types of situations. It is definitely something to consider this week.
Approach shot distribution from 2023 at TPC Scottsdale via Datagolf:
Radar Plot Spider Chart at TPC Scottsdale:
Players With The Best Course Fit Ratings At The WMPO:
10. Sahith Theegala
9. Beau Hossler
8. J.T. Poston
7. Billy Horschel
6. Adam Scott
5. Max Homa
4. Scottie Scheffler
3. Xander Schauffele
2. Eric Cole
1. Min Woo Lee
*All data based on last 36 rounds strokes gained data
