How to play a ball against the collar

The PGA Tour rookie, who narrowly missed out at this year’s Phoenix Open, gives us his best short-game advice

1Most players would reach for their 56° or 54° wedge in this situation. However, when you’ve got a clump of grass directly behind the ball – as I do here – it’s difficult to commit to the acceleration that’s needed to get through the tuft. Your brain is telling you that it’s a finesse shot, and it’s easy to duff the ball out just a couple of feet. There are too many variables, so you’ve got to look at the simplest way of getting a club on the golf ball to move it forward.

2One of the better options here is to use an 8- or 9-iron. To execute this shot effectively, stand as tall as possible – in more of a putting posture. By doing this, you’re encouraging the contact between the club and the ground to be more via the toe of the club, meaning there is very little that can snag in the clumpy grass. 3

Position the club high in the palm of your hand so that it fuses the wrist. You want to minimise the amount of hand activity, both in hinging and rotation. With the club being high in the palm, like a putter would be, the forearms and wrists have to work as one unit. Put this all together and you should find the ball pops out more easily.

1. Chipping

It sounds a cliche, but a lot of people overthink it. I think the main thing is just finding the best way to get the club on the back of the ball. That just comes down to a lot of short-game practice. I think it’s something a lot of people neglect. I use the same club pretty much with every shot around the green, my 54-degree wedge, and I’ll just make sure I’m putting it in the proper spot in my stance. That’s so important for chipping. You never want it in the middle of your stance. If you want to hit it high, get it in the front of your stance; if you want to hit it low, get it in the back. I think if you get it in the middle or a grey area then there’s way too much indecision. You’ve got to really commit to the high one or the low one. There are certain situations where you have a mid-flight chip but I find them very rare, especially in tournament circumstances. You’re trying to either hit it soft or trying to get it to run.

2. Bunkers

With greenside bunker shots, all you need to do is pick a spot behind the ball and try to enter that point in the sand. It’s not necessarily a downward dig or anything like that, it’s just like hitting a chip shot out of thick rough – you pick a spot about an inch and a half behind the ball and just focus on trying to strike that point. I think with the nature of the club you have and how the sand works, the ball is just going to plop out. A lot of people dig really hard into the sand or try and scoop it up and out of there, which never works.

3. Lag putting

Long putts are how I start out pretty much every practice session. I’ll hit 50- and 60-footers all the time, just to get my confidence on the speed of the greens. On the course, I like to look at it in the middle of the putt, so with a 50-footer, I go to 25 feet away. I then walk pretty far out to the left and pretty far out to the right and give myself a visual of how the putt looks from those angles. I’m a visual player, so that helps me get a better feel for what a long putt is doing. When you go through those steps on a long putt, it’s amazing the confidence it gives you when you strike it. The

bottom line is you know you’ve done your homework.

4. Short putts

The right mindset on short putts, especially with a lot on the line, is trying to hit your line and speed. Obviously it’s easy to get a little nervous if you have a five-footer that’s turning hard, but make sure you’re sticking to the process and hitting that line. I think people forget how close the hole is.

5. Putting practice

I’m not a gadget guy at all in my practice, but one thing I love to do is draw a chalk line for alignment purposes. It’s so easy as a feel player to get a little bit out of alignment and that chalk line reassures me that my alignment is right. It may sound very simple, but that will give you an added boost of confidence going into your round. It shows you’re doing the right things and you’re aligned properly.