Strokes gained splits every round into four parts: off the tee, approach, around the green and putting. Across 150,662 PGA Tour rounds from 2016 to 2026 (1,860 players, 402 events), those four parts answer two different questions, and the answers do not match.
Putting is 37% of why a player's good rounds beat their bad ones, but only 17% of why one player is better than another. And a stroke gained off the tee this season is worth 0.82 strokes next season, against 0.53 for a stroke gained putting.
The scenario engine has a knob for three of these four: ball speed and fairways off the tee, approach proximity, and putts made. Move one for any player and see what it does to a round, free and no account needed.
What strokes gained measures
Every shot is compared with what the field would expect to score from the same spot. Hole a long putt and you gain close to a full stroke on that one shot; three-putt from ten feet and you lose more than a stroke across those putts. Add up every shot in a category and you have that category's strokes gained for the round, measured against the players who were out there that day. In our data the four parts add back to the round total to within 0.002 strokes on average, so nothing is hiding outside them.
What makes a good round
Take one player within one season and compare their rounds with each other:
| Category | Round-to-round spread | Share of the swing |
|---|---|---|
| Off the tee | 1.00 strokes | 14% |
| Approach | 1.56 strokes | 34% |
| Around the green | 1.05 strokes | 15% |
| Putting | 1.64 strokes | 37% |
Putting is the largest single part of the swing (37%) and moves the most from one round to the next: 1.64 strokes either way is a normal day. That matches what it feels like from the outside: the putts drop one day and not the next.
What makes a good player
Now average each player's whole season (players with 40 or more rounds, 1,906 player-seasons) and compare players with each other:
| Category | Spread between players | Share of the gap |
|---|---|---|
| Off the tee | 0.36 strokes | 31% |
| Approach | 0.38 strokes | 39% |
| Around the green | 0.22 strokes | 13% |
| Putting | 0.32 strokes | 17% |
The picture changes. Approach is the biggest part of the gap between players (39%), and approach plus off the tee explain 70% of it between them. Putting falls from 37% to 17%: most of its round-to-round swing cancels out over a season, so it separates days far better than it separates players.
What carries into next season
The question a model, a bettor or a fantasy player actually needs answered is which part of this season shows up again next season. Same players, back-to-back seasons (1,502 pairs, 30+ rounds in each):
| Category | Same category next season | Next season's total, per stroke now | 90% range |
|---|---|---|---|
| Off the tee | r = 0.73 | 0.82 | 0.75 to 0.89 |
| Approach | r = 0.60 | 0.62 | 0.54 to 0.70 |
| Around the green | r = 0.55 | 0.74 | 0.64 to 0.86 |
| Putting | r = 0.49 | 0.53 | 0.46 to 0.60 |
The middle column is how well a category predicts itself. The third is how many strokes of next season's total each stroke gained this season is worth, with the other three categories held level, and the range is from resampling the players.
Off the tee and around the green carry forward the most (0.82 and 0.74 strokes next season per stroke now), and the data cannot separate the two. Putting carries forward the least: 0.53 strokes next season per stroke gained now. Around the green (0.74) sits above approach (0.62) in 93% of resamples.
On its own, ignoring the other three, each stroke a round of putting this season was worth 0.32 strokes overall the next; each stroke off the tee was worth 0.87.
The same 1,502 pairs in both charts: r = 0.73 off the tee against 0.49 putting. The putting cloud is the looser one.
How PropGolf's model uses this
Our player model is deliberately slower to believe a hot putter. It remembers putting over a 150-day half-life against 120 days for tee shots and approach, so one good week on the greens moves a player's putting rating less than one good week of driving moves their driving rating. The table above is the reason.
What this does not mean
Putting is not unimportant. In any one round it swings scores more than any other category, and the strokes are as real as anyone's. What it does not do is repeat, so a great putting season says less about next season than a great driving season does.
Nothing carries a full stroke forward. Even the best category keeps 0.82 of each stroke. Every season average contains some luck, and luck does not travel, so every player drifts back toward the middle.
Around the green is small, not weak. Players differ by only 0.22 strokes a round there against 0.38 on approach, so even where it does carry forward it moves the rankings least.
Off the tee is partly physical. Distance changes slowly because it comes from the body, so some of that stability is the player's build rather than their form.
The sample is players who stayed on tour. The next-season numbers need 30 or more rounds in back-to-back seasons, which drops anyone who lost their status. That narrows the range of players and probably understates how much bad seasons regress too.
For the shots behind each category, see how often tour pros make putts, approach proximity by distance, PGA Tour driving distance and what a missed green costs.
PropGolf models every hole from shot-level tracking data. Try it on any player or hole with the scenario engine, free and no account needed.
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