I’m Chris Petefish, professional golfer. I briefly talk about my history in the game. Starting as a top ranked junior golfer in Northern California to becoming one of the top 300 players in the world. In this episode we go over what Course of Action Golf is and how my services such as The Fish Tank will help you play your best golf. My favorite part of the episode is at the end where I talk about how statistics are shaping not only golf but other major sports right now. The MLB, NBA, and NFL are using data analytics to push their sports to new heights and golf will be doing the same.
All right, everyone. This is Chris Petefish. Podcast is Golf Strategy with Chris Pete Fish and we’re giving podcasting a whirl. Here we are. So, in this episode, we are going to do just a little bit of house cleaning introductory items. I’m just going to talk a little bit about introducing myself, who I am, what Course of Golf, Course of Action Golf is, and what they do, what I do within the company. I’m going to briefly talk about strokes gained, what really it is, what it means, and then talk a little bit about statistics in all sports and kind of the evolution of how it’s transformed the way Major League Baseball, NBA, NFL, how they operate, um, the actual game itself, how it’s changed through stats and how golf is going to follow in their footsteps if it’s not already happening. right now. So, first off, the checklist. Again, this is episode one. Uh yeah, the the beginnings. Uh myself, I guess I don’t want to date myself too much, but I guess it helps to talk a little bit about who I am in my history of golf. Um let’s see. I was a top five recruit in 2014, high school, graduating class. Grew up in Northern California. played a lot of incredible players, a lot of incredible talent during that time. You think of, I mean, I was like nine, 10 years old. First time I played with Bryson Dashambo. Uh, I grew up an hour and a half from him. Uh, you think of Austin Smotherman, Cameron Champ, Bohasser played a little bit. Quite a few guys at Aniko Gleti had a really nice year on the cornfairy. Shentaro and Sharo Bond were great players. Um, some of them aren’t playing anymore, but just a ton of talent during that time frame and it was good to have that competition. I then went to play golf at Georgia Tech under Bruce Bruce Heeper from 2014 2018. I I guess we’ll go into some of those years which correlates to strokes gained and how I actually started using in college. I had some good years, I had some bad years. I end up though being a top 50 ammer in the world after a very good junior summer of amateur golf. And then I I end up turning professional. Something I always wanted to do and see how good I could get at golf. I think that inspired me more than some of the results even was just improving and get to be able to see that improvement in uh high stress situations in term of golf. um just be able to like hit the shots like Victor Hofflin says like just just execute great golf shots like that’s just about as good as it gets for me um as well as him in what he said. So yeah, I end up playing professionally. I started on PJ Tour Canada in 2018. Had conditional status out there. Definitely was thrown in a fire. Just started with some Monday qualifiers. Missed like three or four of them by a shot which was brutal. Um, and then played a lot of mini tour golf. I tried Q school a couple times until I got through. I played basically a whole season in Canada in 19 right before CO happened and then everyone was stuck in their on their tour for a year and a half basically and I wasn’t on the cornfairy. So that was a struggle just to get playing really good tournaments. And then I finally broke through and got cornfairy status for 2022 and played out there. got conditional again for 23 and then played well, really well obviously in 2023 and almost got my PGA Tour card and then uh lost my card in 24 and played on America’s in 20125 this summer which was it was fun to get back out there for sure. Definitely have some stories there. Um, but in the meantime, you know, got married, having a baby next spring, so a lot of life things have have changed for for the better. Uh, but in terms of what Course of Action Golf is, it’s a company my mom started about 10 years ago. This is when a lot of you could say college recruiters, planners, consultants started to get wind and she did a lot a lot of strategic planning for junior players on how to navigate where to play. It’s one of those things when you’ve done it yourself, you’re like, “Oh, this seems like easy and I know what to do.” But when you’ve never gone through before, I mean, I can’t imagine if I had a with my son playing another sport like 10 or something, I would have no idea where to put him, how to hit for him to get recognized. So, it definitely makes sense. And it was really um it did really well. And um you know, still doing well. And I just uh where where I came in is within the last year coming from it from a performance aspect. So, she does a lot of the again scheduling, where to play. I am more focused on statistics and getting people to play better golf at those events. And I’m just a big numbers guy. I’ve always wanted to understand where and why things are the way they are through numbers, especially with performances and sports and really being able to quantify. And with golf, there’s just such a there’s just so much to be dug into with statistics and how to play golf. And I think people just don’t really see how much it can really help you and how the game ought to be played. And so I have a huge passion for it considering that I I did this all myself. Like I know it works because I am the first tub, the first test subject, the first I am my own first client and I was able to do it and use statistics, use decade, use correct targets and understand how to practice, understand my game and be able to instill that into other junior players, other amateurs, other professionals that use my services is pretty cool. It’s also rewarding and it obviously fires me up because I know it works. It’s like I just I just know that the numbers are going to help you play better golf. So, it’s pretty easy to get passionate about something that is going to help people do what they want to do in the game. Uh and so that’s where I work with Course of Action Golf is the performance coach side. Uh several ways that people can work with me. Uh first off is the fish tank, which is a minimum three-month program. It’s a mentorship. It is me going through all your statistics. I want you to be able to like have me in your pocket by the end of uh the time almost like a caddy where okay this is like how Chris would think about this shot. Here’s how he’d go about his round and tournament play. It’s also has to do with how do you prepare for events? Like what are you doing in practice rounds? What are you doing at home? How are you uh physically? Like how are you recovering at events? Uh just the little stuff that adds up to a lot that I’ve learned in 20 years of competitive golf and almost decade in professional golf. I’ve I’ve tried everything that doesn’t work. I’ve tried everything that does. I’ve seen it in people that I’ve traveled with. I’ve seen it in people that are on the tours of like here are how high performance oper high performers operate and here’s how people that uh could get more out of their golf game. And so yeah, I go through this three-month program with them. I teach them how they ought to think on the golf course. A lot of shot expectations and they just become more knowledgeable of the game. They become more knowledgeable of what they’re really good at, how are they going to play their best golf, um how they ought to go through targets and practice and uh just operate so that they get the most out of their game, squeeze the most out of their talent. It’s been really rewarding to see success uh from them throughout this process. And so that’s one way people work with me. You can do it almost in a uh you can also do it in an express version which is just I go through for an hour, you bring me your statistics uh on whatever platform it is. I can I can read numbers regardless of where it comes from and I almost like a doctor’s visit. I’m just going to gum coming in look at all your numbers and just be able to really read between the lines which is what I’m good at is being able to see these numbers but interpret like here’s what’s happening. um ask the questions that AI wouldn’t be able to infer a lot more uh just from my knowledge and expertise uh and just my amount of years experience in the game. So being able to like almost diagnose again like a doctor would and have someone come in for an hour and leave with a good idea of what do I do with these numbers? How should I be practicing? How should I think about my game uh in order to get better? um in in that hour versus like a 3 to sixmonth mentorship. Um I’m also have a couple other products I’m working on uh strokes gain PDF that I just launched that goes through all the top strokes gain platforms. I’ve I’ve tried them all out actually uh within the last year inputed a lot of rounds and it’s really meant to kind of dive into what are really the differences of them. From my perspective, it’s everyone’s different. Everyone has different needs. So, instead of going and doing a bunch of trial and error and uh and these all these trial memberships and spending time and money, like I’ve done a a PDF where I just go through all of them and help you figure out what you need and and really what do these things do um at the end of the day and how to try to interpret some of these numbers. I’ll have some webinar content as well talking about strokes gain, how to use it, how to come up with good targets, um just stuff that I’ve learned uh that can help you without directly uh working with me if I get too many clients or uh or whatnot. So, yeah, some other other ways to work with me, but that is what I do. I mean, I’m going to I take the numbers and the math of golf and I make it simple. I make it easy to understand and to apply on the golf course. Um, as far as strokes gained, like what is it? I think I’ll probably do another episode that really dives deep into it, but really it it just comes from Mark Brody and him seeing how Moneyball in baseball changed the game and understanding statistics and deeper statistics in order to analyze what is happening, how do I optimize runs, how do I win more baseball games, especially when you have um different salaries. Uh, you know, you talk about the Oakland A’s, they don’t spend a lot of much money. You have the Dodgers that are willing to spend Nvidia types of money in order to win a championship. Uh, so how do you maximize talent when it’s not an well, it’s not an equal playing field, when you don’t have a salary cap? Um, and so Brody, who was at MIT, he was able to really revolutionize how statistics are measured in golf. And that includes, you know, fairways. Like an example would be a fairway hit or a fairway miss. And before it was just a check mark of did I do that or did I not? Well, it’s like I don’t know if I missed the fairway by did you miss the fairway by a foot and you’re in the semi- rough? Are you a foot into the actual rough? Are you 40 yards off the fairway in a bush in someone’s backyard? Like that all matters a lot. as well as you know did I hit the green by did I miss the green by an inch or am I you know buried in the lip of the bunker those are two very different outcomes so those normal generic stats just do not paint a very good picture of what is really happening uh where are people actually gaining or losing shots so strokes gained is a measurement uh compared to your other playing partners so it’s very easy on the PGA tour to see like okay there’s been millions and millions of 8ft putts over the course of the 20 years maybe their number is around million who knows there’s been a lot of putts and you know they’d be able to see like okay 50% of players of PJ tour players are making 8 foot putts so therefore there’s really only two outcomes of this putt if I make it I didn’t just gain a shot because it’s a 50% likelihood that the PJ tour player next to me is going to make this putt or miss it so if I make this putt I’m going to gain a half a shot I’m not gaining a full shot I’m gaining a half a shot because that is what the expectation for the PJ tour pro next to me to make this putt. And you can literally take expand on that to every single lie, every single shot you can hit on a on a golf course. And so it really becomes a game of probabilities, expectations, and the goal is to beat the expectation of your competitors. Obviously, uh you have to beat it by quite a bit to win golf tournaments, but you just have to beat it in order to make cuts and have pretty good tournaments. And so golf has to be uh thought as of trying to gain tens of shots. Uh every shot is going to be gaining tens of shots, losing tens of shots, hopefully not losing an entire shot, which would be like hitting into a hazard, losing two shots, hitting out of bounds. Um, and so if someone shoots a even par 72, like that is the culmination of, you know, 72 shots that were tens of shots gained, tens of shots lost, and it all equal to 72. Um, and really it all equals to like comparing that to your competitors. So if the field average was 72.5, it’s like, okay, I made up a half a shot today, but like how did I make up a half a shot within the 72 shots that I hit? You could do that a million trillion ways. And so that’s why with strokes gained, it’s you can infer a lot of information and everyone does it differently. Everyone has like a DNA uh print of how they shoot what they shoot. And there’s just so many different opportunities to improve scoring because there’s so many different ways to score in golf compared to even baseball. when you think of off the tea uh approach uh strokes gain around the green and putting u there’s a lot of variables in golf so it makes it a little more complex but it doesn’t mean that uh the math doesn’t work and uh we’ll get into course strategy at some point but that’s where Scott faucet and decade comes in because he then took the averages of where all these PJ tour players play hit shots in terms of dispersion and being able to move that dispersion uh into the correct place in order to optimize your scoring. Um so I don’t want to get too much into that, but really it’s just like if you hit a 100 pitching wedges, like I need to account for all of them where most players just say like, “Oh, I’m just going to aim relative close to the hole and I’m going only going to account for like the 8 to 12 that I hit perfectly.” Like that is just not a good strategy. Um, no one would ever advise doing that at the poker table or the blackjack table. Like, I got a 10% chance of, you know, beating the dealer right here. Let’s double down. It’s just like you just need to play golf a certain way. You need to play percentages a certain way or it’s not going to be optimal. Um, so we’ll get into that and try to make golf uh the math of golf fun and interesting. Um, not that math isn’t the most exciting subject, but we’re going to do our best here. And I want to talk about briefly why stats in sports, how it’s evolved and why it is so uh relevant to golf and how that’s going to change. And I think bear with me B. I think this is pretty interesting stuff. I I I think what the question is like how have stats influenced the modern game? And to that I would say like information and knowledge is is power. And when you talk about big corporations and big businesses and huge like we’re talking NBA, NFL, MLB types of money, you’re going to do whatever you can to create an advantage. Like there’s just you have that billions of dollars online, especially in the betting markets like people’s jobs. I mean, you have coaches making 10 20 million a year. Like you are going to do everything you can to create an advantage. Uh, and so that’s how, you know, statistics is just kind of an easy stepping stone to like, yeah, obviously this was how it was going to go to try to improve on how the game has been thought of or played in the past, which is just, you know, old rhetoric. And so, three main examples I want to give, MLB, NBA, NFL, and how statistics has changed the way they operate. Uh, in baseball, there’s a lot. We could talk about money ball. I think an easy one to talk about is even like the shift and how like defensive the defensive shift is like talking about probabilities of a player and where they are going to hit it uh in the infield. And so you would see like the actual defensive scheme move like over to first base where like the third baseman ends up like uh just left of second base and you just have like a punch a bunch of players over to where the ball probably is going to end up which makes sense. And so that kind of shift actually started in the 1940s ironically from a guy named William Shift who played on the Boston Celtics. Apparently, the shift guy would always hit it in between first and second base if he didn’t, you know, go yard or hit a line drive, single or double. Like, it was always going over there. So, like intuitively, these players in the 40s were like, well, why don’t we just like move over to first base and we’re going to be much more likely to get this William shift out. That’s what they did just naturally and they called it the shift. Uh, and interesting enough, the in the 50s and 60s, that movement kind of died. They almost just kind of forgot about it for a while and just didn’t use it. And then really in the 2000s, you talk about Billy Bean, the analytics of baseball exploding. They actually use dispersion charts because they’re able to track where are all these hits ending up. And then it became like, oh, duh. Why wouldn’t we shift? Why wouldn’t we give ourselves a better chance to record an out and have better defense? Um, so that’s what happened in the mid early 2000s, actually until 2023 where they banned the extreme infield shift because they wanted more offense. It was just like, okay, well, the defense has figured this out. They aren’t people aren’t scoring more runs. No one wants to see a game that ends in two to one. They want to see home runs. They want to see action. And so, they actually saw some of the ratings go down like, “Okay, we we got to like nerf this.” And so, uh, people in the MLB took advantage of analytics. They didn’t do anything wrong. They just they were smart. And then, you know, the Higher Powers said like, “You guys need to chill out and we need to see more runs.” And so, that’s an example of analytics in in basketball. This is a great one. I’m a big NBA guy. The three-point line has gone crazy. The sport has changed night and day. If you’re someone you’re in the 50, if you’re 50 or 60 years old, like you know, like this is not the same sport growing up. You were watching the 80s and 90s. Uh really the ’90s specifically. And like a crazy stat is in 1990s, seven three-pointers were attempted per game. Seven. In 2024, it was 38. 38 per game. Insane numbers. Almost six times as many. And some people credit Steph Curry and said, “Oh yeah, Steph came along generational best shooter on the planet. Like everyone just wanted to model after Steph since they had a ton of success in Golden State.” But I would actually disagree and I would credit Daryl my Houston Rockets in the mid 2014 2017 18 uh years. And my is kind of basically a genius and actually called it Moryball. uh in honor of Moneyball. And what uh Daryl my kind of found out was that he used statistics to maximize points per possession. How can I get the most efficient points possible? And so they used shot charts, they used all the statistics of field goal percentage, and they basically this guy figured out like I just need to like never shoot a mid-range two ever. like I need to either shoot a three or I need to do a layup or shoot attempt a layup cuz I mean threes are just worth so much more. And the fact that if you can shoot it at relatively good, even higher than like 38 37% of the time, like shoot many threes often, early and often, and layups around the rim that are obviously very high percentage shots, like close to 70. And I that’s just what you’ve seen in the game of basketball um in the last 10 years is like guys like Michael Jordan, even Kobe, Tim Duncan, Durk, like those molds are gone. like the the age of the mid-range two uh is just dead. It’s it’s like the same thing as the kind of the fadeaway route in the NFL. Like it’s just a low percentage throw. It’s uh the fadeaway was kind of a fun cool route, but it’s not a high percentage route. So, it’s just dying and dying. But anyways, back to basketball. Mid-range twos are are dying because analytics found out that three-pointers and layups are more efficient and they’re going to lead to more points. So why wouldn’t you attempt shots that are going to lead to more points and model your team around players that benefit that style of play? So that’s how small ball was literally created. You had a bunch of these like 6’6, 6’7 and under guys, no centers, and they all shot threes and play defense and created space so they could get to the rim. So it was just like chuck a three or create enough space where you can drive. And that’s how Harden was. James Harden was literally unstoppable. um I think it was in 2017 he just couldn’t stop it because it was just something they hadn’t seen before. He had used statistics to like break basketball and Harden was scoring 40 points per game. Um and so for better or for worse that is how it’s changed basketball. I don’t think there’s going there’s there’s no going back because it’s just it’s an optimal strategy. You’re going to score more points if you play this way. So people are just going to see who can do it the best of that strategy. And if you’re a seven foot center, you better shoot the three. Like it’s just how it is. You’re just not going to see the court if you can’t shoot threes. Um that kind of age basketball is is now dead based on statistics. My last example is the NFL and the kind of the change of kickoff rules even within the last year and a half. We are now so the NFL changed from kickoff starting at the 25 if it was a touchback to now 35 which doesn’t seem like a big difference. That’s a huge difference. Huge difference. And you’ve seen uh fourth down attempts increase like double over the last couple of years. And I I think teams are starting to realize that just how dramatic the difference is between uh seven points and three. I understand it’s technically six for a touchdown because you have to get the extra point. But just just think about like, oh, this makes sense because I’m going to get 50% more of the points and if I’m in the red zone or within the 30 and if I have less than if I have a fourth and third or less, you have a like statistics will tell us that you have a better than 50% chance of converting that. So, if I have a better than 50% chance of converting that and those points are are 50% more, like why would you not go for that almost every single time unless you’re playing an unbelievable defense? Um, and so that’s what you’re seeing with these fourth downs, like over doubling. It’s just like, oh yeah, I’m I have a better than 50% chance. I have two attempts basically in order to get what I would have gotten if I just kicked a couple field goals. And so it’s the game is changing, the statistics are changing, people are getting more aggressive in the NFL. Um, and it’s also changing the way plays are called at the end of the half because or at the end of the game because it’s just that much easier to score a field goal. Let’s say the game’s tied with 2 minutes left. Um, you’re going to hold off for that ball as much as you can. Um because if you’re going to start at 35, you only need like 20 25 yards in order to kick a field goal to tie the game. And it’s just it’s much easier to do. I mean, you could do that with 30 seconds and no timeouts. Uh I even saw something crazy with the Patriots and the Bucks the other week. Uh the who was it? The Patriots had the ball with like a minute left in the first half and Vrabel liter Tampa Bay had no timeouts. Varel literally the head coach of the Patriots decided to swallow a play like he basically almost took a kneel. Uh Drake May just kind of dipped around and just took a knee uh just to milk the clock so the Bucks could not get the ball back. they sacrificed an entire down just to say like oh because if the Bucks get this ball back they’re gonna probably score three and this whole field goal thing was pointless. So like we’re either going to score a field goal with 1 second left or we’re going to score a touchdown but we’re not going to give you the ball back. And so it’s really changed uh the strategy of the NFL. And all of that goes to say do you really think golf is not change is not going to change is not changing right now? like it absolutely is like statistics are changing sports. It’s going to change golf. It kind of already is. It’s starting to u I think the biggest example is off the tea. Like you just have to hit it very far and very straight. You’re seeing guys that have had long careers be like, I’m just not going to play anymore because I do not hit it 320 yards on a frozen rope. Um, you know, think of guys that are like almost doing soft retirements right now, like Kevin Kisner or I I could name a bunch of guys that were like the 270, 280 carry guys are like, I cannot compete anymore on these golf courses when, you know, I’m giving up a shot, shot and a half every single round to someone that’s going to hit it 330 and hits it relatively straight. And so, golf is starting to change. But I think really when it comes to like bogey avoidance and understanding the math of golf, there’s a whole whole another level that’s that’s going to happen that’s going to be like a NBA style of change in golf and the way that people approach and think about the game. And so that’s what I’m teaching. Uh, you could put in perspective like there are guys that still play golf like they’re taking the fadeaway mid-range twos and I’m trying to teach three balls and layups and score inefficiently. Like that is exactly what I’m trying to do golf. Like how are you going to score optimally um in attacking a golf course? And so that’s obviously why I believe in this because I believe in math. I the math checks out and I know I can help people play better golf. So, we’re going to learn uh throughout this podcast a lot about math of golf and how to take that with you. Um whether it’s practice, whether it’s obviously in tournaments, like duh, we want to use that in events. Um but also have different guests on to talk about this, talk about other stuff, understanding, hey, what are the challenges of college? What how should you be prepared? How should you talk to golf coaches? How should you reach out? Um, so definitely a lot of knowledge throughout my past, different people that I know, and uh, yeah, we’re just going to start to to learn a lot more about math and golf and uh, have some fun on the way. So, I think that’s it for episode one. We’ll get it within 30 minutes. That’s not a bad not bad timing. Um, yeah, since I’m just starting out, obviously, please like, subscribe, do all that cool stuff to support episode one and episodes in the future. So, I appreciate it, guys. Signing off. Till next time.
