PGA Tour Stats Review: Tournament of Champions

Happy New Year! Welcome to the 2016 portion of the 2015-16 PGA Tour season and the Tournament of Champions. This is going to be a crazy year in the world of golf (I'll have an upcoming post on this ... check back for more), but that doesn't change the simple fact that you need to make the best picks possible each week for your team to have the highest chance of success.

That brings us to the first stats column of the calendar year, where big greens dominate the Tournament of Champions.

The Field

A HUGE story here, whether you pick your fantasy team from a stats perspective or just by names is that this field is completely and utterly stacked; the best this event has had since Tiger and Phil played it consistently in the late 1990s and early 2000s. Jordan Spieth, Jason Day, Rickie Fowler, Dustin Johnson, Zach Johnson, Bubba Watson, Jimmy Walker and Brooks Koepka headline, with potent threats like Emiliano Grillo, Justin Thomas, Graeme McDowell and Brandt Snedeker looming, among others. There are three notable players not in this winner's only event: Rory McIlroy (he starts his season in the Middle East), Jim Furyk who has a wrist injury and Justin Rose, who chose not to play as he did not think he would be properly prepared.

So if you thought you had a strategy for picking this week's winner ... think again.

Three-Putt Avoidance

Ahh yes, the enormous, insanely hard to get a handle on greens of the Planation Course at Kapalua in Maui are a big story this week. Last year's winner, Patrick Reed, was 16th in strokes gained-putting (he was first in strokes gained-tee to green) but was fifth in putts per GIR. Avoiding three putts will be crucial. Here's the best from the 2014-2015 in three putt-avoidance that are in the field this week:

Kevin Kisner - He 3-putted (or worse) 1.67 percent of the time last season
Zach Johnson - 1.98 percent
Dustin Johnson -- 2.08 percent
Patrick Reed -- 2.17 percent
Jason Day -- 2.39 percent

With it being a month since the last event many of these players participated in (the Hero World Challenge) and even longer for some, it's tough to make a "pick" or a recommendation like we will do in subsequent weeks. But a couple things we'll point out. First, Kisner won the final event of 2015, the RSM Classic, so he has that momentum -- however much of it is left -- to work with.

Zach Johnson announced Monday he is moving to clubs made by Parsons Xtreme Golf -- that's the company of GoDaddy.com founder Bob Parsons. This is their first foray into professional golf and a huge move for Johnson, so that's something to watch as the weeks go on. He won this event in 2014, so he's got that mojo to work off of.

This is Day's first start since the Tour Championship as he took the fall schedule off for the birth of his daughter. Day has year-ago mojo himself as he shot a final-round 62 to miss out on the Reed-Jimmy Walker playoff by one shot.

Proximity to the Hole

And what's the other way to combat huge greens? Hit it close. Here are those standings for the 2014-15 PGA Tour season:

Russell Knox -- 31 feet, 6 inches
Jordan Spieth -- 33-8
Alex Cejka -- 33-10
Danny Lee -- 33-10
James Hahn -- 34-3

Knox is the most recent winner on this list as he won the World Golf Championships-HSBC Champions event last fall.

In sports we talk so much about conversion rates -- 3rd and 4th down conversions in football, free throws in basketball, etc. In golf, you have to turn those strong approach shots into made putts. So what did Spieth do last season with that 33-8 proximity to the hole mark? He was second in putting from 15-20 feet, first from 20-25 feet and 19th from 25 and more. (By the way, the knock on him being a poor short putter isn't just broadcast blather; he was 114th in putting from 4-8 feet last season.)

That's a good converter.