Solid contact with the wedges is essential if you want to climb and descend more frequently.
Getty Images
A structured, short game may not be the “sexiest” trait in a golfer, but it’s certainly useful. When you can climb up and down from anywhere, you’ll never really get out of the hole.
Professionals are the perfect embodiment of this. Because they are good at it All on the golf course, sometimes short sections of them can be missed. However, their contact with the greens is a key ingredient to their success.
To take Xander Schauffele, For example. During his breakout 2024 campaign, he led the PGA Tour in scrambling, saving more than 70 percent of the time. Do you think it’s a coincidence that he won two majors in such a short game?
The average Joe can’t expect to be as up and down in one clip as Schauffele was, but even saving pars once or twice more per round will do wonders on the scorecard. And the first step to ups and downs is creation constant contact with the wedges.
For more information on this topic, please contact us Phil Mickelson.
Lefty’s secret to solid contact
In the modern era of golf, no one wields the wedge as well as Mickelson. But while Lefty has made plenty of noteworthy saves throughout his career, it’s the little things he does well that make the biggest impression.
One of the most important “little things” in the short game is establishing solid contact. When you regularly create solid contact, it helps control distance AND generates spinning. However, to make such a connection, you need to forget about the golf myth that you may have heard before.
“I see a lot of instructors teaching a clock-like method where you want to go back and cover the same distance,” Mickelson says in the video above. “It’s crazy.”
When you move back and cover the same distance, it can promote deceleration during the downswing. But if you want to make solid contact, you want to make an aggressive, accelerating swing through impact.
“We want to go faster and accelerate to the finish line,” Mickelson says. “It gives me an aggressive touch.”
This aggressive contact will help you create more spin and make you a more consistent wedge player. Try it and you will surely climb and fall more often.
