After Rickie Fowler’s opening round at the Rocket Mortgage Classic — a sparkling six-under 66 — he spoke with Golf Channel’s Todd Lewis and admitted something interesting: he’s been battling the putting yips.
Lewis complimented Fowler on his putting Thursday, and for good reason: he gained nearly three strokes on the greens, ranking seventh in the field. He stayed bogey-free and finished with a flurry, making birdie on four of his last five holes to book a spot inside the top 10 at Detroit Country Club.
The strong putting performance came a week after Fowler putted well at the Travelers in a T20 finish, his second-best result of the season. What had he done, Lewis wondered, to turn his putting around?
“I was trying going back to conventional and regular length for a little, then cross-handed the last three weeks or so,” Fowler said. That’s nothing out of the ordinary, he clarified; he used to switch back and forth with some regularity and his first win on Tour came putting cross-handed (otherwise known as left-hand low).
“But it just seems to have helped a little bit with feel and touch, and that’s a big thing,” he added. Obviously starting the ball on line but controlling speed is another variable when it comes to putting, so I feel like I’ve done a good job the last couple weeks of not only hitting my lines but hitting it with the proper speed.”
Lewis, to his credit, went digging for specifics in his follow-up question. What does cross-handed putting do for him compared to conventional?
“I would say over the last few years I’ve dealt with a little bit of my right hand having a little bit of twitch at times, which you could call it some sort of a ‘yip’, or there’s all kind of names for it,” said Fowler. Lewis visibly reacted to the word “yip,” which is rarely uttered voluntarily by a player, but Fowler put him at ease.
“I’m fine saying it,” he continued. “When people have dealt with that, it makes it tough to trust hitting good putts. I was hitting a lot of putts that would start on line but it was more of a speed thing. Going back to cross-handed felt like it locks my right hand and wrist a little bit more to where I was able to use that as the driver purely for the touch and feel.”
Putting was clearly a point of emphasis for Fowler even before Thursday’s round. In Wednesday’s pre-tournament press conference he was asked about his recent ball-striking struggles and — counterintuitively — pointed to his putting.
“I think a big part of freeing myself up and allowing myself to play better golf starts on the greens and it helps when I’m making putts, which last week started to see that,” he said. “I feel like when I’m putting at least up to my standards or at least average, it kind of frees up the rest of the game. So looking forward to hopefully leaning on the putter a little bit more going forward and allowing the others to kind of fall into place and see the ball-striking stats come back up.”
His season-long numbers support that narrative and have throughout his career. So goes Fowler’s putting, so goes Fowler’s results. In 2024 he’s 131st on the PGA Tour in Strokes Gained: Putting and just No. 91 in the FedEx Cup. During last year’s resurgent season, which included a victory at this event and a berth on the U.S. Ryder Cup team, he finished 48th in putting and made it to the Tour Championship. But during the depths of his struggles in 2021 and 2022 he was 126th and 161st, respectively, and by September 2022 he’d dropped to No. 185 in the world.
It wasn’t always this way. From 2013 all the way through 2020 he gained strokes on the greens every single year, highlighted by his 2017 season, when he led the Tour in putting and finished the season at No. 7 in the world. He became known almost as much for his silky stroke as for his orange attire; it was the hallmark of his game.
To my knowledge, Thursday was the first time Fowler has publicly acknowledged fighting the yips, which are often referenced as a disease or plague and have a near-mythical presence in golf. Some players are loath to admit their struggle with the yips; others have suggested that admitting that struggle is one key to recovery. It would be interesting to hear whether Fowler’s admission is strategic or just came in a moment of honesty.
One thing is for sure: three more days like Thursday and he’ll be in the mix on Sunday with a chance to defend his Rocket Mortgage title. Last year’s win at this event was his first win anywhere since 2019; a win this year would be his first time in serious contention since that win. Good play starts with good putting. Where does the good putting start?
“I was just trying to fairways and greens, wear those out,” he said. So good putting takes the pressure off his irons. And good irons take the pressure off his putting.
Simple enough, on days like Thursday. We’ll see how many Fowler can string together.
