The 2014 golf season had its share of memorable moments, many of them being chronicled by Golf Channel as we count down the year’s top newsmakers. But crunching the numbers for this season revealed many interesting tidbits worth sharing. From Rory McIlroy to Bernhard Langer to Tiger Woods – yes, Tiger Woods - here is a look at the Stat Attack’s top statistical nuggets for 2014.
Putting for dough
Rory McIlroy’s getting most of the year-end honors for 2014 and the accolades are well deserved. He laid the groundwork for his historic season on the greens. Although he was only 41st in strokes gained/putting, McIlroy led the PGA Tour in putting average, birdie or better conversion percentage and birdies per round. His 2013-14 ranking in all three of those stats is among the five best single-season marks in Tour history.
Of course, PGA Tour history is quite modern. The Tour’s Stat Database monitors birdie conversion percentage since 1980, putting average since 1986 and birdies per round since 1996.
PGA Tour single-season leaders in birdie or better percentage
| Player | Birdie Pct. | Year |
| Bob Heintz | 36.98% | 2002 |
| Rory McIlroy | 36.84 | 2014 |
| Tiger Woods | 36.56 | 2005 |
| Phil Mickelson | 36.42 | 2001 |
| Tiger Woods | 36.14 | 2000 |
PGA Tour single-season leaders in birdies per round
| Player | Birdies per round | Year |
| Tiger Woods | 4.92 | 2000 |
| Tiger Woods | 4.65 | 2006 |
| Rory McIlroy | 4.58 | 2014 |
| Tiger Woods | 4.57 | 2005 |
| Phil Mickelson | 4.54 | 2001 |
PGA Tour single-season leaders in putts per GIR
| Player | Putts per GIR | Year |
| Bob Heintz | 1.682 | 2002 |
| Luke Donald | 1.700 | 2011 |
| David Toms | 1.704 | 2002 |
| Brad Faxon | 1.704 | 2000 |
| Rory McIlroy | 1.707500 | 2014 |
| Jim Furyk | 1.707506 | 1995 |
| David Frost | 1.708 | 2001 |
Tiger is No. 1
Strange as it might sound, Tiger Woods led the PGA Tour in something positive in 2013-14. He made the PGA Tour’s longest putt last season at 91 feet, seven inches, on the fourth hole in the second round of the WGC-Cadillac Invitational. At the time, he was so much more concerned with his back, which caused him to withdraw from the Honda Classic one week earlier, that the putt was barely mentioned in his post-round press conference.
Longest putts on the PGA Tour in 2013-14
| Player | Putt length | Tournament (hole, round) |
| Tiger Woods | 91 ft., 7 in. | WGC-Cadillac (fourth hole, second round) |
| Jeff Overton | 76 ft., 10 in. | Deutsche Bank (ninth hole, first round) |
| Ryan Palmer | 76 ft. 6 in. | HP Byron Nelson (fourth hole, first round) |
| Michael Thompson | 76 ft. 1 in. | Wells Fargo (17th hole, fourth round) |
| Jonathan Byrd | 75 ft. 10 in. | Wells Fargo (18 hole, first round) |
Getting better all the time
Jimmy Walker’s outstanding 2013-14, in which he won three times and was fourth on the PGA Tour in earnings, is the highlight of a career that has seen him improve his rank on the money list for seven straight years.
Jimmy Walker money rank since 2008
| Year | Money rank | Earnings |
| 2014 | 4 | $5,787,016 |
| 2013 | 30 | 2,117,570 |
| 2012 | 48 | 1,638,419 |
| 2011 | 67 | 1,336,556 |
| 2010 | 103 | 937,987 |
| 2009 | 125 | 662,683 |
| 2008 | 185 | 282,249 |
Bunting to victory
Tim Clark, winner of the Bell Canadian Open, finished the 2013-14 season with a driving distance of 272.2 yards, 174th of 177 players who qualified for a ranking. Clark was the shortest hitter among PGA Tour winners, and was one of just seven players outside the top 100 in distance to win last season.
PGA Tour winners in 2013-14 who ranked outside the top 100 in driving distance
| Player | Driving distance | Rank | 2014 victory |
| Tim Clark | 272.2 | 174 | Bell Canadian Open |
| Ben Crane | 279.0 | 157 | FedEx St. Jude Classic |
| Brendon Todd | 280.3 | T-148 | HP Byron Nelson Champ. |
| Zach Johnson | 282.2 | T-141 | Hyundai T of C |
| Matt Kuchar | 283.8 | 136 | RBC Heritage |
| Ryan Moore | 284.7 | 129 | CIMB Classic |
| Matt Every | 286.3 | 116 | Arnold Palmer Inv. |
Lefty’s lament
Phil Mickelson had arguably his worst season since joining the PGA Tour midway through 1992. The 2013-14 campaign was his first without a victory since 2003, and he failed to qualify for the Tour Championship for the first time in the FedEx Cup era. Although Mickelson finished 35th in scoring average at 70.278, it was his highest mark since 1998 and his worst rank since 1995. It is a testament to the greatness of Mickelson’s career that this was only the third time he was outside the Tour’s top 30 in scoring.
Phil Mickelson’s highest single-season scoring average
| Year | Scoring average | Rank |
| 1993 | 71.205 | T-90 |
| 1995 | 70.592 | 44 |
| 1998 | 70.280 | 27 |
| 2014 | 70.278 | 35 |
| 2003 | 70.249 | 26 |
| 1996 | 70.228 | 16 |
| 2009 | 70.218 | 28 |
Working on the weekend
When Paula Creamer missed the cut at the LPGA’s Kingsmill event in May, it ended her streak of consecutive cuts made at 74. The longest cuts-made streak on Tour now belongs to Lydia Ko, who played on the weekend in all 26 of her starts in 2014 and hasn’t missed a cut in 42 LPGA appearances as a professional or an amateur. (Adam Scott is the current PGA Tour leader in consecutive cuts made with 44.)
Longest current streak of consecutive cuts made on the LPGA Tour
| Player | Consecutive cuts | 2014 total |
| Lydia Ko | 42 | 26 |
| Stacy Lewis | 35 | 28 |
| Shanshan Feng | 31 | 24 |
The LPGA’s green machines
Suzann Pettersen and Anna Nordqvist led the LPGA in greens in regulation in 2014 at 77.1 percent. Unlike the PGA Tour, the LPGA’s website does not give a breakdown of how many greens were hit and how many attempts were taken, so we cannot break the tie. We can say, however, that the two players hit more greens in one year than any player since Annika Sorenstam.
Lowest single-season GIR on the LPGA since 2000
| Player | GIR percentage | Year |
| Annika Sorenstam | 79.7 | 2001 |
| Annika Sorenstam | 79.7 | 2002 |
| Annika Sorenstam | 78.8 | 2004 |
| Annika Sorenstam | 77.2 | 2005 |
| Suzann Pettersen | 77.1 | 2014 |
| Anna Nordqvist | 77.1 | 2014 |
The cash man
Bernhard Langer was the second player in Champions Tour history to surpass $3 million in earnings, with his $3,074,189 breaking the old single-season record set by Hale Irwin in 2002. Langer also had highest percentage of potential money won – the quotient of his total earnings and what his earnings would have been had he won every event he played – of any Champions player this century. Langer cashed 46.13 percent of his potential earnings. Don January, the Tour’s all-time leader, won 67.06 percent of his potential earnings in 1983.
Single-season Champions Tour earnings
| Player | Earnings | Year |
| Bernhard Langer | $3,074,189 | 2014 |
| Hale Irwin | 3,028,304 | 2002 |
| Hale Irwin | 2,861,945 | 1998 |
| Larry Nelson | 2,708,005 | 2000 |
| Bernhard Langer | 2,648,939 | 2010 |
Highest percentage of potential money won on the Champions Tour: 2000-2014
| Player | Pct. money won | Year |
| Bernhard Langer | 46.13% | 2014 |
| Fred Couples | 45.74 | 2010 |
| Tom Watson | 45.03 | 2003 |
| Hale Irwin | 42.24 | 2002 |
| Larry Nelson | 40.67 | 2000 |
The Mechanic keeps motoring
The oldest champion in European Tour history is Miguel Angel Jimenez, who was 50 years and 133 days old when he won the 2014 Spanish Open in May. He broke the record he set at the Hong Kong Open in December 2013, when he was one month shy of his 50th birthday. The previous record holder was, you guessed it, Jimenez, when he won the 2012 Hong Kong Open. Jimenez didn’t quite reach his goal of making the European Tour Ryder Cup team at age 50, but he did finish fourth at the Masters and 21st in the Race to Dubai standings, his 12th straight year in the top 30 on the money list. If he ever decides to take on Bernhard Langer, the Champions Tour might have its next $3 million man.
The oldest tournament winners in European Tour history
| Player | Age | Tournament |
| Miguel Angel Jimenez | 50 years, 133 days | 2014 Spanish Open |
| Miguel Angel Jimenez | 49 years, 337 days | 2013 Hong Kong Open |
| Miguel Angel Jimenez | 48 years, 318 days | 2012 Hong Kong Open |
| Des Smyth | 48 years, 34 days | 2001 Madeira Island Open |
| Neil Coles | 48 years, 14 days | 1991 Sanyo Open |
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