Nine Birdies, No Three-Putts and a Week Where the Putter Told the Story
Compiled by Multiple-Award-Winning PGA Professional Brendon R. Elliott, PrimePutt’s Director of Instruction and Lead Writer
There are weeks in professional golf where the driver gets the headlines. There are weeks where ball-striking separates the field. Then there are weeks like this one, when the scoreboard can only really be understood by looking at what happened on and around the greens.
At the John Deere Classic, Chris Gotterup started the final round five shots back and walked off TPC Deere Run with a one-shot victory after a bogey-free 62. That kind of Sunday charge usually requires everything to line up, but it especially requires the putter to stay out of the way once momentum starts building. Nine birdies do not happen by accident, and they certainly do not happen when a player gets impatient with speed, start line or routine.
At the U.S. Senior Open, Pádraig Harrington gave us the other version of great putting. His week at Scioto Country Club was not a birdie race in the same way the John Deere became. It was a senior major on a demanding setup, and Harrington won by doing something every golfer understands, even if very few can pull it off under pressure: he avoided the big mistake with the putter.
No three-putts for the week is not flashy in the way a walk-off bomb or a back-nine birdie run might be, but in major championship golf, it is often the difference between chasing and controlling. Harrington also ranked first in putting for the championship, and when a player of his experience says the putter carried him, there is a lesson in there for every golfer.
That is why this week’s “Pressure Putts” is really about two different putting lessons. Gotterup showed what happens when the putter becomes a scoring weapon. Harrington showed what happens when the putter becomes a stabilizer. Both matter, and both translate beautifully to the everyday golfer.
Gotterup’s Sunday Was a Reminder That Birdie Runs Start With Trust
When a player shoots 62 on Sunday to win by one, the natural reaction is to think of it as a heater. That is fair, because nine birdies in a final round is exactly that. But from a putting perspective, the more interesting part is what happens mentally once the round starts turning.
A player chasing from five back has a choice. He can force the issue, aim at flags he should not, rush through reads or start thinking every 12-footer has to go in. Or he can keep stacking good decisions and let the putter turn opportunities into pressure on everyone else.
Gotterup’s final round had the look of a player who stayed inside the round. He did not need the leaders to fall apart. He needed to keep putting clean rolls on committed lines and let birdies change the shape of the leaderboard. That is the part recreational golfers should notice. A hot putting round is rarely built by trying harder. It is usually built by making the same routine feel repeatable, even as the round starts to mean more.
For everyday players, the lesson is not to chase a 62. The lesson is to recognize when you have a chance to build momentum and then keep your putting process simple enough to survive the excitement.
Harrington’s No-Three-Putt Week Was Major Championship Putting
Harrington’s win at the U.S. Senior Open was different. He was not simply trying to out-birdie everyone on a resort-style setup. He was trying to handle Scioto, handle Stewart Cink, handle a national championship and handle the kind of Sunday where par has real value.
That is where no-three-putt golf becomes such a powerful theme.
Most golfers think of putting success only in terms of makes. Did I make the 15-footer? Did I convert the birdie chance? Did I pour in the slider on the last hole? But tournament golf, especially major championship golf, often rewards the player who eliminates the avoidable mistake.
Harrington did plenty of good things, including 19 birdies for the week, but going an entire U.S. Senior Open without a three-putt is the kind of performance that quietly builds a trophy. It happens because the first putt finishes in the right neighborhood. It happens because speed control is sharp from distance. It happens because the player does not lose patience when a green is firm, quick, sloping or simply hard to read.
Everyday golfers can learn a lot from that. You may not have Harrington’s touch, but you can absolutely change the way you measure putting. A 30-footer that finishes two feet from the hole is a good putt. A downhill lag that leaves an uphill tap-in is a good putt. A par save from six feet after a nervous first putt is a good putt.
The best putting weeks are not always the weeks where everything falls. Sometimes they are the weeks where nothing gets away from you.
The Difference Between Scoring Putting and Survival Putting
Gotterup and Harrington gave us two sides of the same coin.
At the John Deere, Gotterup needed scoring putting. He needed to turn chances into birdies, keep the round moving forward and make the players ahead of him feel his presence. That type of putting is about confidence, pace and commitment. The stroke has to be free enough to make putts, not just avoid mistakes.
At the U.S. Senior Open, Harrington needed survival putting, though that phrase does not mean defensive putting. It means he had to control the ball, respect the course and avoid handing strokes back to the field. That type of putting is about discipline, lag control and the emotional maturity to accept two-putt pars when the situation calls for them.
Most amateurs need both. On some days, you are playing a course where you can be aggressive and chase birdies. On other days, the greens are fast, bumpy, unfamiliar or simply more severe than what you usually see. The mistake is using the same mindset for every round.
A good putter knows when to hunt and when to protect.
The PrimePutt Practice Plan: Build Both Types of Pressure Putting
Here are three ways to turn this week’s lessons into better putting in your own game.
1. The Gotterup Birdie-Run Drill
Find a putt between six and 12 feet. Hit 10 putts, but do not just rake them over and fire. Go through your full routine every time.
The goal is to make as many as possible while keeping the same pace, same read process and same reaction. If you miss, do not speed up. Reset. The purpose is to train yourself to stay committed when you feel like a putt matters.
2. The Harrington No-Three-Putt Ladder
Place balls at 20, 30, 40 and 50 feet. Your job is simple: get every first putt inside a three-foot circle. If you leave one outside that circle, start over.
This is not glamorous practice, but it is championship practice. Most golfers would lower scores faster by improving lag putting than by chasing perfect mechanics from eight feet.
3. The Pressure Par-Save Circle
Pick a hole and place five balls around it from four to six feet. Use different angles, especially one left-to-right putt, one right-to-left putt and one straight putt.
You must make four out of five to pass. If you make only three, repeat the station. This gives you a small taste of the kind of putting Harrington leaned on at Scioto and the kind of cleanup work that keeps a hot round alive like Gotterup’s at TPC Deere Run.
YTD Putting Watch
The weekly leaderboard tells one story, but the year-to-date putting stats help us keep track of who is building a season with the flatstick. That matters for PrimePutt because putting form is not always loud. Sometimes it shows up in a trophy, like Harrington’s week at Scioto. Sometimes it shows up in who keeps appearing near the top of the season-long numbers.
PGA Tour: Strokes Gained, Putting Leaders
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Vince Whaley: +0.825
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Jake Knapp: +0.698
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Akshay Bhatia: +0.681
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Jacob Bridgeman: +0.673
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Sam Burns: +0.662
Whaley continues to set the pace in SG: Putting, which is the best public PGA Tour measure for how many strokes a player gains on the field with the putter. Knapp, Bhatia, Bridgeman and Burns give the list a good mix of young firepower and proven Tour scoring ability. For amateurs, the reminder is simple: putting has value beyond highlight makes. Over time, the best putters are gaining small fractions of shots every round, and those fractions become real separation over a season.
LPGA Tour: Putts Per Round Leaders
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Hyo Joo Kim: 28.06
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Mi Hyang Lee: 28.13
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Danielle Kang: 28.33
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Minami Katsu: 28.39
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Alexa Pano: 28.49
On the LPGA Tour, the public putting leaderboard is built around average putts per round, and Hyo Joo Kim currently sits at the top. That stat is not the same as strokes gained, because it can be affected by greens hit, proximity and scrambling patterns, but it still gives us a useful weekly snapshot of who is consistently getting the ball in the hole.
The bigger PrimePutt takeaway is that great putting is not one thing. Some players gain strokes by making more mid-range putts. Some avoid three-putts. Some clean up everything inside five feet. Some turn average ball-striking days into strong scoring days because the putter never lets the round get away.
That is exactly why this week’s Gotterup-Harrington contrast works so well. One player used the putter to chase down a PGA Tour title. The other used it to control a senior major. Both are winning formulas.
Final Roll
The John Deere Classic and U.S. Senior Open were very different tournaments, but they landed on the same putting truth. Winning golf is not only about hitting great shots. It is about what the putter does with the shots you create.
Gotterup’s 62 was a scoring masterpiece because he turned opportunity into birdies. Harrington’s U.S. Senior Open win was a major championship putting clinic because he controlled speed, avoided three-putts and let patience become a weapon.
For the rest of us, that is the takeaway. Some days, putting is about making the round explode. Other days, it is about refusing to let the round leak away.
The best putters are ready for both.
Pressure Putts drops every Monday with the week’s best putting stories, stats and drills from the PGA Tour, LPGA Tour and DP World Tour. Got a putting question or drill request? Drop us a line.
