Tiger @ 50: The secret to Woods' clutch putting wasn't perfection, but something more important

Editor’s Note: In honor of Tiger Woods' 50th birthday on Dec. 30, 2025, Golf Digest is analyzing different parts of Woods' game and career to explain what made the 15-time major champion so great. Other parts of this series will examine Woods' fitness routine, his mental game, course strategy, golf swing, equipment, and more.

Tiger Woods does not have a perfect putting stroke. At least that was a conclusion many years ago when a report of Woods’ putting metrics was released. The data was from a series of putts that Woods hit in the mid-2000s on SAM PuttLab, one of the most accurate tools to measure putting-stroke mechanics.

According to that report, Woods aimed right of his target, opened the putterface too much in the backstroke, and closed the face a lot in the throughstroke, effectively “pulling” his putts back on line. We’ll spare any more specifics because the report only measured five putts—certainly not a large enough sample size to draw definitive conclusions about a man who has hit tens of thousands in his life.

But what was most remarkable about the report was that although Tiger seemed to have plenty of moving parts in his stroke, he repeated the same exact motion every time.

Therein lies the secret to his clutch putting.

“Can you repeat it day in and day out? Can you repeat it when everything matters? When I get too robotic, I can’t repeat that,” Woods told Golf Digest in 2019 while filming the 11-part “My Game” series, which you can watch here. While some might find that a more robotic, rigid motion creates a more repeatable stroke, for Woods, it’s the exact opposite.

That sense of freedom is something Woods said he learned from two-time Masters champion Ben Crenshaw, one of the greatest putters in the history of the game. This was Woods in 2000 on Golf Channel, recalling a lesson he got from Crenshaw at Pebble Beach in 1997:

“[Crenshaw] said, ‘I’ve always believed in letting the putterhead get behind my hands, and then from there, let the weight of the putterhead hit the golf ball.’ … My hands were too tight. I loosened up my hands, got my putterhead behind my hands, and then from there, let the weight of the putter hit the ball. I ended up shooting 63-64 on the weekend putting that way after my lesson with Ben Crenshaw.”

Woods has spoken ever since about the importance of him letting the putterhead get “behind his hands” in the backstroke and letting the weight of the putter hit the ball. This contrasts with a more mechanical stroke, where the shoulders, arms, hands and club all move together. Woods grooves this flow by hitting short putts with just his right hand.

But this free-flowing stroke doesn’t achieve much if you don’t strike the ball squarely and solidly. That’s where the genius of his simple tee drill comes in. A staple of his practice and warm-up routine, Woods places two tees on each end of his putter blade. “I have to hit the ball flush and present a square face at impact,” Woods said.

Notice how close the tees are to the putter blade. This forces Woods to make contact in the exact middle of the face, or else he will hit the tees. By pairing his right-hand only stroke with the tee drill, Woods is marrying freedom with consistency—freedom with the right hand swinging, consistency with the center-face contact.

Andrew Redington

And no one found the center of the putterface more than Tiger. Take a look at this photo of his longtime Scotty Cameron putter and notice the dime-size wear mark in the center of the face. PGA Tour putting coach Ralph Bauer says that mark explains Tiger’s success on the greens.

“What great putters do is their stroke is consistent across all types of breaks,” Bauer says. “A good way to prove that Tiger does that is that he hits the middle of the putter every time.”

Finding the center of the face on a perfectly straight putt is one thing, but Bauer says what’s less talked about it striking the ball squarely on a breaking putt, when the ball is either above or below your feet. Bauer says it’s common for players—even those with technically sound strokes—to slightly mishit and consequently pull or push breaking putts. For example, standing over the ball, a player might think he’s underread a left-to-right putt and so he pulls it slightly, missing the center of the face.

Tiger’s wear mark proves he almost never does this, and that’s what Bauer says leads to his great putting. Take a look at these two breaking putts and notice how he strikes each putt in the exact center of the face.

Sound a little too simple? Perhaps no one knows Woods’ stroke better than his longtime close friend Rob McNamara, who in the “My Game” series explained what Woods focuses on with his putting. “The key is you have to hit the ball in the same spot and launch it with the same amount of loft, and he will strike it in such a way that he’s launching it at pretty much 4 degrees of loft every single time. That’s hard to do,” McNamara said.

That Woods might not aim perfectly every time or his putterface might open and close more than most are mute points. When it comes to what really matters—making solid contact and starting the ball on line, every single time—no one is better.