How to Hit the Flop Shot
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Near the green but have very little green to work with? No problem. In this video, I'll show you how to hit a flop shot like Phil Mickelson, Tiger Woods, and all the pros.
- Set the ball forward in your stance to shallow out the swing arc
- Open the club face by turning it in your hands and not turning the body
- Keep your weight left the entire time
- Be aggressive
The flop shot is one of those shots that you only want to pull out as an absolute last measure.
Because it's the lowest percentage shot that you could possibly play when you're that close to the green.
You're hitting the ball high up in the air with a really open club face, with typically a pretty big swing.
It's not setting you up for accuracy, but sometimes it's the only shot you got and you have to play it.
So how do you play this shot and give yourself the best chance of success?
What's exactly what I'm going to show you today in this video, how to hit a flop shot.
And I'm going to show you from the hardest lie possible.
This is a bare dirt muddy lie.
We just had hurricane Irma blow through here in Florida.
So I'm looking at moldy dirt, hardly any grass at all.
It's a miserable lie.
This is a terrifying shot for most people.
I'm going to show you how to be able to play it every time.
So what do we need to do to hit this shot?
Well, first off, hopefully you're never faced with this shot and thinking, Oh, the flop shot's a great idea here because it's not, this is only again, because I've got no other options.
So if you're in grass, it's got a little more, uh, you know, a little more grass to it, or you're out of the rough, this shot's a thousand times easier, but why not start with the hardest one first, right?
So what are the key ingredients to hitting a successful flop shot?
The first one is loft.
Nothing is more important to a flop shot than having as much loft on the club as you need, or you can get.
And a lot of that has to do with the bounce on the wedge.
Now, in my case, my wedges are ground down off the heel and taking a lot of the bounce off.
So when it sits down, I have maybe two degrees of bounce, three degrees of bounce.
Now, the downside of this is when I get into soft stuff, soft ground, a soft, you know, muddy turf or in the sand, I have to be really careful to keep that club from digging.
I just have to release it a little bit differently.
But on shots like this, it works out perfect because it allows me to lay the face open as much as humanly possible.
So you'll notice I'm going to set up as if I'm going to hit this shot perpendicular to you.
So 90 degrees to the camera angle.
And I want you to see how I'm going to set up for this from your perspective, as if you were standing directly in front of me.
So from your perspective, it looks like the shaft is leaning way away from you, way away from the target.
But the reality is, I'm just setting up open and letting the face rotate so that the face is rotating toward the target.
Or maybe just a little bit right of it.
But it's not going to be squared up and pointing at the target.
It's going to be open.
And to do that, I have to set up more open or rotate myself around this way.
And that's what allows the clubface angle to be pointing more toward the target.
This shot's very difficult if you're pointing one way and the clubface is pointing way off the other way.
So we want to get relatively close to the target line.
Now, as I do that, the second thing I'm going to do, and if you've seen the bunker series, the bunker shot video, it's going to be the exact same thing.
I'm going to squat down to lower the handle of the club.
Now, as I do this, look what happens to the loft on the face.
I'm adding loft.
Now, this is also going to put the club back more on the trailing edge of the flange.
So if you, again, if you have a lot of balance on your wedge, like a lot of people do, this is going to put the leading edge up in the air.
And now this starts looking really scary because I've got a quarter inch between the ground and my leading edge of the clubface.
So that's going to be pretty tough to do off a tight lie.
So there has to be a balance here.
You might not be able to get the clubface super open or as lean back and down as you want because the leading, because of the balance is not going to allow you to do that, but find the balance where the club, the leading edge is close to the ground.
It may be off a little bit, but that's okay because as you come through, you're going to tend to de-loft the clubface a little bit anyway.
So that's normal.
Squatting down, handle down, face open.
Now, The last little trick that I'm going to give you is a grip trick, and that is to take your grip and weaken it.
Now, this is something where I want you to experiment with because there's, This is where you can start having a lot of fun with these shots and getting really goofy and hitting some, really, really crazy, super short shots with a big swing.
It's a fun trick shot, but sometimes you need to do that because you've got to get through really thick grass, but you don't want the ball to go very far.
So to do that, as you weaken your left hand and right hand grip, and as you come through to release the club, it's actually not going to de-loft the club as you come through.
Whereas if you have a strong grip and release it, it's going to turn the toe in and that's going to take loft off, which is the last thing we want to do.
Remember, the most important thing is having enough loft to get the ball up in the air, but allow us to swing with some speed.
So once we put these things together, the rest of it's pretty simple.
We make a normal swing relatively.
Now, to be honest with you, I try to swing a little bit more around when I hit this shot.
I let the club work around a little bit more because I'm wanting the club to come through really shallow.
I don't want to pick my club up and come down really steep.
Not only is that going to de-loft the club, but it's going to make my angle of attack really severe.
And if I don't, if I miss it just a little bit, I'm going to lay the sod over this thing or hit it in the teeth and that's scary.
So I will allow the club to work around my body a little bit more, to allow the club to come through.
Really nice and shallow.
So put all those things together.
You've got a wide open face, an open stance, squatting down a little bit, swing a little bit more around with a weaker grip, and you better pull this flop shot off no problem.
So let's put them all together here.
Little baby flop shot, didn't go very far, and that will get you out of trouble more times than not.
Because it's the lowest percentage shot that you could possibly play when you're that close to the green.
You're hitting the ball high up in the air with a really open club face, with typically a pretty big swing.
It's not setting you up for accuracy, but sometimes it's the only shot you got and you have to play it.
So how do you play this shot and give yourself the best chance of success?
What's exactly what I'm going to show you today in this video, how to hit a flop shot.
And I'm going to show you from the hardest lie possible.
This is a bare dirt muddy lie.
We just had hurricane Irma blow through here in Florida.
So I'm looking at moldy dirt, hardly any grass at all.
It's a miserable lie.
This is a terrifying shot for most people.
I'm going to show you how to be able to play it every time.
So what do we need to do to hit this shot?
Well, first off, hopefully you're never faced with this shot and thinking, Oh, the flop shot's a great idea here because it's not, this is only again, because I've got no other options.
So if you're in grass, it's got a little more, uh, you know, a little more grass to it, or you're out of the rough, this shot's a thousand times easier, but why not start with the hardest one first, right?
So what are the key ingredients to hitting a successful flop shot?
The first one is loft.
Nothing is more important to a flop shot than having as much loft on the club as you need, or you can get.
And a lot of that has to do with the bounce on the wedge.
Now, in my case, my wedges are ground down off the heel and taking a lot of the bounce off.
So when it sits down, I have maybe two degrees of bounce, three degrees of bounce.
Now, the downside of this is when I get into soft stuff, soft ground, a soft, you know, muddy turf or in the sand, I have to be really careful to keep that club from digging.
I just have to release it a little bit differently.
But on shots like this, it works out perfect because it allows me to lay the face open as much as humanly possible.
So you'll notice I'm going to set up as if I'm going to hit this shot perpendicular to you.
So 90 degrees to the camera angle.
And I want you to see how I'm going to set up for this from your perspective, as if you were standing directly in front of me.
So from your perspective, it looks like the shaft is leaning way away from you, way away from the target.
But the reality is, I'm just setting up open and letting the face rotate so that the face is rotating toward the target.
Or maybe just a little bit right of it.
But it's not going to be squared up and pointing at the target.
It's going to be open.
And to do that, I have to set up more open or rotate myself around this way.
And that's what allows the clubface angle to be pointing more toward the target.
This shot's very difficult if you're pointing one way and the clubface is pointing way off the other way.
So we want to get relatively close to the target line.
Now, as I do that, the second thing I'm going to do, and if you've seen the bunker series, the bunker shot video, it's going to be the exact same thing.
I'm going to squat down to lower the handle of the club.
Now, as I do this, look what happens to the loft on the face.
I'm adding loft.
Now, this is also going to put the club back more on the trailing edge of the flange.
So if you, again, if you have a lot of balance on your wedge, like a lot of people do, this is going to put the leading edge up in the air.
And now this starts looking really scary because I've got a quarter inch between the ground and my leading edge of the clubface.
So that's going to be pretty tough to do off a tight lie.
So there has to be a balance here.
You might not be able to get the clubface super open or as lean back and down as you want because the leading, because of the balance is not going to allow you to do that, but find the balance where the club, the leading edge is close to the ground.
It may be off a little bit, but that's okay because as you come through, you're going to tend to de-loft the clubface a little bit anyway.
So that's normal.
Squatting down, handle down, face open.
Now, The last little trick that I'm going to give you is a grip trick, and that is to take your grip and weaken it.
Now, this is something where I want you to experiment with because there's, This is where you can start having a lot of fun with these shots and getting really goofy and hitting some, really, really crazy, super short shots with a big swing.
It's a fun trick shot, but sometimes you need to do that because you've got to get through really thick grass, but you don't want the ball to go very far.
So to do that, as you weaken your left hand and right hand grip, and as you come through to release the club, it's actually not going to de-loft the club as you come through.
Whereas if you have a strong grip and release it, it's going to turn the toe in and that's going to take loft off, which is the last thing we want to do.
Remember, the most important thing is having enough loft to get the ball up in the air, but allow us to swing with some speed.
So once we put these things together, the rest of it's pretty simple.
We make a normal swing relatively.
Now, to be honest with you, I try to swing a little bit more around when I hit this shot.
I let the club work around a little bit more because I'm wanting the club to come through really shallow.
I don't want to pick my club up and come down really steep.
Not only is that going to de-loft the club, but it's going to make my angle of attack really severe.
And if I don't, if I miss it just a little bit, I'm going to lay the sod over this thing or hit it in the teeth and that's scary.
So I will allow the club to work around my body a little bit more, to allow the club to come through.
Really nice and shallow.
So put all those things together.
You've got a wide open face, an open stance, squatting down a little bit, swing a little bit more around with a weaker grip, and you better pull this flop shot off no problem.
So let's put them all together here.
Little baby flop shot, didn't go very far, and that will get you out of trouble more times than not.
Matthew
Craig (Certified RST Instructor)
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