After a couple of weeks in the Northeast, the PGA Tour heads to the Midwest along the banks of the Rock River near the Illinois and Iowa border for the John Deere Classic played at TPC Deere Run. Beginning in 1971 as the Quad Cities Open, the event moved to its current home, TPC Deere Run, in 2000. Other than the Covid-affected year of 2021, the event has been a consistent presence on the Tour schedule.
In what typically ends up as a putting contest that culminates in a shootout, TPC Deere Run is a course with wide fairways, receptive greens, and relatively simple putting surfaces. It is very scoreable for players who excel at managing their way strategically around the course instead of trying to overpower it. It’s no surprise then to see that winners have eclipsed the 18-under mark in each of the last 12 tournaments. Players should be ready to make birdies from their opening hole or prepare to trunk-slam their way out of Illinois by Friday evening.
The Field
The strength of the field is usually among the weakest on Tour given the event’s traditional place on the schedule the week before the Open Championship. That has been worsened even further this year after the 2022 schedule was adjusted to include the Scottish Open the week before the Open Championship as a co-sanctioned event between the PGA Tour and the DP World Tour. With most of the top players choosing to rest for a week before heading overseas, combined with the ever-growing LIV Tour’s roster, the cupboard is very empty for the John Deere Classic.
Daniel Berger stands alone as the only world top-25 player in the field. After Berger, Webb Simpson checks in at 58th, followed by Sahith Theegala at 66th and Christiaan Bezuidenhout at 75th. Those are the four players in attendance from the OWGR top-75. Past winners of this event in the field include last year’s champion, Lucas Glover, Dylan Frittelli, Ryan Moore, Zach Johnson and Steve Stricker.
Course History
When descendants of the John Deere family donated the land to serve as the annual host of the John Deere Classic, course designer D.A. Weibring was the perfect architect for building the course. As an Illinois native and three-time PGA Tour champion of the Quad Cities Open, Weibring left the natural environment undisturbed as much as possible and at the same time incorporated a great mix of challenge and playability to all 18 holes. When looking back on the course he created, Weibring remarked, “It has all the things I think you’d like to have in a golf course. There are elevation changes, great views and scenery, hardwood trees. You have the Rock River complemented with small ponds and deep ravines… and best of all, there’s no real estate.”
It wasn’t until last year’s small renovation that any changes had been made to TPC Deere Run. The course underwent a comprehensive bunker renovation and competitive enhancement project. Bunkers were completely rebuilt with new grass surrounds, drainage, liners, and sand, which also included reducing overall square footage by 30% and repositioning as needed to increase course strategy.
f684b2f3d4218ee06dad551b3bb2074b“We moved some of the bunkers into a more competitive aspect as to where we wanted them,” said Mark Peterson, the PGA Tour advance man who has been helping in preparing the course over the past month. “They made changes using statistics from recent tournaments as a guide to what needed to be adapted. They also tightened up some fairways.
Other changes to the course since last July include other fairways being tightened near landing zones, which adds challenge to the longer hitters. Numerous changes were made greenside along with the bunker work. “We recaptured a couple of greens in order to have some different hole locations,” noted Peterson.
The Course
Located in the “Quad Cities” region of Silvis, Illinois, TPC Deere Run is a public par-71 course that measures 7,289 yards. The past home of an Arabian horse farm, the 385 acres of land that TPC Deere Run comprises is full of American history. The land’s past includes Native American settlements, coal mining, cattle breeding and farming. Located in one of the most rural settings on the Tour, the course is full of natural beauty including the rolling terrain along the Rock River, elevation changes and perfectly framed oak trees highlighted by numerous ponds and ravines.
After reading about nothing but high praise for this course, TPC Deere Run might be the most underrated annual course on Tour. It hasn’t been on any national top-100 public rankings and isn’t in a prime location. The Iowa/Illinois border might not evoke images of beautiful hilly landscapes, but this course has fantastic routing and movement throughout the property as the holes switch directions back and forth. Like all TPC courses, it is gorgeously maintained with bentgrass fairways, Kentucky bluegrass rough, and bentgrass greens.
The course itself has three par-5s, four par-3s, and 11 par-4s. The par-3s are longer and tougher to score on. Eight of the par-4s are under 445 yards. All three of the par-5s are in the 550-600 yard range and should be reachable in two shots. The Birdie or Better rate is almost 44% on just those three holes. This is one of the reasons that shorter hitters definitely enjoy the course.
Although there is no famous three-hole stretch, each hole on the course is unique and has its own character. On the fourth hole, a gigantic oak tree sits right in the middle of the fairway causing players to strategically consider their tee-shot placement.
The par-3 16th hole is known as the signature hole at TPC Deere Run. Measuring 158 yards from the back, the green is situated next to a cliff which leads down to the Rock RIver. The 17th hole is a reachable par-5 with a unique green that has a 3% eagle rate. The finishing 18th hole is a daunting par-4 with a tough tee shot and water guarding the left side of the green.
While TPC Deere Run is not a challenging course, the sloping fairways, the elevation changes and the tight dogleg holes will ask players to use their entire full bag of clubs. Over the past five events it has averaged 1.39 shots under par which makes it the 10th easiest course played on Tour over the past two years.
As for what type of player should have success at TPC Deere Run, Weibring said, “The course rewards a guy who shapes the ball well into the greens and hits a lot of quality shots. It’s not a place where you can fool anyone. It’s a good, straightforward golf course, no tricks. It’s a shot-makers course.” A wide variety of winners have won at Deere Run over the years which is a testament to a quality track. The winning recipe definitely appears to be centered around accurate iron play along with catching fire on the greens with the putter.
Says two-time John Deere winner, Steve Stricker, “Guys enjoy coming and playing. It’s there in front of you. It’s not tricked up. It’s fair. If conditions are favorable, then good scores are going to be shot.” And with the grounds crew needing to heavily water the greens during the hot July summer to prevent them from drying out, it’s going to allow for easy soft targets for players to attack flag sticks.
Strokes Gained Analysis
Off the Tee
Even with generous and forgiving fairways that average 39 yards wide, TPC Deere Run is typically not a course that bombers can overpower. It is tree-lined but not tight. Laying up and staying away from trouble areas is the best strategy for numerous holes. Straying from fairways is costly as the course is protected by thick 4″ penal Kentucky bluegrass rough along with smart fairway bunkering and creative mounding that causes uneven lies. With numerous slight doglegs, being able to shape the ball off the tee is an advantage.
Overall, TPC Deere Run is among the top-10 easiest courses to gain strokes off the tee on Tour. Driving accuracy sits at over 70% on average. It does have the second highest rough penalty of any course which is why players are more conservative off the tee. GIR rate drops from 79% from the fairway to only 52% when hitting from the rough or bunkers. The list of past winners is full of shorter more accurate drivers. Golfers who keep their ball in the fairway will be best able to attack the soft and receptive greens on approach.
Approach
With 42% of all approach shots coming from inside 150 yards, accuracy with wedges to set up shorter birdie chances will be vital this week. While the average GIR rate of 71% shows that the greens are easy to hit, the greens here tend to be long and narrow. Five of them are around 40 yards from front to back. This means a premium on distance control to generate those easier birdie opportunities.
Showing again how important it is to find the fairway off the tee, approach shots from the fairway have an average proximity to the hole of 29.8 feet while approaches from the rough average 47.2 feet.
Around the Green and Putting
There is one design element of TPC Deere Run (that was also seen for the PGA Championship at Southern Hills) that continues to befuddle players – shortgrass collection areas. Even though players are not missing that many greens, around the green play rates as the toughest area for this course and will require some level of creativity. Many greens are elevated which causes misses to be propelled down shaved slopes to runoff areas below the greens. Also, the greenside bunkers are fairly deep and the rough is thick. In any “birdie-fest” type of event, avoiding bogeys and being able to scramble for pars when necessary is the key to keeping the momentum to move up the leaderboard.
The greens at TPC Deere Run have some sloping but overall are relatively easy to read. There are not many tiers with huge ridges which gives longer putts more of a chance to drop. Putts often break towards the Rock River which wraps around the course.
Past winners at this event include superior putters like Steve Stricker, Jordan Spieth and Zach Johnson. With such a high GIR% and most approaches being wedges into soft greens this does turn into a putting contest. Consistently making 5-15 foot putts is paramount this week. Back in 2019, the winner, Dylan Frittelli, make 60 out of 62 putts from inside 10 feet. The last four winners have gained an average of eight strokes putting.
Photo courtesy of Golf Course Gurus