By RickRunGood

New name, same event, better field — the 2024 Cognizant Classic.

It might be a little jarring to not see “The Honda Classic” for this week considering that Honda was the title sponsor of this event since 1982 — one of the longest running partnerships on the TOUR. They ended their deal last year and Cognizant (which is apparently a “information technology services and consulting company”) took over.

The good news is that PGA National will still play host as it has since 2007. So we will still be able to dive into all the data, trends and little nuggets — no matter what they want to call this event!

The field, however, gets a big boost. The field for this event was on a downward trend for multiple years but gets an injection of Rory McIlroy, Tom Kim, Min Woo Lee, Matt Fitzpatrick and others.

Let’s start with the obvious, PGA National is a beast. It played over-par last year, to a 70.36 average — the 14th most difficult stop on the schedule. That was actually a reprieve considering it was the 7th hardest course in 2022, 6th in 2021, 3rd in 2020, 5th in 2019 and 2nd in 2018.

The scoring average numbers will look different this year, since a third par-5 has been added to the scorecard. In addition to no. 3 and no.18, the 10th hole will go from a 508 yard par-4 to a 530-yard par-5. That’ll be the shortest of the trio and, in my opinion, will be the easiest hole on the course. There’s no water on number 10 and 98.2% of players made bogey or better on it last year. Those bogeys are now pars, and even with the 20 yards of lengthening, I find it hard to believe it’ll provide much resistance.

Despite that, there will still be plenty of holes at PGA National that I would classify as “hard”. Here are the top ten players in the field in “SG: Hard Courses”.

The easiest way to inflate your score is to find one of the countless water hazards lurking around PGA National. Some are more “in play” than others, but there is some type of water hazard on 16 different holes.

Most of those holes require a big miss off-the-tee to find the hazard. For example, the average distance from the middle of the fairway to the water is about 30 yards. There are a few tight ones, like number 6 (22 yards) and number 9 (23 yards at 310).

Keeping it in play (and dry) off-the-tee will definitely save you some strokes.

The ‘Distance From Edge of Fairway’ stat does a decent job of showing how big a golfer’s miss can be, when they miss the fairway. This stat is important on courses that are more penal with bigger misses. I would certainly categorize PGA National as one of those courses since a water hazard is about as penal as you can get for a big miss. Below are the best players in the field in terms of “Distance From Edge of Fairway”.

Speaking of fairways, you’ll see more of those this year. The fairways were widened last year, to the tune of an acre in total, which means more approaches will be playing out the short-grass. Of course, there are a few holes where widening can only go in one direction, since the fairways run right up to the water.

The water hazards that gobble up the most balls come around the greens, so they are in play on approach shots and par-3s.

It’s part of the reason that par-3 scoring has always been difficult at PGA National and one of the biggest separators in the field (it also helps that there’s only (2) par-5s).

The par-3s played to a 3.13 scoring average last season, the 7th hardest on TOUR. Again, that’s the easiest that they’ve played in the last six years. Here are the best players in the field in SG: Par 3s.

After starting the year on nothing but poa annua and paspalum greens, the bermuda boys are going to be excited for this week! This will be the first time we’ve seen the surface in 2024 and it comes on a course where putting has been quite correlated to success over the years.

According to the Course Key Stats page, Strokes Gained Putting ranks 16th at PGA National, meaning there are only 15 other courses where SG: PUTT is more correlated to success. That’s a better rank than any other Strokes Gained metric. Additionally, Putting from 10-15 and Putting from 4-8′ are two of the six highest correlated stats to success for this week. Let’s get a little freaky and run a model where one-third of the weights go onto those two ranges AND putting on bermuda.

This is always a fun week where carnage lurks around every corner. I hope you enjoy and prosper!