The 2009 LPGA Elevator

Last week I released my Top 70 rankings for May and while compiling that list, I noticed several players with significant differences in their performance levels from 2008 to 2009.  Here are the players whose seasons are progressing quite differently than last.

Moving Up:

In-Kyung Kim

Inky already has three Top 5 finishes in 2009 (two all of last year) and has yet to miss a cut.  I thought she was a primo candidate to win Corning and was only four shots back going into Sunday but she "struggled" to a 71 and finished T22.  An upper-echelon putter (top 10 last year and this), Kim is playing much better this year because her GIR rank has skyrocketed from 96^th to second.  Most of that improvement comes from having driven the ball a little longer and a lot more accurately.  After ranking 105^th in Total Driving last year, Inky ranks #21 so far this year. 

Brittany Lang

Lang's rise actually started last fall as she closed out the season with five straight Top 10 finishes.  She's continued that good play with three more Top 10s in 2009.  Even during hard times, Brittany is one of the better players on Tour tee-to-green but recently she's been among the best - #1 in Total Driving and #5 in GIR.  Still not so great with the flat stick (up to #69 from #77 last year but worlds better than ‘07s #107) which means she may not have reached her peak yet.

Lindsey Wright

Top 5 finishes at Kraft Nabisco and the Michelob Ultra have pushed Lindsey up the charts recently.  She's putting about the same as in 2008 but Wright is driving the ball better this year (up from #50 to #27) and finding the green a lot more often (#42 to #7).  Got off to a good start last year too so it'll be interesting to see if she can maintain this good level better this summer than she did last.

Ai Miyazato

First off, Ai has finally gotten her swing back after nearly ruining it by playing through a leg injury back in 2007.  Second, I believe The Constructivist was right last winter when he said the Japanese rookies coming into the LPGA (namely Shiho Oyama and Mika Miyazato) would divert a lot of media pressure away from Ai.  At any rate, she has improved in all three facets of her game so far in 2009 - 7^th in driving, 19^th in GIR, 36^th in putting - and has collected four Top 10 finishes in nine starts.

Wendy Ward

Wendy collected back-to-back Top 5 finishes at Corona and Michelob, her first since the summer of 2007.  She has been driving the ball about the same (ranked in the 40s) and has been putting a little better this year but her primary improvement has been in reaching the green in regulation.  Ward ranked very well in that department at #18 last year but has jumped all the way up to #4 this year with an increase of .070 in GIR.

Natalie Gulbis

Free from the back pain that hindered her in 2008, Gulbis has recently posted finishes more like we are used to seeing - three straight Top 20s including a T7 at the Michelob Ultra.  Natalie ranks Numero Uno in putting so I am anxiously awaiting the moment for some commentator to tell us again how much she struggles with her short game.  Ranks #76 in Total Driving, which doesn't look so bad after last year's #124, and #77 in GIR, which is up from #108.  With numbers like that tee-to-green, Gulbis still has lots of room to improve on her game.

Pat Hurst

In the three-plus years I've been studying the LPGA stats, nobody's numbers except maybe Laura Diaz' have confounded me more than Pat's.  Hurst has moved up the HD rankings this year on the basis of her win at the MasterCard and T8 at the Kraft Nabisco.  Atypical of such a long hitter, Pat has improved her GIR to #30 despite dropping in Total Driving from #29 to #88.  She's picked up a little distance but has lost over 50 points on her accuracy.  So unless she has landed an inordinate number of drives into the first cut, I don't know how she's reaching the green so much more often.  Her putting numbers are down too so of all the Moving-Ups, Hurst is the least likely to continue that trend.

Brittany Lincicome

Lincicome executed the most memorable shot of the last two years to set up eagle and win the Kraft Nabisco, then finished T6 at Sybase.  Her other six performances in 2009 have yielded only one finish in the top 50 (T39 at Phoenix).  All told, Brittany is driving about the same as last year (80-ish), putting a bit better (up to #54 from #76) and hitting the green almost 90 points higher than in 2008.  Lincicome is reaching the green in regulation 1.6 more times per round than she did a year ago.

I'll profile those who are Moving Down in another post.