Pro Golf Shot Phil Mickelson: Sky-scraping Flop Shot (Video) - by Pete Styles
Pro Golf Shot Phil Mickelson: Sky-scraping Flop Shot (Video) - by Pete Styles

I think if I could wave a magic wand and give people the ability to hit one particular type of shot for a lot of golfers, it would be the flop shot, not because you use the flop shot a lot, but it's the one that looks the most impressive and it's the one that can go badly wrong in the worse possible cases. So, the flop shot is a shot mostly described as going very high, but a very short distance, so when it comes down on the green, it lands on the sixpence and stops dead.

The first thing to consider here is do you need to play a flop shot? If there's nothing between you and the green, don't bother. Think about how you would pick the ball up and you would throw it onto the green. You would throw it low generally, so play that golf shot. You only need to play the flop shot when there's a big bunker in the way, a small fast green and then another bunker up on the far side, then if you were to pick the ball up, you would probably toss it to pull up higher and get it to come down, that's when you play your flop shot.

The next consideration is how I got right club. I daily play this with the 60 or 64-degree wedge. The most famous person who play in flop shots and I guess, a lot of people even call it the Mickelson shot -- Phil Mickelson. He plays a 60 or sometimes a 64-degree wedge, slides the club beautifully under the ball and it just pops straight up into the air.

The next consideration once you've got the right club and you know you need to play the shot is the right lie. It's very difficult to play the shot of a bad lie or a bad lies, so we need a decent lie to play this. Then in the setup position, you play the ball quite a long way towards your front foot, you point the golf club quite a long way to the right of center for the right-handed golfer and then you would grip it. You then point your body quite a long way left of center, so it's an open stance and an open club face.

We can then make quite an aggressive back swing, quite a big lift up because most of the power that you hit the golf ball with is going to be transferred into upwards energy not forwards energy, so you can go ahead and hit this quite firmly. So, the club points to the right side, I point to the left side and the ball is opposite my left instep. I then make quite a big aggressive back swing and hit down underneath the ball and just slide the club underneath it and this ball should pop up and not go very far forward at all.

So, I'm just going to slide the club underneath the ball and a swing of that length, that ball is going no more than 25 yards and I've had the club quite a long way back, quite a long way through. The risk of playing this shot is if you hit that ball halfway up the ball, that ball would probably go 60 to 70 yards straight over the back of the green and cause yourself into problems over the back edge.

So, only play that shot when you need it, play it with the appropriate setup and a nice and confident length clipping down underneath it. And if you want to watch anybody to learn how to play that shot, watch Phil Mickelson.

[playerProfile url="https://golf-info-guide.com/pga-players/phil-mickelson/"][/playerProfile] 2012-09-17

I think if I could wave a magic wand and give people the ability to hit one particular type of shot for a lot of golfers, it would be the flop shot, not because you use the flop shot a lot, but it's the one that looks the most impressive and it's the one that can go badly wrong in the worse possible cases. So, the flop shot is a shot mostly described as going very high, but a very short distance, so when it comes down on the green, it lands on the sixpence and stops dead.

The first thing to consider here is do you need to play a flop shot? If there's nothing between you and the green, don't bother. Think about how you would pick the ball up and you would throw it onto the green. You would throw it low generally, so play that golf shot. You only need to play the flop shot when there's a big bunker in the way, a small fast green and then another bunker up on the far side, then if you were to pick the ball up, you would probably toss it to pull up higher and get it to come down, that's when you play your flop shot.

The next consideration is how I got right club. I daily play this with the 60 or 64-degree wedge. The most famous person who play in flop shots and I guess, a lot of people even call it the Mickelson shot — Phil Mickelson. He plays a 60 or sometimes a 64-degree wedge, slides the club beautifully under the ball and it just pops straight up into the air.

The next consideration once you've got the right club and you know you need to play the shot is the right lie. It's very difficult to play the shot of a bad lie or a bad lies, so we need a decent lie to play this. Then in the setup position, you play the ball quite a long way towards your front foot, you point the golf club quite a long way to the right of center for the right-handed golfer and then you would grip it. You then point your body quite a long way left of center, so it's an open stance and an open club face.

We can then make quite an aggressive back swing, quite a big lift up because most of the power that you hit the golf ball with is going to be transferred into upwards energy not forwards energy, so you can go ahead and hit this quite firmly. So, the club points to the right side, I point to the left side and the ball is opposite my left instep. I then make quite a big aggressive back swing and hit down underneath the ball and just slide the club underneath it and this ball should pop up and not go very far forward at all.

So, I'm just going to slide the club underneath the ball and a swing of that length, that ball is going no more than 25 yards and I've had the club quite a long way back, quite a long way through. The risk of playing this shot is if you hit that ball halfway up the ball, that ball would probably go 60 to 70 yards straight over the back of the green and cause yourself into problems over the back edge.

So, only play that shot when you need it, play it with the appropriate setup and a nice and confident length clipping down underneath it. And if you want to watch anybody to learn how to play that shot, watch Phil Mickelson.

Player Profile