How Far Did John Daly Drive The Golf Ball?
When John Daly burst onto the golfing scene in the early 1990s, he set new standards for long-hitting. He changed the game with his all-guns-blazing style, demonstrating how effective power could be at the very top level of the professional game. Youngsters coming through saw Daly boosting 300+ yard drives, reaching (apparently) unreachable par-5s and blasting out of rough and bunkers with nonchalant ease. They sought to emulate him. A generation of players would follow "The Wild Thing’s” example with Tiger Woods becoming the greatest exponent of the “power game.”
Daly came from obscurity to win the 1991 PGA Championship at Crooked Stick. He was ninth alternate for the event but sneaked in via a series of strange and serendipitous co-incidences. His victory may have been unexpected but he was, by no means, an unpopular winner. The golfing public had a new hero in the cigarette-smoking, mullet-sporting wild man from California. After that tournament, fans wanted to see “Big John, Grip it and Rip it!”
Daly has a massive shoulder turn, huge overswing and weight-transfer that allows him to generate significant speeds. It was a unique technique at the time, but one that is now much replicated, particular in long-drive circles.
Daly topped the driving distance stats on the PGA Tour in 1991. He was six yards longer on average that season than Greg Norman who, up until John popped up, was considered by many to be the longest driver. John topped the stats every year (save for 1994 when he spent much of the season suspended) up until 2002.
In 1997, he was the first man to average over 300 yards for a season on the PGA Tour and he did that again every year from 1999 up until the last year full stats were kept for him on the circuit - 2012. No other player averaged over 300 yards until Hank Kuehne in 2003.
Daly was clearly the longest hitter on the Tour for a significant period of time, but how far did he drive the ball?
Well, equipment changes during his career mean that when he was a younger man, he actually didn’t hit it as far as he did later into his career. In fact, when he topped the driving stats in 1992, his average was just 283.4 yards. 10 years later in 2002, when he led the stats again, his average was more than 23 yards longer, at 306.8 yards… Anyone who argues equipment hasn’t made a difference only needs look at that discrepancy. Had Daly’s technique changed? Not obviously. Had he become physically fitter? Hmm… again… Not obviously.
Anyway, we digress. Daly’s best driving average for a season was in 2003 (ironically, the first year he didn’t top the stats since joining the tour) … That season he averaged a monster 314.3 yards from the tee.
If one takes an average of all the yearly averages we have for Daly on the PGA Tour, from 1991 to 2012, the number comes out at 301.3 yards.
Daly is still sending it out there on the Champions Tour. Although a little below par in 2023 with an average of 281 yards, for the previous six years, he managed averages above the 290 yards mark – 303.6 yards in his first year on the Champions circuit in 2016.
Daly was, of course, able to hit monstrous bombs that travelled far further than his average figures. In 2003 (when he averaged his furthest) he sent one 385 yards in the John Deere Classic. In 2007, he got one to travel 396 yards in the Sony Open. In 2005, he sent one 399 in the Western Open. And, in the 2004 WGC NEC Invitational, he hit one that travelled 400 yards… John is long!
So how far did John Daly drive the golf ball? Well, he’s still driving it pretty far today and he could bomb it out to 400 yards in his prime, but during his PGA Tour career, purely looking at averages – He drove it between 283.4 and 314.3 yards.
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