What Makes Sam Stevens' Golf Coaching Different

Sam Stevens has built a reputation as a coach who simplifies what many instructors overcomplicate. His approach centers on three pillars: correct fundamentals, targeted repetition, and smart course management. Rather than rebuilding a student's swing from scratch, Stevens identifies the two or three technical errors causing the most damage and fixes those first.

This is why golfers at every level respond to his method. You are not asked to change everything at once — you are asked to change the right things in the right order. The result is faster, more durable improvement than wholesale swing changes produce.

A student who understands why a drill works will continue doing it correctly long after the lesson ends. That self-sufficiency is central to Stevens' philosophy: he aims to give you a diagnostic framework, not a dependency on constant instruction.

The Foundation: Grip, Stance, and Posture

Before any drill makes sense, your setup must be solid. Stevens insists that 80 percent of swing errors originate in a flawed grip, stance, or posture — not in what happens during the swing itself. Fix the setup, and the swing often corrects itself.

Grip

Use a neutral grip: the back of your lead hand (left hand for right-handers) should face the target at address. Place the club in the fingers — not the palm — of both hands. When you look down, you should see two to two-and-a-half knuckles on your lead hand.

• Grip pressure: hold the club as if it were a tube of toothpaste you do not want to empty — firm enough to control it, loose enough to feel the clubhead swing.
• Check your grip before every session. Grip drift is the most common problem Stevens observes in returning students.

Stance

Feet shoulder-width apart for a mid-iron. Ball position is slightly forward of center for irons and opposite your lead heel for the driver. Weight should be balanced 50/50 between both feet at address, not tilted toward the back foot.

Posture

Hinge forward from the hips — not the waist — until your arms hang naturally under your shoulders. Knees softly flexed, spine straight but not rigid. A simple check: hold a club against your spine and verify the butt of the grip points toward your belt buckle, not your chest. Rounded posture is the most common setup fault Stevens corrects.

The 9-to-3 Drill: Building a Consistent Swing Arc

This is the centerpiece of Stevens' early teaching. The 9-to-3 drill uses a half swing — club pointing to 9 o'clock on the backswing and 3 o'clock on the follow-through — to teach a centered, repeatable arc before adding power. It is deceptively simple and extremely effective.

1. Set up correctly using the grip, stance, and posture described above. Use a 7-iron for the first several weeks.
2. Take the club back to the 9-o'clock position: shaft roughly parallel to the ground, clubhead pointing away from the target, wrists not yet fully hinged.
3. Rotate through to the 3-o'clock position: shaft again parallel to the ground on the follow-through side, chest facing the target, weight fully transferred to your lead foot.
4. Focus on the feeling of the clubface squaring at impact, not on where the ball goes. Contact consistency comes before distance.
5. Hit a full bucket using only this motion before moving to a full swing. The drill forces you to use body rotation rather than arms-only hitting.

Progression: Once 9-to-3 feels automatic and your contact is consistently solid, extend to a full swing while keeping the same tempo and rotational feeling. Add range of motion, not effort. Most players who rush past this stage regress within a few weeks.

Short Game Priority: Chipping and Putting Drills

Stevens is emphatic: the average recreational golfer loses 40 to 50 percent of their strokes within 50 yards of the hole. Improving your short game returns more shots per hour of practice than any full-swing work, and the motor patterns are simpler to learn.

The Gate Putting Drill

Place two tees in the ground just wider than your putter head, about 6 inches in front of the ball on the target line. Make putting strokes that send the putter head cleanly between the tees without touching either one. This trains a straight, square stroke and eliminates the most common putting fault — an inside-out or outside-in path that causes pulls and pushes.

• Start from 3 feet. Make 20 consecutive successful strokes before moving back.
• Work through distances of 3, 6, 10, and 15 feet in each session.
• Track the number of three-putts per round. That number should drop within two weeks.

The Clock Chipping Drill

Around a practice hole, place balls at the 3-, 6-, 9-, and 12-o'clock positions, each about 10 feet off the edge of the green. Chip each ball and try to get it within 3 feet of the hole. Record how many you convert from each position. Stevens recommends targeting a 60 percent success rate to reach bogey golf consistently, and 75 percent to regularly shoot bogey or better.

For chipping technique: use a narrow stance, lean the shaft slightly toward the target at address, and keep your hands ahead of the clubhead throughout the stroke. Think of chipping as a long, firm putting stroke rather than a miniature swing. The ball should roll more than it flies on most chip shots.

Course Management: Playing Smart to Score Lower

Stevens argues that most amateur golfers lose 6 to 8 shots per round not to poor ball-striking but to poor decisions. Course management is the fastest route to a lower score that requires no change to your swing at all.

Aim at the Fat Part of the Fairway

Instead of aiming at the center of the fairway, aim at the half that keeps your miss in play. If there is water left of the fairway, aim at the right half. A slight draw or push still finds the short grass. A miss toward water costs two or more shots.

Miss the Green on the Correct Side

Before hitting an approach shot, identify where a difficult recovery lies — a steep upslope, a deep bunker, or a tight lie on a downhill chip. Aim deliberately away from that spot. A ball that misses the green but leaves an easy chip costs at most one shot; a ball in a greenside bunker often costs two or three.

Know Your Actual Carry Distances

Most amateur golfers overestimate how far they hit each club by 10 to 20 yards. Use a GPS app or a rangefinder during practice rounds and record actual carry distances for each club over several sessions. Then club up — take one more club than you think you need — on approach shots, especially when a short miss finds water or a bunker. Hitting past the hole is almost always easier to recover from than coming up short.

Play for Your Typical Shot Shape

If you consistently draw or fade the ball, factor that shape into your alignment rather than fighting it. Aim your body and club at a starting line that lets your natural shape bring the ball to the target. Fighting your own ball flight wastes energy and creates tension.

A Weekly Practice Routine That Delivers Results

Consistency beats intensity. Stevens recommends five to six sessions per week of 30 to 45 minutes rather than one long range session on the weekend. Short, frequent sessions build motor patterns faster than infrequent marathon sessions.

• Monday: Setup and grip check using a mirror (10 min), then 9-to-3 drill with a 7-iron (20 min), finish with 20 short putts from 3 feet using the gate drill (10 min).
• Tuesday: Gate putting drill from 3, 6, and 10 feet (20 min), then clock chipping drill from all four positions (20 min). No full swings today — short game only.
• Wednesday: Full swing with a 7-iron using alignment sticks to verify ball position and aim (20 min), then driver with deliberate focus on tempo rather than distance (15 min).
• Thursday: 50-yard pitch shots to a specific target — a towel or hula hoop — tracking how often you land within 10 feet (20 min). Putting from 6 and 15 feet (15 min).
• Friday: Mental rehearsal of course-management decisions from your last round (10 min), then 9-to-3 drills emphasizing the rotation feeling (20 min).
• Weekend: Play a full round with a single focus — one technique from the week, not everything at once. Track fairways hit, greens in regulation, and total putts.

Those three numbers — fairways, greens, putts — tell you exactly where to concentrate next week. If putts are high, shift more practice time to the gate drill. If greens are low, spend more time on approach distances and short-game recovery.

Common Mistakes and How to Fix Them

Stevens has identified the most frequent errors he sees across students of all levels. Each has a direct, repeatable fix:

• Scooping the ball: Trying to lift the ball into the air with the hands at impact. Fix: keep your hands ahead of the clubhead through the entire impact zone. The loft built into the club does the lifting — you do not need to help it.
• Swinging too hard: Overswinging breaks posture, timing, and contact simultaneously. Fix: consciously swing at 75 percent effort and focus on completing a balanced follow-through with your chest facing the target. Distance improves as a byproduct of better contact.
• Under-reading putts: Most amateur golfers see only half the break on longer putts. Fix: read each putt from three feet directly behind the ball, then add 30 percent more break to your read. Near the hole the ball is moving slowly and breaks sharply; factor that in.
• Wrong ball position: Ball too far back in the stance causes thin, low shots; too far forward causes fat shots and weak pulls. Fix: use an alignment stick on the ground at address as a reference point until the correct position is automatic for each club.
• Gripping too tight: Tension travels from the hands up through the arms and into the shoulders, reducing clubhead speed and restricting rotation. Fix: rate your grip pressure on a scale of 1 to 10 before each swing. Aim for a 4 or 5. A 9 or 10 grip ruins the swing before it starts.
• Ignoring pre-shot routine: Inconsistent address and alignment produce inconsistent results. Fix: build a repeatable routine — take one practice swing, step in from behind the ball, set the clubface first, then build your stance around it. Do this on every shot, including short putts.