One of the big reasons that golfers of all ability levels, and especially mid- and high-handicap players, don’t shoot better scores is that they tend to play too aggressively and ignore the percentages.

What’s more disconcerting, however, is that many of those same players don’t realize that they’re making such a mistake and believe instead that they’re playing the game the way it was meant to be played, or more accurately the way they see the game played on television by the best players in the world.

But the elite golfers on the planet play the percentages and play conservatively far more often than one might consider, especially when you factor in their talent levels.

And what it comes down to more often than not is the ability to hit fairways and greens, and the bottom line is that if you hit lots of fairways and greens, you’ll shoot more good scores far more often. Period.

So try this approach the next time you play and see what happens.

Pick a club off each tee that with a good shot will put you in the fairway at the 150-yard marker on each par-4 or par-5 that you play. That might mean driver, that might mean 3-wood, that might mean 4-iron. But do the math and make the 150-yard approach shot you goal.

From there, when playing into the green (and on all of the par-3s), forget that there’s a flag on the putting surface and just try to play your approach shot to the middle of the green.

If you do this, and it will take some discipline, you’ll hit more fairways, you’ll hit more greens, you’ll take pressure off of your overall game and you’ll ultimately post better scores.

And not only will you accomplish all of those things, you’ll also routinely beat your buddies who rip driver into the woods off every tee and go flag-hunting on every approach shot and end up short-siding themselves far too often.

So go conservative and play the percentages. You’ll be shocked at the results and what that approach will do for your game.

There's an old saying in golf: If the ball doesn't get to the hole, it can't go in. Often you hear this wisdom stated more sarcastically as, "Short putts almost never drop."

Almost nothing in the game is more frustrating than having the line of a putt nailed, but coming up short.

In this swing tip video, SwingFix instructor Justin Bruton offers up a simple but effective pre-round drill for finding the right speed for your putts. Place a club a couple feet behind the hole and roll your putts past the hole but not as far as the club.

Simple. Easy. And a sure-fire way to lower your frustration level on the greens.

If you’ve watched much golf on television through the years, you’ve heard good players talk about staying in the moment. But what exactly does that mean?

To put it most simply, it means that when you’re in the middle of a round of golf, nothing else matters other than the shot you’re about to play.

Too many times, average golfers find their minds wandering during a round of golf to something other than the shot at hand. If that’s happening to you on the course, you’re unlikely to be getting the most out of your game.

And truth be told, staying in the moment is much harder to achieve than one might think in theory, as there are so many reasons why minds start to wander during any given round,

It could be that you’re looking ahead to a hole on your home course that typically gives you trouble. It could be that you can’t stop thinking about that tee ball on No. 2 that you hit out of bounds, even though that happened more than an hour ago. Or it could be that you’re standing over a 4-foot putt exactly like one you missed on the previous green and the miss is what’s front and center in your mind.

Even more common, however, and even more dangerous, is being too score conscious during a round of golf.

You might be working potentially on your best round ever and get caught up in thinking about the scores you’ll need on the last three holes to eclipse your previous best mark. You might be 6-over after 14 and worried about how you’re going to break 80 when you haven’t shot a score that high all year. You might have strung together three birdies in a row and find yourself on the tee thinking about a fourth, something you’ve never done.

Regardless of what the particular scenario is, if you start looking ahead or toward the finish line, or you get caught looking in the rear-view mirror at something you can’t do anything about any longer, you’re adding stress and/or pressure to your game, and golf is hard enough as it is without making the game even more difficult.

So the next time you hit the links, see if you can make it through 18 holes or even nine without thinking about your score or anything other than the shot you’re about to play.

It won’t be easy and you’ll probably slip up. But if you can do that for the most part, it’s almost a certainty that when you do add those scores up, you’ll see improvement, and for many that improvement just might be dramatic.