Plus Handicap Formula is Illogical

[Ty_Webb]

24 minutes ago, dhc1 said:

You seem to be having difficulty understanding how trouble is recognized between course rating and slope. A course with a lot of trouble that affects good golfers would certainly show itself in the course rating. Of course, (as I've constantly mentioned) we're holding course rating consistent between the two courses with different slopes. 

 

You've also mentioned that you want Joe Scratch to get more strokes on the higher sloped course. Let's do some math

 

Player A shoots 67 on 72/122 for a +4.6 index in today's system. relative to a scratch, he'd give 5 strokes to Joe Scratch on a 120 rated course and 6 strokes to Joe Scratch on a 150 rated course. I think you agree with this.

 

Here's what it would look like if we ignored the slope rating when calculating the index. 

 

Player A shoots 67 on 72/122 for a +5 index in today's system. relative to a scratch, he'd give 5 strokes to Joe Scratch on a 120 rated course and 7 strokes to Joe Scratch on a 150 rated course. Isn't that exactly your stated point that Justin should give more strokes on the harder course? 

 

More importantly, let's look at Player C who shoots 67 on a 72/140 course. His index in today's system is +4.1. Therefore, when playing a match vs. Player A, he gets a shot from Player A on both the 120 and 150 sloped course. This makes no sense that the player who plays on the harder course and puts up equivalent scores relative to the exact same course rating actually benefits from playing well on a higher sloped course. It's directly opposite to what what intended when the system was created. 

 

Okay - let's follow your math. Your first example works exactly like I'd think it should. He has his +4.6 index and he gives 5 shots on the 120 course and 6 shots on the 150 course. In your "here's what it would look like if we ignored the slope rating when calculating the index". What if Player A shoots 67 on the 72/150 course? His index is +5 under your system. Now you're a scratch and you play him on that same golf course. You think he should give 7 shots? How is that fair? He should give 5 shots. So if you apply the slope in calculating the course handicap, then you have to apply it the other way when you calculate the index. Otherwise you end up with unfair situations. Surely you can agree that's not right? So if you want to not apply slope in the index calculation, then you have to not apply it in the course handicap calculation. In that case, you're giving 5 shots regardless of the slope. But you should be giving more shots on the higher slope course.

 

If you're a 6 playing a 12, you have 6 shots of difference in index. On a slope 150 course, you'd be giving 8 shots. If you're a 12 playing an 18, you'd be giving 8 shots. If you're a 18 playing a 24, you'd be giving 8 shots. If you're a scratch playing a 6, you'd be giving 8 shots. If you're a +6 playing a scratch you'd be giving 8 shots. Exactly as it should be. 

 

Edited October 20, 2020 by Ty_Webb

[dhc1]

32 minutes ago, dhc1 said:

You seem to be having difficulty understanding how trouble is recognized between course rating and slope. A course with a lot of trouble that affects good golfers would certainly show itself in the course rating. Of course, (as I've constantly mentioned) we're holding course rating consistent between the two courses with different slopes. 

 

You've also mentioned that you want Joe Scratch to get more strokes on the higher sloped course. Let's do some math:

 

Player A shoots 67 on 72/122 for a +4.6 index in today's system. relative to a scratch, he'd give 5 strokes to Joe Scratch on a 120 rated course and 6 strokes to Joe Scratch on a 150 rated course. I think you agree that Joe Scratch should get more strokes on the higher sloped course.

 

Here's what it would look like if we ignored the slope rating when calculating the index. 

 

Player A shoots 67 on 72/122 for a +5 index in today's system. Relative to a scratch, he'd give 5 strokes to Joe Scratch on a 120 rated course and 7 strokes to Joe Scratch on a 150 rated course. Isn't that exactly your stated point that Justin should give more strokes on the harder course? Well, he's now getting two extra strokes rather than one.

 

More importantly, let's look at Player C who shoots 67 on a 72/140 course. His index in today's system is +4.1. Therefore, when playing a match vs. Player A, he gets a shot from Player A on both the 120 and 150 sloped courses.

 

This makes no sense!  The player who plays on the harder course and puts up equivalent scores relative to the exact same course rating actually benefits from playing on a higher sloped course. It's directly opposite to what what intended when the system was created. 

 

One additional calculation:

 

Player B shoots 90 on a 72/122 for an index of 16.7 while Player D shoots 90 on a 72/140 for an index of 14.5. When playing head to head, Player B is getting shots from Player D on both a 120 and 150 rated course even though she is shooting the same amount over the rating as Player D. This is logical because Player D is navigating a more difficult course.

 

This only highlights that for plus players, the player who navigates the more difficult course is losing strokes rather than gaining them (all else but slope being equal)!

 

 

[dhc1]

17 minutes ago, Ty_Webb said:

 

Okay - let's follow your math. Your first example works exactly like I'd think it should. He has his +4.6 index and he gives 5 shots on the 120 course and 6 shots on the 150 course. In your "here's what it would look like if we ignored the slope rating when calculating the index". What if Player A shoots 67 on the 72/150 course? His index is +5 under your system. Now you're a scratch and you play him on that same golf course. You think he should give 7 shots? How is that fair? He should give 5 shots. So if you apply the slope in calculating the course handicap, then you have to apply it the other way when you calculate the index. Otherwise you end up with unfair situations. Surely you can agree that's not right? So if you want to not apply slope in the index calculation, then you have to not apply it in the course handicap calculation. In that case, you're giving 5 shots regardless of the slope. But you should be giving more shots on the higher slope course.

 

fair point

[Rincewindwiz]

Sorry if this has been said before but . . . .

 

Wouldn't it be much simpler and more logical if all slope adjustments ignored the sign (Plus or Not Plus) of the golfers handicap? After all big slope = harder course = higher handicap

 

So for example:

Ordinary mortal  CI = 12.2

playing on course with slope 130

Adds  a slope adjustment of 12.2*(130 - 113)/113 to their HI to get their CI which is 12.2+1.8 = 14.0

 

Ace Golfer CI = +4.0 (well -4.0 actually!)

playing on course with slope 130

Adds a slope adjustment of 4.0*(130-113)/113 = 0.6 to get their CI which is then -4.0 + 0.6 = -3.4

 

Or am I missing something?

Edited November 2, 2020 by Rincewindwiz

[DaveLeeNC]

1 hour ago, Rincewindwiz said:

Sorry if this has been said before but . . . .

 

Wouldn't it be much simpler and more logical if all slope adjustments ignored the sign (Plus or Not Plus) of the golfers handicap? After all big slope = harder course = higher handicap

 

So for example:

Ordinary mortal  CI = 12.2

playing on course with slope 130

Adds  a slope adjustment of 12.2*(130 - 113)/113 to their HI to get their CI which is 12.2+1.8 = 14.0

 

Ace Golfer CI = +4.0 (well -4.0 actually!)

playing on course with slope 130

Adds a slope adjustment of 4.0*(130-113)/113 = 0.6 to get their CI which is then -4.0 + 0.6 = -3.4

 

Or am I missing something?

 

To start with you are missing (like some other folks around here) the fact that slope is NOT the same as difficulty. Here is an example. Take the Blue Tees (one set in front of the Championship Tees) at Pinehurst No. 2 and compare that to the "Long Tees" at Forest Creek North. The Course Rating (what a scratch golfer would shoot) at No. 2 from the Blue tees is 73.7. It is 72.4 (Long Tees) at Forest Creek. The Bogey Rating (what a Bogey golfer would shoot) at No. 2 is 98.4 and at Forest Creek it is 98.2. I don't see how you could come to any conclusion other than, for that range of golfers, No. 2 is a little bit harder than Forest Creek. 

 

The slope at No. 2 is 133. The slope at Forest Creek is 139. Both par 72, BTW. 

 

dave

[Rincewindwiz]

Well we can argue semantics for ever. To me at least, CR is simply what a scratch golf would go round in. In my dictionary, larger CR is not necessarily 'harder' just more shots.

To me at least, 'harder' means "if you get it wrong it is more expensive" which is effectively what slope measures because bogey golfers get it wrong more often.

 

But if you want to view 'harder' differently, that's fine by me.

 

 

 

[DaveLeeNC]

That is an interesting definition of harder - and it is not totally unreasonable. But it is not what slope measures. Slope is simply the expected scoring difference between a scratch and bogey golfer. There is nothing else to the calculation as that is all there is. 

 

Sometimes a big difference between scratch and bogey golfer scores (i.e., big slope) can be pretty much what you described where a course is full of 'bogey golfer scoring impediments' that mostly don't affect scratch golfers. 

 

But courses with impediments that affect both sets of golfers would not have as high a slope even though they would be more difficult courses. 

 

And another way to increase the slope on a course would be to take a whole bunch of doglegs that were protected by trees (for example) and remove the trees. Further assume that the dogleg was out of reach for bogey golfers but now scratch golfers could cut these doglegs. Obviously this is now and easier course (roughly the same BR and a lower CR), and the slope will be higher. 

 

So slope may or may not correlate with your definition of harder (or maybe 'more penal' would be a more descriptive term). 

 

dave

 

ps. I had my own questions about why the handicap system did not seem to 'give enough credit' to course difficulty factors like tons of fairway bunkers, etc. The answer that I got was that the system was intended to best match golfers familiar with the course and these golfers usually figure out, one way or the other, how to avoid those issues (mostly). No, I did not find that answer completely satisfying either. But at least I understood the perspective and how they got to the answers that they came up with.

Edited November 2, 2020 by DaveLeeNC

[Halebopp]

We have a set of "easy tees" at our club, the tees are placed at the start of fairways etc., it's about a 3 400-meter par 71. The Slope Rating for those tees are 112 for men and 109 for the ladies. I doubt anyone really thinks that set of tees is actually easier for the ladies than it is for men.

[ThinkingPlus]

30 minutes ago, Halebopp said:

We have a set of "easy tees" at our club, the tees are placed at the start of fairways etc., it's about a 3 400-meter par 71. The Slope Rating for those tees are 112 for men and 109 for the ladies. I doubt anyone really thinks that set of tees is actually easier for the ladies than it is for men.

That's broken.  Slope should never be harder for men than women.  Guessing it is a typo.  Should be 119 for women.  A seven point difference would not be crazy.

[Halebopp]

Just now, ThinkingPlus said:

That's broken.  Slope should never be harder for men than women.  Guessing it is a typo.  Should be 119 for women.  A seven point difference would not be crazy.

 

Nope, the Course Rating is about 4 strokes higher for the ladies. You'd need handicap indices well over 100 to actually make the course mathematically easier for a lady than for a man.

 

My point was that Slope Rating is a practically useless piece of information on its own when discussing how easy or difficult a course or a set of tees are.

[dhc1]

I think what people don’t understand is what slope is meant to be. It is absolutely meant to identify the harder course for a given course rating. Both the USGA and the designer of the systems explicitly said so. 
 

anyone whose argument uses courses with different course ratings simply doesn’t understand what slope was specifically designed for: portability of handicaps across course with differing difficulty (particularly for bogey golfers). 
 

the concept that a course with an extra par 5 instead of a par 3 is harder because the course rating is higher is quite baffling to me but that appears to be an frequent argument here. 
 

it’s as baffling as the concept that it easier for a +6 to shoot lower scores, relative to the course rating, on a “harder”/higher sloped course than it is for her to do it on one with a lower sloped course. 
 

thus, this thread. 
 

 

[ThinkingPlus]

21 minutes ago, Halebopp said:

 

Nope, the Course Rating is about 4 strokes higher for the ladies. You'd need handicap indices well over 100 to actually make the course mathematically easier for a lady than for a man.

 

My point was that Slope Rating is a practically useless piece of information on its own when discussing how easy or difficult a course or a set of tees are.

Notice I specifically said slope not course.  Typical CR differences between men and women for the same tees usually vary between 4.5 and 7.5 strokes.  Slope differences vary between 6 and numbers in the low teens usually (varies wildly) for the same tee between men and women.

[Halebopp]

4 minutes ago, ThinkingPlus said:

Notice I specifically said slope not course.  Typical CR differences between men and women for the same tees usually vary between 4.5 and 7.5 strokes.  Slope differences vary between 6 and numbers in the low teens usually (varies wildly) for the same tee between men and women.

Yes, I didn't even mention the CR in my original comment and in my reply to you I was simply moving the discussion forward explaining why the Slope Rating is lower for ladies; because the CR is a lot higher.

[ThinkingPlus]

1 minute ago, Halebopp said:

Yes, I didn't even mention the CR in my original comment and in my reply to you I was simply moving the discussion forward explaining why the Slope Rating is lower for ladies; because the CR is a lot higher.

But that's not how it works.  The CR and slope are always higher for women than men from the same tees.  If it isn't it is a mistake.  I cannot think of any good reason for it not being that way although someone might be able to contrive a course that theoretically would create such a situation.

[Rincewindwiz]

7 hours ago, DaveLeeNC said:

 But it is not what slope measures. Slope is simply the expected scoring difference between a scratch and bogey golfer. There is nothing else to the calculation as that is all there is. 

 

And so goes the official party line.  But when you go and rate a course,  you look at the features (and specifically the ones that make the course harder - bunkers, rough, trees, water, slopes, etc) score them for scratch and bogey golfers (relevant location is different for both), mix in the appropriate yardage numbers and and turn the whole lot into a single number (CR) for each of the scratch and bogey golfers and thus derive a slope. Not unreasonably, they describe this as 'expected scoring difference'. I rather think we are in violent agreement here :-) merely disagreeing about the words!!

[Rincewindwiz]

7 hours ago, DaveLeeNC said:

ps. I had my own questions about why the handicap system did not seem to 'give enough credit' to course difficulty factors like tons of fairway bunkers, etc. The answer that I got was that the system was intended to best match golfers familiar with the course and these golfers usually figure out, one way or the other, how to avoid those issues (mostly)

You certainly look at features in different places for the scratch and bogey golfer. so fairway bunkers at say 240 from the tee are effectively ignored when rating for a bogey golfer because they are not in the 'landing area'

[Halebopp]

7 hours ago, ThinkingPlus said:

But that's not how it works.  The CR and slope are always higher for women than men from the same tees.  If it isn't it is a mistake.  I cannot think of any good reason for it not being that way although someone might be able to contrive a course that theoretically would create such a situation.

 

I don't know why the Slope would need to be higher for ladies as it (or Slope/113) merely depicts the slope of the line that passes through Course and Bogey Ratings.

 

Ahyhoo, on that course the Slope is the same (122) for both from the reds, 127 vs 128 from the blues and 132 vs 135 from the yellows, slightly higher Slopes for men. But those numbers alone are completely useless.

 

All it tells us is that the difference between CR and BR is around 25.7 (actually 25.9) for the ladies and around 20.8 for men from the orange (easy) tees. For men the BR is 135% of the CR and for ladies it's 141%. Everything I look at makes it clear the orange tees are more difficult for women than they are for men.

[ThinkingPlus]

5 hours ago, Halebopp said:

 

I don't know why the Slope would need to be higher for ladies as it (or Slope/113) merely depicts the slope of the line that passes through Course and Bogey Ratings.

 

Ahyhoo, on that course the Slope is the same (122) for both from the reds, 127 vs 128 from the blues and 132 vs 135 from the yellows, slightly higher Slopes for men. But those numbers alone are completely useless.

 

All it tells us is that the difference between CR and BR is around 25.7 (actually 25.9) for the ladies and around 20.8 for men from the orange (easy) tees. For men the BR is 135% of the CR and for ladies it's 141%. Everything I look at makes it clear the orange tees are more difficult for women than they are for men.

In the US, what you describe would be highly unusual and highly unlikely, but theoretically possible.

[Halebopp]

20 minutes ago, ThinkingPlus said:

In the US, what you describe would be highly unusual and highly unlikely, but theoretically possible.

 

The Course Rating System is the same all over the world and the raters go (or should be going) through the same vetting processes to ensure they get things right so I'm not sure about how the U.S. would be any different from other countries. But I do agree with you that such a situation is most probably extremely rare.

 

[ThinkingPlus]

4 minutes ago, Halebopp said:

 

The Course Rating System is the same all over the world and the raters go (or should be going) through the same vetting processes to ensure they get things right so I'm not sure about how the U.S. would be any different from other countries. But I do agree with you that such a situation is most probably extremely rare.

 

It shouldn't be different, but it is the only place I have ever played.  All the course info in my personal spreadsheet is US only.

[DaveLeeNC]

15 hours ago, dhc1 said:

anyone whose argument uses courses with different course ratings simply doesn’t understand what slope was specifically designed for: portability of handicaps across course with differing difficulty (particularly for bogey golfers). 

 

I have never heard of such a thing as slope being specifically a tool to measure the difficulty of two courses with the same CR. Why in the world is this even particularly useful? Where does this come from? 

 

Slope is actually intended to measure the difficulty of a course across differing skill levels. And that is a purpose that is actually useful.

 

dave

[Rincewindwiz]

48 minutes ago, DaveLeeNC said:

Slope is actually intended to measure the difficulty of a course across differing skill levels. And that is a purpose that is actually useful.

 

My understanding also.

[Rincewindwiz]

1 hour ago, Halebopp said:

The Course Rating System is the same all over the world and the raters go (or should be going) through the same vetting processes to ensure they get things right

Great theory but . . . . .

In the UK we are just getting started with slope and by general consensus, a number of course ratings just don't stack up against peoples experience.  This rather suggests the course rating process was not overseen by anyone with a knowledge of the golf courses in question. Quite likley since the process is mostly a tick box process that can even be completed by non-golfers!

[Halebopp]

1 hour ago, Rincewindwiz said:

Great theory but . . . . .

In the UK we are just getting started with slope and by general consensus, a number of course ratings just don't stack up against peoples experience.  This rather suggests the course rating process was not overseen by anyone with a knowledge of the golf courses in question. Quite likley since the process is mostly a tick box process that can even be completed by non-golfers!

 

Without trying to belittle their experiences, I rather believe the raters have gone through the required training and passed the practical tests before they've been set free on your islands.

 

The system isn't perfect and there are outliers that simply don't fit into the system (we have one at our home club, I've mentioned it in the PCC thread). But even so I'd be willing to bet that the vast majority of the complainers simply aren't happy with losing strokes at their home club and/or are simply looking at the Course Handicaps at different courses without realizing they also need to consider the Course Rating (which was omitted from the CH calculations in the UK) to get the whole picture.

[Rincewindwiz]

29 minutes ago, Halebopp said:

 

I rather believe the raters have gone through the required training and passed the practical tests before they've been set free on your islands.

 

. But even so I'd be willing to bet that the vast majority of the complainers simply aren't happy with losing strokes at their home club

UK raters were home grown (my girlfriend was one so Ive been through the pain!)

 

I have no idea what the members are saying, these are my observations from courses I know well - though I do understand at one course (Rye in Sussex) the members are 'unhappy' because the CR is 116. Bernard Darwin (a famous UK golfer and golf writer from a bygone era) famously said 'the hardest shots at Rye are the second shots to the short holes!!.

Edited November 3, 2020 by Rincewindwiz

[nsxguy]

42 minutes ago, Rincewindwiz said:

UK raters were home grown (my girlfriend was one so Ive been through the pain!)

 

I have no idea what the members are saying, these are my observations from courses I know well - though I do understand at one course (Rye in Sussex) the members are 'unhappy' because the CR is 116. Bernard Darwin (a famous UK golfer and golf writer from a bygone era) famously said 'the hardest shots at Rye are the second shots to the short holes!!.

 

The CR (Course Rating) is the number closest to par.

 

116 would be a SLOPE rating. They represent different things.

[Rincewindwiz]

1 minute ago, nsxguy said:

 

The CR (Course Rating) is the number closest to par.

 

116 would be a SLOPE rating. They represent different things.

Sorry Yes. Slope

[Ty_Webb]

1 hour ago, Rincewindwiz said:

UK raters were home grown (my girlfriend was one so Ive been through the pain!)

 

I have no idea what the members are saying, these are my observations from courses I know well - though I do understand at one course (Rye in Sussex) the members are 'unhappy' because the CR is 116. Bernard Darwin (a famous UK golfer and golf writer from a bygone era) famously said 'the hardest shots at Rye are the second shots to the short holes!!.

 

I'm kind of with you. I haven't looked at all of them, but a good number of the courses in England that I know well have slope ratings lower than I would have expected. Certainly relative to courses in the US I would consider as broadly similar.

[dhc1]

4 hours ago, DaveLeeNC said:

 

I have never heard of such a thing as slope being specifically a tool to measure the difficulty of two courses with the same CR. Why in the world is this even particularly useful? Where does this come from? 

 

Slope is actually intended to measure the difficulty of a course across differing skill levels. And that is a purpose that is actually useful.

 

dave

Sigh. As specifically mentioned by both the designer of the program and the USGA Head, slope was designed to account for the fact that being 10 over the course rating at a harder course is far more difficult than being 10 strokes over on an easier course and that without a slope adjustment, the two players wouldn’t be able to have a fair match. 
 

the concept that certain posters keep asserting (a higher course rating means “harder” even if it’s solely because a course swapped a par 3 for a par 5), is simply wrong as is the concept that it’s easier to shoot below the course rating on a higher sloped course than a lower sloped one. 

[Shilgy]

21 hours ago, dhc1 said:

Sigh. As specifically mentioned by both the designer of the program and the USGA Head, slope was designed to account for the fact that being 10 over the course rating at a harder course is far more difficult than being 10 strokes over on an easier course and that without a slope adjustment, the two players wouldn’t be able to have a fair match. 
 

the concept that certain posters keep asserting (a higher course rating means “harder” even if it’s solely because a course swapped a par 3 for a par 5), is simply wrong as is the concept that it’s easier to shoot below the course rating on a higher sloped course than a lower sloped one. 

Your example of what is harder-swapping out a par 3 for a par 5 is valid....but....the course may not be “harder” with the par 5 but the scores will be higher. Which is what is actually being measured. Not “difficulty “.