Sandbagging

pingguy · January 22, 2006

Is it bad everywhere?

Sandbagging has gotten so bad at my course that low handicappers have no chance in the tournaments anymore. To make things worse the handicap and tournament chairmen are the worst sandbaggers of them all. They have even gone as far as to eliminate the gross score payout in most of the tournaments. I love my course and I would hate to have to quit playing tournaments there because of a bunch of cheaters. I also don't want to have to artificially inflate my handicap in order to compete. Either way I refuse to donate my entry fees this year. Whats it like at your club? How do other places keep the cheaters under control?

progolferch · January 22, 2006

I the 2 day select shot tourneys at my club if your in a high flight your pretty much screwed

Sam-Tee-Time · January 23, 2006

It's terrible everywhere I"ve been. The sandbagging, "gimmes", and the "foot wedge" are alive and well in Golf. (cool)

For this reason - I find it hard to play handicap-adjusted events, whether they be Fun events (corporate scrambles, etc.), or member events (Member/Guest, etc.) at a club. What a shame - it's disgraceful to watch the behavior of most golfers I see out there.

progolferch · January 23, 2006

I agree with that 1000%

tpariff · January 23, 2006

On Saturday we played the opening day tournament at my new course, Southern Hills Plantation Club, in Brooksville, FL. The format was a 4 person, 2-ball low net. My group consisted of me (6 handicap), a 7, an 18 and a 20. We shot 19 under using the 2 best net low ball scores on each hole. I shot a gross 79, the 7 shot a gross 82, the 18 shot a gross 86 and the 20 shot a gross 91.

Another group had 3 players, two 18s and a 14 and they shot 21 under using the 2 best net low ball scores. Their 14 handicap shot a gross 77 from the blue tees which play almost 6,500 yards and have a course rating of over 72 (I can't recall the exact rating). And keep in mind this is the first time anyone has played the course. One of the group's 18s shot an 82 gross.

I've been playing tournament golf for a long time and really don't like playing in net events. I only played in this one because it was opening day and the entry fee went to a very good charity, the Monique Burr Foundation.

tarik · January 27, 2006

During the summer months I play allot of sponsored scrambles and must say that there are allot of sandbaggers. Guys who won city and state champs are playing as 5's and 6's, when they should be giving strokes. I play as a -1 so to even the playing field I will acquire two women players with 30+ handicaps, with one mid player and another sub-ten player. Its a formula for success and we won about ten tourneys last season.$$$

simmoboy · January 28, 2006

We dont have a very big problem with it at our course because all our tournemnts are split up into 2 or 3 grades depending on your handicap and the number of people in the comp.

Of course there is still the people playing of there high 20 handicaps but atleast they are only playing against other people with handicaps in the 20's.

The best thing about it is if you are a single figure marker the highest handicap you are going to play against is 9 or even 6 depending on the event.

Brent

QbSpanka11 · January 28, 2006

At my club they do a lot of like 75% handicap stuff, so if you're a 4 you're playing as s 3, if you're a 20 you're playing as a 15. This really cuts down the high handicaps winning stuff,but still gives them a chance. theres also some max handicap of like.. 27 i think?

maguy1970 · January 28, 2006

I thought the max handicap was a 36...

Anyways, sandbagging is an issue you will never be able to eliminate. I played in a charity event down in New Jersey, at Hollywood Country Club. The tournament is a fund raiser for a community medical center. Great tournament. It is every man for himself/herself, with 100% handicaps being used. The winning net score was 62. So, who ever won basically shot 10 strokes better than their handicap. I played as a 10 and had a 81, so I was 71. I finished in 7th or 8th. The winning 5 scores were all between 7 and 10 under.

Has anyone here with a legitimate handicap, ever shot 10 strokes better than your handicap? A lot of my posts refer back to articles, adn this one will as well. Golf Digest had a GREAT article about sandbagging a few years ago, complete with statistical analysis on handicaps and the probabilities of shooting a specific number of strokes below your handicap... I am going to try to find it, it is a great read

My course here, if you are not in the top flight, you will end up with some sandbaggers. Guys whose handicaps you look up on GHIN and find that of their 20 reported scores, go figure 5 out of 5 tournament scores are on there and then 1/2 the "recreational" rounds are 5-6 strokes worse. I was suprised when one of my pals at another course told me his club championship is done with full handicaps, but some guys will haggle with some of the more notorious sandbaggers to get them to agree to cut their handicap by a stroke or 4, so whatever they decide on the tee, is what they play to. My club just has seperate flights. Championship (up to handicap of 7) A Flight (8-11) B Flight (12-15) C Flight (16-19) D Flight (20+) Although guys with a 7 handicap have the option to compete in the A Flight is they wish.

maguy1970 · January 28, 2006

I see people shoot 10 strokes under their handicap a lot. There are 2 reasons. Firstly, their handicap may be based on play at a course rated at say 68. So if they are a 10 handicapper, 96% of the average of te top 10 of their last 20 scores would be 78. So say the course is a par 72, and they play 6 strokes better than their "handicap" and shoot a 72. That's a net 62!

The other issue is simply probablility. If you have say 200 people in a tournament, and say a 30% chance of anyone shooting better than their handicap on a given day, 60 of those 200 will play better than their handicap. How much better? Who knows? Some people can play a lot better. Now if 60 people are 10 strokes better, that is one thing, but of 3 are 10 strokes better, that's another.

Low handicappers are really at a disadvantage in large handicapeed events becasue of the variance of scores for high handicappers. If I were say a real 3 handicapper, I would not enter group scored handicapped events very much.

Frostback,

OK, on a rating of 68, a person who goes and shoots 78's and ends up with an index of 10 or so, would then not go shoot a 78 on a 72 rated course. That would already be an improvement of 4 or so strokes. If you take a person's index, it gets adjusted for the rating. so if this course where the rating is 68, and it is a par 72, wouldn't anyone's index get adjusted down 3-4 strokes when playing there? So for a person to be a 10 handicap at a par 72 with a rating of 68, wouldn't their index then be around a 14? With an index around there, in a 100% handicap tournament, on a rating of 72, that person then would have to shoot a 76 to get to 62. Anyone ever play a match with a 14 who shot a 76? If so, did you ever do it again with them still as a 14?

I wish I could find that article for you. It goes into statistics beyond just 'probability' like standard deviation among other things. If I remember right, it is almost a statistical improbability to shoot 5 strokes better than your handicap. And it does not matter if you are a 2 or a 22. With an accurate handicap, there is very little probability in shooting significantly under your number.

I want to readdress that TEN stroke issue. I was involved in a thread here about pro handicaps. Most agree your average, repeat average tour pro is around a +5. 10 strokes below that would be +15. How many 57's do you see? ok, adjust up for rating and slope... how many 60's do you see? Take it a step further. If the average tour handicap is around 5, what about the elite? Tiger might be a +7, so let's take his extra TEN strokes and that brings us to 58. Never been done. Getting 5 strokes under his handicap, working off these rough assumptions, leads us to 63. How often does Tiger shoot 63? Yes, the greatest golfer ever arguably, is capable of shooting 5-6 strokes better than his handicap once out of maybe every 12 rounds, which would be 8% of the time. So please let me knoe of any mere mortals in the golf world who can play 7-10 strokes better than their legitimate handicap.

Frostback, I am not trying to attack you, I get off on throwing around numbers and statistics and analysis. I actually love to get into discussions about probabilities of handicaps and all that, with different folks theories on which handicap and what profile is better suited for tournaments or better suited for general enjoyment of the game, etc, etc , etc....

animalistic · January 28, 2006

the '18' hcaps playing to 10 and 12 are everywhere in golf and it pisses me off to see them take the prizes at the end of the day (cool)

wmann · January 28, 2006

this happened to me this fall...these are from previous posts...

So heres the deal, I am playing in a big tournament this weekend. An event that you play either sat or sun and its full handicap.

There are 3 flights 0-9 (which I am in so this doesn't effect me) 10-14 and 15+. The prize structure is that gross and net are the same prize (they pay both) and its a set of clubs in all flights for both.

I notice when I get done that in the 10-14 flight there is a net 57.

I am so dumbstruck that I didn't notice the gross.

I just checked with the pro shop, the 57 net did indeed win...

no suprise there. 2nd net was a 64.

The course is a par 70, but the slope is a 130 and its no easy track....

sounds like the saying "cheaters never prosper" isn't always true.

The tournament is the "International" at the st johnsbury country club in Vermont. The course is a very nice track....Kind of short but a nice track.

The tournament gets 180 or so players over the 2 days.

The course rating is:

68.9/130 par 70

For what its worth I ended up at 2nd net with a net 68 and feel I hit it pretty good.

What are the odds that this could happen with a legit handicap? Anyone ever seen a number like this?

pingguy · January 29, 2006

I notice when I get done that in the 10-14 flight there is a net 57.
I am so dumbstruck that I didn't notice the gross.

I just checked with the pro shop, the 57 net did indeed win...

no suprise there. 2nd net was a 64.

For what its worth I ended up at 2nd net with a net 68 and feel I hit it pretty good.

What are the odds that this could happen with a legit handicap? Anyone ever seen a number like this?

The odds are astronomical. In fact they are so impossible that chances are even if someone played their entire lifes they would never do it.

From Golf Digest-

The odds of someone beating their handicap--if it's an honest handicap--by eight strokes are 1,138 to 1. For most players that represents about 54 years of golf--a lifetime for many. The odds of beating your number by eight strokes twice are 14,912 to 1, or 710 years of golf.

The fact is these people are cheaters and we have wrapped them up in this cutesy "sandbagger" moniker. I quit calling them sandbaggers last year and switched to cheater. I love the game of golf, it's like no other game in the world, but people who have legitimate handicaps need to stand up to the 12 handicapper who shoots 72 (yes this happened to me 2 weeks ago) and tell them what you think.

Wow sorry went off on a rant there (cool) The good thing is everyone out there hopefully has that group they play with where the games are fair, and the payouts are friendly.

Damo75 · January 29, 2006

Hi guys.

In Australia, both the handicapping system and the course rating system works completely differently It also sounds like the way competitions are run is quite different as well. All up, it certainly goes a way to alleviating the problem, but I suppoose you can never get rid of it completely. If someone wants to cheat bad enough, they will find a way.

Most competetions are run in 3 grades according to handicaps, and have gross and nett prizes, so the single figure players aren't competing against the high handicap players. And while someone can still cheat, it is much more likely that someone off say 27 will shoot a gross 89, than a player off 2 shooting a gross 64. So the players with similar handicaps play against each other rather than everyone. Like I said, it helps against sandbagging, but still not foolproof. Then again, I suppose nothing is.