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Golf League Change-Up, Need Some Opinions

Golds

Golds

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NY Winter
My golf league is in the middle of contemplating a change in the format of how we group players and scoring. We want to implement a very simple stroke program where players below average will get a fixed amount of strokes to help equalize the playing field. The goal is to allow someone with a higher scoring average to at least have a shot at winning in tournaments but still force them to play lights out to win. We do not want to implement a whole handicap system because not all golfers in the league are enthusiasts with the understanding or the time to handle that. Also, handicap strokes sometimes negatively effect a "scratch" player going against a high handicapper. Right now we have 3 flights that are determined by the skill level, Flight A is the best, followed by B, and Flight C is the worst. We are thinking of only having two groups, A and B with group B being the players below the avg score of the entire league. Good players will be "scracth" and strokes will only be given to players who have a certain avg score, for example players who score 105-110 will get 5 strokes, players who score 110-115 will get 10 strokes (this is hypothetical) with 10 strokes being the ceiling.

Has anyone been in a league that does this or does this sound like it would be successful? Anyone see flaws in this that will mess up scoring?
 
I see by changing to just A and B that may push away some members. My club does the A,B and C flights but we also have people cheating by not entering certain rounds. Our B flight has some seriously good golfers that flat cheat. It's always tough to figure out a fair system, especially with high HC'ers that can have some decent rounds every now and than. If I am shooting say 100 and I am playing against a scratch player, I would expect a few strokes on almost all the holes except par 3's. Good luck with it bro, it's tough to please the mass's.
 
Golds said:
My golf league is in the middle of contemplating a change in the format of how we group players and scoring. We want to implement a very simple stroke program where players below average will get a fixed amount of strokes to help equalize the playing field. The goal is to allow someone with a higher scoring average to at least have a shot at winning in tournaments but still force them to play lights out to win. We do not want to implement a whole handicap system because not all golfers in the league are enthusiasts with the understanding or the time to handle that. Also, handicap strokes sometimes negatively effect a "scratch" player going against a high handicapper. Right now we have 3 flights that are determined by the skill level, Flight A is the best, followed by B, and Flight C is the worst. We are thinking of only having two groups, A and B with group B being the players below the avg score of the entire league. Good players will be "scracth" and strokes will only be given to players who have a certain avg score, for example players who score 105-110 will get 5 strokes, players who score 110-115 will get 10 strokes (this is hypothetical) with 10 strokes being the ceiling.

Has anyone been in a league that does this or does this sound like it would be successful? Anyone see flaws in this that will mess up scoring?
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I'm not a scratch golfer. But I don't believe that to be true at all.
 
blugold said:
I'm not a scratch golfer. But I don't believe that to be true at all.
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I've played in tournaments where the lowest scorer could get a birdie on a hole but a high handicapper erases that birdie with his bogey (because he got two strokes). That's what I meant by "negatively effecting" the low scorers.
 
Golds said:
I've played in tournaments where the lowest scorer could get a birdie on a hole but a high handicapper erases that birdie with his bogey (because he got two strokes). That's what I meant by "negatively effecting" the low scorers.
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But a bogey for a high capper is no different than a bird for a scratch player, IMO. I am a 15HC and have plenty of doubles on holes, more bogeys than pars.
 
Golds said:
I've played in tournaments where the lowest scorer could get a birdie on a hole but a high handicapper erases that birdie with his bogey (because he got two strokes). That's what I meant by "negatively effecting" the low scorers.
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Yeah this thread is totally derailed. But that is how the handicap system is supposed to work. It did what it was supposed to do. But I digress.
 
VA. Vince said:
I see by changing to just A and B that may push away some members. My club does the A,B and C flights but we also have people cheating by not entering certain rounds. Our B flight has some seriously good golfers that flat cheat. It's always tough to figure out a fair system, especially with high HC'ers that can have some decent rounds every now and than. If I am shooting say 100 and I am playing against a scratch player, I would expect a few strokes on almost all the holes except par 3's. Good luck with it bro, it's tough to please the mass's.
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We would merge the groups into 2, nothing would really change that much to make anyone feel disrespected. This isn't a club league or anything like that, it's a league that has developed over the years into a 27 person self ran league.
 
Golds said:
We would merge the groups into 2, nothing would really change that much to make anyone feel disrespected. This isn't a club league or anything like that, it's a league that has developed over the years into a 27 person self ran league.
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Ah, I was thinking like my club. We have abc teams playing other clubs. With 27 players that may work? What do the other members think?
 
blugold said:
Yeah this thread is totally derailed. But that is how the handicap system is supposed to work. It did what it was supposed to do. But I digress.
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I agree, but the low handicappers in the league don't like that system (I know it's stupid) that is why we are playing around with something like this.

Back on topic lol...
 
The league I play in is a nine hole Tuesday afternoon league where no one belongs to the course (its run through a company and its employees and add ons). We use some simple software that keeps track of player's handicaps on the rounds played for that course. Before you have a handicap established (we allow a single round to create the starting handicap), the Callaway handicap scoring system is used for that first round.

We have some pretty decent players and some absolute duffers, and no one has any problem using handicaps to equate play. This way, you don't need any flights and just play to the handicap strokes given. Sandbagging is not really a serious problem because only scores from the league are used to calculate handicap, not from the rest of the rounds each player plays during the year. However a couple players have been known to blow some short putts at the end of the round if they are way up or down in their match so it still comes into play a little bit.

I think this approach would server your league better than 1 or 2 thresholds to determine # of strokes given.
 
Also, there's a 36 handicap limit (18 for nine holes) so that the good players have a very good chance against the weak players. I would tell your low cappers to quite whining and play well to win.
 
Golds said:
I agree, but the low handicappers in the league don't like that system (I know it's stupid) that is why we are playing around with something like this.

Back on topic lol...
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On the flip side, your proposed system might not give enough strokes to those that need them.
 
VA. Vince said:
Ah, I was thinking like my club. We have abc teams playing other clubs. With 27 players that may work? What do the other members think?
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They are open to it, I wanted to see if anyone on here saw any holes in this type of scoring system. The whole idea behind this is to allow some equalization in the league with out having a crazy high handicapper having an average round but with strokes given having a chance to win. We want to keep it so that everyone has a chance to win, but keep it so that everyone will need to still have a fantastic round to have a shot at winning.
 
blugold said:
On the flip side, your proposed system might not give enough strokes to those that need them.
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That is why I wanted opinions on here about this idea. Nothing is set in stone, the original post was simply a blue print of what we are trying to design. Any feedback and suggestions are welcome.
 
Golds said:
They are open to it, I wanted to see if anyone on here saw any holes in this type of scoring system. The whole idea behind this is to allow some equalization in the league with out having a crazy high handicapper having an average round but with strokes given having a chance to win. We want to keep it so that everyone has a chance to win, but keep it so that everyone will need to still have a fantastic round to have a shot at winning.
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that's the point of the handicap system. FWIW.
 
golf4life said:
Also, there's a 36 handicap limit (18 for nine holes) so that the good players have a very good chance against the weak players. I would tell your low cappers to quite whining and play well to win.
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Thank you, I completely agree and I don't think they necessarily know what a handicap system really is. It's a lot of back and forth when it comes to changes in this league, even though everyone is awesome
 
Golds said:
That is why I wanted opinions on here about this idea. Nothing is set in stone, the original post was simply a blue print of what we are trying to design. Any feedback and suggestions are welcome.
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If you're not going to follow the Handicap manual, a good method that I have seen used in leagues (average score - course rating) x .8 then round up or down to the nearest number. The difference is the amount of strokes the high average gets in that pairing. It give a touch of advantage to the low handicap, but it is pretty simple.

VA. Vince said:
Like I said...

Sorry if my opinion derailed...
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It didn't. Too many leagues get dominated by the opinions of the low handicaps because they feel entitled to advantages because of the handicap.
 
Golds said:
They are open to it, I wanted to see if anyone on here saw any holes in this type of scoring system. The whole idea behind this is to allow some equalization in the league with out having a crazy high handicapper having an average round but with strokes given having a chance to win. We want to keep it so that everyone has a chance to win, but keep it so that everyone will need to still have a fantastic round to have a shot at winning.
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As Blu has said, the whole point of a handicap is so that a weak player having an average game has a chance to beat a good player having an average game. Handicap systems actually slightly favor the better player as it is. I just think a lot of good players don't like to lose to poorer players ever in any situation.

I would definitely keep the flights if they wouldn't accept handicapping as not giving enough strokes to a weaker player is eventually going to cause those weaker players to stop playing I would think.
 
blugold said:
If you're not going to follow the Handicap manual, a good method that I have seen used in leagues (average score - course rating) x .8 then round up or down to the nearest number. The difference is the amount of strokes the high average gets in that pairing. It give a touch of advantage to the low handicap, but it is pretty simple.



It didn't. Too many leagues get dominated by the opinions of the low handicaps because they feel entitled to advantages because of the handicap.
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The latter quote, I agree 100%.
 
The only leagues or tournaments I've played in have all been handicapped systems, and usually based on GHIN handicaps.
 
Thanks for your opinions guys!!
 
I think because it isn't a club league, this will fall a part since I am sure not everyone will keep a handicap. Plus this is a traveling league so it isn't centered around one home course. Currently we have 3 flights and no strokes given, wil probably stay that way.
 
IceyShanks said:
The only leagues or tournaments I've played in have all been handicapped systems, and usually based on GHIN handicaps.
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Same here. Sandbagging also is as old as the game itself........
 
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