2023 Memorial Tournament

[klineka]

22 minutes ago, jxdama said:

It  doesnt  matter how far  offline  a shot  goes  if there  is  no penalty  for  it. 

But in your scenario (thick rough right off the fairway) that brings less of a penalty because the balls have virtually no chance of rolling into hazards but in my scenario (less thick rough or shave areas near hazards) the balls have a higher chance of reaching the hazards or getting way offline, which actually brings a higher penalty into play vs just having a bad lie but a clean shot at the green because the 5 inch rough 6 feet off the fairway stopped the ball.

There are plenty of hazards that would be more in play at Muirfield Village if the rough wasn't as thick.

 

25 minutes ago, jxdama said:

Here are several things  i would do to adjust  courses to the explosion in equipment technology. No more  535 yard  par  5's. Any par 5 has to be  600+ yards, any other gets  converted to a  long  par 4. Reduce  chicken sticking. If you  have a  410 yard  par  4 make the layup landing area extremely  narrow with the very  narrow  fairway lined with deep rough and deep bunkers.

Par is largely irrelevant though. The goal of golf is (in their case) to play 72 holes in the fewest number of strokes. Every hole regardless of length could be called a par 3, would that make you feel better? There'd be far more bogies, far less birdies, and players would be struggling to make pars which is what you claim you want. But that doesn't change the difficult of the course, the winner would still be the player who plays 4 rounds in as few strokes as possible.

26 minutes ago, jxdama said:

I want the  best  players to have to figure  out how to make a  par. That  to me  is far  more exciting than to have every  hole  a  birdie  hole.

Par doesn't matter. It's quite literally a made up concept. 

 

You still didn't address my comments about how thick rough around the greens isn't a good test of golf compared to having shaved areas.

Nor did you address my question about how if a player comes out and shoots a 62 or 63 or something today does that automatically mean this tournament is no longer a decent test of golf?

[saevel25]

On 5/29/2023 at 10:45 AM, georgep said:

The free shuttle from the zoo is a great way to avoid parking headaches/fees.

I wish I saw this earlier. I would recommend parking at hole 16 entrance, if it is still there. Really easy to get out of the tournament, just hang a right. 

On 5/29/2023 at 10:45 AM, georgep said:

Never seen discounts on tickets that I recall, but they are often available thru business contacts or you could split the week with a friend.

This is how I use to go. We would get tickets through a rep when I worked at the City of Dayton. 

On 5/29/2023 at 10:45 AM, georgep said:

The front nine is a longer walk (fewer holes are adjacent) but also typically is less crowded (6 and 7 are good spots… I love watching on 5 but it’s about as far from the main entrance as you can get).

I find the course to be a pretty bad tournament course from a spectator perspective. It is hilly, and it is out and back. There are not really many holes that are next to each other. The course looks amazing. 

34 minutes ago, jxdama said:

It  doesnt  matter how far  offline  a shot  goes  if there  is  no penalty  for  it.

These guys are really really good at saving par. So, you miss 40% of the fairways, make par on them. Then try to go on a birdie run when you hit the fairway. You have 60+ golfers, odds are a handful are going low. Even if the winner ends up at -15 to -20, the average for the week might still be over par. 

34 minutes ago, jxdama said:

ere are several things  i would do to adjust  courses to the explosion in equipment technology. No more  535 yard  par  5's. Any par 5 has to be  600+ yards, any other gets  converted to a  long  par 4.

Par is not relevant. It is who shoots the lowest score. You could take par away and just count up the # of strokes. 

34 minutes ago, jxdama said:

make the layup landing area extremely  narrow with the very  narrow  fairway lined with deep rough and deep bunkers. Make  hitting driver the  best  option. Eliminate  lift  clean and  cheat and  in any drop never allow  a  player to place the  ball. If  the  ball happens to land  slightly  closer to the  pin, so be  it. I  have other  ideas, especially  for  improving the  playoff.

That just promotes hitting driver. Shot zones scale with distance hit, so a 3-wood is not that more accurate than a driver. A long iron might not be as accurate as you think it is. If you make it so penal off the tee, then why would you ever hit iron to just be stuck 80+ yards behind your driver? 

They RARELY play lift clean and place. Not sure why you bring that up. Especially this week, it hasn't rained in Ohio for about 10 days or so. All the courses are hard as a rock right now. 

Also, you want to modify every course so they look the same then? 15 yard wide fairways, 8" rough, british style pot bunkers? Come on man. 

30 minutes ago, jxdama said:

I want the  best  players to have to figure  out how to make a  par. That  to me  is far  more exciting than to have every  hole  a  birdie  hole. Also, its  incredibly  boring when its  coming  down to the  last  few  holes  but  you  know none  of them are difficult and  its  unlikely the  leader will stumble.

If you watch golf tournaments, plenty of leaders crumble in the final round. 

Also, scoring average on tour right now is 71. With how often they turn courses in to par 70 or par 71 courses, average scoring is even par. 

[snapfade]

I have to agree with some of the above comments. Par is irrelevant in stroke play tournament golf.  Its who took the least amount of shots. Par, birdie, GIR, on base percentage and whatever gives Brandy Chambly and stat guys something to talk about. Somewhere I remember a book that was titled, "Lowest Score Wins"......hmmm if I can only remember where it was that I saw that????  

 

P.S. I'll say it again, the only thing good to come out of Dayton, Ohio is Guided by Voices. 🙂

Edited June 2, 2023 by snapfade
add snide comment

[jxdama]

5 hours ago, klineka said:

But in your scenario (thick rough right off the fairway) that brings less of a penalty because the balls have virtually no chance of rolling into hazards but in my scenario (less thick rough or shave areas near hazards) the balls have a higher chance of reaching the hazards or getting way offline, which actually brings a higher penalty into play vs just having a bad lie but a clean shot at the green because the 5 inch rough 6 feet off the fairway stopped the ball.

There are plenty of hazards that would be more in play at Muirfield Village if the rough wasn't as thick.

 

Par is largely irrelevant though. The goal of golf is (in their case) to play 72 holes in the fewest number of strokes. Every hole regardless of length could be called a par 3, would that make you feel better? There'd be far more bogies, far less birdies, and players would be struggling to make pars which is what you claim you want. But that doesn't change the difficult of the course, the winner would still be the player who plays 4 rounds in as few strokes as possible.

Par doesn't matter. It's quite literally a made up concept. 

 

You still didn't address my comments about how thick rough around the greens isn't a good test of golf compared to having shaved areas.

Nor did you address my question about how if a player comes out and shoots a 62 or 63 or something today does that automatically mean this tournament is no longer a decent test of golf?

From what  i just  heard  on the golf  channel magically  the  course  got  softer  overnight and  now  its  a  boring  birdie  fest. The  players had a  pissy fit and  once again the  course was altered to satisfy egos.

 

As far as rough around the greens  if  players thought  thick rough  lining  greens and fairways would  make them score better they would  be crying  for  it.

Edited June 2, 2023 by jxdama

[klineka]

9 minutes ago, jxdama said:

From what  i just  heard  on the golf  channel magically  the  course  got  softer  overnight and  now  its  a  boring  birdie  fest. The  players had a  pissy fit and  once again the  course was altered to satisfy egos.

Your takes are ridiculous man. They don't make logical sense.

The cut is going to be MULTIPLE strokes over par and you're calling it a boring birdie fest? That means that around half the field hasn't shot a 2 round score under par. But yeah go on about it being a boring birdie fest. That's absurd.

In fact, as of typing this, only 5 holes are averaging under par. That means over 72% of the holes are averaging OVER PAR. Some boring birdie fest huh?

9 minutes ago, jxdama said:

As far as rough around the greens  if  players thought  thick rough  lining  greens and fairways would  make them score better they would  be crying  for  it.

 We see far more thick rough right off the greens on a week to week basis than we do shaved areas that repel balls further away.

So by your own logic in the previous paragraph about players getting whatever course setups they want, it'd sure seem like the players actually want thick rough around the greens opposed to shaved runoffs and tight lies, right? 

Edited June 2, 2023 by klineka

[GolfLug]

8 hours ago, jxdama said:

Thats fine  if an offline shot  is  penalized severely  but far too often hitting  it  60 yards offline finds  nothing  but  a  good  place to play from.

Did you mean 60 feet?

[jxdama]

3 hours ago, GolfLug said:

Did you mean 60 feet?

60 yards

[iacas]

6 hours ago, jxdama said:

a  boring  birdie  fest

The cut came at +3, buddy.

[klineka]

1 hour ago, iacas said:

The cut came at +3, buddy.

@jxdama 40 out of like 120 players shot under par today. Some birdie fest, eh?

It's comical at this point man. 

[ChetlovesMer]

Maybe I'm the weird one, but I like when they go low. 
If I want to watch a bunch of guys shoot over par, I'll just attend a TST meet-up. 👍😁👍

Seriously, though. I enjoy watching great golf. If that means watching the best in the world struggle to break par against a really tough course or really tough conditions, so be it. (I'm looking at you, 2007 Masters.) 

But I actually prefer when somebody can make a run at the end by stringing together some birdies, get hot and take the tournament. (Like the 1989 Masters.) 

Given a choice I'd always prefer the 1989 Masters, where Faldo made 8 birdies down the stretch to take the tournament. For my taste, that's much more exciting than the 2007 Masters where we watched a whole bunch of guys make bogies and double bogies down the stretch and have Zach Johnson win the Masters as basically the winner of a war of attrition. 

[GolfLug]

10 hours ago, jxdama said:

60 yards

Unless you are talking about an outlier St Andrews Old Course double hole complex like 1 & 18, that doesn't make sense. 

Do you have any other examples? 

[Vinsk]

16 minutes ago, GolfLug said:

Unless you are talking about an outlier St Andrews Old Course double hole complex like 1 & 18, that doesn't make sense. 

Do you have any other examples? 

[saevel25]

Announcers crapping on the use of training aids. Calling it Tin Cuppy. Ugh. 

[iacas]

15 minutes ago, saevel25 said:

Announcers crapping on the use of training aids. Calling it Tin Cuppy. Ugh. 

In what context?

I'd be curious to hear more about this. Tour pros use them pretty frequently.

[iacas]

I started watching the coverage (I recorded it). Rory was using a Smart Ball to keep the club/arms in front of him more in the backswing, and a ProSENDR to get a neutral wrist condition at the top, they said.

Nobilo quickly added that Justin Rose has used the Smart Ball in the past. I think they're a little surprised he's using it on a Saturday, but… it wasn't too bad a reaction.

[saevel25]

Maybe I took it wrong, but the comment about Tin Cup made me think that they were mocking the use of training aids. I think in Tin Cup, every scene about training aids were like, WTF are you using these things for. 

[iacas]

37 minutes ago, saevel25 said:

Maybe I took it wrong, but the comment about Tin Cup made me think that they were mocking the use of training aids. I think in Tin Cup, every scene about training aids were like, WTF are you using these things for. 

They were, a little. But I thought it was pretty mild.

[boogielicious]

The final three holes are posing quite a challenge today. Lots of missed fairways and long putts for par.