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Baggers getting the boot!


ditchparrot19
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The men's club at my course has conducted two Northern California Golf Association qualifiers so far this year – the 2-Man Better Ball in February and the 4-Man, 2-Best Ball on the 15th of this month. The same guys who won the 2-man deal were on the team that won the 4-man event by a whopping 16 shots. Their score in the 4-man was 109, which was reportedly 9 strokes better than any score turned in across the entire NCGA for this event. A 12-handicapper shot a gross 73, a 20-handicapper had an 82, etc., etc.

In addition, one of those guys was a three-peat winner of the net club championship prior to last year.

Needless to say, there's much uproar within the club and a lot of people have said they'll boycott any future handicap events that the two main guys in question are a part of. Talk is that they'll be eighty-sixed from the club, which is a move I'm in favor of. I not only don't trust them, but I don't care for either one personally. They dick around on the course and play slow as hell and act like whatever they want to do should be fine with everybody else.

Has anybody ever seen a situation like this play out? I'm just wondering whether these clowns will have any recourse if things go down like they appear they're going to.

John

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KUDOS to your club! There's usually a lot of talk and saber rattling, but in my experience it's extremely rare that a club or association actually takes action to ban someone due to sandbagging. Honestly though, a strong handicap committee can and should have taken steps a long time ago to get the naggers back in line. I'm curious, were there any interim steps taken to try to keep them in line? That's what the peer review process is supposed to be all about..... Keep us informed!

In David's bag....

Driver: Titleist 910 D-3;  9.5* Diamana Kai'li
3-Wood: Titleist 910F;  15* Diamana Kai'li
Hybrids: Titleist 910H 19* and 21* Diamana Kai'li
Irons: Titleist 695cb 5-Pw

Wedges: Scratch 51-11 TNC grind, Vokey SM-5's;  56-14 F grind and 60-11 K grind
Putter: Scotty Cameron Kombi S
Ball: ProV1

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We had one guy at the club who either seemed to not be able to count in tourneys or only posted his second and third rounds of the day.

After years of hearing the whispers - the members themselves ran him out of playing in any cash events.

Honestly he was a nice guy and I loved getting paired up with him only because I could never miss a putt with his reads - but for some reason he just could not control himself.

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Chris, although my friends call me Mr.L

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I'm curious, were there any interim steps taken to try to keep them in line? That's what the peer review process is supposed to be all about.....

Keep us informed!

I'm not sure whether there was any official action taken, as I'm still a fairly new member of the club. Might've just been a lot of griping and wringing of hands until this became a last-straw scenario.

John

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I think thats great that your club is booting them. I can't stand sandbaggers. When I play in the Golf Week Amatuer tour here in Denver. They have flighted groups. I'm in the C group 12-15.9 handicap range. If someone wins and shoots 4 strokes or more better then there handicap, they are immediately moved up to the next group.

I think they do a decent job of controlling sandbaggers.

Driver: Callaway Big Bertha 10.5* 

3WD:  Callaway Big Bertha 15* / X2 Hot H4 Hybrid
Irons:  Callaway Apex 4-PW Project X 5.5 shafts

Wedges: Callaway MackDaddy 2  52/58
Putter: Odyessey Metal X Milled 1

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With handicap system, if someone continues to win or place high in tournament standing, isn't that a sure giveaway that he is sandbagging?   Or, the person is improving fast, too fast for handicap index to catch up.    But what can be done?   I like the system of only counting scores from official tournaments to count toward GHIN.   That'd eliminate a lot of sandbagging, would it not?

RiCK

(Play it again, Sam)

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With handicap system, if someone continues to win or place high in tournament standing, isn't that a sure giveaway that he is sandbagging?   Or, the person is improving fast, too fast for handicap index to catch up.    But what can be done?   I like the system of only counting scores from official tournaments to count toward GHIN.   That'd eliminate a lot of sandbagging, would it not?

it might eliminate sandbagging a bit, but what would a guy like me be called when I dropped 5 strokes in 3 months, it probably would take a year for me to drop with tourney only scores. It may give me a bit of an advantage.

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Chris, although my friends call me Mr.L

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With handicap system, if someone continues to win or place high in tournament standing, isn't that a sure giveaway that he is sandbagging?   Or, the person is improving fast, too fast for handicap index to catch up.    But what can be done?   I like the system of only counting scores from official tournaments to count toward GHIN.   That'd eliminate a lot of sandbagging, would it not?

No, quite the opposite.

A lot......maybe even most golfers, don't even play official, sanctioned tournaments, but they do play competitively with buddies and acquaintances.  What you would have would be legal, sanctioned sandbagging.  Where a relatively few, "tournament" rounds, would serve to keep handicaps artificially high even though the golfer may play over a hundred rounds a year.

Handicaps would, in many cases take years to adjust to an individuals actual ability.  You see a lot of that in the CONGU system.

In David's bag....

Driver: Titleist 910 D-3;  9.5* Diamana Kai'li
3-Wood: Titleist 910F;  15* Diamana Kai'li
Hybrids: Titleist 910H 19* and 21* Diamana Kai'li
Irons: Titleist 695cb 5-Pw

Wedges: Scratch 51-11 TNC grind, Vokey SM-5's;  56-14 F grind and 60-11 K grind
Putter: Scotty Cameron Kombi S
Ball: ProV1

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The men's club at my course has conducted two Northern California Golf Association qualifiers so far this year – the 2-Man Better Ball in February and the 4-Man, 2-Best Ball on the 15th of this month. The same guys who won the 2-man deal were on the team that won the 4-man event by a whopping 16 shots. Their score in the 4-man was 109, which was reportedly 9 strokes better than any score turned in across the entire NCGA for this event. A 12-handicapper shot a gross 73, a 20-handicapper had an 82, etc., etc.

In addition, one of those guys was a three-peat winner of the net club championship prior to last year.

Needless to say, there's much uproar within the club and a lot of people have said they'll boycott any future handicap events that the two main guys in question are a part of. Talk is that they'll be eighty-sixed from the club, which is a move I'm in favor of. I not only don't trust them, but I don't care for either one personally. They dick around on the course and play slow as hell and act like whatever they want to do should be fine with everybody else.

Has anybody ever seen a situation like this play out? I'm just wondering whether these clowns will have any recourse if things go down like they appear they're going to.

Truthfully, I'd put a lot of the blame on your club and their board of directors. These guys may be cheaters, but it's up to the handicap chairman to monitor things like this so that they don't get out of control. In this case, your board ducked the issue for far too long. Now, it's taken an uprising by many of the members for them to man up and take action??? Sounds to me like your handicap chairman should get the boot, along with the cheating members.

One of the nice things about my men's club is that despite a sizeable membership (nearly 400 members), the handicaps are pretty well policed and the handicap chairman does a good job of monitoring tournament showings. At any given time, there will be a sheet in the Pro Shop showing 10-15 members who are playing at their LI, or given a designated handicap for all tournaments until further notice. One of my buddies was adjusted down, and while he was pissed off (and I sympathized with him, because he is definitely not a sandbagger), part of me was glad to see that the board wasn't afraid to take action.

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I post every score religiously and right now I play to a 15.1 index.

I am very sensitive to the "sand bagger" issue.

So much so that I generally will not play money games except with my regular group.

And when I do play for money I will volunteer to drop at least two strokes from my posted handicap.

I have a nagging rotator cuff injury to my left shoulder (I play left handed). It will flair up for a couple of weeks and then go away for a week.

When my shoulder is sore I cannot keep my elbow tucked into my body on the down swing due to the pain.

As a result I end up hitting weak slices or shanks almost every second shot. It looks like I am flailing at the ball.

So my posting record will show a few mid to low 80 scores and then a bunch of mid to high 90 scores.

I know that the handicap systems takes the best 10 of 20 scores but often I have have a bunch of good scores in a row and then a bunch of bad scores and there are times when the majority of the good scores fall off and only the bad scores are left.

My shoulder affects every swing except for my putts ....... and that's a completely different story.

So if I play after my shoulder is feeling good for a week or more I can shoot over 5 strokes below my handicap easily.

This makes me a sand bagger.

So my only solution is to NOT post my scores when my shoulder is sore.

I would suggest that my handicap committee would frown on that solution.

I wonder just how many others are in a similar situation to mine.

I am not suggesting that these two are not truly sand baggers as they are posting 10 strokes below their cap.

I am merely pointing out a situation where there exists a large swing in the posted scores even though one is trying not to be a sand bagger.

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I am merely pointing out a situation where there exists a large swing in the posted scores even though one is trying not to be a sand bagger.

I buy that although I don't believe you should lower your handicap for tournaments as long as you play tournaments when you are healthy, and when your injury flairs up.   If you only play tournament when you are healthy, that's in gray area of sandbagging (IMHO).

As far as scoring range goes, I don't think you are alone.  Even without any known injury like yours, I think there are two kind of golfers: one who scores in narrow range most of the time, and the rest whose scores fluctuate in wide range (especially those high handicappers like me).  I am the latter.  E.g, in the last 2 week period, I've scored 87 and 109 from a same course/tee.   I think I can win a tournament on a good day and appear to be I was sandbagging.  But I won't be winning them in any consistent manner given my score range and that we play 90% handicap in our club.

RiCK

(Play it again, Sam)

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I'm sure my club has a few sandbaggers but I'm too new to the club to know who they are yet.  There appears to be no shortage of vanity cappers though.

Joe Paradiso

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Played in a club tournament last year, quite a big deal because it was sponsored by Ping and the prizes were expensive. It was open to all

I came in after playing really really well, apart destroying myself on the 18th, was gross 8 over, so thought I was really in with a shout.

Didn't stand a chance. Never made the top five. Guy who won shot something like gross 6 over playing off of 20. He'd been a member for a week.

I shook the guys hand, because not to is to be a bad loser, but many didn't.

Have not seen him since. Knowing some of the more 'Mediterranean' membersof my club, he's probably fish food.

Taylor Made R11S 9 Degree

Callaway X 3 Wood

Taylor Made 3 & 5 Rescue

Mizuno MP57 5-PW

Titleist Vokey 52, 60

Ping Scottsdale Anser

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My club uses strictly tournament results for handicapping; this began last year and it's why I let my GHIN expire (I use Yahoo Golf to track non-tourney rounds). There are 12 tourneys annually, about 7 or 8 where a handicap can be posted, ie, non-scrambles. So yes, it could take a long time to move a handicap but I think it's a fair trade. All tourneys are flighted and I haven't heard any complaints yet.

In my Bag: Driver: Titelist 913 D3 9.5 deg. 3W: TaylorMade RBZ 14.5 3H: TaylorMade RBZ 18.5 4I - SW: TaylorMade R7 TP LW: Titelist Vokey 60 Putter: Odyssey 2-Ball

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I am merely pointing out a situation where there exists a large swing in the posted scores even though one is trying not to be a sand bagger.

You make an interesting point, although this is probably a topic for another thread. The one recourse that you have available to you I believe, is that you can always declare a "practice round" before you tee off. As long as you declare before the round, you aren't required to post the score whether it be good or bad.

If your shoulder pain is as debilitating as it sounds, I would declare a practice round every time it flares up. There's simply no way you are going to shoot a good score when every other shot is a weak slice or shank.

I do something similar, as I play about 5 or 10 "travel" rounds each year, mostly for work. I almost never bring my golf clubs with me on an airplane, so I am usually using rental clubs - sometimes extremely crappy rentals, at that. Over the past year, I have decided any round that I play with a rental set (whether it be a brand new set of new model TaylorMade's or a crappy old set of Dunlop knockoffs) will be a practice round.

PS, ask @bplewis24 , about the quality of rental clubs at Wildhorse. By the back 9, I was digging into his bag just about every other shot!

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Honestly though, a strong handicap committee can and should have taken steps a long time ago to get the naggers back in line. I'm curious, were there any interim steps taken to try to keep them in line? That's what the peer review process is supposed to be all about.....

Truthfully, I'd put a lot of the blame on your club and their board of directors. These guys may be cheaters, but it's up to the handicap chairman to monitor things like this so that they don't get out of control.

I'm with David and Big C here.  While I have no doubt they are sandbaggers, I place at least some of the blame at the club and it's committee(s) or lack thereof.  That's one of the reason I left my club from the past 3 years.  The same sandbaggers are always competitive in rounds, and always play great in NCGA qualifiers or money events.  Yet, my club has no handicap committee that adjusts tournament handicaps based on past performance.

PS, ask

Ha, I seem to recall the wedges in that set were pretty bad.

Brandon a.k.a. Tony Stark

-------------------------

The Fastest Flip in the West

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The handicap committee should assign a "special handicap" to these two individual in any future competition.  I have seen this done at my club and in a men's club I belong to.  If the handicap committee doesn't react to these situations they will soon find no one willing to compete in any handicapped tournaments.

Butch

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