Strength and Depth of Field in Jack's Day and Tiger's Day

[GreatestGolfers]

I think the model of levelling out as in your graph has logic & is likely (unless they double the number of entrants per tournament - not likely)

[Rogin]

Hi, new to the forum and this thread immediately appealed to me. As a bit of a golf historian it's right up my street.

I think most of the salient points have been made above. I thought one approach would be to try and find a common unit to measure strength of field. As people have argued above, scoring averages are interesting but ultimately irrelevant, as no-one really knows what former players would have shot with modern equipment on today's courses, or vice-versa. I think there is only one standard measure comparable to the 1960s and the 2010s, and that is "players good enough to win a major". Now I would argue that nowadays, there are certainly 50 players in any given major field who are quite capable of winning, quite aside from the "freak" complete outsiders like Lawrie, Micheel or Curtis who pop up from outside that group to win. A look at the current rankings pretty much backs that up - in the 40s are Dubuisson, Schwartzel, Mahan, Molinari, Hoffman, Bradley, Simpson and Lowry. Three of that group have won majors, and no-one would bat an eyelid if any of the others won the PGA next month.

Go back to 1970, and a comparable set of players (those in the 40s-50s on the World Money List) would have included Ray Floyd (a recent major winner), a young Hale Irwin (who would go on to win a few), Chi Chi Rodriguez, Deane Beman, Jim Colbert, Kermit Zarley, Labron Harris, and Neil Coles. All good players, and in Coles' case certainly a player who could have won an Open with a bit more luck, but I would argue head-to-head not as good as the modern crop, by the "good enough to win a major" measure. Certainly, from my memory, when majors teed off in the 1970s/80s, no-one was credibly expecting any players to come from outside the top 20 or 30 on the rankings to win.

However, are the players at the very top of the rankings as good now as then? Let's define a second common standard unit, "players to win four majors or more". Among currently active players, only Tiger, Mickelson, Els and McIlroy have won four majors or more (and two of those are nowhere near the top of the rankings). Now, okay, this is post-hoc reasoning, as Spieth, Oosthuizen and others may go on to join that set, but in say, 1977, at or still near the top of the game were Nicklaus, Watson, Trevino, Player, Floyd and Ballesteros, who were all in (or would go on to join) the four-major-winning category, and even Arnie was still knocking it round (finished top 25 in all the majors that year). It's very difficult to draw a conclusion from that, but I would agree that the overall strength of the top ten has, on occasions in the past, been higher than now.

What I can't decide is if the first factor outweighs the second in answering the overall question!

[iacas]

However, are the players at the very top of the rankings as good now as then? Let's define a second common standard unit, "players to win four majors or more". Among currently active players, only Tiger, Mickelson, Els and McIlroy have won four majors or more (and two of those are nowhere near the top of the rankings). Now, okay, this is post-hoc reasoning, as Spieth, Oosthuizen and others may go on to join that set…

The first directly affects the second. And I think the first extends beyond the top 50 today while it almost never really went below 20 or 30 in Jack's day. That affects the multiple major winners too.

[mmoan2]

Hi, new to the forum and this thread immediately appealed to me. As a bit of a golf historian it's right up my street.

I think most of the salient points have been made above. I thought one approach would be to try and find a common unit to measure strength of field. As people have argued above, scoring averages are interesting but ultimately irrelevant, as no-one really knows what former players would have shot with modern equipment on today's courses, or vice-versa. I think there is only one standard measure comparable to the 1960s and the 2010s, and that is "players good enough to win a major". Now I would argue that nowadays, there are certainly 50 players in any given major field who are quite capable of winning, quite aside from the "freak" complete outsiders like Lawrie, Micheel or Curtis who pop up from outside that group to win. A look at the current rankings pretty much backs that up - in the 40s are Dubuisson, Schwartzel, Mahan, Molinari, Hoffman, Bradley, Simpson and Lowry. Three of that group have won majors, and no-one would bat an eyelid if any of the others won the PGA next month.

Go back to 1970, and a comparable set of players (those in the 40s-50s on the World Money List) would have included Ray Floyd (a recent major winner), a young Hale Irwin (who would go on to win a few), Chi Chi Rodriguez, Deane Beman, Jim Colbert, Kermit Zarley, Labron Harris, and Neil Coles. All good players, and in Coles' case certainly a player who could have won an Open with a bit more luck, but I would argue head-to-head not as good as the modern crop, by the "good enough to win a major" measure. Certainly, from my memory, when majors teed off in the 1970s/80s, no-one was credibly expecting any players to come from outside the top 20 or 30 on the rankings to win.

However, are the players at the very top of the rankings as good now as then? Let's define a second common standard unit, "players to win four majors or more". Among currently active players, only Tiger, Mickelson, Els and McIlroy have won four majors or more (and two of those are nowhere near the top of the rankings). Now, okay, this is post-hoc reasoning, as Spieth, Oosthuizen and others may go on to join that set, but in say, 1977, at or still near the top of the game were Nicklaus, Watson, Trevino, Player, Floyd and Ballesteros, who were all in (or would go on to join) the four-major-winning category, and even Arnie was still knocking it round (finished top 25 in all the majors that year). It's very difficult to draw a conclusion from that, but I would agree that the overall strength of the top ten has, on occasions in the past, been higher than now.

What I can't decide is if the first factor outweighs the second in answering the overall question!

I agree with your post wholeheartedly. The only way to answer this question completely rationally is to develop a strength-of-field metric. The problem is, to get a consensus, you would need a team of well-funded university statisticians to account for all the variables and make a peremptory, robust model. They have more important things to do (generally!). Which is why these sports topics about "was the past better than the present" are compelling - they work in incomplete arguments, and appeal to emotion at the same time. Everyone gets to pick their favorite scientific evidence and roll with it. I would agree that some arguments are better than others, and I have my own opinions, but there's no unassailable proof here. BTW - I voted that 17 majors in the 90s-10s is better. I would have voted for 15!

[turtleback]

Then how do you explain Hoosiers? HA!!!!! How you like them apples, science guy!

Sorry, couldn't resist.

Easy.  That was such a rare occurrence (low probability events Do happen) that they made a friggin' movie out of it.  To try to apply the same logic to strength of field you would need that same to thing over and over and over again  Because Hoosiers was a single data point.  And strength of field involves hundreds of events.  Very low probability event become astronomically low when we ask that they compound.

Hi, new to the forum and this thread immediately appealed to me. As a bit of a golf historian it's right up my street.

Welcome to the board!!  A couple of points"

Scoring averages are not irrelevant - absolute scoring averages are irrelevant.  The degree to which one player's scoring average is better than his contemporaries on a year to year basis IS relevant, IMO.  And, as you could find documented in other threads here, this is yet another area where Tiger is dominant. I know this doesn't bear directly on the strength of field issue, but since I had most recently addressed the scoring average I wanted to make sure I wasn't misunderstood about that.

As to your "players who have won 4 majors" criteria.  Doesn't it almost automatically follow that if the fields are weaker only below the top 4-5 the best players will pile up more majors than if the fields are stronger?  And aren't you using that to then argue that the fields were stronger?  Strong fields will even out the winning of majors.  Weak fields will skew them so fewer guys have more majors.

[GreatestGolfers]

The first directly affects the second. And I think the first extends beyond the top 50 today while it almost never really went below 20 or 30 in Jack's day. That affects the multiple major winners too.

To measure whether player A's year "X" was better / worse than year "Y", I'd first put some relative weightings to the different events.
Let's say, if we give a regular US Tour event a weighting of 1, what would you give to these events in 2015: -

a) A major - win

b) A major - R'up

c) A Major - 3rd place

d) A WGC event

e) The Players Champ.

f) Other

[mmoan2]

Easy.  That was such a rare occurrence (low probability events Do happen) that they made a friggin' movie out of it.  To try to apply the same logic to strength of field you would need that same to thing over and over and over again  Because Hoosiers was a single data point.  And strength of field involves hundreds of events.  Very low probability event become astronomically low when we ask that they compound.

Dude, lighten up, please. Would you feel better if I said I agree with you?

Using a robust multivariate time-series regression model that had variables such as average wind speed in 1977 vs. 1999, comfort level of golf slacks of the top 5 clothing manufacturers, and a decay factor of persimmon wood club heads vs. the wearing of wedge grooves in the 80s,90s,and 00s I've determined that Tiger Woods would take 2 of 3 from Jack Nicklaus in a bare knuckle boxing match. That makes him my GOAT. Screw the majors thing!!!!

[iacas]

To measure whether player A's year "X" was better / worse than year "Y", I'd first put some relative weightings to the different events.

Let's say, if we give a regular US Tour event a weighting of 1, what would you give to these events in 2015: -

a) A major - win

b) A major - R'up

c) A Major - 3rd place

d) A WGC event

e) The Players Champ.

f) Other

That has almost nothing to do with my post.

You can't look at players who win four majors or more as a measure of strength of field… because it's more likely to have four-time-major-champs in weaker fields. The first (strength of field) directly affects the second (players with 4+ majors).

As I've said multiple times (in various versions):

A game = capable of winning a major if they play reasonably well.

B games = capable of winning a major if they play really well.

C games = not really capable of winning a major unless $DEITY_OF_CHOICE has placed a few grand on them in Vegas.

Scenario 1

10 players with "A" games

30 players with "B" games

110 players with "C/D" games

Scenario 2

60 players with "A" games

90 players with "B" games

Conduct four majors a year for 20 years. Which group will have more 4+ major winners? Which has the stronger field?

The problem with talking about strength of field is that you can only compare players to their fellow competitors at the time, who may be weaker or stronger than the players they played against when winning or losing as often as they did.

[turtleback]

Quote:

Originally Posted by iacas

The first directly affects the second. And I think the first extends beyond the top 50 today while it almost never really went below 20 or 30 in Jack's day. That affects the multiple major winners too.

To measure whether player A's year "X" was better / worse than year "Y", I'd first put some relative weightings to the different events.

Let's say, if we give a regular US Tour event a weighting of 1, what would you give to these events in 2015: -

a) A major - win

b) A major - R'up

c) A Major - 3rd place

d) A WGC event

e) The Players Champ.

f) Other

Quantifying opinions does not change them from being opinions.  And even if there WERE some magical method for weighting these achievements, who is to say the weighting would be anything like the same for some other season.  After all this also depends on strength of schedule.  Does a British Open without McIlroy, the #1 ranked player in the world, playing get a lower weighting than one he plays in?

You weren't around here back then but I was one who argued that there should be no asterisk for majors won while Tiger was injured (a point that only seemed to be raised by tiger detractors as a red herring they could easily swat), but if you really want to get quantitative you would have to adjust for the strength of the field in every event- AND have a way to make year to year and era to era comparisons.  And at every step of the way you are going to have to make subjective decisions about how to incorporate it into the ostensibly objective weighting.

Look at the OWGR.  You couldn't ask for a more quantified objective system.  Yet at times it produces silly results.  Because it is not really objective it is the outcome of a lot of subjective decisions (how many years, what weighting per event, how measure strength of field for assigning points to events, how to "age" the points, etc.).  It IS possible to devise a system that, while subjective, can be objective in its application, but the OWGR doesn't even do that.  It has an objective way of assigning points to events based on its strength of field model BUT when they do not like how THAT comes out they override and replace the results of their own model with their (subjective) judgement, assigning points in majors in a way unrelated to strength of field, as every other event was objectively weighted.

And I'm not even saying that they are wrong in their outcome - it is their opinion and they are certainly entitled to it.  But they are not entitled to claim any kind of special status, credibility-wise, based on a claim of being objective.  And the same applies to any system that tries to objectively measure something that is, by its very nature, subjective.

[GreatestGolfers]

Quantifying opinions does not change them from being opinions.  And even if there WERE some magical method for weighting these achievements, who is to say the weighting would be anything like the same for some other season.  After all this also depends on strength of schedule.  Does a British Open without McIlroy, the #1 ranked player in the world, playing get a lower weighting than one he plays in?

You weren't around here back then but I was one who argued that there should be no asterisk for majors won while Tiger was injured (a point that only seemed to be raised by tiger detractors as a red herring they could easily swat), but if you really want to get quantitative you would have to adjust for the strength of the field in every event- AND have a way to make year to year and era to era comparisons.  And at every step of the way you are going to have to make subjective decisions about how to incorporate it into the ostensibly objective weighting.

Look at the OWGR.  You couldn't ask for a more quantified objective system.  Yet at times it produces silly results.  Because it is not really objective it is the outcome of a lot of subjective decisions (how many years, what weighting per event, how measure strength of field for assigning points to events, how to "age" the points, etc.).  It IS possible to devise a system that, while subjective, can be objective in its application, but the OWGR doesn't even do that.  It has an objective way of assigning points to events based on its strength of field model BUT when they do not like how THAT comes out they override and replace the results of their own model with their (subjective) judgement, assigning points in majors in a way unrelated to strength of field, as every other event was objectively weighted.

And I'm not even saying that they are wrong in their outcome - it is their opinion and they are certainly entitled to it.  But they are not entitled to claim any kind of special status, credibility-wise, based on a claim of being objective.  And the same applies to any system that tries to objectively measure something that is, by its very nature, subjective.

I agree with what you say.

All I am suggesting, as an interesting exercise (based on opinion) is to come up with a slightly improved view, which at least is consistent in applying certain rules (shared weighting of events). This will produce a result - not THE result, but one based on certain criteria/opinion.

Each type of event weighting can be argued higher or lower, so it is subjective - but still interesting.

I would exclude complexities that you mention, like majors with Tiger not in the field (for now) to get something that addresses the "simple model" first. Then one can add ...

Please give your view on weightings?

On the strength of field (which I would not include for now), I see data on US tour site, going back to 1980 - do you know of available data before that?

[iacas]

All I am suggesting, as an interesting exercise (based on opinion) is to come up with a slightly improved view, which at least is consistent in applying certain rules (shared weighting of events). This will produce a result - not THE result, but one based on certain criteria/opinion.

To what end?

Did Harry Vardon face the competition Hogan, Nicklaus, or Woods did? Yet you'd assign the same values to a British Open in 1896 as you would to one in 2005?

Please give your view on weightings?

Again, to what end…?

It's too complex an issue. Harry Vardon should probably get less points for winning a British Open than a modern Tour player gets for finishing 10th. But you can't quantify that, so… to what end?

[Patch]

Because of the difference in course conditions, and equipment used by Jack, and Woody in their different eras of golf, this question will never have a complete, 100% answer.  It'not relevant, and is  the same as the discussion on slow play. It's has no definitive answer, and the various pro/con opinions are just that. Nothing more, but good for one's post count.

[iacas]

Because of the difference in course conditions, and equipment used by Jack, and Woody in their different eras of golf,.

I don't think those have much to do with anything. Jack has said better equipment makes it tougher to separate yourself from the pack. It has a known (not quantified, just direction) on strength of field - it improves weaker players while not helping stronger ones.

[Rogin]

Quote:

On the strength of field (which I would not include for now), I see data on US tour site, going back to 1980 - do you know of available data before that?

For the 1960s/70s, McCormack's annuals often contained a table showing how many of that year's top 15 money winners competed in each event. It - by its nature - means it is a retrospective view, as it doesn't tell you how many of LAST year's top 15 competed in each (which in principle is how the OWGR weights events nowadays). But it's a reasonable guide. And as a rule of thumb, follow the money: the richer events, like the Westchester Classic, the Memorial, the Crosby, the Bob Hope, and the TPC after it was founded, always had the strongest fields. The Canadian Open was always strong, too, and the Western Open, as I think winning those events offered 5-year exemptions not 1 year.

[ccotenj]

[QUOTE name="Patch" url="/t/74049/strength-and-depth-of-field-in-jacks-day-and-tigers-day/330#post_1178118"] Because of the difference in course conditions, and equipment used by Jack, and Woody in their different eras of golf,.  [/QUOTE] I don't think those have much to do with anything. Jack has said better equipment makes it tougher to separate yourself from the pack. It has a known (not quantified, just direction) on strength of field - it improves weaker players while not helping stronger ones.

^^^ this... not just the better equipment, but the technology to "fit" the player with that equipment... it can easily be argued that tiger would have been even more dominant (a somewhat scary thought) if the "golf ball arms race" alone hadn't have happened (thanks usga/r&a; for dropping the ball there)... add in the clubs, and the ability to fit those clubs perfectly to a player's swing, and it makes the argument even easier to make... if the op wants to bring "course conditions" into it... it is again easily arguable that course setups are more "difficult" than they used to be, and that has nothing to do with length... watch some old golf telecasts and see where the pins are cut, for one example...

[saevel25]

^^^ this... not just the better equipment, but the technology to "fit" the player with that equipment... it can easily be argued that tiger would have been even more dominant (a somewhat scary thought) if the "golf ball arms race" alone hadn't have happened (thanks usga/r&a; for dropping the ball there)... add in the clubs, and the ability to fit those clubs perfectly to a player's swing, and it makes the argument even easier to make...

Heck, Tiger destroyed the field from 99 till 2003. Golf fitting and the driver distance boom didnt happen till after 2003-2004. Then Tiger started to drop from the top 10 driving distance consistently.

[ghalfaire]

There is an engineering adage, "if you cannot put a number on it you don't really understand it yet".  So since it is fun to argue the point the issue will never be solved until there is some consensus on a specific definition of "strength field".  How about something like Strength of Field is the probability that a player in the lower 90% of the field scoring averages can win a tournament given that 80% of the better 10% of scoring average is present.  It would take a lot data and a lot of calculations to ever find this number but it could be done.  More work than I am willing to do but who knows?  Maybe someone will.  One has to wonder how Tiger would do on 1960 courses with a steel shafted, persimmon head driver, and wound balota (spelling) ball.

[iacas]

There is an engineering adage, "if you cannot put a number on it you don't really understand it yet".

Strength of field is not an engineering problem.

Even if you try to turn it into one, with your definition, others will disagree with your definition and that changes all of the math.

One has to wonder how Tiger would do on 1960 courses with a steel shafted, persimmon head driver, and wound balota (spelling) ball.

Well, he won three U.S. Ams with some pretty old equipment. I think he'd have done fine… and again, even Jack Nicklaus has said that better equipment narrows the gap between the poorer players and the elite players.