Scramble Cheaters

[Elmer]

Yes, but I honestly don't have much choice on participation.

The Marketing dept will stop by my desk -"We need you to take the day off work and go play golf at this very nice country club. Paid"

Am I going to say no?

You need to grow a backbone and tell the Marketing Dept that you have work that needs to be accomplished.

Spending the day golfing does not help you meet the deadlines and productivity management and the stock holders expect of you!

(As I type this I am watching the clock, because I am leaving work early to go golfing!)

[Dave2512]

I agree. My thread is a little difference in that it asks how they do it. It seems foreign to me to be like "hey, we would have birdies that if your ball wouldn't have bounced, we're taking a birdie."

This is what I see in scrambles: people that "lose" typically don't take advantage of everything allowed. Some of it ignorance, may not have seen the handout describing the format and rules, and some of it they approach it wrong i.e. they ignore what's allowed in favor of trying to play it like it's a stroke play tournament by adhering to the RoG when they don't have to. And there is always some luck involved. When you have four chances at every shot happenstance tends to be favorable.

There is little reason to cheat in a scramble because most are fundraisers and those that aren't typically some kind of teambuilding or networking event where the real goal is people having a good time. A bigger problem than cheating, which probably isn't as rampant as it seems, is people playing in  scrambles taking it too serious. The only scrambles I've ever seen that have any real consequence are usually held at private clubs in two man teams that play multi day tournaments with seeded brackets, handicaps are used, strokes involved etc. and real prize money as well as trophies are awarded.

So I wouldn't ask how they supposedly cheated as much as trying to figure out what I (you) missed. I've seen oblivious teams turn in silly scores like 80 or something in scrambles where mulligans were sold. It's a total WTF because you know they were out there grinding away while everyone else was partying and laughing as they were taking stupid shot after stupid shot burning through mulligans and beer trying to make birdies.

[turtleback]

Yeah I don't know. Last summer my instructor had me a play a 3 ball best ball scramble homework assignment to prove a point. I didn't have any bad holes playing 3 balls on my own, both days yielded sub 70 scores.

And I'd bet most of that comes from not having to play the bad shots as compared to getting to play the best shot.  I bet your score would have improved almost as much if you just played the second best shot.  Not your worst but not your best.  I bet you would still get most of the improvement from eliminating the bad shot.  It would be an interesting experiment.

Let me illustrate

the 18HI's might improve by 20 strokes better than their HI and be -2.

The 5Hi's might improve by 15 strokes and end up at -10.

The 18's improved by more than the 5's but they'll still lose.

I do not understand your problem.  Dave, a 6 at the time, said he played a personal 3 ball scramble and finished a little under par. @Duff McGee says that demonstrates the unlikelihood of the crazy scores people turn in.  You say no it doesn't because high handicappers benefit more than low cappers from the forgiveness of scrambles.

There is a pretty clear implication there, if maybe unintended.  Don't you see how this is easily saying that even though a 6 playing a 3 ball scramble could only get a little under par, high handicappers can get into those crazy 50s scores because they benefit more from scramble format?  And surely you can see, when put this way, how what you are saying above is no justification for the issue you took with @Duff McGee ?

[tony21]

I think these people write down the "woulda been in" shots as in. Some do just straight up lie. The worst I was in this year was -19. 2 teams had double eagles on a 560 yd par 5, even with a 330 yd drive you have a 230 down hill shot to a green surrounded with traps and a pond in front. The best was on the same course with volunteers at every hole to "greet and thank golfers for participation" or verify scores. winning score was -4...the same team that shot -17 a month earlier was +1...I guess they just had an off day.

[Duff McGee]

And I'd bet most of that comes from not having to play the bad shots as compared to getting to play the best shot.  I bet your score would have improved almost as much if you just played the second best shot.  Not your worst but not your best.  I bet you would still get most of the improvement from eliminating the bad shot.  It would be an interesting experiment. I do not understand your problem.  Dave, a 6 at the time, said he played a personal 3 ball scramble and finished a little under par. @Duff McGee says that demonstrates the unlikelihood of the crazy scores people turn in.  You say no it doesn't because high handicappers benefit more than low cappers from the forgiveness of scrambles.    There is a pretty clear implication there, if maybe unintended.  Don't you see how this is easily saying that even though a 6 playing a 3 ball scramble could only get a little under par, high handicappers can get into those crazy 50s scores because they benefit more from scramble format?  And surely you can see, when put this way, how what you are saying above is no justification for the issue you took with @Duff McGee ?

Thank you. This is what I was trying to get across but you did so more eloquently.

[Duff McGee]

I think these people write down the "woulda been in" shots as in. Some do just straight up lie. The worst I was in this year was -19. 2 teams had double eagles on a 560 yd par 5, even with a 330 yd drive you have a 230 down hill shot to a green surrounded with traps and a pond in front. The best was on the same course with volunteers at every hole to "greet and thank golfers for participation" or verify scores. winning score was -4...the same team that shot -17 a month earlier was +1...I guess they just had an off day.

Thanks for posting this. This is exactly what I would predict would happen if there were score checkers. Perfect illustration.

[David L Yskes]

No lie, I think most scrambles are a joke.... but that's just me... Now my brother plays in scrambles, but it's only two people scrambles and you are paired with another team, so you always have eyes on you.... But if I get a chance , I will try a 3 ball challenge to see how my scores would be... Sent from my SM-N910V using Tapatalk

[flopster]

Been a few years since last time I played in one of these and of course I didn't get disappointed with the wild scores, we came in at -12 and I felt we played pretty damn good but of course there was a -17 team who lets just say by appearance didn't pass the eye test if you know what I mean, the unfortunate thing was this was a nice establishment that had gps display panels on every cart and for the tournament (cough, cough) they had us enter our scores electronically so you can keep track of the leaders, the winners finally made par by the 15th hole according to their card.... I was the shortest hitter on the group and the first 2 holes were dead into the wind giving us approaches from 190+ we managed a par but the winning team made birdies on both just hard to imagine.