World Handicap System Now Out (2020)

[dennyjones]

7 minutes ago, DaveP043 said:

As I understand things, eventually all scores around the world will be available to handicapping authorities through some centralized database.  In theory, all scores posted for play on that golf course on that day are used to determine the PCC, no matter where those players maintain their handicaps.   Assuming that is so, scores from the Grint would be used to determine the PCC, along with scores posted in GHIN, scores posted through the Chicago District Golf Association (directly authorized by the USGA for that region, but chooses not to use GHIN), scores posted by England residents who happen to play your course and post through their home service, etc.  I don't know for sure how the Grint is set up for this, I hope they'll explain it to you if you ask.

From what I've been told, I'd expect the influence of the PCC to be pretty small.  First, its expected to be applied relatively rarely, something like 10% of the time in Virginia.  Chances are that if scores are high enough to trigger a PCC, correcting them down by a stroke or two won't bring them into your best 8 of the last 20.  

The GRINT thinks the par is 72, rather than 69, which explains the 3-stroke difference in Course Handicap.  Did par change for the course based on the new guidelines?  Its possible that the Grint just needs to update its data.  

thanks...

[dsc123]

My home club is still out of season but I played 5 rounds in North Carolina last week.  I was interested to see how the PCC shaked out, but none of the scores were adjusted. 

The day we played Pinehurst No. 2 it was really windy.  The +2 in our group shot an 81 (followed it up the next day with 7 birdies and an eagle at Tobacco Road en route to a 69).  Another scratch player shot an 89.  I thought maybe that would be indicative of everyone that day and we'd see a PCC, but it didn't happen.    

[iacas]

8 hours ago, dsc123 said:

My home club is still out of season but I played 5 rounds in North Carolina last week.  I was interested to see how the PCC shaked out, but none of the scores were adjusted. 

The day we played Pinehurst No. 2 it was really windy.  The +2 in our group shot an 81 (followed it up the next day with 7 birdies and an eagle at Tobacco Road en route to a 69).  Another scratch player shot an 89.  I thought maybe that would be indicative of everyone that day and we'd see a PCC, but it didn't happen.    

The point many seem to be missing is that even if those were “PCCed” they likely wouldn’t be top 8 of 20.

For all we know that might be a small factor in the PCC calculation: what percentage of players would, if adjusted, count the score when they otherwise wouldn’t have. Maybe if >5%, no PCC.

[dsc123]

I assume the PCC will show up regardless of whether the score is used for my handicap, right?

I've just been interested to see how the PCC will work in practice.  And what the threshold might be.  Those 5 rounds are my only "in season" rounds since the change (I assume they don't adjust out of season scores) so I was curious to see if there were any PCC adjustments.  With the wind and high scores from good golfers, I thought that might be indicative of a round that would see a PCC. 

Its one data point, but it suggests to me that it would take extreme weather to get a PCC.

 

2 hours ago, iacas said:

For all we know that might be a small factor in the PCC calculation: what percentage of players would, if adjusted, count the score when they otherwise wouldn’t have. Maybe if >5%, no PCC.

Perhaps.  Then again, your 10th best round might be your 8th best two weeks from now. 

[iacas]

15 minutes ago, dsc123 said:

Its one data point, but it suggests to me that it would take extreme weather to get a PCC.

It’s not about the weather, really.

For all you know your scores were high because it’s not your home course or you’re not used to the conditions, etc. For all you know your scores were the only real aberrations that day. Maybe 75% of the scores were perfectly normal.

It’s simply an algorithm that requires a significant enough scoring change from what’s expected by enough people to matter.

 That’s all it is.

If scores are mostly normal, no PCC.

If not enough scores are posted, no PCC.

[Missouri Swede]

24 minutes ago, iacas said:

It’s simply an algorithm that requires a significant enough scoring change from what’s expected by enough people to matter.

The manufacturing guys might know better, but it reminds me of one method of quality control/assessment for a process.  Check the end results, to see if there's a significant deviation from the expected (or previous) outcome.  So here we aren't worried about every variable in the process (e.g., wind, temperature, precipitation) to see if we "should" have a PCC.  Let the statistics tell us.

[DaveP043]

33 minutes ago, dsc123 said:

I assume the PCC will show up regardless of whether the score is used for my handicap, right?

I've just been interested to see how the PCC will work in practice.  And what the threshold might be.  Those 5 rounds are my only "in season" rounds since the change (I assume they don't adjust out of season scores) so I was curious to see if there were any PCC adjustments.  With the wind and high scores from good golfers, I thought that might be indicative of a round that would see a PCC. 

Its one data point, but it suggests to me that it would take extreme weather to get a PCC.

Perhaps.  Then again, your 10th best round might be your 8th best two weeks from now. 

The PCC will show up in your scoring record, yes, no matter whether that score is one of the best 8 or not.

The PCC won't apply to "out-of-season" scores, since the system won't let you even enter a score if its not "in-season" where you play.  For instance, if you play today at Worthington Manor, GHIN (or more likely for you, the MSGA app) will not let you enter the score, since the posting season doesn't open in Maryland until March 15.

As @iacassays, extreme weather isn't the primary variable, only the actual scores posted matter.  The systems uses some statistically based calculations that consider a number of factors:

How many players scored better (or worse) than would normally be expected. Higher percentage worse will push PCC greater.

How far above (or below) the expected scores were the scores actually reported.  Greater deviation would push PCC greater

How many players actually reported scores.  More scores would push the PCC greater, and lower the "trigger" for a PCC to apply.

The stuff in red is my best estimate of the influence of each factor analysed.  Those are just general influences, the actual calculations will not be released.  And most of us won't be able to see the full list of scores reported for any particular day.

 

[dsc123]

Yeah, I get all that you're both saying.  I'm not saying there should have been an adjustment.  I'm not saying I don't understand why there wasn't one. I am not arguing about anything. 

I was just offering an observation about my first experience with the new system.  I'm curious about how often we'll see adjustments and what the magnitude might be.  I shot an embarrassingly high score, and the other 12 guys on the trip played poorly also (including some terrific players who shot 12+ strokes lower the next day, on a similarly rated course).  The caddy had told us the wind was as strong as it ever gets there.  I thought it might be a candidate for PCC and was interested to see how the new system might be different.  In this case, it wasn't.  That's all. 

As I said, " I thought maybe [our scores] would be indicative of everyone that day and we'd see a PCC, but it didn't happen."  Apparently I was wrong.  Maybe our scores weren't representative of the rest of the players out there.  Maybe the wind stopped.  Maybe it just takes a greater magnitude of differentials to hit the PCC threshold.  Who knows?  Just my observation that after five rounds, I haven't seen a PCC. 

I'm curious if others in places that don't have off seasons have seen any PCC? 

FWIW, the MSGA does let me enter scores all year.  It just doesn't count them.  For the out of season scores, it has a zero in the PCC column, as you would expect. 

[DaveP043]

17 minutes ago, dsc123 said:

I'm curious if others in places that don't have off seasons have seen any PCC? 

FWIW, the MSGA does let me enter scores all year.  It just doesn't count them.  For the out of season scores, it has a zero in the PCC column, as you would expect. 

That's surprising, but that may be one reason that Maryland has chosen to maintain its own calculation service.  You folks are just barely north of the year-round posting area, and I'd guess that you can get a moderate number of rounds in over the winter.  This way you can keep a record of them, even if they don't count in handicap calculation.

I'm just south of you, in northern Virginia.  At my home club we've had a PCC on just one day so far, February 16, with a PCC of +1.  

[dsc123]

Interesting.  Makes me wonder whether its worth the trouble. 

[DaveP043]

46 minutes ago, dsc123 said:

Interesting.  Makes me wonder whether its worth the trouble. 

Its not trouble at all for those of us using it.  Just enter your score.

[dsc123]

1 hour ago, DaveP043 said:

Its not trouble at all for those of us using it.  Just enter your score.

Sorry, I meant that it seems likely to have a minuscule effect on actual handicaps.  Assuming your experience thus far is representative.  In which case, I'm not sure its worthwhile to bother including in the formula.  I suppose they can always see how it goes and tweak it.

[DaveP043]

56 minutes ago, dsc123 said:

Sorry, I meant that it seems likely to have a minuscule effect on actual handicaps.  Assuming your experience thus far is representative.  In which case, I'm not sure its worthwhile to bother including in the formula.  I suppose they can always see how it goes and tweak it.

Yeah, I kinda knew what you were probably getting at, I was just playing dumb (or maybe dumber than normal)

Its important to remember that the WHS is attempting to unify what were previously 6 different handicap systems worldwide.  In an ideal world, they would take the best feature from each system, in a not quite ideal world they had to compromise.  Some version of the PCC has been in effect over much of the world for decades, and is generally seen by its users as a positive thing.  So maybe it IS one of the better ideas.  Otherwise, it may just be a reasonable compromise, with little or no downside.

As for the last sentence you wrote, I've wondered if that's one reason not to release the actual calculation.  The Ruling Bodies can evaluate how things work over some significant time frame, and tweak it a bit if they think is necessary, and we'll never know.

[iacas]

Of the ~4.5 million scores posted so far this year, only about 6% of the scores have had a PCC adjustment applied.

Like we’ve said, too, if you’re having a +PCC adjustment, your score probably isn’t going to count as one of your best 8 of the last 20 scores, so the PCC effect is pretty minor. Still useful, though, as someone who plays well in tough conditions will continue to see an accurate index.

[gbogey]

I must say that 6%

20 minutes ago, iacas said:

Of the ~4.5 million scores posted so far this year, only about 6% of the scores have had a PCC adjustment applied.

I must say that 6% is higher than I thought it would be.  I've basically decided that this is a total non-factor in my area - we get windy days but I think it would be extremely rare to have winds high enough to cause this to go into effect.  Maybe we could have a real soaking rain and the courses play long the next day, but those tend to happen in early spring / late fall when there aren't as many people out playing. 

It almost seems like this is something that could come into play very often in a place like Florida, wet and windy, and almost never in other parts of the country.  

[Missouri Swede]

29 minutes ago, gbogey said:

I must say that 6%

I must say that 6% is higher than I thought it would be.  I've basically decided that this is a total non-factor in my area - we get windy days but I think it would be extremely rare to have winds high enough to cause this to go into effect.  Maybe we could have a real soaking rain and the courses play long the next day, but those tend to happen in early spring / late fall when there aren't as many people out playing. 

It almost seems like this is something that could come into play very often in a place like Florida, wet and windy, and almost never in other parts of the country.  

Yeah, a lot of our summer is windy.  Summer wind is usually out of the SW, 15-20 with gusts of whatever.  But since that's so common, I expect it will be "built in" to the usual scores.  Maybe calm days will be the outliers.

[JGus]

Got this today from the Maryland State Golf Association if anyone is bored and wants to read more about the WHS.

https://bluetoad.com/publication/?m=59758&i=654229&p=1

[gbogey]

Somehow I missed this but I thought the PCC adjustment was a one way adjustment that can help but not hurt.  Today I saw that Sunday was my first PCC adjustment and it was negative, meaning it made my score higher.  Funny but the course didn't seem particularly easy that day.  It was actually windier than usual although I would say the fairways were firm enough for the ball to run.  Makes me wonder if a fluke PCC is possible.