Slope & Rating - I Get Lower Differentials from Shorter Tees

[David in FL]

10 minutes ago, Pendragon said:

OK...but you didn't really answer my question. If I play from the tips for the next 20 rounds, is my index going to go down? Don't think so...

 

As a 3.5, assuming that it doesn't, for some reason, become unplayable for you, I wouldn't be at all surprised if your index went down by moving back a set of tees...

[No Mulligans]

On 1/8/2017 at 10:45 AM, Cartboy said:

In reality, because my short game is not as bad as my long game is short, when I play a shorter tee over a period of time, my GHIN Index comes down.  Or, if I play different tees, almost all of the scores used to determine my GHIN Index come from shorter tee settings, lower Slope and Rating. 

Your first post was really easy to understand.  From the replies, it seems it was well understood.

And, that quote from your first post is you answering your own question.  You are not representative of the hypothetical average golfer at your HI (and very few are).  Accordingly, rating and slope are not perfect for you (or most individuals) because they are not customized to your idiosyncrasies.  This is really a pretty simple idea.

For me, it's narrow courses with OB/Lateral hazards/nasty rough on the side of every hole that causes me problems.  If I want a higher handicap I just need to play that type of course more.

[Cartboy]

1 hour ago, Pendragon said:

OK...but you didn't really answer my question. If I play from the tips for the next 20 rounds, is my index going to go down? Don't think so...

 

Mine would go up.

Oh, I see I've been saying that.

 

55 minutes ago, David in FL said:

As a 3.5, assuming that it doesn't, for some reason, become unplayable for you, I wouldn't be at all surprised if your index went down by moving back a set of tees...

That would be because Slope is intended to be measurement of how much more difficult it would be for a Bogey golfer to play than a scratch golfer. 

As was presented previously, the USGA observed statistically that Scratch golfers are more likely to shoot near Par regardless of the difficulty the course, and less-proficient golfers are more affected by the difficulty of the course.  That is why it is called Slope, and the higher the Slope, the more less-proficient golfers are affected.

[mdl]

Others have said as much, but thought I'd add my example of what's my exception.

I hit the ball long for an amateur, but have a pretty wide shot dispersion.  I tend to score better net than I "should" when playing from the back tees at courses that are long but pretty open/forgiving.  IOW, I used to get great net scores from a couple of courses I played regularly with ratings in the 70-71 range (par 72) and slopes in the 118-124 range from the back tees but which were actually really wide open, just getting not too easy rating/slope from being quite long – just shy of 7k yards.

I could roll my drives out to the 280-310 range, and with the open course, even my long sprays would usually give me an open PW-8i on the 430+ yard par 4s.  That's because the courses are rated for "average" scratch and bogey golfers.  Even if your dispersion is a good bit tighter than mine, if your drive rolls out to 240 in the fairway and I'm in the not too penal rough off a quite wide fairway at 290, I'm going to score better on that hole hitting 9i in than you are going to hitting 5w, so my net score is going to be lower than it "should" be.

[Lihu]

On 1/8/2017 at 0:51 PM, Patch said:

I have never been ask what my "index", or "GHIN" is either. It's always "what's your handicap?" I just reply "I am a 10, at my home course, which is 6600 yards". If the person I am golfing with wants to factor in other info, due to different tees, or a different course rating, I have no problem with that either.

Is the 6600 yard course at sea level or at altitude? If you further stipulate the altitude, then that might complete the description better too.

I think that's why rating and slope are easier for people to relate to.

[Lihu]

21 hours ago, Cartboy said:

I said that in response to the post that said as long as I play the tee I set my Index at, it will be accurate, or something like that.

You're right that one of us has not been following, or understanding.

I guarantee that, based on my experience, if I play the next 20 rounds from the tips, my INDEX will be higher, and if I play the next 20 rounds from the front, my INDEX will be lower.

The entire gist of this thread is that when I play shorter tees/lower Slope/Rating for a number of rounds, my Index goes down, and vice versa. 

I thought what I was doing is asking if that happens to anyone else.

Well, I thought that was it.  Let me go look.

Yup:

"Anyone else have a lower GHIN Index when they play lower Slopes?"

So, back to where I started . . . does that happen to anyone else, that if you play lower Slope/Rating tees for a number of rounds, you Index goes down?

You might be over swinging on longer courses or something like that?

In general, if you play your own game, the number of strokes should only really go up by roughly the course rating/slope.

Might be just "intimidation factor"?

[No Mulligans]

1 hour ago, Cartboy said:

As was presented previously, the USGA observed statistically that Scratch golfers are more likely to shoot near Par regardless of the difficulty the course, and less-proficient golfers are more affected by the difficulty of the course.  That is why it is called Slope, and the higher the Slope, the more less-proficient golfers are affected.

It's slope because it actually is slope in the geometry sense and uses the slope formula as in rise over run.

Here's an article on the origins of golf slope: http://www.ongolfhandicaps.com/2013/02/the-mathematical-underpinnings-of.html

 

[Cartboy]

1 hour ago, mdl said:

 IOW, I used to get great net scores from a couple of courses I played regularly with ratings in the 70-71 range (par 72) and slopes in the 118-124 range from the back tees

118 and 124 are actually two of the three Slopes in my last 20 rounds, except that they are from forward tees.  The rest of the Slopes in my 20 are 130.  There's three more sets of tees behind the 130 set, but I don't play them.

The group I play with has threatened to play the tips (75.1/135), just to see what our scores would be.

When I started at the course I am at, when it was new 9 years ago, most played the 130 set.  A significant number of players struggled from the 130 tee, but did not want to move forward to the 118 set, because that was the "Ladies' Tee."

I proposed a "Combo" tee, using a combination of the 130 and 118 tees, based on my personal game, and it was accepted by the GM and Course owners, got Sloped and Rated, and went on the card at 124.  Most of the guys I play with are really 130 golfers, but play the Combo (124), to give the less-proficient golfers a chance to have more fun.

Recently I have opted for the straight 118 Slope, for fun-factor.  It's more fun to be in position for the second, or third, shot.  I'm at our Florida home for the Winter and last week took my Buddy to my favorite course here for a Golf Now round.  When we met the other twosome, I asked how Platinum (118) sounds, and everyone agreed.  That score will be with me for 20 rounds.

From the 130 tee, I simply don't have enough of a drive to be able to do that.  Even playing the Combo (124) set, there are holes that I will never be able to be in position for my second/third shot.  We have a 180-yard Par 3 that I reached once in 8 years.  Strange, but most of guys I play with don't either, but they should.

43 minutes ago, No Mulligans said:

It's slope because it actually is slope in the geometry sense and uses the slope formula as in rise over run.

Here's an article on the origins of golf slope: http://www.ongolfhandicaps.com/2013/02/the-mathematical-underpinnings-of.html

 

I meant to be saying the same thing with different words when I said, "That is why it is called Slope, and the higher the Slope, the more less-proficient golfers are affected."

I was just at the same, or similar, Slope/Rating site earlier today.

Edited January 9, 2017 by Cartboy

[iacas]

3 hours ago, Pendragon said:

OK...but you didn't really answer my question. If I play from the tips for the next 20 rounds, is my index going to go down? Don't think so...

It very well could. I know a lot of people whose handicap index (or differentials if you want to talk about individual rounds) go down when they play higher rated (rating/slope) courses.

Maybe your index won't go down @Pendragon, but mine probably would. For example I tend to shoot the same score from the black or blue tees at Whispering Woods, yet one is 74.0/144 and the other is 72.0/142.

2 hours ago, Cartboy said:

That would be because Slope is intended to be measurement of how much more difficult it would be for a Bogey golfer to play than a scratch golfer.

Yeah, and all golfers worse than a scratch golfer are affected at the same rate (percentage). A 140 course is the same "percent" harder for a 5 as it is for a 20.

2 hours ago, Cartboy said:

As was presented previously, the USGA observed statistically that Scratch golfers are more likely to shoot near Par regardless of the difficulty the course

Not necessarily near par, but near the course rating, yes, because multiplying 0 by anything (any slope) is 0, so the slope doesn't have as much of an (or any) effect.

But scratch golfers define the "difficulty" differently - they tend to define it based more on the course rating. Put a scratch golfer on a PGA Tour stop and he's not going to "shoot near par" very often at all… but he may shoot 78 or 79 or so, near the course rating. That course is difficult in a different way, and might have a slope lower than a 71.6/145 course.

1 hour ago, Cartboy said:

I proposed a "Combo" tee, using a combination of the 130 and 118 tees, based on my personal game, and it was accepted by the GM and Course owners, got Sloped and Rated, and went on the card at 124.  Most of the guys I play with are really 130 golfers, but play the Combo (124), to give the less-proficient golfers a chance to have more fun.

118/113 is 1.044. 130/113 is 1.150. 124 is of course 1.097. It's really not that much of a change.

Calculating your own course ratings/slopes is not too difficult given a set of tees. There are pretty simple formulas for doing combo tees, as you know. At that level, since the upper and lower bounds are known (ideally), it's really a close approximation to just do a sort of weighted average to determine the tees. You won't always be super accurate - a forced layup that's erased from the up tee but comes into play on the back tee might not be weighted properly, for example - but it's really close.

If they have some par fours that they can't reach from the 130 tees but can from the 124 tees, that can obviously make a difference. But the "difficulty" of a course doesn't go up much when you change the slope a little bit.

72.0/118 = guy shoots 88 = differential of 14.7
72.0/130 = guy shoots 89 = differential of 14.2

Not a very big change. Remember, 118 to 130 isn't like it's "12" strokes. It's not even 12%, because the base isn't 100, it's 113.

Furthermore, slope can drop and a course can still be more difficult. Consider Course A at 72.0/144 and course B at 73.4/132.

Score	Differential A (72.0/144)	Differential B (73.4/132)
72	0.0	-1.2
74	1.5	0.5
76	3.0	2.1
78	4.5	3.8
80	6.0	5.4
82	7.5	7.1
84	9.0	8.7
86	10.5	10.4
88	12.1	12.0
90	13.6	13.6
92	15.1	15.3
94	16.6	16.9
96	18.1	18.6

You can see there that the more "difficult" course just by slope is the first course, yet a player shooting 80 on the each course has done comparatively "worse" on that first course because it's got a 1.4 stroke lower course rating.

[Pendragon]

6 hours ago, David in FL said:

As a 3.5, assuming that it doesn't, for some reason, become unplayable for you, I wouldn't be at all surprised if your index went down by moving back a set of tees...

I think I can safely guarantee that my index isn't going to go down if I start playing the back tees at my club. I usually play the white tees, which are barely 6000 yards, with a rating of 69.7 and 124 slope. The blues are 6,775 yards with a 73.5 rating and 129 slope. I'll be 71 in 2 weeks, and I can think of at least 3 par 4's that I can't even reach in regulation from those tees. I do get your (and iacas') point, though. 

Many with lower indexes can score as well on longer and more challenging layouts because, well, they're good players. I may be an exception because I've lost a lot of distance, but I think my original argument is still valid, particularly where higher handicap players are concerned. While it's true that you (or iacas), might score lower on the longer set of tees, the guy with an index between 15 and 20 (or higher) likely isn't going to fare nearly as well. 

[David in FL]

59 minutes ago, Pendragon said:

I think I can safely guarantee that my index isn't going to go down if I start playing the back tees at my club. I usually play the white tees, which are barely 6000 yards, with a rating of 69.7 and 124 slope. The blues are 6,775 yards with a 73.5 rating and 129 slope. I'll be 71 in 2 weeks, and I can think of at least 3 par 4's that I can't even reach in regulation from those tees. I do get your (and iacas') point, though. 

Many with lower indexes can score as well on longer and more challenging layouts because, well, they're good players. I may be an exception because I've lost a lot of distance, but I think my original argument is still valid, particularly where higher handicap players are concerned. While it's true that you (or iacas), might score lower on the longer set of tees, the guy with an index between 15 and 20 (or higher) likely isn't going to fare nearly as well. 

You might be surprised.  Do you really think that you'll average 4 strokes higher from the tips?  That's a LOT, and anything less results in lower differentials, and subsequent index.

Admittedly, nearly 800 yds is a big difference between two sets of tees, and as I said, if it makes the course unplayable for you, it may be that your index won't improve.  I'd like to see you play a few rounds from there though.  I know it won't be a ton of fun, (I hit a lot of hybrids and 3-woods into par-4's too, and don't always get there) but I still think your scores will surprise you.

[Pendragon]

1 hour ago, David in FL said:

You might be surprised.  Do you really think that you'll average 4 strokes higher from the tips?  That's a LOT, and anything less results in lower differentials, and subsequent index.

Admittedly, nearly 800 yds is a big difference between two sets of tees, and as I said, if it makes the course unplayable for you, it may be that your index won't improve.  I'd like to see you play a few rounds from there though.  I know it won't be a ton of fun, (I hit a lot of hybrids and 3-woods into par-4's too, and don't always get there) but I still think your scores will surprise you.

You might be right, but the last time I played the back tees (about 6 months ago), I shot 80. My situation may well be an anomaly, but I'm almost certain that I'd average at least 4 shots higher from back there. Of course, when all is said and done, there are no worries as long as we're playing golf. 

[iacas]

14 minutes ago, Pendragon said:

You might be right, but the last time I played the back tees (about 6 months ago), I shot 80. My situation may well be an anomaly, but I'm almost certain that I'd average at least 4 shots higher from back there. Of course, when all is said and done, there are no worries as long as we're playing golf. 

If you're shorter these days, tees with a delta in their rating of 3.8… yeah, I could see you averaging 4+ strokes difference. Makes sense to me, @David in FL. Especially since your average score from a set of tees is not necessarily the same as the handicap. The latter would likely be closer to 4, while the average could be 5, 6, even 7.

[Cartboy]

15 hours ago, Lihu said:

In general, if you play your own game, the number of strokes should only really go up by roughly the course rating/slope.

That was the thought that started this thread. 

By, I get the "In General" part.

[Cartboy]

Ever notice that the professionals on television always seem to shoot in the low 70s or high 60s no matter how easy or difficult the golf course is?

In the 1980s, The USGA noticed this too. Statistically, they could show that no matter how easy or difficult a course was, the very best of golfers will still shoot a score close to par.

But they also noticed that the scores of less-proficient golfers were more strongly affected by the difficulty of a golf course. And in general, the worse the golfer, the more that golfer's score was likely to be affected by the difficulty of the course itself.

http://www.leaderboard.com/abcs.htm

I will go with the USGA on this, that, in general, the worse a golfer is, the more the difficulty of a course affects them.  So, a 16.5 is more affected by the difficulty of a course than a 3.5.

That should also explain why worse golfers fare disproportionately better than good golfers on less difficult courses, because the difficulty affects them more, which is my case.

So, there's my answer.

- - - - - -

Some may have not taken this discussion as a serious golf discussion, but, given the decline of the game in recent years, it's serious as a heart attack.  Working and playing at a tough course in an area with a lot of senior golfers, and seeing them coming off 18 after being beat up because they played 6700/132, or 6300/130, instead of 5877/124 or 5300/118, I believe a reason for the decline in the game, and a reason for decline in play at some courses, is that it became too much challenge and not enough fun.

Tee it Forward may have been about Pace, but it's also about fun.  Fun is what brings the golfer back.

Since the USGA has statistically shown that playing a lower slope favors less-proficient players more than good players, and the less-proficient they are, the more they are affected favorably, if your course is on the decline, keep that in mind.

[iacas]

19 minutes ago, Cartboy said:

Working and playing at a tough course in an area with a lot of senior golfers, and seeing them coming off 18 after being beat up because they played 6700/132, or 6300/130, instead of 5877/124 or 5300/118, I believe a reason for the decline in the game

The differences between 130 and 124 are still relatively small. About 5%. I don't think they're getting "beat up" at 6300 and then having a breeze at 5877.

And if they are, move up. They're free to play whatever tees they want. They're still playing golf, though, so they're hardly to blame for the decline.

The decline can pretty easily be traced to a few things: time and cost being highest on the list by far.

[Cartboy]

3 minutes ago, iacas said:

The differences between 130 and 124 are still relatively small. About 5%. I don't think they're getting "beat up" at 6300 and then having a breeze at 5877.

And if they are, move up. They're free to play whatever tees they want. They're still playing golf, though, so they're hardly to blame for the decline.

The decline can pretty easily be traced to a few things: time and cost being highest on the list by far.

For my course, some right, some not.

[Lihu]

13 hours ago, Pendragon said:

I think I can safely guarantee that my index isn't going to go down if I start playing the back tees at my club. I usually play the white tees, which are barely 6000 yards, with a rating of 69.7 and 124 slope. The blues are 6,775 yards with a 73.5 rating and 129 slope. I'll be 71 in 2 weeks, and I can think of at least 3 par 4's that I can't even reach in regulation from those tees. I do get your (and iacas') point, though. 

Many with lower indexes can score as well on longer and more challenging layouts because, well, they're good players. I may be an exception because I've lost a lot of distance, but I think my original argument is still valid, particularly where higher handicap players are concerned. While it's true that you (or iacas), might score lower on the longer set of tees, the guy with an index between 15 and 20 (or higher) likely isn't going to fare nearly as well. 

I can see this being the case as people with these handicaps are usually not as confident with their swings so added intimidation factor could easily lead to worse scores?

 

3 hours ago, Cartboy said:

That was the thought that started this thread. 

By, I get the "In General" part.

Yeah, telling someone to duff the same shots on a more difficult course could readily lead to more strokes.

 

2 hours ago, Cartboy said:

Tee it Forward may have been about Pace, but it's also about fun.  Fun is what brings the golfer back.

Since the USGA has statistically shown that playing a lower slope favors less-proficient players more than good players, and the less-proficient they are, the more they are affected favorably, if your course is on the decline, keep that in mind.

This makes sense, but I really think it depends upon why someone is a 16.

For instance, if someone is a solid hitter, but can't drive more than 200 yards, then playing a more difficult courses would only lead to a higher score by rating/slope.

Whereas, if someone has the ability to hit 270 yards off the tee but ends up right/left and duffs lots of shots to be a 16, then that person would have a tough time on a harder course. You'll generally find him hacking his way out of trees (or whatever) on harder courses. . .

In either of these two cases, a shorter course could benefit them towards having fun.