Golf World Ranking for Average Golfers

[Wornout1iron]

To be honest, the important questions are not verification or data mining fears but rather whether people think this is a cool idea or not. If they do, the verification and data mining concerns can be addressed. If they don't think it is cool (conceptually) then all the verification and data protection in the world does not matter as it is simply not needed. Reading the above I am getting the sense that people don't like the idea conceptually which is good to hear as maybe I should not continue with it if nobody wants it. That said, I have had some good feedback too so a balanced consideration is required!

[Finman]

Reverting back to most of the responses, I just don't see the benefit if only (for example) 2% of the golfing population interacts with the site.  I could be ranked Top 100 in the World, but if only 110 people enter scores, how does that help me? There is simply no way that a large enough population will utilize the site to gauge a true "World ranking" number.  

And like others also said, percentiles can be found through handicapping fairly easily.  In theory it is interesting, but not feasible with the current setup.  

[Wornout1iron]

3 minutes ago, iacas said:

If I may ask, @Wornout1iron… how old are you?

I don't mean this as a slight, but this thing you've made (with no investment of money, and a little in time) seems like the ideas people have when they're kids. There are a bunch of holes here, obvious ones, and if there's no back-end marketing concept here, I'm not sure I even sense an end-plan. A gameplan (or a business model).

 

Hi there. Thanks and no slight taken. To be honest, great ideas are never fully formed when they begin. They go through a series of pivots (great pun there!) and often become something completely different from what the person originally envisaged. Not to compare for millions of reasons but Twitter started as something very different to what it is now. It had no business plan as to how it would ever moneitize. Facebook also morphed massively from what it was originally supposed to be. Sometimes things take off, sometimes they don't. Few people would be bold enough to say they can predict the success or failure of something in the future when it is just embryonic. Ultimately the users decide the fate. Maybe GWR's fate is to have a short life, maybe not. At this stage I am just gathering feedback using a beta model that has tons of holes in it. Actually, this is how tech companies introduce new software changes, in beta form, and the users then give feedback and they fix or scrap depending. 

This is beta version. If you hate it cool but hate it for the concept, not for the holes, holes can be filled if the concept is of interest to users.

[iacas]

I've written and sold software for 20 years.

Bad ideas at the start rarely morph into good ones. There has to be something there, something people can see and sink their teeth into.

I'm not seeing that here. I don't think it's bold at all to suggest that something resembling what you have now will be a flop.

You didn't say how old you were.

[No Mulligans]

You can already see where you stand if you have a handicap: http://www.usga.org/Handicapping/handicap-index-statistics/mens-handicap-index-statistics-d24e6096.html

This is a large database and there are controls regarding accuracy (handicap committees and peers and practical reasons to keep an honest handicap).  Your project just can't compete with what is much better and already in place.

[Wornout1iron]

Thank you to all for your feedback. I know it takes time to look at another person's idea and to give constructive comments. I will take all of the above onboard and decide which direction I need to take GWR. All the best and happy golfing #golow

[p1n9183]

There´s a site for south america´s countries which make a ranking for all of them. The system take automatically your best index round for every month of the year and assing points to it and then sum them up, with this you can know your position in your country, your state or even your club. Every player with handicap it´s in the system, you don´t have to submit your rounds to it. it also has handicap categoies like 0-9, 9-16 etc besides scratch.

Take me as an example, country Argentina for 2016 player_ID 59366. i ended 145th in argentina, 45th in my province and 1st in my club for the scratch category. With this kind of comparation for 2017 i spect to get better and climb up on the country and province rankings to be closer to best amateurs in the country.

website: http://www.digitalgolftour.com/  

You can pay to compete in this ranking, and the winners take a price, but you still be on it without paying.

Maybe you can acomplihsh something like this. Hope it helps.  

[Wornout1iron]

 

There´s a site for south america´s countries which make a ranking for all of them. The system take automatically your best index round for every month of the year and assing points to it and then sum them up, with this you can know your position in your country, your state or even your club. Every player with handicap it´s in the system, you don´t have to submit your rounds to it. it also has handicap categoies like 0-9, 9-16 etc besides scratch.

Take me as an example, country Argentina for 2016 player_ID 59366. i ended 145th in argentina, 45th in my province and 1st in my club for the scratch category. With this kind of comparation for 2017 i spect to get better and climb up on the country and province rankings to be closer to best amateurs in the country.

website: http://www.digitalgolftour.com/  

You can pay to compete in this ranking, and the winners take a price, but you still be on it without paying.

Maybe you can acomplihsh something like this. Hope it helps.  

 

Thank you so much for taking the time to write this and for including the link. Nice to see that something like this is appreciated by golfers (and it's not just me). Congratulations on doing so well in Argentina. I will study digitalgolftour and see if there are elements that can be brought into GWR. All the best to you, your constructive feedback is appreciated.

[FrankfurtDave]

The information provided above for South America is also available here in Germany and hence I would have thought in the UK as well.

Depressingly it tells me with 9,1 Hcp that I am

4th in my club,

1727th in Hessen (State)

and 17,501st in Germany.

[Wornout1iron]

2 minutes ago, FrankfurtDave said:

The information provided above for South America is also available here in Germany and hence I would have thought in the UK as well.

Depressingly it tells me with 9,1 Hcp that I am

4th in my club,

1727th in Hessen (State)

and 17,501st in Germany.

 

Thanks for this. Yes, the problem with a handicap ranking system is just what you point out, who cares whether there are 1727 golfers with lower handicaps than you in Hessen? That is why the GWR approach would not be to rank you according to your handicap but rather to rank an individual round. So, if you shoot 3 under your handicap of 9,1, that would a great round and might be the best round for that month and compared to someone playing off a 6 handicap who shoots 2 under his/her handicap, for that month, you would outrank them as you are both in the same division. You would be -3 and they would be -2. 

At the moment, you would outrank Tiger. Tiger's handicap is probably about +2 at the moment and with his recent 77, that would give him a score of +7 (assuming a par 72 course). You would be -3 and Tiger would be +7 (even though you are in different divisions). How cool is that? 

[David in FL]

4 minutes ago, Wornout1iron said:

Thanks for this. Yes, the problem with a handicap ranking system is just what you point out, who cares whether there are 1727 golfers with lower handicaps than you in Hessen? That is why the GWR approach would not be to rank you according to your handicap but rather to rank an individual round. So, if you shoot 3 under your handicap of 9,1, that would a great round and might be the best round for that month and compared to someone playing off a 6 handicap who shoots 2 under his/her handicap, for that month, you would outrank them as you are both in the same division. You would be -3 and they would be -2. 

At the moment, you would outrank Tiger. Tiger's handicap is probably about +2 at the moment and with his recent 77, that would give him a score of +7 (assuming a par 72 course). You would be -3 and Tiger would be +7 (even though you are in different divisions). How cool is that? 

What's "cool" about it?  It means nothing....

I don't need anything to tell me that if I shoot a round that's several strokes below my handicap, it's a very good round for me.  Nor that, relatively speaking, it's better than a round by a better player that's a couple of strokes higher than his handicap.  And it certainly doesn't make me a better player than he is.

[FrankfurtDave]

10 minutes ago, Wornout1iron said:

Thanks for this. Yes, the problem with a handicap ranking system is just what you point out, who cares whether there are 1727 golfers with lower handicaps than you in Hessen? That is why the GWR approach would not be to rank you according to your handicap but rather to rank an individual round. So, if you shoot 3 under your handicap of 9,1, that would a great round and might be the best round for that month and compared to someone playing off a 6 handicap who shoots 2 under his/her handicap, for that month, you would outrank them as you are both in the same division. You would be -3 and they would be -2. 

At the moment, you would outrank Tiger. Tiger's handicap is probably about +2 at the moment and with his recent 77, that would give him a score of +7 (assuming a par 72 course). You would be -3 and Tiger would be +7 (even though you are in different divisions). How cool is that? 

Okay understand the difference but not sure I really agree on its "coolness". Not sure where the enjoyment is in ranking that says my 1 over on a dog track in still conditions here in Frankfurt was better than Tiger's 4 over in windy conditions in Torrey Pines.

Let alone a comparison with a round made by Joe Nobody in Winnepeg.

[jsgolfer]

9 minutes ago, David in FL said:

What's "cool" about it?  It means nothing....

I don't need anything to tell me that if I shoot a round that's several strokes below my handicap, it's a very good round for me.  Nor that, relatively speaking, it's better than a round by a better player that's a couple of strokes higher than his handicap.  And it certainly doesn't make me a better player than he is.

 

8 minutes ago, FrankfurtDave said:

Okay understand the difference but not sure I really agree on its "coolness". Not sure where the enjoyment is in ranking that says my 1 over on a dog track in still conditions here in Frankfurt was better than Tiger's 4 over in windy conditions in Torrey Pines.

Let alone a comparison with a round made by Joe Nobody in Winnepeg.

Dead on for both of these posts, can't see where this GWR thing is useful even a little bit.  We have a post your round thread already and it's cool to see how others are playing, but not sure it really matters (or is cool) that my 77 on any particular day is ranked above or below other TST'ers on a different course, different weather conditions, etc.  We all want to play better, not sure my moving up the ranking board would be all that rewarding. 

So my vote is that it is not a cool idea, sorry, but welcome to TST.    

[Wornout1iron]

2 minutes ago, David in FL said:

What's "cool" about it?  It means nothing....

I don't need anything to tell me that if I shoot a round that's several strokes below my handicap, it's a very good round for me.  Nor that, relatively speaking, it's better than a round by a better player that's a couple of strokes higher than his handicap.  And it certainly doesn't make me a better player than he is.

 

You raise an interesting point: how do you measure how good a player is? Some might say, just look at the scores, that will tell you. Others might say, you have to look at the opportunities that one player has verses the opportunities that another has and then compare scores to their average score.
 
For example, if you play off a 6.6 and shoot 3 under your handicap for a given round despite only managing to get to the range once a week (or every 2 weeks even) and only practice your short game once a month, does that make you a better player than someone who plays off scratch and shoots level par although plays every day, practices for 3 hours every day and has a practice green in the backyard? Some would argue that you are a better player than the scratch player (all practice opportunities being equal). Others of course would say that it does not matter how much extra practice another player gets or how much extra coaching he gets, if he beats your score in medal, he is the better player. I get that, but that is not the only way to measure how good someone is. You almost have to ask, if you, with a 6.6 handicap had access to unlimited coaching with any world renowned coach (Harmon/Leadbetter etc), had unlimited time to practice and unlimited cash (through sponsorship or from whatever source), how good could you be? I am guessing a lot better than 6.6, probably even pro level.

Therefore you can't just look at handicaps, you have to look at how well someone can play given the opportunities they have. While talent is a big factor in determining handicap, other factors are the time you can dedicate to the game and the level of coaching you have. To beat your handicap by a significant amount on a given day means you have played better than you normally do. Kind of like an average pro suddenly winning a tournament. Does that mean they are better than the top pros? No, but it is something to celebrate and might even be "cool" as this is the great thing about golf. On any given day, with our handicaps, we could have the best net round in the world. Does that make us the best player? No. Does it mean we had the best-ranked round of the month? For sure.

[jsgolfer]

1 minute ago, Wornout1iron said:

You raise an interesting point: how do you measure how good a player is? Some might say, just look at the scores, that will tell you. Others might say, you have to look at the opportunities that one player has verses the opportunities that another has and then compare scores to their average score.
 
For example, if you play off a 6.6 and shoot 3 under your handicap for a given round despite only managing to get to the range once a week (or every 2 weeks even) and only practice your short game once a month, does that make you a better player than someone who plays off scratch and shoots level par although plays every day, practices for 3 hours every day and has a practice green in the backyard? Some would argue that you are a better player than the scratch player (all practice opportunities being equal). Others of course would say that it does not matter how much extra practice another player gets or how much extra coaching he gets, if he beats your score in medal, he is the better player. I get that, but that is not the only way to measure how good someone is. You almost have to ask, if you, with a 6.6 handicap had access to unlimited coaching with any world renowned coach (Harmon/Leadbetter etc), had unlimited time to practice and unlimited cash (through sponsorship or from whatever source), how good could you be? I am guessing a lot better than 6.6, probably even pro level.

Therefore you can't just look at handicaps, you have to look at how well someone can play given the opportunities they have. While talent is a big factor in determining handicap, other factors are the time you can dedicate to the game and the level of coaching you have. To beat your handicap by a significant amount on a given day means you have played better than you normally do. Kind of like an average pro suddenly winning a tournament. Does that mean they are better than the top pros? No, but it is something to celebrate and might even be "cool" as this is the great thing about golf. On any given day, with our handicaps, we could have the best net round in the world. Does that make us the best player? No. Does it mean we had the best-ranked round of the month? For sure.

Still having a hard time trying to see why you think this matters to the majority of golfers?   So what if my round is the lowest based on one great round in the month.  I'm a 6.5 index, from the blue tees I'm at 7 at my home course, I've shot as low as 71 on the course (Par 71), so I end up with a 64 (-7).  The next day I go out and shoot 80 (+2), what difference does it really mean that I shot -7 the day before and had the best round for the month?  Just not feeling it dude, but you seem to think it's cool, all the more power to you.  Good luck. 

[Wornout1iron]

2 minutes ago, jsgolfer said:

Still having a hard time trying to see why you think this matters to the majority of golfers?   So what if my round is the lowest based on one great round in the month.  I'm a 6.5 index, from the blue tees I'm at 7 at my home course, I've shot as low as 71 on the course (Par 71), so I end up with a 64 (-7).  The next day I go out and shoot 80 (+2), what difference does it really mean that I shot -7 the day before and had the best round for the month?  Just not feeling it dude, but you seem to think it's cool, all the more power to you.  Good luck. 

 

Look, you may well be right, maybe nobody does care about a one off low round for the amateur golfer. Also, scores come in from different courses and in different conditions which do diminish comparability. I accept that and yes, that is a weakness. That said, 59's on tour are brought up all the time despite being on different courses, different conditions and heck, sometimes even on par 70s verses par 72/73s (what is a 59, 13 under or just 59 no matter if you play off a par 67 or 74). These problems in comparability don't bother the media, the fans, the players (or for that matter the Golf Hall of Fame). All are celebrated and all are cool.

To be honest, I was expecting (hoping) for more positive feedback and the fact that I am not getting it tells me there is something not quite right with the idea/format so this has been invaluable to hear. For your reading pleasure, see if you can find the comparability of these  59s on tour

[David in FL]

So the 20 hcp who shoots 87 had a single great (for him) round.  The 6 hcp who shoots 78, nice, but nothing special.  I get that.  More importantly, I don't see the attraction/need of something that tells me that.  I know that my 78 is a decent round, but does it give me any sense of accomplishment to know that a scratch golfer had a bad round at the same course and shot a 75 that is relatively worse for him?  Heck no.  Nor does it detract from how I feel about my score to know that the high hcp player had an outlying low round.

[jsgolfer]

12 minutes ago, Wornout1iron said:

Look, you may well be right, maybe nobody does care about a one off low round for the amateur golfer. Also, scores come in from different courses and in different conditions which do diminish comparability. I accept that and yes, that is a weakness. That said, 59's on tour are brought up all the time despite being on different courses, different conditions and heck, sometimes even on par 70s verses par 72/73s (what is a 59, 13 under or just 59 no matter if you play off a par 67 or 74). These problems in comparability don't bother the media, the fans, the players (or for that matter the Golf Hall of Fame). All are celebrated and all are cool.

To be honest, I was expecting (hoping) for more positive feedback and the fact that I am not getting it tells me there is something not quite right with the idea/format so this has been invaluable to hear. For your reading pleasure, see if you can find the comparability of these  59s on tour

59 is an awesome gross score, there's reverence in that number.  A 59 net means your a sandbagger.