Forums

Tournament handicapping

• ChiefBroom 6 Posts

  Sun, Jan 8 2012 2:36 PM

  I just had a member resign from my country club because one player seems to win almost every tournament.

  Is there some way that WGT could handicap tournaments to give players at all levels a fair chance to win?

   

• patrickmar 245 Posts

  Sun, Jan 8 2012 5:25 PM

  set up tournaments for the players tiers

• DanosDemons 23 Posts

  Sun, Jan 8 2012 6:35 PM

  Chief, maybe the player that is winning is doing their homework and is a good player.Someone always have to lose, you just have to make yourself better at this game and your time will come. i am still working on that myself.

• LeonDelBosque 1,551 Posts

  Sun, Jan 8 2012 9:22 PM

  You can create your own handicap system..... It takes a bit of imagination and work, but it can be done. The simplest way is to use players' score averages. Say person A has an average of 68.5. Subtract that from par (let's say 72), you get a hcp of +3.5. So if he/she shoots a 70, their score would be 73.5. You'd have to have people sign up, figure out their handicaps, and do the math. We use Google documents spreadsheets, with a link in the cc forum, for leader boards.

  There are other variations.... you could calculate a scoring average based on last 10 or 20 rounds... or you can do tier-based tournaments (eg, pro only)... or you can do team play, or best ball, with high/low tier players partnered. Lots of possibilities beyond what WGT offers.

• thebigeasy707 5,885 Posts

  Sun, Jan 8 2012 9:50 PM

  ChiefBroom:

  I just had a member resign from my country club because one player seems to win almost every tournament.

  i'd lose no sleep whatsoever in letting member(s) go because they'd rather leave the club other than try harder to improve their game in order to eventually up their game to take on the best in the country club....i mean isn't that how the weaker players become stronger? and as such...in the long run, you'll have a stronger group of players in the club.

  but in terms of a handicap system, the guy's post above will work.

   

  tbe

   

• piztaker 5,743 Posts

  Sun, Jan 8 2012 11:37 PM

  One thing is for certain. Whatever you do, somebody will complain.

• ChiefBroom 6 Posts

  Sun, Jan 15 2012 12:30 PM

  Thank you all for your insightful responses.   I agree in part with all of them, particularly when it comes to free tournaments.  Free tournaments provide a great chance for even the most inexperienced beginner to go up against the best players in the club with nothing to lose and everything to gain.  Also, using an excel based handicapping system is a fantastic idea that I will probably implement.

  The problem that none of these solutions deal with is the "pay for play" tournaments.  Even if you keep the cost for these tournaments in the 15 to 25 credit range, if a relatively small number of players always wins those tournaments, then sooner or later they are they only players signing up.  What's the point of even bothering?  If a real country club did not bother to handicap its tournaments, how many members would sigh up for them?

  What I would like to be able to do is create handicapped "pay for play" tournaments which could draw enough players to generate respectably sized pots because many more players felt like they had some semblance of a chance to win. A tournament with 100 players and a prize pool of 2500 credits would be a lot more exciting that a 4 player tournament with a 100 credit pot.

  Members would still be free to create and enter "open" tournaments that are not handicapped if that's what they want to do.

• LeonDelBosque 1,551 Posts

  Mon, Jan 16 2012 10:17 AM

  I hear you. One possibility is to go around WGT's system somehow. For example, you could require players to commit to awarding a prize, if they lose. Half the field wins, half the field loses; the losers donate a sleeve of balls or whatever to the winners. You could stagger the prizes, too, so last place gifts Callaways to 1st place, player with highest non-winning score gifts 10c balls, etc. 

  In our cc we also have tier-based premium tourneys; this spreads out the members into 3 or 4 comps, which does limit the pot size, but puts together players of similar abilities. 

• TarheelsRule 5,566 Posts

  Mon, Jan 16 2012 3:36 PM

  One of the former clubs I was a member in did this.  Determine the handicap by your average score minus par, so for example someone with an average of 69 would play to a plus 3 handicap.  Unfortunately it will only work in WGT for stroke play and you have to keep the scoring yourself but it can be done.  We had a four round tourney in this manner that was fun and another match play that basically you self reported.

• DarSum 1,440 Posts

  Tue, Jan 17 2012 8:20 AM

  Why aren't CC tournaments considered ranked rounds?

  I'm not saying this person winning all of them is a sandbagger (TM with a 61 av that never plays ranked rounds). But this would sure help if those rounds started counting for them.