Handicap Question

[ATL96Steeler]

Help me settle a debate.

Regardless of how long you've been playing...When you are establishing a handicap should you post non adjusted scores, or should the scores be ESC adjusted?

 

[TobyTyler]

Help me settle a debate.

Regardless of how long you've been playing...When you are establishing a handicap should you post non adjusted scores, or should the scores be ESC adjusted?

I always put down the exact score I shot at the course. If I blow up and make a snowman on a par 4, that is the score I put in.

 

[SFNL]

If you have a handicap you should be adjusting your scores before entering them.


9 or less Double Bogey
10 through 19- 7
20 through 29- 8
30 through 39- 9
40 or more- 10

 

[SFNL]

Until establishing a handicap, post exactly what you have.

 

[ATL96Steeler]

If you have a handicap you should be adjusting your scores before entering them.


9 or less Double Bogey
10 through 19- 7
20 through 29- 8
30 through 39- 9
40 or more- 10

What if you are trying to establish a handicap?

I thought your initial scores posted (up to 20) should be the actual score shot...then once your index is established, you adjust scores according to the chart above.

My buddy thinks every score should be adjusted. My counter to that is...how do you adjust scores if you have no basis established yet. He says you have to base it off the max handicap index.

i.e. the max score you can post is a 10 based on the chart above. He went on to say...if my theory was in play, a player can have an artificially high index by posting scores with 12s, 13s, etc. included on the card.

What brought this on is we're both considering playing in an event that requires a USGA index...it might impact him more than me because our non-adjusted scores over the last 20 rounds, he has some blow up holes that exceed a 10.

 

[ATL96Steeler]

Until establishing a handicap, post exactly what you have.

Okay...this is my thinking as well...so if you have scores higher than 10, it doesn't matter, still post the actual score....you can read my other post to see why he thinks that is not right.

 

[ATL96Steeler]

I always put down the exact score I shot at the course. If I blow up and make a snowman on a par 4, that is the score I put in.

I do as well...some courses post the scores themselves, and they handle the adjusting.

 

[SFNL]

Okay...this is my thinking as well...so if you have scores higher than 10, it doesn't matter, still post the actual score....you can read my other post to see why he thinks that is not right.

The whole idea for the handicap system is to make it fair for people to play each other in tournament play, holing everything out. If your buddy has a few huge holes, he's gotta count them up. It would only hurt him not to since he obviously has the capability to have those big numbers. It also doesn't do anyone any good to take putts. My handicap would be lower if I did that (have been known to battle yips at times). Ultimately you get a range of scores that won't waver too much. I think my last 20 at the moment are all between 82 & 72 and there is probably only a few shots out there that could have been ESC'd.

There is no way of knowing what the adjustment should be until the handicap is established, so count them all. I think that it takes less than 20 nowadays though. Maybe 10? Not sure.

 

[ATL96Steeler]

The whole idea for the handicap system is to make it fair for people to play each other in tournament play, holing everything out. If your buddy has a few huge holes, he's gotta count them up. It would only hurt him not to since he obviously has the capability to have those big numbers. It also doesn't do anyone any good to take putts. My handicap would be lower if I did that (have been known to battle yips at times). Ultimately you get a range of scores that won't waver too much. I think my last 20 at the moment are all between 82 & 72 and there is probably only a few shots out there that could have been ESC'd.

There is no way of knowing what the adjustment should be until the handicap is established, so count them all. I think that it takes less than 20 nowadays though. Maybe 10? Not sure.

Exactly...for the handicap to be reasonably accurate you can't adjust scores while establishing an index.

20 or 10...from my understanding you can establish a USGA with 10 scores posted, but once you have 20, the formula takes your last 10 rounds or something like that.

 

[ATL96Steeler]

Putting out...absolutely. When were playing our little traveling club tourney...you had to putt out and most newbies would just get killed over 54 holes because they were not used to having to make those little 2' putts.

If it's just us playing, we can putt out every hole and still be done in 3 hrs.

 

[SFNL]

I know many sub 10 handicaps that wont play in things bc they dont hole out & dont want to be embarassed... Thats fine with me if you're having fun but under normal casual situations (we play sweeps games on the weekends with random draws) its annoying bc I know that not everyone does what our group does.

 

[ATL96Steeler]

I know many sub 10 handicaps that wont play in things bc they dont hole out & dont want to be embarassed... Thats fine with me if you're having fun but under normal casual situations (we play sweeps games on the weekends with random draws) its annoying bc I know that not everyone does what our group does.

I'm learning there are quite a few bogus low hdcps out there...played as a single a couple of weeks ago and one of the guys in my group was a pretty good player, but he was raking/dragging in putts from 4'...probably had about 5 or 6 holes like that and he shot like 75 doing that.

But...I'll go up against that type of player any day over the opposite...sandbagging to win in golf is premeditated...imo the lowest of all who cheat in the game.

 

[SFNL]

I fight the yips from time to time. Especially last year. I can remember 1 round that I shot 81 and missed 12 putts from inside of 5 feet, a few not much longer than that... I pretty much have it fixed now but it's hard to forget about those kinds of struggles. It causes many to quit the game altogether.

I'll say this though... It was on bent grass greens that were running about 12 on the stimp. If they were slow greens I WOULD have quit.

 

[ATL96Steeler]

You're a much better player than me so putting I'm sure is always at the forefront...just last week...I had a great chance to break 80...9 GIR, and 3 jacked 3 of them, and missed another 3 right around 4-5' and finished with 83.

The life of a weekend hack man, gotta wait a whole damn week to get back on the horse again!

 

[TobyTyler]

You're a much better player than me so putting I'm sure is always at the forefront...just last week...I had a great chance to break 80...9 GIR, and 3 jacked 3 of them, and missed another 3 right around 4-5' and finished with 83.

The life of a weekend hack man, gotta wait a whole damn week to get back on the horse again!

Lotta guys can't shoot 83 if their life depended on it. That's a pretty decent score.

 

[ATL96Steeler]

Lotta guys can't shoot 83 if their life depended on it. That's a pretty decent score.

Agreed...considering I also shot a 100 not that long ago!

We'll see how it goes this week...playing track I haven't played in probably 5 or 6 years again. Total redo on the greens, new tees, etc. Recent reviews were really good on the greens and the price was right, so why not was my thinking.

 

[TobyTyler]

Agreed...considering I also shot a 100 not that long ago!
We'll see how it goes this week...playing track I haven't played in probably 5 or 6 years again. Total redo on the greens, new tees, etc. Recent reviews were really good on the greens and the price was right, so why not was my thinking.

Ha ha! To much info. That's almost obscene! Have fun at the new course. I love playing courses that I've either never played before or that have been re-designed since I played them.

 

[Wazmankg]

I always put down the exact score I shot at the course. If I blow up and make a snowman on a par 4, that is the score I put in.

Does the system you enter them into automatically adjust it for ESC purposes. Otherwise that would be cheating.

 

[ATL96Steeler]

Ha ha! To much info. That's almost obscene! Have fun at the new course. I love playing courses that I've either never played before or that have been re-designed since I played them.

Not proud of it, but you're right, I could've kept that quiet...lol.

Thanks I plan on it.

 

[TobyTyler]

Does the system you enter them into automatically adjust it for ESC purposes. Otherwise that would be cheating.

Then I'll just have to cheat. I am a +0.5 so I give the course a half a stroke anyway.