SCRAMBLE GOLF
HANDICAPPING
the
Score-Count way
Copyright
© 2005, 2007, 2009 John W. Scully
Click photo to enlarge
Conventional Handicapping | Formatting | Conclusions | Score-Count System | Implementation & Free Download
For golfers, there are few games as enjoyable as a Scramble, especially when teammates are long-time friends. Yet many golfers of average skill are reluctant to enter them. Topping the list of reasons for this reluctance is that winning is often unlikely and costly entry fees are hard to justify, in spite of our “fun” and “charity” rationalizations. A young golf pro once proclaimed the truism that, ”Scramble tournaments are usually won by teams with the best golfers, even when teams are handicapped”.
Another reason for this reluctance is that the satisfaction of having one's ball location selected for the team’s next shot is likely to be reaped by one of the team’s low-handicap golfers. This is especially true with drives. A low-handicap friend once admitted that he always looks for good putters when forming his teams. He doesn’t need good ball strikers. And when an "averaging" system of handicapping is to be applied, the higher their handicaps the better.
The common practice of selling mulligans (i.e., repeat shots) also discourages casual golfers. When individuals or teams are allowed to purchase varying numbers of mulligans the equity sought by handicapping can be corrupted beyond recognition.
Flighting teams is, of course, a convenient way to distribute wins across a field of social golfers, but it’s a feeble method for rewarding better-than-normal performance in skill competitions. The element of chance is substantial and, unless equitable flights are established before play, the opportunities for manipulatiion are many. Consequently, flighting often does little to encourage fair-minded knowledgeable golfers to participate.
Some of the more popular Scramble handicapping systems in use today are those outlined below:
1. One of the easiest ways to calculate team handicaps is to divide the sum of team-members’ Handicap Indexes by a factor of 5, 8 or 10. Although simple to implement, this system can only produce reasonable team handicaps when golfers are assigned to teams according to their relative skills, with one member from each of four ranges of skills assigned to each team. This, of course, minimizes the likelihood of friends playing together, but it is an essential feature of team formation when a "conventional" handicapping system is to be used.
2. Another method is to total a percentage of each member’s Handicap Index, applying percentages of 20, 15, 10 and 5 to A, B, C and D players, respectively. Although this method produces team handicaps that differ from Score-Count handicaps by a factor of about 7, the differences between the team handicaps produced by the two systems - the differences that matter - are nearly the same.
3. A third, less precise, method is to assign golfers to teams as described above and then use 35% to 50% of the team’s best Handicap Index as the handicap for the team.
4. For social events, when most players don’t have official handicaps, the Modified Scheid Scramble Handicap System is used. It employs hole-deduction procedures similar to the Callaway System; so individual Handicap Indexes are not involved. It gives all golfers an equal chance, according to its supporters. Details of the Scheid System can be found on the Internet.
5. To achieve equity in major open Scramble tournaments organizers necessarily impose detailed guidelines for team formation and for the application of player handicaps. In addition to requiring all participants to be amateurs, one organizer limits the number of low-handicap golfers a team may have and requires all participants to have current USGA Handicap Indexes (which are used to calculate the number of handicap strokes, from -4 to +4, that each player adds or deducts from his or her team handicap - based on 9 predetermined handicap ranges).
In addition to handicapping and team-formation restrictions, tournament organizers often impose a variety of, sometimes awkward, play stipulations; all with the intent of promoting fair competition, maximizing everyone’s enjoyment and accommodating all who wish to play. A few of the more common format provisions that are addressed in the Score-Count System include:
1. Limitations on the number of mulligans permitted;
2. A maximum Handicap Index any player may claim;
3. Permission for each member of a 3-man team, for 6 holes, to play a second shot at each ball location - with team handicaps based on a phantom 4th player Handicap Index equal to the average of the teams’ other three; and finally,
4. Requiring that the locations of 2 or 3 of each team-member’s drives be used for subsequent shots; a practice intended to achieve scores that better represent the performance of an entire four-person team.
Since the Scramble handicapping systems described above, apparently, serve their users reasonably well, why then is there a place in our repertoire of handicapping systems for a system as complex as the Score-Count System - a system that requires a computer for its implementation? The answer is that not all Scramble tournament formats are, or need be, conventional 4-man team arrangements. There are times when situations don't permit full conformity to that format, times when conventional systems are likely to be compromised: Maybe four players with similar handicaps want to play together; maybe teams of 2 or 3 players also want to compete; maybe some players want to play from different teeing grounds; maybe a good distribution of A,B,C and D players can't be achieved; maybe last-minute no-shows upset team arrangements; or maybe participants like to play gmes of 6 holes from each of 3 different teeing grounds.
All of these "irregularities" are accommodated with the Score-Count System; and with the availability of small computers, last-minute equitable team handicaps can be produced at the first tee (or after the round if necessary).
The Score-Count System embodies the concept that a team’s handicap is defined by the projected performance of the team’s best golfer as enhanced by the projected performances of his teammates. It is based on two empirically-based premises: (1) that a player’s normal performance can be represented by the average number of Birdies, Pars and Bogies (including Double Bogies) golfers of his caliber produce in a complete round of golf, and (2) that the number of each hole-score he produces is proportional to the fraction of the round being considered.
By progressively blending the fractional numbers of different hole-scores projected for less-skilled members of a team with those projected for the team’s best golfer one can arrive at a potential team score that reflects the skills of all its members. With projected-performance data in hand for each member of a team, the theoretical number of Birdies, Pars and Bogies projected for the team as a joint effort can be calculated and used to determine the team’s handicap.
Although designed primarily to produce realistic team handicaps, the computerized Score-Count System makes implementation easy while also providing valuable flexibility and precision. In addition to handicapping single-tee tournaments it can handicap teams with a mix of men and women or the young and old playing from as many as four different tees – using Course Handicaps which have been adjusted for differences in teeing-ground Ratings. And due to the system's methodology, it can produce competitive handicaps for teams of 2 and 3 golfers in 4-man tournaments without the use of convenient but arbitrary format appendages. Consequently, Score-Count handicapping has the potential for encouraging those who normally shun Scramble tournaments to enter them, knowing that winners will be those teams that post the day's best better-than-normal performances, rather than teams of low-handicap golfers whose performances are normal.
The Course and Game Setup section of the program offers default data for a number of factors that have an impact on handicaps, all of which can be changed to fit the course being played and the game’s format. These include:
Number of teeing grounds used for tournament
Course Rating (for up to 4 teeing grounds)
Course Slope (for up to 4 teeing grounds)
Number of game holes (up to 18)
Number of required mandatory drives per golfer
Maximum Handicap Index allowance
Number of free mulligans per golfer
This is followed by a Team Handicap Processing section which requests input for (1) the number of golfers on the team under consideration, (2) either a Handicap Index for each player or the score that player would likely post at a course of average difficulty (Such scores are immediately converted to handicap indexes for use in subsequent processing.) and, (3) when more than 1 teeing ground is used, which tee that player will be using. Processing then proceeds with the data provided in the Game Setup section and with adjustments for tee selections, mandatory drives, mulligans, double-bogies and for the better-than-normal performance facilitated by the Scramble format.
To accommodate formats that require mandatory drives, the Score-Count system increases handicaps based on the number of drives required of each member and on the projected number of those drives that are likely to be poor. However, instead of using mandatory drives to produce team scores that more accurately represent the performance of all team members, the Score-Count program, in conjunction with tee assignments, can accomplish this when long-ball hitters (such as, low handicappers) are required to drive from back tees and short knockers from fronts, with players’ Course Handicaps automatically changed to match. The good drive of any team member, then, is more likely to influence play - without the need for a mandatory drive requirement.
Although the Score-Count system produces equitable team handicaps for teams with Handicap Indexes of 40.4 or less there are times when tournament officials may want to limit indexes to a lower number (to defuse sandbaggers, for example). The Game Setup section of the program permits such limits to be entered.
Since the Score-Count System is based on the actual stroke-making ability of participants, the unproductive strokes included in USGA handicap calculations are discarded, - just as unproductive strokes are abandoned during actual Scramble play. Such strokes include penalty strokes and strokes required to recover from bad lies, bunkers and natural obstructions. The system also embodies calculations for the effect of better putting facilitated by information gleaned from prior putts made from the same location. When such stroke projections are deducted from a player's normal score for individual play the number of birdies, pars and bogies projected for that player will change as well, resulting in more realistic team handicaps.
To account for the Double-Bogies that are included in the Bogie counts of some teams a further adjustment is made, based on the size of the team and on the handicap of the team’s best golfer.
The use of mulligans adds considerable enjoyment to Scramble games, but to maintain equity they should be provided equally to every participant or team. Unequal distributions of mulligans cannot be processed by the program. Any reduction of income this approach may cause to sponsors can be recouped by a small increase in entry fees and by the income produced with the additional participation it will likely generate.
Since mulligans are likely to lower gross scores, those reductions must also be reflected in team handicaps. By recognizing that low-handicap golfers are more likely to be successful with a “second chance” than will high-handicappers, the Score-Count program calculates the potential score reduction each player is likely to contribute to his team’s score and reduces the team’s handicap accordingly.
Finally, after the team’s profile of projected Birdies, Pars and Bogies has been fully developed, the Score-Count program calculates the team’s handicap by subtracting the number of Birdies from the number of Bogies, adding and deducting adjustments, and rounding the result to a single-decimal number.
The complexity of Score-Count Scramble
Handicapping, necessarily, requires a great deal of number crunching.
Consequently, the system has been programmed for implementation with Windows
operating systems on conventional desktop and laptop computers.
To obtain a FREE COPY of the Scramble Handicapping zip file containing the program and its related documents click DOWNLOAD here. (Note: Should the downloaded zip file be empty or corrupted, delete it and download the file again with a different browser.) Instructions for setting up and running the program are included in the "Read Me " subfolder of the Scramble_Handicapping folder, which is created when the downloaded zip file is unzipped, that is, when the files in the zip file have been "Extracted" (or opened) and placed somewhere on the "C" drive.
For more information about the system and its use call (256) 236-4135.
