How long do votes count? Have there really not been 40 raters that have played Friars Head since it opened?
It seems to me that one of the inherant flaws in this is the body of courses played. If I am from the Pacific NW and play the courses here and have not played any/many the great courses of the east, aren't my ratings going to reflect that? GD raters aren't RANKING ANGC higher than PV on a ranking list. The scores just came out higher.
When I see courses like Sahalee, Eugene and Black Rock on here, I have to think that there may be some holes in many of the raters resume's. I saw the numbers from GD for my home course two years ago when the rankings came out, and although there wasn't enough to qualify for the top 100, the scores were too high. But around the NW, it is considered great, so I bet that had a lot to do with it.
In terms of the major jumps/falls by certain courses, I might venture a guess that the eliminating of the outlying scores may have caused that.