How we evaluate courses

[Mark_Fine]

Sean,
You stated "your system offers a fairly clear narrative as to whether or not you think a course is worth the effort, time and money to play."

I presume this system results in a list of courses that meet your criteria (does it not)?  I would also speculate that that list of courses would be compelling and enjoyable to play.  So if I asked you the rank that list of 10 or 20 or 100 courses that your system generates, could you do it?  Or would they all be the worth the exact same effort, time and money to play? 

I think you use numbers more than you might want to admit.  You just don't write them down 
Mark

[John Kirk]

Ran once told me that he could tell me why his 42nd ranked course is better than his 43rd ranked course.  Frankly, I would struggle to do that.  I actually like the Doak Scale and I can get down to what is an 8.5 vs an 8 but that is where if I am honest with myself I get tapped out.  After that level of scrutiny, it is more flip a coin as to which 8.5 is better than another 8.5. 


There is nothing wrong with numbers.  It is more about "what formulates those numbers" that one ends up with.
Mark

Hi Mark,

At some level you have proved my point with this paragraph.  Ran can tell you why he likes the 42nd best course better than the 43rd, but in all likelihood, they will be assigned the same number as a rating.  The digital system is an approximation of an analog rating methodology.

I like the Doak scale too, and I love to rate courses and songs with numbers or stars.  I like discrete groups of like-rated things.

[Sean_A]

Sean,
You stated "your system offers a fairly clear narrative as to whether or not you think a course is worth the effort, time and money to play."

I presume this system results in a list of courses that meet your criteria (does it not)?  I would also speculate that that list of courses would be compelling and enjoyable to play.  So if I asked you the rank that list of 10 or 20 or 100 courses that your system generates, could you do it?  Or would they all be the worth the exact same effort, time and money to play? 

I think you use numbers more than you might want to admit.  You just don't write them down 
Mark

Mark

No, there is no list other than all the courses I play.  If a course isn't good enough I simply give it an NR.  But to be honest this doesn't happen often because I take my own advice and avoid courses which aren't very good    There is no need or desire on my part to rank the courses...the recommendation speaks for itself.  When it gets down to brass tacks it doesn't matter a tosh what recommendation I give to the big guns...they come self recommended if you follow.  It is the lesser courses where I can provide a service.  Perhaps golfers looking for better value, more experience, an adversion to tourists etc will use the information to their benefit.  A few taps of the fingers will find days worth of info and press on Muirfield, not so much for a great deal of courses worthy of attention and time.   

Ciao

[Mark_Fine]

Sean,
I understand that you personally don't like to make lists or rank courses.  But you by your own admission have at least a few lists - courses you have played and courses that you don't play and courses that you played and give an NR. You have to admit you wouldn't know what to play or what was maybe worth playing if someone else didn't provide those lists/rankings for you.

All rankings/reviews are subjective.  No one will argue with that.  And they all are based on some preconceived criteria (good or bad) which is also subjective.  And the only way to come up with ANY kind of list is to give some kind of numerical value to that criteria.  You are doing the same with your three lists. If a course is worth playing it gets a value, if it is not it gets a different value and if you play it and then decide it should not have been played it gets yet another different value.  You could call them each A, B and NR if you want but the reality is they have each been valued in your own way. 

Golf Digest used to rank their Top 100 courses alphabetically early on.  That was kind of like Peter's scale by saying these are all the top courses worth playing.  Then they moved to dividing them up even further from which is #1 to which is #100.  Their list was also the "Toughest" courses but thankfully they got away from that criteria. 

No one's criteria is perfect and never will be.  They are all just lists that have been organized based on numerical weighted values 😊

[Ulrich Mayring]

Sean,

you may not produce a ranking list explicitly, but if we take all your reviews and sort them by your numbers, then there is your ranking. So you are doing all the legwork. If you were to just write textual and pictorial reviews and not assign any number, then I would buy your argument, because you would explicitly make it very hard for the reader to compare courses.

Numbers are for relative comparisons, but by themselves they are not mathematics. They are just stand-ins for lists like "great", "good", "mediocre", "bad". If you wonder in your head whether you should spend your vacation in area A with one great course and two mediocre ones or rather in area B with three good courses, then the mathematics start. But you (the reader of the ranking list) are doing the mathematics and you are, for example, subconsciously assigning a 7 to the great course, 5s to the good ones and 3s to the mediocre ones. Then you add it all up and arrive at a conclusion - that's your mathematics, whether you do them algebraically or symbolically.

And perhaps we can agree that doing these mathematics are not the business of the rater, because he cannot know the individual's weightings.

cheers,

Ulrich

[George Pazin]

Ulrich -


In reading your posts and Sean's, my own interpretation of what Sean says is that his list is HIS list. By relying on masses of subjective numbers, others are trying to pass off their own list as A list, as opposed to THEIR list.


But maybe that's just me...


I think few, if any, of us are as objective as we believe. I know I certainly am not the least bit objective. My criteria are my own, no one else's, and few would likely agree with them.

[Kalen Braley]

I think what Sean is trying to say, which I agree with, is...


When you make a purely subjective list that you somehow rank 1 to 100, others may come along and infer its actually objective as well as make god knows what other judgements of the courses based purely on its relative numerical ranking.  This is the bs part, especially when talking about the top 10 rated courses in the world.


No one could ever prove objectively why CPC should be ranked higher than Pine Valley or visa versa....

[Peter Pallotta]

I got us sidetracked by suggesting that Sean preferenced uniqueness and exceptional quality. I don’t know why I noted the second value; I think my pen ran away with itself (and I confused my appreciation for the choices with his rationale for making them). But I noted the first as to say that Sean’s were recommendations based a personal and subjective preference, not evaluations of specific qualities/features.

More generally, I assume that what Sean is saying (to Mark and Ulrich) is that he doesn’t evaluate — numerically or otherwise — the constituent parts (eg green sites, shot values) of a golf course, but instead tries to focus on the whole, ie the whole experience.

And if that whole experience is enjoyable for him, he then shares his belief that it is “worth the expense of an overnight stay”.. the short-form code for which phrase is a *1.

[MikeJones]

 

We are almost unanimous in naming the greats, Cypress, Pine Valley, The Old Course…we have some outliers, but for the most part we generally agree on the greatest in the world.

In a phrase 'herd mentality'


I'm sure there are hundreds of great courses that do not register on people's radar here because they are from a lesser known architects or in an area of less than natural beauty. It's easier to appreciate and comment on well known courses because there is more information on them and people are much more likely to have played them.

[Sean_A]

George, Kalen and Pietro..for sure...I don't even try to pass off my recommendations as objective...which is what ranking numbers, weighted categories etc is all about...trying to inject an element of validity where it none exists.  Validity comes from people trusting another person's judgement most of the time...that is as good as it will ever get in this game...and most have people they trust in this way when it comes to courses, wine, books, music and on and on.  Granted, this trust is often on a more personal level, but nothing is perfect. I am merely attempting to provide a different perspective to the run of the mill rankings which reproduce at least 85% of the same courses over and over. 

Ciao

[Mark_Fine]

But Sean, you said there are courses you won't even bother to go see?  I have played a lot of golf courses and I can't think of one that I didn't learn at least something from playing.  Maybe it was just one hole that was worth seeing or one design idea or maybe it was what not to do 


I can't imagine you would swing by Mullen Nebraska and not be happy that someone told you to make sure you see Sand Hills when you are out that way.  Good thing it made it on at least someone's list 

[Sean_A]

But Sean, you said there are courses you won't even bother to go see?  I have played a lot of golf courses and I can't think of one that I didn't learn at least something from playing.  Maybe it was just one hole that was worth seeing or one design idea or maybe it was what not to do 


I can't imagine you would swing by Mullen Nebraska and not be happy that someone told you to make sure you see Sand Hills when you are out that way.  Good thing it made it on at least someone's list 

Mark

My recommendations are not about learning something.  They are more about what the course can provide as an experience, a day out...enjoyment...and if that experience is worth the effort and expense. 

Ciao

[Kalen Braley]

I think Tom D once said years ago that a "better" ranking system would be something like


In Alphabetic order:
The top 10,
The next 15
The next 75...


That way people could still get an idea of the best of the best wthout quibbling over 3rd vs 6th.


P.S.  As far as I'm concerned, I think the vast vast majority of follks would be thrilled to death with playing any course in the top 100, instead of "it was only #80"

[Mark_Fine]

Kalen,
And what you said it for the most part how most Top 100 lists should be looked at.  Anything in the Top 100 or Top 200 is probably worth at least one round (even by Sean's criteria)     Yet many on this site will argue FOREVER that they can't believe a course that is 52nd is ranked higher than a course which is ranked 73rd      If it is one person's list, then it is very understandable but when it is a collection of opinions, it is not worth arguing about (though it can be fun) which is what makes the lists a lightning rod for debate! 
Mark

[Peter Pallotta]

On the other hand, those who’ve played 100s of courses and work in the industry could knock off the false humility and tell the rest of us what they really think! 
And I mean what they *really* think, in their heart of hearts, and using not the pedestrian and utilitarian standards of the day, but the timeless and transcendent ones!
Sure, sure, I know — it’s all subjective (wink wink) and courses serve various purposes and types of golfers (ahem) and we have no idea (no, none at all) what environmental or budgetary restrictions the architect was working under.
Yes, yes — we all have valid tastes and opinions...until you experts get behind closed doors and start telling it like it is 

[Ulrich Mayring]

I don't think anyone is trying to pass off his rankings as objective. I do however believe that some people perceive some rankings as objective because of a "star factor". And there may be some "stars", who are not always enthusiastically objecting to that

Subjective rankings are the only useful rankings, but they are even more useful, when the rater puts his biases out in the open. I'm all for strong opinions, but without full disclosure they tend to be self-serving.

Ulrich Mayring