Is “par” and/or tallying average scores good or bad for golf?

[Ira Fishman]

Mark,


I am willing to bet that whenever you have pitched to do an 18 hole design that you did not offer one with a Par less than 70 or more than 73 or one with more than four Par 3s or less than three Par 5s. And that is not a criticism. You would not be alone. Which is my point: the Convention about Par is the kind of constraint that Peter identifies.


Ira

[Mark_Fine]

Ira,
Isn't the real "constraint" the 18 holes?  Given the most popular golf hole is probably a par 4 if you have 18 of them you end up with par 72.  If you replace a few with some par threes and some par fives you will end up in the same par range as you suggested.  Months ago I proposed an 18 hole course composed of 10 par threes, four par fours and four par fives that I think could be set up to challenge even the best golfers in the world and only be 6400 yards long.  Of course it is unconventional but it is one idea.  Maybe the total par is holding ideas like that back but then again, most architects think two shot holes (par fours) are the best kind of holes so there are usually more of them.   

[V. Kmetz]

VK,
Great post and thanks for taking the time.  Like many things in GCA, there is sometimes no right answer.

I do want to reference your last line about #10 at Riviera.  It is one of my favorite holes in golf and have been fortunate to play it several times.  As you said it is a good (I think great) hole regardless of the par it is given and as you said it not better or worse for it.  But I am also convinced that when Thomas built that hole he knew that some golfers would play it different ways and treat it as a par 3 or 4 or 5 or 6 and I don't think he cared.  I also don't believe the concept of par hindered what he designed.  Do you?

First, yes, no "right" answer... but in my belief, an answer we haven't tried since scorecards and tee signs and post Gutty golf has been played.  (When's the first time the classic UK courses first introduced scorecards with yardages and pars - I do not know; I've never seen a scorecard from before 1897)..


Second, I don't for a second surmise Thomas (or any architect) has been actively aware of that par balance/nomenclature in the guts of designing a hole in the way we're speaking, but remember that superb hole (which I had my only play 20 years ago next week) isn't designed in a vacuum, unto itself... Thomas could very well be aware of what his total course is like, perhaps knowing what he intends for that piece of the routing or that he is lacking (on that course) many an experience in the 300-350 range; who knows if other routing and facility choices would have made him put something else there.


A last hole of emphasis on that same course (which I think is the best in America; there I said it), which draws out precisely what I mean is the very first hole.  It gets shit on every year by this well-informed board, because they see the pros hit 6, 7 and 8 irons and make exciting 3s, loads of 4s and rather disappointing, tap in 5s... they see it be a "fairly" standard 4 on TV and I've seen all sorts of "change the par" to a 4 and the course to a 70, as if it that would cure the deficiency.  I tell you that's a wonderful 500 yard hole for 99% of us...even better as an opener, stirring and frightening in its suggestion of dead center accuracy, but yet with generous playing corridor befitting an opener... It's a challenging, inspiring, difficult "4" for most of us, but more importantly it is a fine 500 yards of golf that will reward the power besotted man and the short player well for control of their abilities. But yet since we see the pros tear it up as a Par 5, it takes on the reputation of antiquated, or chinzy as if Thomas lost his mind for a moment designing the opener of the most well-regarded courses in the world...when we want to alter that, I know that par ought to be given a break for a while.

[Mark_Fine]

VK,
Again you make good points.  Par is a fascinating subject and this has been an interesting discussion.  Thanks to all for chiming in.

[JESII]

A last hole of emphasis on that same course (which I think is the best in America; there I said it), which draws out precisely what I mean is the very first hole.  It gets shit on every year by this well-informed board, because they see the pros hit 6, 7 and 8 irons and make exciting 3s, loads of 4s and rather disappointing, tap in 5s... they see it be a "fairly" standard 4 on TV and I've seen all sorts of "change the par" to a 4 and the course to a 70, as if it that would cure the deficiency.  I tell you that's a wonderful 500 yard hole for 99% of us...even better as an opener, stirring and frightening in its suggestion of dead center accuracy, but yet with generous playing corridor befitting an opener... It's a challenging, inspiring, difficult "4" for most of us, but more importantly it is a fine 500 yards of golf that will reward the power besotted man and the short player well for control of their abilities. But yet since we see the pros tear it up as a Par 5, it takes on the reputation of antiquated, or chinzy as if Thomas lost his mind for a moment designing the opener of the most well-regarded courses in the world...when we want to alter that, I know that par ought to be given a break for a while.

This is a good paragraph VK. I'll expand on the sentiment with an interesting story exactly on this theme.


I play my golf at Lulu, just outside of Philadelphia. A good Donald Ross course. Not his best, but a very enjoyable place to play. Over these several years I've gained more and more appreciation for his use of subtle angles to create challenge and interest on, what is today, a short course.


The first hole is about 475 from the back tees and is listed as a par 5 on the scorecard and fits my definition of a half-par hole to a T. There is a bunker protecting the left corner that's about 250 carry (again, from the back tees). From there, the hole turns to the left and goes uphill maybe 20-25 feet to the green. The terrain itself provides visual obstruction to seeing the green and surrounds if you're 175 - 225 out and hoping to hit the green. Importantly, there is also a brilliantly placed approach bunker about 30 - 40 yards short. This bunker really forces you to hit the fairway so it's not in play for the second shot but it also works to virtually hide the entire flagstick from view. This is through the eyes of anyone hitting the ball 230 - 280 in my opinion. Longer players don't worry about it and shorter players have two comfortable shots and an 80 yard pitch. To me, every other feature on the hole is superfluous but the approach bunker makes the hole good and interesting.


A few years ago I was walking up the hole with a buddy who asked what I thought about changing the hole from 5 to 4 on the card. It would give the course more teeth and reduce the total par to 70 which is fine. I said, if that was the goal at our 6,400 yard course, fine but asked what else he would do. He said he would want to take out that bunker because "you can't have a blind approach on a 475 par 4!"  What's the MasterCard slogan? Priceless...


At which point I objected and let him know what I thought of that bunker.


Now, what does that mean in this conversation? To me, I'll play more aggressively in an attempt to make a birdie than a par. If it's a par 4 and I hit a poor drive, I'll lay up and hope to get up and down for 4 and be content with a bogey. As a par 5, I have to be stone dead to lay up because if I can just get it over that bunker I have a great chance to make a birdie.

[Ira Fishman]

Mark,


I am willing to bet that whenever you have pitched to do an 18 hole design that you did not offer one with a Par less than 70 or more than 73 or one with more than four Par 3s or less than three Par 5s. And that is not a criticism. You would not be alone. Which is my point: the Convention about Par is the kind of constraint that Peter identifies.


Ira

Mark,


Good for you to go so outside of the box with that proposal. The fact that the developer did not pursue it though might be evidence about the point about the Convention of Par being a constraint on design.


Ira

[V. Kmetz]

The first hole is about 475 from the back tees and is listed as a par 5 on the scorecard and fits my definition of a half-par hole to a T. There is a bunker protecting the left corner that's about 250 carry (again, from the back tees). From there, the hole turns to the left and goes uphill maybe 20-25 feet to the green. The terrain itself provides visual obstruction to seeing the green and surrounds if you're 175 - 225 out and hoping to hit the green. Importantly, there is also a brilliantly placed approach bunker about 30 - 40 yards short. This bunker really forces you to hit the fairway so it's not in play for the second shot but it also works to virtually hide the entire flagstick from view. This is through the eyes of anyone hitting the ball 230 - 280 in my opinion. Longer players don't worry about it and shorter players have two comfortable shots and an 80 yard pitch. To me, every other feature on the hole is superfluous but the approach bunker makes the hole good and interesting.


A few years ago I was walking up the hole with a buddy who asked what I thought about changing the hole from 5 to 4 on the card. It would give the course more teeth and reduce the total par to 70 which is fine. I said, if that was the goal at our 6,400 yard course, fine but asked what else he would do. He said he would want to take out that bunker because "you can't have a blind approach on a 475 par 4!"  What's the MasterCard slogan? Priceless...

At which point I objected and let him know what I thought of that bunker.

Now, what does that mean in this conversation? To me, I'll play more aggressively in an attempt to make a birdie than a par. If it's a par 4 and I hit a poor drive, I'll lay up and hope to get up and down for 4 and be content with a bogey. As a par 5, I have to be stone dead to lay up because if I can just get it over that bunker I have a great chance to make a birdie.

Jim, an apt tale in this context...as I think of it now, there are more than a few sub 500/"half par" holes that start some interesting courses and one 265 yard hole (Fenway) that also does.


But I mainly want to respond to your last paragraph (how you play it); I emphasize that in my no-hole par world, you and your friends and your history and a TV commentator do not have to abandon their traditional nomenclature... I just think stating the yardage and saying "Have at it" will elicit and enhance all the features of your description of the hole in the first paragraph I quoted here....and you make a sound final point, as "no par" tends to dampen that which would have people remove wonderful features (or add penal ones) because they don't appear to fit in some inscrutable idea of rigor pinned to a yardage, pinned to a number.


Isn't it interesting to contemplate, that blindness is less "unfair" when there's no par, that the meanest (but fun and memorable) two shot pit you might encounter is acceptable on a 265 yard hole with no par...  That a featureless, straight, slightly downhill wide open hole of 480 yards with F/F conditions and a mild green (I'm thinking #10 Mohansic) is as nearly legitimate a potential for 2,3,4,5,6,7...J, Q, K, (lol, Peter Alliss) as is a 130 yard hole with complications, such as 17 Sawgrass.  All of the sudden, just in perspective, the shots and offerings are just the shots and the offerings, judge them and tackle them as you will... (for me, it takes on the "playing" character of simply knowing that 4 will be a good score on any hole, the rest will take  care of it itself in relation).


Lastly Jim, your story about Jerry Kelly registers to the extent I think he stole it from me, as I've been needling the members of the clubs I serve/served over 40 years when they negotiate affairs on the putting green, what tees to play, etc.  I've told them repeatedly, that you can't leave the reds (5700) until you shoot 72 from the reds, you can't leave the whites (6250) until you've made an attested 4 on every hole, and you can't leave the blues (6550) unless you've broken 80 from the blues... and if you play the blacks, I get paid double.

[Garland Bayley]

Well, now that this thread has devolved into a few people posting repeatedly, I can report my count of the good vs. bad tally.
Good 6
Bad 8 (Ally posted his response on the match vs medal thread.
The count may not be entirely accurate, as some posters were not hugely specific, and I had to ascertain to the best of my ability what they were intending. Others were so unspecific, I did not count them in the total.

In the match play vs. medal play thread, we have a much more definitive answer.
Match 13
Medal 0
And, one poster who said good things about both, so perhaps we call that a draw.

Since this very scientific poll (NOT) says definitively (?) that everyone should be playing match play, it begs the question what the heck is par good for? Or, as V.K. says remove it from the score card. I.e., let it be a concept, or challenge that each individual might expect for him/herself.

[Mark_Fine]

Garland,
What would be interesting to see is a poll about par from golfers with different handicaps?  We might think that the lower the handicap the more they value par but I am not sure.  As I said it would be interesting.


However, how par has influenced GCA is another matter.  Don't most sports have "standards of measurement" including their playing fields.  Is there any reason golf should be that different?  I think it still is more than most.  18 holes is probably a bigger constraint but as much as I love golf I don't think I would love playing a 47 hole golf course (even if it were in match play)     Plus those last few holes would probably rarely if ever see a golfer play them 

[Garland Bayley]

Playing 47 holes for a match might be something you would or could do at the Himalayas. But, if you have noticed, I am saying that I don't need classifications of 1, 2, and 3 shot holes. What does that leave? The possibilities of 4 and 5 shot holes (and more). So instead of 47 holes, I would be more in favor of 12 holes. Some of them would be 4, and possibly 5 shot holes for scratch golfers. 4, 5, and 6 or more shot holes for non scratch golfers. But in reality, if you are playing match play, no one really cares if they are 6 shot holes, as par and birdie are not the object. In fact, the greatest golf lovers are those that have been playing 6 shot holes on our current courses, because they have been ardently pursuing this sport even while the sport has been telling them they suck at it! So, thank you ladies! We really appreciate your great love for our favorite game.

[Mark_Fine]

Garland,
Isn’t the last thing golf needs is a six shot hole that plays as 12 shots for those golfers who you talked about

That is why I am such a strong advocate for more shorter tees and call par what you want

[Garland Bayley]

Garland,
Isn’t the last thing golf needs is a six shot hole that plays as 12 shots for those golfers who you talked about

That is why I am such a strong advocate for more shorter tees and call par what you want

Golfers love hitting golf balls. Go to a driving range, and get a 40 ball bucket. Isn't that a 40 shot holeless hole?
You really need to divorce yourself from John Low and his bonkers academic analysis that produced the bogus 1,2,3 shot hole theory.

Why can't a properly handicapped weak woman player play a match against a properly handicapped strong woman player on long holes, and be interestingly competitive? It may require some improvement in handicapping technique, but should be doable!

[Jeff Schley]

So the reason for par and course rating/slope is to get golfers a handicap index so they can play against anyone else. Outside of that you can go to any course and make a bet.  Without that baseline (as manipulated as it maybe for some), I don't see how anything else can be more accurate for one to play another.

[V. Kmetz]

So the reason for par and course rating/slope is to get golfers a handicap index so they can play against anyone else. Outside of that you can go to any course and make a bet.  Without that baseline (as manipulated as it maybe for some), I don't see how anything else can be more accurate for one to play another.

How does individual hole/course par have to do with course rating or slope or the hcp holes or the players' hcps?

[Jeff Schley]

So the reason for par and course rating/slope is to get golfers a handicap index so they can play against anyone else. Outside of that you can go to any course and make a bet.  Without that baseline (as manipulated as it maybe for some), I don't see how anything else can be more accurate for one to play another.

How does individual hole/course par have to do with course rating or slope or the hcp holes or the players' hcps?

Your score for the day gives you a differential using your index, if you don't have the course par score how can you calculate the differential?

[Garland Bayley]

So the reason for par and course rating/slope is to get golfers a handicap index so they can play against anyone else. Outside of that you can go to any course and make a bet.  Without that baseline (as manipulated as it maybe for some), I don't see how anything else can be more accurate for one to play another.

How does individual hole/course par have to do with course rating or slope or the hcp holes or the players' hcps?

Your score for the day gives you a differential using your index, if you don't have the course par score how can you calculate the differential?

Very easy! Par is not part of the calculation, so it is completely irrelevant.

[Jeff Schley]

So the reason for par and course rating/slope is to get golfers a handicap index so they can play against anyone else. Outside of that you can go to any course and make a bet.  Without that baseline (as manipulated as it maybe for some), I don't see how anything else can be more accurate for one to play another.

How does individual hole/course par have to do with course rating or slope or the hcp holes or the players' hcps?

Your score for the day gives you a differential using your index, if you don't have the course par score how can you calculate the differential?

Very easy! Par is not part of the calculation, so it is completely irrelevant.

Then let's get rid of it already! Where is the petition??

[Mark_Fine]

Guys,
How is a course rating or slope rating different from Par?  I must be dense to not understand. 


If a golf course only consisted of ONE hole how would you rate it for handicap purposes?  Wouldn’t that rating essentially be its par?  Isn’t it no different for a two hole course or an 18 hole course?  When I see a course rating of 76.4 from the back tees I consider 76.4 as par for the course!  That 76.4 gets divided up over the 18 holes so they each have a rating and that rating is their par.  What am I missing?

[JESII]

WHAT???




How does a hole rating of, say, 4.2 instruct anything?


Too funny...


Garland, was Mark one of your Goods or Bads? Ha

[Mark_Fine]

Jim,
How do you interpret a course rating of say 69 or 76.3,...?  I interpret that as par for the 18 (or what a scratch golfer is expected to shoot from those tees.  Is that wrong?

[Garland Bayley]

Guys,
How is a course rating or slope rating different from Par?  I must be dense to not understand. 
...

For one thing, it's not listed for each hole on the score card, thereby suiting VK's criteria for what to do with par.

[JESII]

Garland, how does that suit VK's approach?


The hard 4 easy 4 concept is fine, but just a mutated version of par. What could be the point of thinking of a 600 yard hole in relation to 4?  His method is purely a scoring tracker that would have the same mental/emotional impact that I'm suggesting the actual par numbers has...but with several holes per round that become irrelevant.




Mark, I think this is where half par holes can help...both over and under half.


If the hole by hole rating were somehow posted, that would simply tell you which holes are viewed as more difficult than others but doesn't advise on a place to take risks versus being conservative...and I'd be shocked if there were ever a hole rated as substantially under par.

[Mark_Fine]

Jim,
I understand that each hole's individual rating is not listed on the card but each hole's individual rating is how the total rating gets tallied.  A 76.1 rating for 18 holes is a tally of the rating for all the individual holes.  Most of us can figure out approximately what each hole's rating is (just like when you assign your own 1/2 pars to certain holes).  There is NEVER a 1/2 par on the scorecard but we all know which ones are.  Par is an expected score for a scratch golfer which is what a course rating is.  What is the difference?  If you play what you call a par 4 1/2 twice and score a 5 and a 4, you have achieved your expected par score for that hole.  The course rating for your par 4 1/2 hole might be similar.   

[mike_malone]

I think that the difference between a long four and a short five or three shotter is some challenge in the layup area. If there is a challenge like a bunker or some natural hazard it’s a par five.

[Garland Bayley]

Mike,

Perhaps criteria was a poor choice of words. I was just referring to his advocacy of taking hole pars off the card.