[Mark_Fine]

Thomas,
AMEN

[Garland Bayley]

Garland,
So are you saying you don’t count your strokes on each hole when playing a match?  How do you establish your handicap? 
...

It's like you don't even read what I've written. That has already been answered.

[Garland Bayley]

When googling forced carry I found the statement that "it is presumed that nearly all golfers can carry the ball 60 yards."

When I stated that forced carries be eliminated, I was referring to carries in such a range. I was not referring to carries of a burn or bunker that can be carried with a chip shot. Sorry for not making that clear. But, I suspect most everyone but Mark understood that.

[Mark_Fine]

Garland,
This is what you posted:

“ Seems to me that golf in its beginnings didn't have forced carries, multiple tee, and par. Several years ago the USGA declared golf was a walking game, and that if you were riding in a cart you weren't playing golf, you were playing "cart ball".In the origins of golf, they didn't count the number of strokes players took, they kept track of the difference in strokes taken by the competitors. So there was no idea that par would become this thing that ruled a game that we can call stroke count, but it is not golf. Sure, it uses the same implements as golf, but it is much different than the original game. In the original game, it was not uncommon to take four strokes to reach the putting surface. Whole golf courses did not have one, two, or three shot holes like the current game of stroke count.”

I see nothing about 60 yard carries in your post.  Admit you were wrong.  It’s ok.   And I am sorry but early on they DID count strokes.  Thomas gave just one example.

[Niall C]

Mark


I'm not sure that David was saying exactly what you think he was saying. In any case Garlands point is that in the early days match-play was what the game was about and in match play it is not the total number of strokes that count but rather how many strokes played relative to your opponent. Hence the terms "playing the like", "playing the odds" and "one off two" etc. The players didn't need to know how many strokes it took to get the ball in the hole, only who did it in the fewest strokes.


When you think of the length of the holes on Leith Links relative to the distance they hit the ball, it made sense.


Niall

[Garland Bayley]

Scene a few hundred years ago.
First Scottish shepherd "Reckon I can hit this small stone into that wee hole using less hits with this stick than you can."*
Second Scottish shepherd "........................"
atb


* accents don't usually related well to the written word.

What is your reference Dai? Is this "scene" documented somewhere?

When young, my son liked to hit rocks with a stick. I never considered him to be playing golf. Do you consider your Sheppards to be playing golf? What golf rules were they following? Musselburgh? St. Andrews?

[Ken Moum]

Garland,
Do you really think that golf was played with no keeping of any kind of score?  Even when playing match play, some kind of score is kept.  Almost everyone plays match play when betting and or playing a friendly game.  Some keep their full score for the day and some don’t but there is no way to get a handicap if you don’t keep count of your strokes.  I am traveling but maybe Forrest will chime in if he sees this with some references for you.  Honestly it is just common sense - golf is a game/sport and I can’t think of any that don’t keep score of some kind.

Mark, Garland, and Niall, are absolutely correct. That in fact, for a LONG time match play was not scored by counting up the strokes and comparing at the end of each hole, but instead by a method called reckoning. Hell. Darwin published a book referring to it in the '30s called "Playing the Like."


And handicapping in the early days was often simply starting someone up several holes.

[Garland Bayley]

Garland,
Do you really think that golf was played with no keeping of any kind of score?  Even when playing match play, some kind of score is kept.  Almost everyone plays match play when betting and or playing a friendly game.  Some keep their full score for the day and some don’t but there is no way to get a handicap if you don’t keep count of your strokes.  I am traveling but maybe Forrest will chime in if he sees this with some references for you.  Honestly it is just common sense - golf is a game/sport and I can’t think of any that don’t keep score of some kind.

Of course match play has a score. How could you over look that?

There is no need to count the strokes to determine the winner just like in basketball where you don’t count shots taken.

[Garland Bayley]

...
At least you have come around on the idea that in the beginning there were forced carries.  You start with one even on the first hole at St. Andrews.

You haven't defined what you mean by "forced carry".

Given your example here it would seem you have the myopic view that to reach the green in regulation, two strokes, you are forced to carry the burn. Particularly myopic since this thread is about players that can't even reach the burn in three strokes. For them, carrying all 10 feet of the burn is a choice of when to do it, not being forced to do it on a particular shot.
...

[Garland Bayley]

...
You can admit you were wrong. It’s ok.

Given your myopic and false statements that you have promulgated on our readers, isn’t suggesting I admit to being wrong a bit unprofessional?

Did you ever hear of something called a topped shot bunker or a cop mound or cop bunker? 

How can you not know that a very high percentage of the members that are on here to discuss golf architecture would definitely know these?

Most times they were in the direct line of play and most had to try to play over them.  Golfers encounter forced carries in golf of some type all the time on almost every course. 

If there is a 60 yard wide top shot bunker, it should be taken out. I'm sure Tilly took out many that were far narrower than that when he went around the country contracted to take them out.

Sometimes they can go around the trouble but many times it is silly to try. You could play the #17 hole at TPC Sawgrass with a putter but would you want to?

Clearly the lady Jason observed on the practice tee would have to adopt some other strategy than taking on the forced carry. Playing the hole with just a putter might be appropriate. Nothing more boring than watching someone who thinks a challenge is fun dump ball after ball in the drink.

[Mark_Fine]

Garland,
Don’t mean to create a big argument.  All I was saying was that some kind of score was kept from the beginning (maybe not by all or in certain games) but some golfers did count the number of strokes to get the ball in the hole (in basketball the shot gets scored when you make a basket).  Not sure that way of scoring would work for golf . Obviously there was no par or birdie or… but no one is saying that. 


And as far as forced carries; all I was saying is there were obstacles that had to be played over (we never talked about distance to get over them) from very early on.  Don’t know about you, but I have watched many a golfer stand in front of a ten foot wide stream and top one after another balls in the creek. It is the fear of the carry that scares them sometimes more than the short carry distance.  Same with trying to chip a ball over a bunker. 


Back to the point of this thread; some (not all) of these issues can be solved with alternate tees.  I know not everyone agrees, but I have no problem with teeing it up to start a hole from almost anywhere.  We are seeing more and more designs with no formal tees.  Just played Congaree and while there are markers you can tee it up anywhere.

[Kalen Braley]

Garland,

I'm not sure why you continue with this charade.  Of course you must count aka keep track of your strokes, and your opponents, in match play.  And even if you aren't writing it down somewhere its still in fact counting.

Quick dictionary search:

"Determine the total number of a collection of items'
"take into account: include"

[Ken Moum]

Kalen, except it's not a charade. Match play in the beginning didn't involve counting up strokes.


Scoring via "reckoning" was the norm and it only involved knowing if where a given stroke put you in relation to your opponent.


And handicapping was done by starting the weaker player one or more holes up.

[Kalen Braley]

Ken,

My only point is whether you want to call it "keeping track of", "taking note of", "tallying", "enumerating", or even "reckoning" it's still all just plain old counting strokes to determine a winner for the hole.  I can't ever recall playing a match where I didn't count strokes, especially on long par 4s or 5s, to determine a winner.

Now if you want to say total strokes in the aggregate was not a thing, I would agree 100%. 

[Garland Bayley]

Kalen,

You play different than me, probably because you have been corrupted by the stroke count game. When playing a match, I am calculating my next play using my standing relative to my opponent. The count doesn't matter. If we have taken the same number of strokes, and I have a positional advantage I will work to maintain my advantage. If I am at a disadvantage, I will take more risk to try to gain the advantage.

Given our skill level, the number of strokes can add up. Need I remind you that you have taken a double digit number of strokes to win a hole from me? On the way to amassing that total, the count didn't matter. What mattered was our standing relative to each other as we went along. That was the origins of golf.

[Sean_A]

Kalen,

You play different than me, probably because you have been corrupted by the stroke count game. When playing a match, I am calculating my next play using my standing relative to my opponent. The count doesn't matter. If we have taken the same number of strokes, and I have a positional advantage I will work to maintain my advantage. If I am at a disadvantage, I will take more risk to try to gain the advantage.

Given our skill level, the number of strokes can add up. Need I remind you that you have taken a double digit number of strokes to win a hole from me? On the way to amassing that total, the count didn't matter. What mattered was our standing relative to each other as we went along. That was the origins of golf.

But you have to count shots to know your relative standing.

Ciao

[Garland Bayley]

Kalen,

You play different than me, probably because you have been corrupted by the stroke count game. When playing a match, I am calculating my next play using my standing relative to my opponent. The count doesn't matter. If we have taken the same number of strokes, and I have a positional advantage I will work to maintain my advantage. If I am at a disadvantage, I will take more risk to try to gain the advantage.

Given our skill level, the number of strokes can add up. Need I remind you that you have taken a double digit number of strokes to win a hole from me? On the way to amassing that total, the count didn't matter. What mattered was our standing relative to each other as we went along. That was the origins of golf.

But you have to count shots to know your relative standing.

Ciao

[Sean_A]

Kalen,

You play different than me, probably because you have been corrupted by the stroke count game. When playing a match, I am calculating my next play using my standing relative to my opponent. The count doesn't matter. If we have taken the same number of strokes, and I have a positional advantage I will work to maintain my advantage. If I am at a disadvantage, I will take more risk to try to gain the advantage.

Given our skill level, the number of strokes can add up. Need I remind you that you have taken a double digit number of strokes to win a hole from me? On the way to amassing that total, the count didn't matter. What mattered was our standing relative to each other as we went along. That was the origins of golf.

But you have to count shots to know your relative standing.

Ciao

That is my response as well. You say you don't count strokes, but this is clearly not the case. Being pedantic is a 2 way street. 🤷

Ciao

[Garland Bayley]

Sean,

When playing match play, usually you are pretty much even with your opponent after playing "the like". Therefore, you know how you stand without having counted the strokes. When a course consists entirely of what we would now call four shot holes as Lieth was back in the day it would be natural to keep track of the relative status instead of counting strokes which is unnecessary in match play. In fact, when Kalen and I are taking a double digit number of strokes, it is far easier to keep track of the relative status than to be counting the strokes.

Remember, this is a topic about players hitting driver only 100 yards. Their following strokes might max out at 80 yards. That is why many women at my club carry braids with 10 beads to keep track of strokes taken on a hole, because it becomes too onerous a task to count and remember the number of strokes they have taken on a hole.

Using playing the like in match play alleviates this problem.

[Sean_A]

Sean,

When playing match play, usually you are pretty much even with your opponent after playing "the like". Therefore, you know how you stand without having counted the strokes. When a course consists entirely of what we would now call four shot holes as Lieth was back in the day it would be natural to keep track of the relative status instead of counting strokes which is unnecessary in match play. In fact, when Kalen and I are taking a double digit number of strokes, it is far easier to keep track of the relative status than to be counting the strokes.

Remember, this is a topic about players hitting driver only 100 yards. Their following strokes might max out at 80 yards. That is why many women at my club carry braids with 10 beads to keep track of strokes taken on a hole, because it becomes too onerous a task to count and remember the number of strokes they have taken on a hole.

Using playing the like in match play alleviates this problem.

Do you know what playing the like was? Playing the like just means you are currently playing the shot which equals the number your opponent has played. What happens when players don't neatly hit shots on the odd and like? What if a guy is hacking his way up the fairway? I spose he is hitting the odd, the odd +1, the odd +2....Its a type of counting.

Using beads is counting.

Ciao

[Ken Moum]

Sean, the terms used when not playing the like or the odd were one off or two off, etc.

[Mark_Fine]

What are we arguing about??  Everyone (maybe not all the time) but everyone counts strokes some of the time.  I absolutely guarantee you that if ANYONE just happens to be out knocking the ball around (counting nothing) and comes to a new hole and knocks their first shot into the cup on their first swing they will tell everyone they made a 1!  Guess what, they were counting, at least on that hole 

[Dave Doxey]

Yes, a course could be designed for short hitters.  However, it would reduce the design options that would make it interesting for longer hitters.  I don’t think that a course could be designed to interest and challenge both.  That is the question for you architects.


I also offer the opinion that short hitters (those not able to reach greens in regulation) cannot fully appreciate courses with great architecture.  Older members – do you find that you now have less ability to enjoy playing (not just studying) great architecture than you once did?

[Jeff Schley]

What are we arguing about??

No idea, but at the least it is a "discussion".

[Kalen Braley]

What are we arguing about??

No idea, but at the least it is a "discussion".

Jeff,

Yes at least we discussing, but I agree with Mark on this one.  The absurdity in insisting that the act of counting be called by some other name is beyond pedantic.   The only think Garland is missing is the Pat Mucci green in his posts. 

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