2017 Next Generation Disc Golf Top Prize: Car

[PWaggoner]

"Sandbaggers: We value integrity. If clear evidence of sandbagging is produced and provided to Next Generation Staff, we reserve the right to disqualify you without refund."

I'm curious what this means. How can you sandbag? I could see a ma1 player playing in ma2 to try and win the side bet, but that's not sandbagging.

I guess one could tank they're rating just to win side bets, but that would take months to accomplish the rating drop. And it wasnt exactly like anyone had very much info about this to plan ahead.

 

[thrembo]

Sandbagger. Noun. Anyone in your division that did better than you.

 

[JC17393]

"Sandbaggers: We value integrity. If clear evidence of sandbagging is produced and provided to Next Generation Staff, we reserve the right to disqualify you without refund."

I'm curious what this means. How can you sandbag? I could see a ma1 player playing in ma2 to try and win the side bet, but that's not sandbagging.

I guess one could tank they're rating just to win side bets, but that would take months to accomplish the rating drop. And it wasnt exactly like anyone had very much info about this to plan ahead.

The only way to sandbag the overall event is for a pro to pose as an amateur (which is a different kettle of fish), so the sandbagging concern lies with the sidebet.

There is a reason that they include language about "sandbagging" there rather than doing as the PDGA does and relying on TDs to monitor such things where it concerns non-members and otherwise unrated players, and that is the nature of the registration process. All registration is handled online and payments go directly to the NGTS. To the national folks, almost all of the players are just going to be names on a computer screen. There may not even be a process to cross-check players against the PDGA database, at least not an automated one. Nothing is likely to jump out at them as needing to be looked at unless it's reported to them.

Also keep in mind that sidebet divisions are entirely irrelevant to what the TDs are asked to do at the qualifier. The tournament is to be run as a single division event. There's no reason that TDs need to pay attention to what sidebet division a player is signed up for, or for it to even come up at all during play. So the last line of defense on the ground isn't quite as strong as it might be at a more traditionally structured tourney.

That's not to say that TDs won't be monitoring their player list ahead of time to head off any sandbagger concerns, but the set up does leave gaps for potential abuse. Having a stated policy in advance at least notifies players that there will be consequences if they do abuse the system.

 

[Aim For The Chains]

Not that this means anything official, but the NGT Facebook poll on the make and model people would prefer to see resulted in the Chevy Spark getting the most votes followed by the Kia Soul and the Hyundai Veloster.

It means disc golfers like ugly cars?

 

[thrembo]

It means disc golfers like ugly cars?

No necessarily. Big giant SUV's are out. The smallest electric cars are trending.

 

[Aim For The Chains]

Id rather have a minivan.

 

[Toro71]

Send in the Caaaaarrr

 

[bnbanbury]

Terry had Pat Govang on the podcast Tuesday to detail the other prize package offerings for each level of the NGT. The initial qualifiers will be players pack of plastic and then payout through (i believe) disc golf center.

The regional champ participants will get an Easy-Go backpack in their player pack and the those that make the day 1 cut will get Shady Rays sunglasses. These are highlights in addition to plastic and payout.

The 72 people in the finals will get a Zuca cart with their players pack. Those making the 1st cut will get a Keen gift card, Infinite discs stuff, and waterproof socks. The 4 finalists will get all that stuff plus tour cards, a trip to the Memorial Championships (not clear if that is a paid trip or just automatic entry), and a Nixon Ranger Chrono watch. This info hasn't been published, it is just my understanding from listning to the podcast on my way into work this morning.

 

[Discslinger12]

Next Generation Disc Golf sponsored by Latitude 64° is pleased to announce 2017 sponsors and competitor player/prize packages for all Qualifier, Regional Championships and National Championship tournaments. In January, Next Generation Disc golf announced its title sponsor Latitude 64° and strategic partners, the Disc Golf Pro Tour and Disc Golf Course Review. Most recently it announced www.discgolfcenter.com‘s sponsorship of its virtual, national division challenge called the DANCe.

New sponsors include:

Zuca who is providing an exclusively designed disc golf cart for all entrants into the National Championship
Keen who is providing shoe and gift cards to their great products.
Infinite Discs who is providing gift cards with free shipping.
Shadyrays who is providing a custom sunglass/case sets
Dexshell makers of the world's best waterproof socks
Onnit cutting edge performance supplements, food and fitness tools

"Building sponsor relationships is key to providing great products and value back to our competitors. We're excited both to share who they are along with what our competitors can look forward to when they compete in our events." said David Feldberg, Next Generation Tour Series Director.

Details of the contents of all player and prize packages can be found on the Next Generation Disc Golf Website including:

Qualifier Tournament Details

Regional Championship Details

National Championship Details

"The positive response from the player base has been almost overwhelming since we announced Next Generation Disc Golf in January. We expect this announcement to take it up a notch as it answers many of the questions that have been asked since. The sponsors make it happen, we're grateful to have them on board" stated Pat Govang, Business Director

The make and model of the grand prize car will be announced next week and registration for all Qualifier tournaments opens on March 7, 2017.

 

[PWaggoner]

Are these events mostly trophy only style?

 

[scarpfish]

Are these events mostly trophy only style?

Unless you take that crap shoot side bet, probably so.

 

[bnbanbury]

From what the links show, the qualifier tournaments are trophy only plus entry to regionals for 1st place. Regionals top 72 get the shades and then top 3 get trophy plus entry to national championships. Then nationals has a bunch of prizes.

 

[ICantPutt]

Maybe it's me but this has lost all it's luster to me. It went from a tournament for the rest of us (amateurs, rec, int, advanced, etc). great payouts, awesome sponsored prizes for each division and a nice players pack.
Now we have no payouts, one division and it's more expensive. Players pack is decent, until you realize one of the discs is a gladiator which most of us could never throw and and ugly hat. Not impressed.

 

[bnbanbury]

Maybe it's me but this has lost all it's luster to me. It went from a tournament for the rest of us (amateurs, rec, int, advanced, etc). great payouts, awesome sponsored prizes for each division and a nice players pack.
Now we have no payouts, one division and it's more expensive. Players pack is decent, until you realize one of the discs is a gladiator which most of us could never throw and and ugly hat. Not impressed.

I can't disagree. As a decently rated AM I fell like I am one of the people to whom this series is marketed and I feel much less excited about it than when I first heard the idea of an amateur tour proposed.

I feel like this has some overlap with the "payout" thread but I think the cost is a big factor. I have no interest in players packs in general and $50 bucks for an unsanctioned tournament is steep compared to even B tiers I am playing in this year. Particularly for players packs full of things I don't particularly care for.

I may play the first round to support the great local TDs that are involved but I can't see myself paying potentially $300 plus travel for the rest of it.

 

[ICantPutt]

I can't disagree. As a decently rated AM I fell like I am one of the people to whom this series is marketed and I feel much less excited about it than when I first heard the idea of an amateur tour proposed.

I feel like this has some overlap with the "payout" thread but I think the cost is a big factor. I have no interest in players packs in general and $50 bucks for an unsanctioned tournament is steep compared to even B tiers I am playing in this year. Particularly for players packs full of things I don't particularly care for.

I may play the first round to support the great local TDs that are involved but I can't see myself paying potentially $300 plus travel for the rest of it.

Players pack is always dangled in front of am to show value all while including discs for 500ft throwers.

I initially was planning on trying to play 3-5 of these, but I will likely play the spotsy and colonial ones to support both clubs (member of neither as I live in tappahannock in the middle of both) but potentially none at all. It is what it is, I get it, I just feel it alienates the sub 940 or so player.

 

[bnbanbury]

Players pack is always dangled in front of am to show value all while including discs for 500ft throwers.

I initially was planning on trying to play 3-5 of these, but I will likely play the spotsy and colonial ones to support both clubs (member of neither as I live in tappahannock in the middle of both) but potentially none at all. It is what it is, I get it, I just feel it alienates the sub 940 or so player.

Well really there isn't much in this for almost anyone compared to the costs involved unless you really want something in the players pack. Unless you are one of the 6-8 great amateurs in the country this year, you are just helping Lat 64 make some money and helping fund a car for whichever 17 year old talent comes out on top.

 

[ICantPutt]

Well really there isn't much in this for almost anyone compared to the costs involved unless you really want something in the players pack. Unless you are one of the 6-8 great amateurs in the country this year, you are just helping Lat 64 make some money and helping fund a car for whichever 17 year old talent comes out on top.

agree, hate to be negative about it as I was stoked but really wish we had last years layout back

 

[Understable]

I've done some searching (obviously not enough) but what are the main rules for this event? Ams only but do I get to play with my own mixed bag of discs or do I have use specific Latititude discs?

 

[JC17393]

I've done some searching (obviously not enough) but what are the main rules for this event? Ams only but do I get to play with my own mixed bag of discs or do I have use specific Latititude discs?

It's a regular tournament series, not a promotional event. You can use any PDGA-approved disc you wish.

 

[Discette]

The NGT has course standards it has asked its TDs to observe when selecting the course and/or layout used in qualifying events. I expect those standards should be enough to keep most of the qualifiers in roughly the same range in terms of course difficulty. They basically disqualify using the deuce-or-die, Intermediate-players-shooting-45 type courses, and as an amateur event, Gold-level courses aren't apt to be used either (e.g. Maple Hill is hosting, but they won't be using the Gold layout). We're probably talking about a lot of courses in the 50-55 SSA/SSE range.

Since you are a Next Gen TD, were the TD's given the DGCR SSE's for the courses they wanted to use? If the TD's were not given SSE's/SSAs, how were they supposed to find that information to make decisions on which course(s) to use?

SSE's are figured out based on whatever layout the TDs end up choosing to play. They have to enter some information on the NG site, it pings DGCR via an API to grab the SSE for the information they enter. I had assumed the layouts being played might differ and wasn't certain as to which tee would be used, etc. so each event has custom fields (length, etc.) on the NG site that will be used for all calculation.

Tim - Can you please post the current DGCR SSE's for all the courses being used for the Next Gen Tour?

That is a major red flag if they are actually going to use course and hole data on this site, entered by third parties often years before that may no longer be accurate, to determine a winner, in something people are putting money on.

If a player is gambling on the DANCe, they should check the accuracy of the DGCR hole distance information. Players should update the hole information if it could lower the course SSE and leave errors if corrections might raise the SSE.



If you are paying out money to potentially hundreds of players based on SSE's which are based on hole distances, the hole distances need to be accurate to be fair for everyone. It appears a savvy player might be able to game the DANCe by correcting (or not correcting) DGCR course listings. For this reason, the DANCe should absolutely, positively require every single TD to measure every single hole. If a TD hasn't actually measured every single hole, there is no way to know if the current DGCR course information is accurate.


What if a hole is really 230 feet but is listed as 430 feet? What if a hole is 430 feet and is listed as 230 feet?