2018 USDGC

[rhatton1]

I've heard players complain about ledgestone's OB in the past, what makes USDGC different?

Better designed use of OB normally.

The original Ledgestone layout that gave it a bad name had a number of holes that were all risk no reward, watching Simon standstill putt off the tee did not make for exciting viewing! It's got better over time. Some of the elements were so bad they forced changes on PDGA sanctioning.

The USDGC layouts nearly always balance a fair risk and reward with lots of options off the tee. You tend not to see too many "fluky" OB's (ie tree kicks to OB etc) There have been some notable exceptions to this over the years, they are nearly always sorted by the next year.

In general USDGC tends to get the balance better than Ledgestone did to begin with, Ledgestone has got better but is struggling to shake the early rep.

From a personal point of view there are a number of things about the USDGC layout that rankle with me, most notably that one of the premier events and most filmed in the sport plays across car parks and walking paths regularly, and use buildings to edge fairways. It sends a very bad message to rookie course designers "well USDGC do it, it must be fine..."

 

[JC17393]

wow...after only round 1.....at 8 or more strokes off the lead, these guys are out of it imop...Wysocki, Sexton, McMahon, McCray, Koling. That's crazy to say, but I just don't see the top 4-5 players botching the course enough to give that many strokes back. If anything I think the top 4-6 players pull away from the chase card(s) even more.

8 strokes, over 54 holes, on this course...not insurmountable. If McBeth keeps putting up scores of double digit under par with no bogeys, then yeah, no one's catching him not even Anthon, Melton, or Conrad. But there are no guarantees on this course.

Just off the top of my head, Barry Schultz was, I believe, 8 back of Climo after two rounds the year he came back and forced the playoff (and won). And that was when Climo was CLIMO. All it really takes for someone like Ricky or Sexton is cleaning up the bogeys and they should chip away at the deficit. If the guys at the top falter a little bit, it makes it a bit easier.

 

[PoorPutter]

On 10 of the holes, over half of the field didn't have a birdie putt (i.e. they were outside Circle 2 in regulation). Is that bad design, bad play, a combination, or just all good? (If you go with the traditional "green" of 10m, only 3 holes on the course had over 35% of the field putting for birdie.)

Of the other 8 holes, only 1 of them isn't a par 3.

Put another way, hole #10 is the only par 4 or par 5 on which over half the field gets a birdie putt. And on every par 3, at least half the field has a birdie putt.

 

[kiwichiwi]

On 10 of the holes, over half of the field didn't have a birdie putt (i.e. they were outside Circle 2 in regulation). Is that bad design, bad play, a combination, or just all good? (If you go with the traditional "green" of 10m, only 3 holes on the course had over 35% of the field putting for birdie.)

Of the other 8 holes, only 1 of them isn't a par 3.

Put another way, hole #10 is the only par 4 or par 5 on which over half the field gets a birdie putt. And on every par 3, at least half the field has a birdie putt.

I think it speaks volumes for the course design. Its so hard to design a course where par is 1000 rated while keeping it still a fun course to play. Every Birdie you get on a par 4 or 5 requires great shots from tee to approach to get the birdie. the par 3s all have a way of biting you in the butt if you are just a little off. I can see how people have issues with holes like 9 but I think it requires a lot of discipline to play safe and not try to go for to much. This course was never designed to be a birdie fest.

 

[chosenmatrix]

Maybe I missed it here, but does anyone know what PP was penalized for post round? It looks like a 2 stroke penalty, so I am assuming some scoring error on her part, but was just curious if anyone has the deets?

 

[JC17393]

On 10 of the holes, over half of the field didn't have a birdie putt (i.e. they were outside Circle 2 in regulation). Is that bad design, bad play, a combination, or just all good? (If you go with the traditional "green" of 10m, only 3 holes on the course had over 35% of the field putting for birdie.)

Of the other 8 holes, only 1 of them isn't a par 3.

Put another way, hole #10 is the only par 4 or par 5 on which over half the field gets a birdie putt. And on every par 3, at least half the field has a birdie putt.

I would lean toward bad play. This is a difficult course designed to challenge the very best players in the world. Yesterday, +2 was 1000 rated. So players who are sub-1000 rated can't really be expected to get a lot of birdie looks, and 38% of the field is under 1000. Those players are probably going to skew the numbers a bit. I wonder what the stats look like if you exclude everyone under, say, 1010? (since par was rated at 1012)

Also, when you consider most players putting percentages (the worst circle one percentage by hole was on hole 1 at 80%...nerves?), the only real way to put teeth into a disc golf course is to make it tougher to reach circle 1, and circle 2 by extension. I don't really see 50% of the field failing to get to the green in regulation as a sign of poor design. Because if 80% of the field is getting to the green, it probably means the birdie rate on the hole is going to be above 50%. That seems less than desirable for a challenging course.

 

[PoorPutter]

Yes, I'd love to see the same stats for just the top half.....or those over 1000 or 1010.

I lean toward poor play / bad decision-making as well. Through the years I've been amazed at how stupidly the mid-pack plays this course. Yes, the top players need to play with a "controlled aggression" as Climo or Barry said so many years ago. But the mid-pack seem to play as if they think they are better than they actually are. Haha, or maybe they just don't care about score. They certainly SEEM good enough to play essentially par golf fairly safely (and place way higher)......yet so many of them don't.

In general I question holes where only a small fraction are playing the hole as-designed......like if only 10%-20% have birdie putts......because a lot of those holes are flukey and don't correlate to the overall skill. But in the case of this course and this tournament, I'm not of that same mindset.

 

[Flick Maniac]

This course was never designed to be a birdie fest.

Aaaaand yet a select few make it exactly that... or a birdie feast, if you may

 

[Cgkdisc]

"Greens in Reg" stat is messed up on courses with lots of OB. Technically, it should be based on number of physical throws made excluding penalties accumulated along the way, not your throw count including penalties, if you're really trying to measure percentage of players getting to the "green". This is just one of the standard stats that get skewed when throw count is artificially padded with penalties.

 

[kiwichiwi]

"Greens in Reg" stat is messed up on courses with lots of OB. Technically, it should be based on number of physical throws made excluding penalties accumulated along the way, not your throw count including penalties, if you're really trying to measure percentage of players getting to the "green". This is just one of the standard stats that get skewed when throw count is artificially padded with penalties.

Its not artificial. They didn't make the green because they went OB.

 

[joecoin]

I find it impossible to imagine that "Reek" guy as anything else than the emasculated character from Game of Thrones

Both Queen and Reek, I had no idea they played DG:

Queensreek has sold over 20 million albums worldwide, including over 6 million albums in the United States.

 

[ThrowBot]

If Jomez had covered Climo's card, then they would have had to film only 3 players for the last 17 holes yesterday.

Less film to get flipped over for next day post-prod coverage.

Everybody would have won!
Nice shiny participation trophies all around!

 

[Steve West]

On 10 of the holes, over half of the field didn't have a birdie putt (i.e. they were outside Circle 2 in regulation). Is that bad design, bad play, a combination, or just all good? (If you go with the traditional "green" of 10m, only 3 holes on the course had over 35% of the field putting for birdie.)

Of the other 8 holes, only 1 of them isn't a par 3.

Put another way, hole #10 is the only par 4 or par 5 on which over half the field gets a birdie putt. And on every par 3, at least half the field has a birdie putt.

Put another way, hole #10 is the only hole where par was set too high.

So, almost "just all good". This is what it looks like when the TD actually makes the effort to set par as it is defined: the score that an expert disc golfer would be expected to make on a given hole with errorless play under ordinary weather conditions.

Nothing in that definition about getting to any circles. For more, see the Par Talk thread.

 

[notroman]

If Ricky gets hot... no one is safe.

If McBeth stays hot. . .it does not matter how hot Ricky gets

It's all easier said than done. Consistent golf wins this tournament. Hot golf usually doesn't. Mostly because aggressive players usually will have at least one blow up round. Winthrop will get ya.

 

[PoorPutter]

Interestingly(?), Paige P only shot 3 strokes worse than "expected". I.e. she shot a 953-rated 77.....a 74 was rated 971.......her rating is 972.

I bet she feels like it was a lot worse than 3 strokes off her "average".

Similarly, Sexton and Koling shot their rating.....with a 7 and an 8 on #17, respectively.

Trippy.

 

[PoorPutter]

Oh good lord, I didn't notice that Sexton bogeyed #10 and #12. Yow. Same for Koling on #6 and #7.

"Hey guys, I know you bogeyed two of the easiest holes, and you blew up on 17, but you shot average for you!".

 

[ThrowBot]

Can't wait to see how BigSexy commentary addresses those facts.

Sheeeeeet, Nate won the whole thing last year. He said he couldn't breathe until he had 17 on the score card final round.
It'll get you. Course management is key.

 

[brutalbrutus]

Cant find any links but it appears that the live coverage will be on Innova's YT channel at 130pm est Fri and Sat...

 

[RShope33073]

Cant find any links but it appears that the live coverage will be on Innova's YT channel at 130pm est Fri and Sat...

There's all kinds of links on USDGC.com under the media tab and how to follow online

 

[brutalbrutus]

There's all kinds of links on USDGC.com under the media tab and how to follow online

I meant links to the actual scheduled stream. The only one I found sends you to Innova's YT channel.