Late/Early At Riviera

With the cut made Saturday morning, Peter Yoon of the LA Times was finally able to compute the scoring average differences between late/early and early/late players and came up with this killer stat that sums up just how brutal the conditions were...for some.

Players who had tee times on Thursday morning and Friday afternoon enjoyed less windy conditions both days and it showed in the statistics.

Those players averaged 71.28 on Thursday morning and 70.68 on Friday afternoon. The other half of the field averaged 73.51 on Thursday afternoon and 73.78 on Friday morning -- a total difference of 5.33 strokes.

"The wind was gusting and swirling enough that you were really out there guessing as much as you were feeling like you were making good decisions on club choices," said D.J. Trahan, who played the more difficult times the first two days and then shot a third-round 66, the best round Saturday.

Comments

[jneu]

Rub o' the green. Nothing more, nothing less.

[JD]

Case closed, 70 and ties is the GOLD standard for this very reason, Thursday and Friday different conditions/waves. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to see one wave had a five shot advantage, just a statistician. Any player tied for 70th deserves two more rounds.

[Ronald Montesano]

When did The Spanish Kite (Sergio) play? He averaged 72.5 those days. Coincidentally, the words for kite and comet are the same in his language: cometa. He aspires to both, apparently.

[jneu]

JD, why does a player who ties for 70th DESERVE two more rounds? (As opposed to, say, a player tied for 63rd? or 57th? or 81st?) And what about the players who tie for 70th, say, but happened to play in the benign conditions? Arguably, they played no better than guys five shots behind them.

Top 70 is what everybody's used to, so it seems inevitable and righteous. Doesn't make it any less arbitrary than Rule 78.

[JD]

jneu-

70 x 2 = 140

The fields are 156, you'd like to see 100 players gone after Friday us that right? No problem, as long as those 100 players are paid a stipend for the week, let's say 3,000 a man times 100. After all why should these guys be out $3,000 for the week while Northern Trust rakes in about $8 million for the week? Seventy and ties is arbitrary, it's also the balance between no guaranteed money vs. guaranteed money, the 100 players you want to send packing are not showing up for free!!

[jneu]

JD, I don't really care how many people make the cut -- 44, 50, 70, or 99.3. I assume there's enough money to pay everybody in the field something (and if there's not, for god's sake reduce the winner's check -- what, they're not going to show up if 1st prize is only $750,000 instead of a million?). All I'm saying is that 70 is arbitrary, whether it's half the field or 52.3% or any other fraction. Wherever you put the cut line, it's arbitrary. I never said a word about where I thought it "should" be -- I don't think it's a "should" issue, so I'm not bothered by the Tour trying something different.

[JackM]

I also do not understand the infantile fixation on the number "70". It makes no sense that so many on this site seem to equate 70 with some eternal notion of justice.

"After all why should these guys be out $3,000 for the week while Northern Trust rakes in about $8 million for the week?"

This is an idiotic thing to say.

Northen Trust (for good reasons or not) has chosen to make a 5 year commitment to sposor this event and, not coincidently, provide a place for PGA tour members to spend some time trying to make a $million, earn some Ryder Cup points and bank some all-important FedEx Cup points.

These poor pros are not required to play. They have a choice to stay home and not, as you so Leninistly put it - play for free.

If Northern Trust makes $8M or loses $8M is no business of yours. They took the risk and it's their name on the door. If the pros don't want to "play for free", they can give lessons and plan the tee prizes for the Member-Guest.

The answer to all their problems is....PLAY BETTER.

[Eric Stratton]

if PLAY BETTER is the answer...

...then why don't we just pay the top-30 and be done with it?

ES