Geoff Skins Game - Summer 2015 Recap

I was pleasantly surprised at the conditions of the Forest Course this past weekend. The greens and fairways were in great shape, and thankfully the course was dry. Thanks again, Gorecki, for booking us out there.

But what was shocking was how well everyone played on the long and hazard-filled layout. Three-quarters of the league shot under net-par. For the second week in a row we had someone buy a "good" pitcher for shooting -10 or better. And with 6 holes to play there were about seven people who had a realistic chance of winning.

But in the end, it was Reid who prevailed with a long overdue victory. He shot +2 (gross) on the final six holes to beat a crowded leader board and win his first event in his last 20 attempts. Perhaps he's finally out of the "just had a baby" slump? His three birdies on the day might be a record in league play, and he's now tied for the 2nd lowest net score in a tournament.

Four other guys had two birdies on the day, and the 13 birdies in total might also be a record. Very surprising on a course that is by no means "easy."

Buchert and Chandler both scrambled for par on the final hole to finish 2nd. And then there's The Baron... who wasn't able to collect his weekly tax due to the skins format. He finished 2nd as well and now has the most insane handicap chart in the history of the world.

How is this possible?

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Big John apparently didn't write down the Ryder Cup date, and won't be joining us this year due to a conflict. And since Geoff bailed this weekend, he can't qualify in the Top 12 rankings due to lack of tournaments played (less than 8 in last 18). Therefore the 12 automatic qualifiers are basically set weeks before the rankings were going to lock.

In a few weeks I'm going to post payment instructions. I've already pre-paid for the Ryder Cup lodging. Everyone will have a set period of time to get me their payment, and after that time expires I'll open it up to the alternates.

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Next week we play up at Southern Hills, Sunday June 7th at 10:30am. I'm assuming all 12 from last tournament are IN, as well as Dan and his dad making a guest appearance. I'm also assuming Tall Mike will be back with us. This gives us one spot open for Dave or Geoff. Comment if any of you won't be making the event.

Westchase at 2:53 for $31. Tomorrow/Friday/5-29-15

I have two open spots if anyone cares to join. Just me and my buddy Matt Murphy at this point. Let me know if you are available and want to join. You can call/text me (321) 537-5855.

Chandler Classic - Stats & (Un)interesting Facts

Since I slacked off so badly last season I decided to do an extensive stats post for our first event of the new season.  In reverse order of finish, here's a little something about all 13 players in the Chandler Classic.

Also, here's a little look at our illustrious president or commissioner or whatever he is and this event's namesake.  I'm not sure if this swing or his current one is harder to watch.

Gorecki achieved the rare feat of two 10s in one round, something he’s somehow only managed to do one other time in league play.  Shockingly, two 10s is not the worst in league history.  Big John pulled off three 10s at Lexington Oaks last summer and Geoff racked up three of his own at Heritage Harbor several seasons ago.

Stoneybrook continues to be a nemesis of mine.  I have six official rounds there with 88 being my all-time low score.  Tough to play well when you take 8 penalties and are able to throw a wedge further than you hit it on the par-3 4^th hole.

Darryl – welcome to the league!  Darryl got off to a pretty rough start with a 56 on the front-9 but improved by 9 shots on the back for a 47.  He was also only one of three players to make par on the difficult 8^th hole.

Tall Mike had a fairly average day in terms of overall score (+1) but had a hell of a closing stretch.  He made four straight pars to close his round, which includes being the only player to par the very difficult par-3 17^th hole.

JW hit the ball better than he scored, which was still a very respectable even par.  He could have very easily shaved 4 or 5 strokes if it weren’t for a few silly mistakes and unfortunate bounces.  Even par is his best score posted in league play since July 19^th of last year at none other than good ol’ Stoneybrook, where he posted a -3 and earned a 2^nd place finish.

Gary played a lot of good golf with an unfortunate pinch of bad golf thrown in the mix that killed his chances of a higher finish.  He made a total of 10 pars and played holes 9-16 in +2.  Not that he (or anyone) had a chance of beating Brendan, but he could have contested for 2^nd or 3^rd place if he hadn’t played holes 4-8 in +9.

Reid posted a score of +23 gross with 15 of those extra strokes coming on 5 holes.  He’s another one that could have made the fight for 2^nd and 3^rd a little more interesting if it weren’t for some all too typical blow up holes.  His birdie on the altered par-5 16^th was one of only four birdies made all day by the entire field.

Chris Guest began his round by sinking a 20-30 footer for birdie, which was his first in 106 holes of league play (2^nd hole at River Strand, 8/9/14).  The fun was short-lived though as he proceeded to make triple bogey, double bogey, and bogey over his next three holes.  Despite the roller coaster of a day, his 71 was good enough to earn him solo 6^th.

Buchert posted the lowest gross score of the day, 81, helped by playing the par 5s in even par.  His net 68 was very solid and a little extra impressive due to the fact that I don’t believe he ever played the course before.  It’ll be interesting to see if he can keep up his good play and overcome the challenge of often having the lowest handicap in the field.

Chandler had the next best gross score of the day, 82, helped by playing the par 3s in even par.  Unfortunately for him he saw his league record for low net score (-10, also at Stoneybrook) not only disappear but be completely annihilated by BD’s -16 performance.  He can still hang his hat on having the record (shared with Geoff) for largest margin of victory, which is 10 shots.

Darren continued his strong play by making 7 pars and not having anything higher than a 6 on his scorecard for the day.  Seeing as how last season’s average winning score was -5, his score of -6 would typically put him in a good position to win.  Alas, Stoneybrook is not normal.  The worst winning score ever posted there is -7.  Still a very solid start to the season for the guy attempting to be the first repeat winner of the cup since Chandler (first 2 seasons) when the league was an even poorer excuse of a league than it is today.

Geoff “Buddy Kane” Leighly made quite the reappearance to league play.  On almost any other day he would have grabbed his 9^th league victory and second at Stoneybrook, where he won the Jamaican Open with an identical score of -7 just over a year ago.  He played exceptional golf for the first 16 holes and was the only player with a realistic chance at challenging Brendan until finishing double par, double par.  Great to have you back out, hope you stick around!

Last but certainly not least, Brendan.  This f’ing guy.  In his 17^th official start finally earned his first victory by completely embarrassing the rest of the field.  He set an incredible record for net score (-16) that is very unlikely to ever be matched.  I believe he also posted his best 9-hole (41) and 18-hole (85) gross scores of his life.  He only had three 6s on his card, two of which came on par 5s and the other was on 18, a veteran move to try and limit the impact to his handicap.  Not much else to say except congratulations and good luck with keeping up the great play.

DPT Open

We are going to leave the Open (week 3) on Sunday June 7th. 

We are just too large of a group to accommodate everyone... Especially when we have a posted schedule that people plan around. 

More details on when/where later. 

Geoff Skins Game - Saturday May 30th

We've officially moved our next event to Saturday, May 30th.

Reluctantly, I've let Gorecki book us at The Eagles out in Odessa. Our first tee time is 11:18am. They do have a range. I have no idea how much it's going to cost (Gorecki was working on our "deal").

The Eagles was a decent facility years ago, and one of the best bargains in Tampa. It then went bankrupt and sat untouched for years until someone bought both courses for the rumored deal of $1 million.

Since then they've jacked up their rates and fixed up the Forest Course. It should be decent as long as we don't get much rain this week. Anyway... blame Mike if it sucks.

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For the skins game this year, I'm going to divide up the league into two tiers based on handicap. Everything else stays the same... as in there's still a stroke play event going on.

Creating multiple tiers allows us to spread around the winnings, as well as prevents people from getting a ton of strokes.

Later this week I'll have the scorecard all updated so you can see which holes you are stroking.

Chandler Classic - Summer 2015 Recap

Rory McIlroy obliterated the field at the Wells Fargo Championship, winning by 9 strokes and setting the course record in one of his rounds. And yet… he looks like a chump compared to Brendan.

Stoneybrook was in solid shape for the first event of the season, playing fairly easy despite what the Slope Rating says. Nine players shot net par or better, and really only two guys had a “bad” round. Holes like the par-3 15^th, with its deep bunkers and steep collection area behind the green, yielded 9 pars. And the entire field played the shortened 16^th at two-over, a hole that requires a decent tee shot and accurate lay-up.

The Baron collected his weekly tax on the peasants, shooting and impressive -6 (net) to finish 3^rd, a score that would win most weeks.

Geoff took a break from his weekend job to finish 2^nd at -7 (net). Granted, he was +9 on the final three holes. It was a good showing considering how infrequently he has played this year.

But then there’s Brendan, who shattered all golfing records known to man. His net 56 is definitely a record for our league (Faz can verify the historic significance), but it’s even more impressive considering he made double-bogey on the final two holes. Veteran move by Brendan to fill his bags with a little sand before finishing his round!

Four people in the field could have shot even par (gross) and still lost to Brendan yesterday.  His net score beat Gorecki by a staggering 27 strokes. And apparently he set personal records for his lowest 9 and 18 hole scores. It’s a long overdue performance by Brendan, who earned his first ever victory as well as a bunch of cash with the newly increased entry fees.

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With yesterday’s round, Geoff snuck back into the Official Golf Rankings at the 10 spot. But he’ll need to play in ALL of the next four events in order to meet the Ryder Cup qualification of rounds played (8 in previous rolling 18). There’s going to be a very close battle for the 12^th spot.

Keep in mind that we’ll probably end up taking more than 12 guys up to World Woods. But I doubt we’ll have more than 12 actually competing in the event.

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We’re off next week for Memorial Day. Go ahead and tell me if you’re IN for week 2 (Sunday, May 31^st). Also let me know if you have an issue with moving the event to Saturday, May 30^th. Darren has requested the change and we’ll do so if nobody objects. Right now the only person I have OUT both days is Tall Mike.

Week 1 Pairings

Pairings for our first week. Sunday the 17th at Stoneybrook in Bradenton. 11am.

Group 1:
Chandler
Gorecki
Darryl

Group 2:
Buchert
Reid
Geoff

Group 3:
Gary
Darren
Brendan
(Tall Mike)

Group 4:
Faz
Guest
JW

While the course is in decent shape... they are apparently ripping up the greens and doing massive maintenance two days after our round. They've already started on the par-5 16th hole. Because of this, we will play it from the blue tees. The temporary green is a small circle mowed into the fairway. Once you are inside this circle, you can't have any more than a 2-putt. Feel free to attempt your first putt. Hit it hard.

Spring 2015 Stats (Lazy Version)

I had grand plans of doing separate stats posts about each player but obviously that isn't going to happen before this next season gets started.

Here are various stats and how everyone ranked from the Spring '15 season.  People highlighted in yellow played in 4 events or less and therefore should basically be ignored.  My computer was giving me issues when I was copy/pasting from Excel so these are just screen grabs, sorry if they look like crap.

Summer 2015 - Week 1

We're back! Unfortunately, Esplanade is punching their greens this week. So we'll go there later in the season.

Instead we'll start at Stoneybrook, 11am on Sunday the 17th.

We have 13 people at the moment and one spot saved for the often injured Tall Mike.

Week 1 - Headcount

Esplanade is pretty solid, and a great place to open next season. They'll also give us a group discount.

So who is in for week one? So far I know:

Chan

Gary

Darren

Reid

Faz 

JW

Gorecki

Darryl
Geoff
Buchert
Guest
Brendan
Dave

I can assume the rest of you are in... But make a comment anyway. The sooner the better.

Out:
John
Dan

Esplanade - This Sunday

Got one spot open for a noon tee time this Sunday at Esplanade. $52. Heading down there around 10am.

http://www.esplanadelwr.com

Check it out and comment if you want the spot. We will more than likely be playing there this upcoming season.

Stats Post #2 - Brian

Although there wasn't any competition for this season’s rookie of the year, I have a hard time thinking anyone would have put up much of a fight with the way Buchert played.  He placed 2^nd in the overall standings with 1,665 points, won twice, and had the 2^nd highest average points per event with 208.125.

Brian technically played in all 9 events but was still establishing a handicap during week 1 so his stats are based off his 8 official starts.

Gross Scoring Average: 86.25 (1^st)

Net Scoring Average: 72.75 (2^nd to Darren)

Par or Better Percentage: 46.528% (1^st)

Par 3 Scoring Average: 3.410 (1^st)

Par 4 Scoring Average: 4.897 (4^th)

Par 5 Scoring Average: 6.037 (2^nd)

The 8 he posted on the 2^nd hole at Cypress Creek was his only max double par of the season.

He made one double bogey on a par 3 all season, which happened on the 3^rd hole of the Hangover Invitational at Quail Hollow…very understandable.  He made par on all of the other par 3s that day.

He only failed to break 90 once, which happened at Club Renaissance.  Must have been those “first official event nerves” getting to him.

Buchert has been a great addition to the league.  Hope to see him at all or most of the events in the Summer ’15 season.

Let the Stats Posts Begin...

Now that the season is over, it's time to let everyone (except Darren) know how bad they are.  This will be the first of many stats posts coming over the next several days.  Every person who officially played in 5 or more events this season will have their time to shine.

That 21 year old kid may have broken a lot of records last week at that other tour’s “prestigious” tournament but let’s not lose sight of what our very own Darren “The Baron” did this season.

• 4 wins ties Faz and Chandler for most ever in a single season
• Darren played 9 of 9 events
• Faz (Summer ’14) played 8 of 9 events
• Chandler (Spring ’13) played 11 of 11 events
• Has most career wins with 11 (Faz in 2^nd with 10)
• Accumulated 2^nd most points in league history (2,962.5)
• Chandler (Spring ’13) accumulated 3,087.5 when there were 11 events
• 329.167 points per event is 2^nd highest in league history (Faz 341.250 Summer ’14)
• Dropped his gross scoring average more than 5 strokes from last season (98.500 to 93.444)
• Gross scoring average has gone down every season, started at 106.444 in Spring ‘13
• Only person this season to have a below par net scoring average (70.778)
• Only 3^rd time anyone has had a below par net scoring average (Faz 70.071 Summer ’13, 70.125 Summer ’14)
• Increased percentage of making par or better from league worst 13.889% last season to middle of the pack 22.840% this season (remember his gross pars are net birdies, sometimes eagles)
• Lead the league in bogey percentage with 45.062% (those are all net pars, sometimes birdies)
• Dropped his double bogey or worse percentage from 44.444% last season to 32.099%
• Dropped par 3 scoring average from 4.125 to 3.744 (tied this season with Chandler, better than Dave, Gary, and Faz)

DPT Masters - Spring 2015 Recap

The "Season of Darren" continued Sunday, as The Baron hoarded more wealth from the peasants of the league. Picking up his 3rd win in a row (league record), Darren put Jordan Spieth to shame with an 8 under gross 88 round that won by 5 strokes. And the beatdown should have been worse if not for a sand-bagged quad-bogey on the final hole.

It was Darren's second sub 90 round in a row (personal record since joining the league), his 11th tour win (league record), his 6th Major title (league record) and he increased his earnings to an astounding $336 ($268 higher than the next golfer).

Basically... he's the greatest golfer in history. It's gotten to the point where we should consider a name change to DPD: Dudes Paying Darren.

Cypress Creek played as difficult as usual with two league members failing to score a single par. Double-pars were frequent (19 of them) and less than half the group broke 100. There really isn't anything wrong with difficult courses, especially when they add some balance to other venues like Quail Hollow. Cypress Creek isn't really "tricked up" either. It's just frustratingly hard. Unless you're Darren in the Spring of 2015. I mean... check out his entire history at the Creek: 107, 109, 105, 97, 111, 88.

Where did that come from?

Anyway... next season starts Sunday, May 17th. I'll slowly start changing over the information on the blog to reflect the new season.

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We are all set for the Ryder Cup during the weekend of August 22nd at World Woods. Check in is Friday night (21st), we'll play two rounds on Saturday, and one more round on Sunday before heading back to Tampa.

We're going to lock the Official Golf Rankings at the end of June, giving everyone 5 more tournaments to increase their standings. To be on the list you must have 8 tournaments played in the previous rolling 18. Once we lock the standings I'll give the top 12 guys a week to pay for the villas ($80 each). After that week we'll open it up to the alternates.

There's a slight chance we can increase it to 16 players if everyone wants in. But we'll talk about that after I collect money from the first 12. We could also just bring the alternates and let them play each day in their own group, so at least they'll partake in the trip.

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Not a ton of movement in the Golf Rankings, however. Buchert finally debuted in the 2nd captain spot (as expected). Geoff also finally dropped out of the rankings due to lack of tournaments played (as expected). He basically has to play all of the first 5 events next season to qualify. And there's zero chance that happens now that he's a weekend working man.

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A couple of people have expressed interest in increasing league fees to $10/$20. Doing so would give bigger payouts as well as allowing us to collect a bigger rake, which would be spent on the Champion's Dinner. Comment your thoughts on this. Luckily it's too late for The Baron to get a free meal. But next season it could be you...

DPT Masters - Spring 2015 Pairings

9am at Cypress Creek in Ruskin! They do have a range. Get ready for some high scores! $10 entry fee this week.

Group 1:
Chandler
Gary
Gorecki
Gorecki's dad

Group 2:
Reid
Buchert
Big John
Guest

Group 3:
Dave
Faz
Darren
Tall Mike

Masters party after our round at 3pm!