Why have a cut in golf tournament?

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Kevin Shields

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I missed the cut at the PGA National Championship by 1 shot. My buddy Rob McClellan was 6 shots ahead of my at 5 under. He was in 6th place. I was in 86th place. It was a hard cut because 1 under ended up in a playoff for the PGA so by definition anyone who made the cut had a great chance to get in. However, I never doubted why there was a cut. Its just sometimes there are really tight cuts, fields are deep and you have to come out guns blazin in round one.

I will say this though, golf tournaments, especially 72 hole ones, are marathons. Alot of guys like the anonymity of the 1st 2 rounds and gag in the last 2 under the spotlight. Some good closers, Greg Norman comes to mind, often barely made the cuts because of slow starts and then contend. Its a good topic.
 
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Mike Thomas (sunmart)

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Kevin, For TV purposes would you be opposed to repairing and teeing off by score on the 2nd day of the tournament rather than early- late and waiting for Saturday. Would be much better to watch and maybe more competitive. It always perturbed me when Tiger was at his prime to miss him playing live on Thursday or Friday. I thought that did not make any sense.
 
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ekennedy

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Teeing off late for four consecutive days is a HUGE disadvantage. Playing early then late or vice versa is the closest thing that tournament golf has to equality. Friday's round, despite being good television, means nothing other than making the cut and getting to the weekend.
 
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ms1170

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Early - Late for 1st two rounds is the most fair way to do it. Plus this way they can spread the popular players out so we get to see them on TV, one of the 1st two rounds. Tiger and Phil are always opposite each other in PGA tour events the 1st two rounds.
 
faux_maestro

faux_maestro

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sunmart said:
"Teeing off late for four consecutive days is a HUGE disadvantage" Why?
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Greens get tracked up late. Generally in the USA in the summer, weather/wind kicks up as the day goes on. Storms kick up here a lot in the afternoon. I played 9 holes today, teed off at 7am. Absolutely no wind, smooth greens. A few hours after I was done the wind kicked up a bit. Not everything about a golf tournament is about what people want to see on TV. Fairness to the field is more important than seeing Eldrick or Phil or anyone else on TV.
 
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ekennedy

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sunmart said:
"Teeing off late for four consecutive days is a HUGE disadvantage" Why?
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During most professional events, the greens are watered over night. They are also double cut and rolled in the morning. They are as pure and perfect as you can imagine at 7am. By 3pm, they are firm, baked out and spiked up beyone recognition. Fortunately, the guys that are playing late on the weekend (with 1/2 the foot traffic) are playing the best and can deal with adversity...but it's clearly not the same golf course in the late afternoon as it is in the morning.

And don't get me started on wind...
 
faux_maestro

faux_maestro

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sunmart said:
Tell the sponsors forking out millions that. Basically every tournament winner played 3 out of 4 days late.
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Basically everyone who makes the cut and is in the top half after the cut plays 3 of 4 late. That has nothing to do with the discussion. First two days before the cut it's fair to play early-late or late-early.

And as far as sponsors, they have been forking out a lot of money for a lot of years under this current system. Not sure that is an issue.

How often do players that barely make the cut go on to win? I know Paul Lawrie came from 10 back the last day in 1999 under awful conditions. Loren Roberts was pretty far back in the 1994 U.S. Open and got into a playoff. How often does it actually happen though?

Do you suppose that Todd Hamilton or David Duval or Alvaro Quiros would like to keep playing this weekend?
 
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Kevin Shields

Super Moderator
sunmart said:
Kevin, For TV purposes would you be opposed to repairing and teeing off by score on the 2nd day of the tournament rather than early- late and waiting for Saturday. Would be much better to watch and maybe more competitive. It always perturbed me when Tiger was at his prime to miss him playing live on Thursday or Friday. I thought that did not make any sense.
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Yes, I would be opposed.
 
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jertapper

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I think it would be interesting to forgo the low 70 and ties idea and look at statistics to find out an appropriate amount of strokes back it is actually realistically possible to come back from and win (within reason) and include everyone that is within that many strokes of the leader. I think anyone that has a chance after 2 days should get to play the weekend and dump the rest of the guys who aren't playing. It would be really similar to the low 70 and ties the majority of the time, though.

If you are outside of the low 70 then you aren't playing well enough that week. They don't need you wrecking the course for the contenders anymore. Bye!
 
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DCgolf

New
Cut

Anyone within 10 shots of lead should make cut in all events. Before we all exempt tour making the cut was how you played next week! Guys played to make the cut, not go low on thur and fri. They only started going low first two days when they knew they were in next week regardless. Dc
 
faux_maestro

faux_maestro

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DCgolf said:
Anyone within 10 shots of lead should make cut in all events. Before we all exempt tour making the cut was how you played next week! Guys played to make the cut, not go low on thur and fri. They only started going low first two days when they knew they were in next week regardless. Dc
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The only issue with this is I can remember one year in the British Open when they still had that rule something like 100+ players made the cut. I think that was why they made the rule change.
 
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jertapper

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faux_maestro said:
The only issue with this is I can remember one year in the British Open when they still had that rule something like 100+ players made the cut. I think that was why they made the rule change.
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It seems like it would be easy to let all players within 10 strokes make the cut and just add the exception of if it's over 100 players you drop it down to 9 and then if that is somehow over 100 they drop it down to 8, etc.
 
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