Skins Game - 8. page

As I mentioned Monday, we’re going to try something different for this Friday’s skins game. I’ve come up with “combo” tee sets to replace the normal gold, white, and blue sets we normally play. The goal is to make all the par 5s play like real par 5s, so that no one can reach #10 or #14 with a drive and 7 iron. And #5 won’t be longer than #10 from the golds or #14 from the blues. These combinations result in total yardage changes of less than 10 yards, which means we can post scores as if we played the normal rated tees. And you will take your handicap strokes on the same holes you normally do, where they fall on the scorecard. So here are the changes we’ll use Friday:

• Gold tees: Move back to the whites on 6, 10, and 14; move up to the reds on 1, 5, and 18. Total yardage reduced by 9 yards.
• White tees: Move back to the blues on 10* and 14; move up to the golds on 5 and 18. Total yardage reduced by 5 yards.
• Blue tees: Move back to the blacks on 7 and 14; move up to the whites on 5 and 18. Total yardage reduced by 2 yards.

I will prepare a handout for each team to use Friday, detailing these changes. We’ll try this Friday and discuss it after the round to get feedback.

*Note: If the blue tees on #10 are back by the road as they have been lately, white tee players will use the front of the blue tee box, near the first path to the restrooms. Blue tee players will play from the tee markers.

Because some of you sign up for our skins games well in advance, I want to inform you of two changes to the schedule:

February 16: No skins game, due to the Gringo Classic

March 2: We WILL have a skins game on Friday, March 2nd.

The first skins game will be Friday, Nov 3rd. Since I will not be arriving until Nov 7th, Jack Gindi has agreed to organize the games on the 3rd and 6th (coordinate with the starter, assign holes, designate hole sequence for team bets, etc). I look forward to seeing everyone in two weeks.

Duane Bender

For those who have recently migrated south, welcome, and we look forward to you starting to play with us each Monday and Friday at 11 am.

And I want to take this opportunity to review some of the rules and practices of this league, for those who haven’t read the description here. These are some specific questions that have come up this year:

• Mud on balls: We are allowing players to lift, clean, and place any ball on your own fairway, including closely mown areas around the greens, until further notice. Play the ball down in the rough or on adjacent fairways.
• Skins: We pay both gross and net skins, but no player gets both on the same hole. All skins, gross and net, are paid an equal share of the total skins pot. Some have criticized my skins policy as favoring gross skins over net skins; specifically that a player without a stroke who makes a gross birdie wins a skin, but a player with a stroke who makes a net birdie does not. But remember, a skin, by definition, is a score that no one else achieves on that hole. So the first player wins a skin because he has the only gross birdie on the hole. The second player doesn’t get one for his net birdie, because the first player also had a net birdie. Two net birdies means no skin.
• Signups: You sign up to play in the skins game using the My Calendar app on the website. The bag list for each skins game is generated and emailed to Phil Woodrum at 3 pm the day prior. Please remember to sign up (check the box), or delete your signup, by 3 pm the day prior. After 3 pm, you can email me, but that causes the wrong bags to be pulled and the pairings to require adjustments.
• Guests: You are welcome to bring guests who want to participate in our game. Notify me by email well before 3 pm the day prior.
• Pedro: When we have a mix of threesomes and foursomes, the threesomes have a phantom player who always makes net par on every hole. If we have only threesomes, Pedro doesn’t play; that means all three scores will count on holes 13-18.
• Max score: The maximum score for any player on any hole is net double bogey. So on a day when we’re playing all threesomes, and therefore no Pedro, one player hitting 2 tee shots into the water on 18 and making a 9 will only add +2 to the team score. Personally, I would put a 7+/7 on the scorecard; the top 7 is the player’s ESC score for handicap purposes, and the bottom 7 is his net score under this max score rule.

If you have any questions, you can reply to this post or send me an email. We hope to see you on the course!

Duane Bender