Official Golf World Rankings: Five New Things To Know

The new Official Golf World Rankings system begins to roll out on August 8, 2022, with the first ranking using the modernized method being released a week later. The following story, written after last year’s OWGR change announcement, explains how world rankings will be different in the future.

Three years ago, the Official Golf World Rankings began an analysis to answer one question: What is the best way to compare the performance of players who compete around the world but may never play each other?

That was an easier task when the OWGR was introduced in 1986 and included only six courses. More than 20 tours are included in the ranking.

This growth was one of the reasons for the world ranking changes that were announced on Wednesday. This new system was created to provide a more accurate ranking, which eliminates biases that existed due to arbitrary values ​​that had been used in the ranking calculation.

Here are 5 things to know about the new world ranking:

1. WHAT’S NEW? This is not the first update to the Official Golf World Rankings. In its 35 years, the system has been adjusted at least 17 times, according to Peter Dawson, chairman of the OWGR Governing Board.

According to the new world ranking, a field will be evaluated based on the skill of all the players on the field. The old system focused primarily on players ranked in the top 200 in the world, without taking into account the skill level of the rest of the field.

Each player will now have a World Strokes Earned Ranking based on their scores in stroke play events over the past two years.

The Performance Points’ sum determines the tournament’s Field Ranking, which determines the number of Ranking Points that will be distributed. Ranking points will be awarded to all players who cut a distribution similar to the prize pool, i.e. 18% for the winner, 11% for second place, etc. The old system did not guarantee points for all players who cut. . But the new one does.

Other features of the world ranking, such as its two-year weighted average and the minimum and maximum divisors for individual players, remain intact.

2. OUT OF THE OLD: Field Rating replaces Field Strength measurement, which was primarily focused on the number of top 200 players on a field. Also gone are the arbitrary values ​​that are used in the current iteration of the world ranking, such as the minimum values ​​that tournaments can award on each tour. The new world ranking is independent of tour affiliations and is only concerned with the ability of the players on the pitch.

“We are using all of the players that enter a field to determine the strength of an event rather than a smaller subset,” said Steve Otto, R&A technical director, and OWGR Technical Committee member.

For example, PGA TOUR and European Tour events may award no less than 24 points to the winner, regardless of course quality.

There are no longer flagship events, a designation given to the highest-profile event in a specific course, which also had a floor in the minimum number of points they could award.

3. WIN: So what is a player’s world strokes-earned rating? If it sounds like something Mark Broadie would create, it should be, as he was instrumental in its development.

Described most simply, a player’s SG World Rating is based on their actual scores in stroke play events, which are then adjusted for the strength of the field. Things get a bit more complex when you consider that it is a statistical modeling calculation known as fixed effects regression that allows the scores to be standardized.

With either description, SG World Rating allows comparison of players on a wide variety of tours, allowing a shot of 67 in the first round of THE PLAYERS to be compared to a shot of 64 on the final day of a Challenge Tour event. in Kazakhstan.

Each player’s SG World Ranking will fluctuate according to their two-year record, with more emphasis given to more recent scores.

SG World Ratings is an excellent evaluator of skills and would have significant predictive power, said Billy Schroder, PGA TOUR vice president of international relations and a member of the OWGR Technical Committee, but World Ratings believes a rating should reflect “standards of golf established,” including recognizing the majors as the pinnacle of the sport, prioritizing winning and awarding points to all players who cut.

4. WHEN: The new system will not go into effect for a year from the week ending August 14, 2022 rankings. From then on, tournaments will award points under the new system (no points will be awarded). will make retroactive changes). to points awarded in the past). Because the Official Golf World Rankings is calculated over two years, the OWGR will not fully reflect the new system until August 2024.

5. THE IMPACT: The OWGR predicts that the top 10 in the world rankings will likely remain the same under this new system and the top 50, which fluctuates weekly, would feature only 2-5 new players. The fact that these players regularly compete against each other is the reason for the minimal impact.