Have the World Rankings become meaningless?

King_of_Kingz

http://http://sportshangout.wordpress.com/2014/05/20/has-the-title-of-golfs-world-number-1-become-meaningless-golf/

Hey everyone,

Read this article and it got me thinking about the rankings. Have they lost their value and does the system really need to be changed or tweaked to make the rankings reflect who really is the best in the world?

Would love to hear everyone's thoughts!

big_drive

Well it always seems to me that its crazy a person can move up the rankings but not have played that week

King_of_Kingz

Or that people can stay In the top 10 who aren't playing regularly..

SaveOurLyric

Or that a player who is 'back' is only ranked 209th.

King_of_Kingz

Is there even a solution though?

Carpo86

They could perhaps do with some tweaking all right (I would personally prefer a 52 week rolling ranking system rather than a 104 week one for instance). The article you link to is pretty poor though, I have to say.

charlieIRL

SaveOurLyric wrote: »

Or that a player who is 'back' is only ranked 209th.

give it a break will you?

King_of_Kingz

Yeah it would be a lot better if they just adopted the 52 week system, what was the thinking behind the 104 week one originally?

PARlance

King_of_Kingz wrote: »

Yeah it would be a lot better if they just adopted the 52 week system, what was the thinking behind the 104 week one originally?

The problem with that is that the FedEx cup is "almost" a 52 week ranking IMO.

Carpo86

The idea with the two year ranking system is that it rewards 'consistency' over 'form'. I think a one year system would be better though personally.

The FedEx is a bit different as it's more of a rankings 'race' that is interesting at the end but not that informative earlier on in the year.

King_of_Kingz

Still though a 52 week system would encourage players to play more to keep their ranking intact which would only be good for the game.

Think it was a valid point about the European Tour however...

I agree about the FedEx rankings, you do get some strange names up there this time of year

blackwhite

The danger with a 52 week ranking system is that it could unduly punish a player who suffered an injury requiring surgery.

With a 52 week system, a player could be in the top ten following a strong 12 months, before falling victim to injury that they struggle with for 3 months, before having surgery that rules them of for 4-6 months.

By the time they return they could very easily have fallen outside the top 50, and could find themselves excluded from Majors because they were injured for a few months.

The 104 weeks, whilst not perfect, doesn't punish players as severely for missing a spell due to injury.

Carpo86

blackwhite wrote: »

The danger with a 52 week ranking system is that it could unduly punish a player who suffered an injury requiring surgery.

With a 52 week system, a player could be in the top ten following a strong 12 months, before falling victim to injury that they struggle with for 3 months, before having surgery that rules them of for 4-6 months.

By the time they return they could very easily have fallen outside the top 50, and could find themselves excluded from Majors because they were injured for a few months.

The 104 weeks, whilst not perfect, doesn't punish players as severely for missing a spell due to injury.

Tennis overcomes this problem by allowing players who miss significant time out due to injury to use a 'protected ranking' to gain entry into tournaments. This allows the use of a 52 week system without unduly punishing someone for being unlucky enough to suffer a significant injury.

slave1

I don't think it's perfect but it ain't that bad, the ranking of points based upon the ranking of players in the event is bang on, and two years rewards consistency but it is a bit long. I always take a gander at the points gained stats but that is only per calendar year and would be better if it was a rolling 12months.
When someone is not playing it does throw it open to criticism (and rightly so) but then in it's defence it still has a minimum divisor of 40 events so if you're not playing you are heavily punished. Tiger was so far ahead that he hangs on to his placing longer than others would.
Take Lowry for example, only made ranking points for the first time last week (which is the same as not playing prior to that really - from a ranking perspective) and he fell 66 places this year because of the number of ranking points he had relative to Tiger who has only fell one place despite not playing for 10 weeks. Lowry's ranking points are being divided by 51 events and Tiger's ranking points are being divided by 40 despite the fact he's only played 36 events so he is being punished mathematically for not playing.
The anomalies only exist for very highly ranked players IMHO like Tiger a few years back and again this year, also Luke and Rory last year.
It's a pretty good system once you understand and accept the assumptions and calculations I think.

If you want to rank on 2014 ranking points then Tiger drops to 100 with Bubba, Mattie and Jordan numbers 1-3, Lowry drops to 195...

Seve OB

what is wrong with punishing someone for being out of the game because of an injury.

surely the rankings are supposed to be an indicator of who is the best golfer at a particular point in time.

if someone is out for a period because of injury, well then they aren't going to be the best.... yes the 104 week protects that to an extent, but so would a 52 week cycle.

mike12

If you look at the rankings it is hard to argue with the players in the top 100. Not really sure thee is any better way of doing it and you never look at the match play who are the top 64 players and go there are xxx players missing that should be there.

Seve OB

it would be fascicle to us the fed ex cup/ race to dubai etc as a ranking system. these are done on an annual basis so can take months to shape up into a meaningful format.

points are the way to go, and the more prestigious the event/field is, the more ranking points are on offer and rightly so. it means there is ranking points for all events, even the chalenge & europro tour etc. so gives the opportunity for weaker players to really see where they stand in relation to the big guns.

if you actually take time to understand the way the rankings work, they are quite fair, and i think the article writer is just a typical sh1tstirrer journalist. i mean if he wants to know who is the best golfer in the world is at the moment surely it was whoever won the last tournament........ after all, The Mechanic was the best last week..... but you have to take averages though to be fair

the only argument i can see that would be anyway valid could be a tweak on the current system, maybe 52 week and maybe some other tweaks.

BUT, yes it doesn't give a good indication on who is the best in the world ATM. So a simple addition could be introduced something current form guide over the last 10 weeks, or a players last 10 tournaments. i don't think there is any easy to work it out yourself.

Eg in football, all that matters is who is top of the league, but it is always interesting to see the form table.
http://www.premierleague.com/en-gb/matchday/form-guide.html

the 104 or even a 52 week cycle gives players a chance to hold their position (roughly) despite a possible run of poor form or being out injured.

if Tiger is flying it, winning most and making top 5/10's all over the place, then goes 5 or 6 tournaments missing the cut, does this mean he is no longer the best player in the world? absolutely not, but the rankings will punish the poor performances accordingly, but he would still deservedly be top of the rankings based on all the top 5 finishes.