Is putting too easy? too hard? Just right?

[zenbot]

Done.

What channels do you get with that?

 

[iacas]

What channels do you get with that?

All of them.

To those who have said a smaller basket (or whatever that makes putting more difficult) would decrease excitement, I don't agree. I don't think there's any real reason why you should think that, either.

When a PGA Tour player sticks a shot to a few feet, that's exciting. Or when they drain a long putt, that's exciting. Tapping in is not exciting, and making a putt from eight feet (where PGA Tour pros are 50/50) is not exciting (if it's for eagle, the shot they hit to eight feet was the exciting shot).

From what range are 1000 rated players 50/50? It's probably too far out. It might be outside the circle.

As with golf, disc golf's exciting shots are often the throws, not the 30' putts that are more surprising if they miss.

Shrink the size of the catching devices (or whatever you do), and you'll still have those exciting moments. You'll still have pros parking it for a tap-in birdie or making a medium-length putt for eagle. You'll still have pros draining long putts, but maybe a "long putt" moves from 80' to 50'. Your "gimme" range moves from 20' to 10'.

"It will decrease excitement," I don't agree. I think it will increase it. Right now, star frames are not all that rare of an occurrence. Three guys on a 320' hole put it to 30' and you're almost guaranteed to get 3 or 4 birdies out of that. That's not exciting.

The park job to inside 5' from 320', now that's exciting.

 

[Inverted]

Instead of chains, use a small backboard. This will encourage the players to approach from a determined fairway position, but if they miss they may still have an opportunity to make it, although at much greater difficulty. Make a really bad throw and end up behind the backboard, and you'll probably pay the price of losing a shot.

 

[Hampstead]

Watching guys miss 20 footers on a smaller basket is the adrenaline rush that this sport is missing!

 

[Steve West]

..

From what range are 1000 rated players 50/50? It's probably too far out. It might be outside the circle.

For 1000-rated (not the top players) they're 50/50 from about 25 to 30 feet, as best we can tell from the limited data.

 

[Emoney]

I would love to see smaller baskets. Especially at courses like the memorial. Seeing pros at 40under par is annoying. The discs and talent have improved and you see more and more courses using fake o.b. and flags everywhere to make a course harder. The basket has not changed other than making putting easier with more chains.
When I see a "pro" make a 60 footer it's not exciting, it's expected...So sad.
Make the basket more of a bull's-eye type and that 60 footer is amazing.
Smaller baskets will only help the sport. Most courses are not championship level in the u.s. Add smaller baskets and half the courses will be closer to championship level immediately without adding a bunch of rope and flags

 

[teemkey]

I'd be more sympathetic to making putting harder if any one of the following were true:

1) We couldn't identify the best from the rest;
2) Some players only finish top five when their putting is on;
3) Players stop spending hours practicing.

 

[DavidSauls]

When I see a "pro" make a 60 footer it's not exciting, it's expected...So sad.
Make the basket more of a bull's-eye type and that 60 footer is amazing.

It shouldn't be expected, since most of the time, pros miss from 60'.

The 60 foot putt into a bull's-eye will be more impressive, but a 60' lay-up won't be. If you make the risk of missing a comeback putt too great, players won't run the basket from distance nearly as often.

*

The basic formula goes like this:

(1) At what short distance will a putt be uncertain enough to avoid, and (2) at what distance will a long putt, if missed, end up at that uncertain distance, and (2) will those odds exceed the chance of making the long putt.

Or,

Would you rather have excitement at 60' but boredom at 20', or boredom at 60' but excitement at 20'?

Because changing baskets is bound to make this trade-off. It's hard to come up with a way that putts are practical to go for, but uncertain to make, at all distances.

 

[zenbot]

I would love to see smaller baskets. Especially at courses like the memorial. Seeing pros at 40under par is annoying. The discs and talent have improved and you see more and more courses using fake o.b. and flags everywhere to make a course harder. The basket has not changed other than making putting easier with more chains.
When I see a "pro" make a 60 footer it's not exciting, it's expected...So sad.
Make the basket more of a bull's-eye type and that 60 footer is amazing.
Smaller baskets will only help the sport. Most courses are not championship level in the u.s. Add smaller baskets and half the courses will be closer to championship level immediately without adding a bunch of rope and flags

I don't understand why half the courses need to be championship level. Does that help or hinder the growth of disc golf?

 

[thrembo]

I don't understand why half the courses need to be championship level. Does that help or hinder the growth of disc golf?

This. Most courses should be designed for the majority of people that play. Rec/Am.

 

[Steve West]

..Seeing pros at 40under par is annoying. ..Most courses are not championship level in the u.s....

40 under is a par problem, not a putting problem. (Unless it is over 8 rounds or so, then it is not a problem at all.) No change in baskets is needed to fix that annoyance.

As you point out, most courses are not championship level, yet many TDs just use course par rather than figure out what championship par would be. No matter how easy the course, properly set par would not result in huge-under numbers.

The golf-centric die-hards think par includes two putts, but disc golf par does not.

 

[DavidSauls]

All of what Steve just said.

Although....

The golf-centric die-hards think par includes two putts, but disc golf par does not.

Or equate our 10-meter circle with the golf green.

If you look at putting as whenever you throw a putter, the percentage of makes goes way down.

 

[Emoney]

I don't understand why half the courses need to be championship level. Does that help or hinder the growth of disc golf?

Hurts the growth. Athletes at the top of their sport do stuff we can only dream about. Disc golfs top guys dont. I get that Mcbeth is great BUT the main difference I see between a local pro and a traveling pro is consistency.
There is no shot Mcbeth has thrown that I haven't seen a top advanced guy replicate.

Give Mcbeth a full time non-disc golf job and he is good , not great. Give your local pro a full time disc golf job and he becomes great.

Let's face it, we can only find so many perfect pieces of property for disc golf. Even the best courses in the world use flags and artificial o.b. We have to do something to increase the difficulty level that will make it harder for AMs and slightly harder for Pros.

The PDGA should at least give the option to use bull's-eye baskets on tour.

Individuals sports should be very challenging and I don't believe disc golf offers that.
I played ball golf before I played disc golf. I could spend 10yrs playing ball golf and never shoot par. The challenge is what keeps me interested and makes me appreciate the tiger woods and speiths.

The fact that putting in our game is mostly mental is rediculous. A 4 footer in ball golf can be extremely challenging.
We don't have to be ball golf but we need to improve the difficulty without finding a million dollar piece of land.

Smaller baskets , even if just for NTs, is a huge start to validate our sport. It will only showcase the talent of the pros while making ams and local pros appreciate what they see on YouTube.

Ask your local pro if he thinks if he was able to play full time could he challenge Mcbeth. 90% would say yes. And that's a problem. No other sport works that way. Just my opinion.

More exposure isn't gonna grow our sport, we need to increase the difficulty level

 

[Dr.Smooth]

Huge thread here. Twenty plus pages. DG an evolving forum. I like the marksman basket tourney. It gives the sport exposure and make you think about basket specs.

But golf and dg are as similar as they are dissimilar so comparing stats can be like saying the apple and the orange are the same.

Good green design will help make the putting green more difficult just not changing the size of the basket.

 

[tampora]

Except it doesn't look like that. See the URL:
https://cl.ly/3h0d2N2s3V2F

I'm curious what the curves would look like for disc golf.

P.S. I know you were mostly joking around. Ha ha.

While my 2 second art showed linear graphs and the URL you linked showed quadratic graphs, I was concerned with qualitative similarity of both graphs always increasing to the right.

Here is what I was suggesting in a crude mspaint drawing that should be closer to accurate.

I'm trying to illustrate:

1. There's a point where the ball golf arcs are bent, where they go from a slope greater than one to a slope less than one. Let's call it the 'turning point'.

2. Before the turning point, current disc golf putting has a slope less than ball golf. After the turning point, the slope becomes greater than that of ball golf.

3. My proposition increases the difficulty on the near-putt end and (slightly) lowers it on the far-putt end.

 

[Steve West]

Can anybody provide any statistics to show that putting on a narrower basket is harder?

 

[Emoney]

Can anybody provide any statistics to show that putting on a narrower basket is harder?

I personally don't think it will affect touring pros as much as ppl think. Maybe a few strokes depending how good of a putt they have. A good putt will still stick. It's just part of fixing a problem. We just don't have the land to make great DG courses so we need to do something. Especially with having tourneys on ball golf courses which is soooooo boring to watch.

It will def make it more difficult for AMs. Maybe 5 or more strokes a round. Which will make them practice more AND appreciate the consistency of Pros.

I'm saying at least give it a try. Even the top pro in the sport wants to see it. Smaller baskets combined with a more accurate par system is a good start.

We need to showcase our pros talent. Having small baskets for NTs will "WOW" the audience.

We are trying to take a liesure game of frisbee golf and turn it into a legit sport without changing anything? Doesn't make sense.

All those damn flags and rope take away from one of the best aspects of disc golf...The natural beauty of the outdoors.

We have to take DG to a new level. The discs have changed and evolved to fly farther than ever. Property for disc golf will continue to decrease. Flags and rope are horrible. Why not look at changing the basket?

 

[Hampstead]

Crowds are going to go crazy for missed 30 footers and layups from 50'.

That is clearly what's holding our quaint little hobby back.

 

[Emoney]

Crowds are going to go crazy for missed 30 footers and layups from 50'.

That is clearly what's holding our quaint little hobby back.

Why would a pro layup from 50ft? If it's rare to make a 50-60ft putt anyway, it's basically a layup when they miss.

We have alot of things holding us back. Staying the same makes no sense.change is good bro

 

[DavidSauls]

Why would a pro layup from 50ft? If it's rare to make a 50-60ft putt anyway, it's basically a layup when they miss.

If there's a danger of missing the comebacker---because we've made putting tough enough to put 15 footers in doubt---then they'd be foolish to run at the basket, take a 2% chance of a make for a 30% chance of a 3-putt (or whatever the odds turn out to be).