For the few who may have been on the fence, I hope that this thread forever makes clear that not only is BO a huge troll, but he's also a massive dick.

Ship is fine here, he's just mostly wrong.

What's this argument over?

If you make a graph with Line on one axis and Speed on the other, there will be a certain space that consists of putts that will go in. Is this space larger for straight putts than for breaking putts? I doubt you can make a general rule. It will obviously depend on the exact nature of the putt - some putts are such that if you mis-hit it even a little bit, it will deviate further off course, some are such that the contours of the green tend to funnel the ball toward the hole. Are people saying that one of these conditions applies in most real world cases?

The other argument would be psychological. In a real golf game you don't know a priori whether the putt is straight or breaking. Putts with very little or no break may be more difficult when you factor in the reading component. Let's say you always hit the putt on the line you intend. If you read a putt as being straight and it in fact breaks, you are now guaranteed to miss, and vice versa, if you read a break and it is in fact straight you miss. Whereas with a breaking putt, you're almost certainly going to read the direction of the break correctly, and even if you screw up on the extent of the break you could still get luck and make the putt if you make a compensatory misread of the speed component.

And finally, what's the relevance of this whole discussion to a practical golfer? Can you ever imagine playing a shot to a certain part of the green with the specific intention of leaving yourself a straight as opposed to a breaking putt?

The last part...

Of course.

Alright, wow.

ship/BO, I know what your thought process (and thus the thought process of many good/pro golfers) is with respect to the argument that you'd rather have a putt that breaks a bit instead of a straight one. It's because the straight putt is harder to read - maybe it truly is exactly straight. Maybe it has 3/4 inch of break on an 8-footer, or something similar which is very hard to perceive out on the golf course. If there's a noticeable break that is perceivable and more easily quantified in your brain, it seems logical to think that you have better information. However, in the scenario, we are informed that the green is perfectly straight. And if the green is more of a real-life-like "straight-ish," then by your first 5 or 10 attempts you will more or less have a great idea of the line, or enough of an idea to know the line by a fraction of a degree from 100 feet away. And even if your perceived line is off by 6 inches or something, I suspect that for a bogey golfer this will not have a large impact on the odds of making it due to most of the result being variance/luck based.

It's also true that there are more lines that a ball can take in order to arrive at the hole. However, this means that the speed margin for error is proportionally that much smaller for each of those lines. It's a wash either way. Having break does not increase the odds of the ball going in. Somehow when focusing on the line so much, you forget the speed factor.

And Re: the fairway aiming thing, it has nothing to do with increasing your margin of error and everything to do with making your shot distribution line up more perfectly with said margin for error. If you hit a straight ball and 60% of the time you are between 20 yards left and 20 yards right, you're better off aiming down the middle. If you hit a fade and 60% of the time you're between straight and 40 yards right, then you're better off aiming down the left side. It is dependent on the golfer's personal preferences and abilities and swing as to what their shot distribution looks like. LOL at trying to apply this to the putting scenario.

I'm going to go out in the next few days and practice. The bet will go down 1st week of Jan.

Yeah, what Clark said.

I'd like to add that this thread is amazing and I loved reading it, almost totally due to ntnBO and ship-this, you guys have put on a heck of a show.

WTF have I said dickish ITT? Hell, NXT has been 10 times the dick anybody has with the repeated name calling and insults and gay GIF's.

BO

NXT has been remarkably patient and restrained, given the scenario that has unfolded.

You know you're old and shouldn't be on the internet when you still think calling something gay is good insult.

First, let’s look at the genesis of the argument. I did think that even a pretty good golfer would be a dog originally.
I then had the ability as an adult to admit I was incorrect in how I handicapped myself and stated it wasn’t really a big EV either way most likely. Then I clearly began the derailing by noting that a straight putt would in fact put them massively –EV. Notice the context of my statement and realize that from the beginning this was about a 100 foot putt. Of course from there it was deduced that I felt ALL breaking putts were easier than straight putts which was never my stance. NXT took it to the extreme of a straight 3’ vs a 6 inch breaking 3’ putt. I guess I simply thought that with basic intelligence it would be derived there is an inflection point. I didn’t realize I would have to explain that idea.

CW noted the following early on:
Only to have Brocktoon state (and I am not trying to use his words against him here, merely quoting what he said about the 100’ putt)

So I would say that the one person on the dissenting side who actually seems level headed and thought this out will now agree with the 2 former professionals as well as YB and Reid who I would say appear to have the most expansive physics background.

In addition, I would never think the constant plane breaker would be easier from 100’. Simply a relatively straight putt that then breaks in the last 8 feet or less.


I’d say that this sums up my point and when compared with our trial results as a forum so far. I could be wrong but have we had myself go 2/54, NXT 2/25 (left handed as a 130’s shooter) and another 1/63 that I am not sure of his handicap? For a total of 3.5% (or for you poor with math, about 3.5 makes per 100). I think we all agree that at best the correct speed would be hit about 20-25% of the time so I’ll just go with 25%. So to make 3.5 putts per 100 you need to hit your line about 14 times (14 * .25). You truly think that 14% of the time a bogey golfer will have the face angle to hit a roughly 4” target from 100’ considering the amount of force to hit it that hard.

Again, YAY ME!



I’m not sure how many times I have to go over the concept of inflection point, but from the intelligence of you posts I assume you understand that concept exists.

Beyond that I would assume you agree that a flawed experiment is useless. I would assume that the authors of the experiment are not aware that flat putts of 10’ exist in reality due to the many times mentioned agronomy of greens. The simply can’t exist. So to prove that in a lab a straight putt 10’ is easier than a breaking 10’ putt is kind of pointless. I’d assume, again due to the fact you aren’t ignorant of reasonable parameters for a study, that you agree that the data is worthless in the real world where our experiment will take place.

Right?


Welcome.

This thread has really helped me actually and I thank all for that. It really has given me the confidence that I do possess a strong aptitude for conceptualizing ideas. I had really begun to be frustrated with how cloudy my head has become, but watching quite a few people who I know are intelligent not be able to get this has really boosted my confidence.

Thanks!

Incredible thread. The twists and turns.

Those twists and turns make the thread easier to hole though.

I'll burn my ONE-TIME lame internet joke on this one.

Standing. Clapping.


I just realized that I should note the reason I posted that the forum is running at 3.5% on the trial so far is based on the assumption that the other two who attempted it did not in fact find a dead flat 100' putt on their trial.

Man, the obvious things I have to note so A Rod can somewhat follow along.

Ship,

Let me summarize how I'm reading your posts.

There are breaking putts, that only exist in the real world and not in theory, specifically those that are over 15 feet, that are uphill, that have a break that's between a teeny bit and a lot, on green speeds that the putter is comfortable with, that are easier to make than a comparable distance real life straight putt.

Accurate?

Thank you for the kind words. However, I once again feel the need to reiterate that I was never on the dissenting side of the straight vs. breaking part of this debate. I was never on any side at all. I specifically said over 200 posts ago that I thought the straight vs. break talk would side track the entire thread, and that I did not wish to be involved in it. I do not have a dog in this particular fight. I think you'll find I've been consistent on this throughout the thread.

What I did say, was that I thought an average golfer would be +EV in the prop bet described in the OP. Going a bit further, I also said that BO and ship--this were greatly underestimating the ability of an average golfer to succeed in this challenge. Further still, they (much more BO than ship to be fair) were completely discounting an amateur's ability to even think about this problem properly or effectively, while at the same time justifying an inflated sense of their own intuition on the matter with handicap alone.

I realize the focus has shifted almost entirely away from the 100 putts from 100 feet prop bet described in the OP, but this is the only subject on which I have made any definitive statements of either support or dissension.

EDIT: I'm glad you have decided not to nuke the acct yet, ship.

This is one line that definitely found the hole. POTY candidate. Faith in entire thread has been restored.

Is Bo homohobic?

Say it aint so Bo

Let's face it, the only way for Ship and NXT to settle this debate is with a Zoolander-style walk off.

Thanks for bringing that up again Bo http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/93...l#post34392639.

Post #460 in that thread is such a classic Bo post

And that thread was another example of a member being wrongfully banned for challenging the elitist expro golfers views. I also stuck up for Steven Fox because he was getting **** on simply because his opponent that he beat( or should I say owned?) happened to be a member here.

Lol at instantly after Fox wins the U.S. Amateur, declaring him 0% chance of ever having any successful pro golf career within 10 years. Aswell as guaranteeing he finished dead last in both majors (wrong on that one pro).

If a gay guy wrote a Golf Digest article... would BO read it?

No no no. The vast majority of this discussion is about the theoretical concept of which putt is more forgiving.

I'm willing to concede that due to human infallibility, and the disconcerting feeling that comes from not being certain about a straight putt actually being straight, plus the fact that in the real world most putts have movement that's imperceptible thus lessening the margin on one unknown side, that a player would have a preference for a putt they can absolutely tell will move a certain direction, and may in some circumstances make a higher percentage of those than they do a putt that appears straight but actually moves.

That doesn't change the real question though. Which putt, in a vacuum, has a bigger margin for error?

From 15 feet, in a controlled experiment, a group of college golfers made:

51% of their straight putts
41% of putts that had roughly 4 inches of break
11% of putts that had roughly 8 inches of break.

This needs to be posted again, apparently.

ship and BO appealing to authority til the bitter end, who could have imagined such a thing

A+ thread. kudos NXT, et al.



pretty sure he's talking about this:

what does "passed up a chance" even mean in this case? like, if he's saying he applied and was accepted to MIT, then, yes, anybody who was accepted and declined to attend passed up that chance since they could have majored in [whatever the ****]. in that case just say "i got accepted to MIT". you could have double majored in comp sci and math at Missouri*; why didn't you?

further, there are always a ton of kids who think they're going to major in all kinds of elaborate **** in college until they take a class or two and realize they need to change majors or fail.

*assuming they believe in those concepts in Missouri

You always hear during telecasts the announcers be like "Oh man he's left himself with a straight 4-footer here. Yikes. He was aiming for left of the hole to get that sweet 8" L-R breaker but he really ****ed this up.