Buick Open 2003

Posted on May 15th, 2004 by admin

If the winner of a golf tournament was determined by the Gross Negative Score
(GNS), Tiger Woods would win a lot fewer golf tournaments. For example, Tiger’s
-20 GNS would have placed him no better than 5th in last weeks Buick Invitational
behind Mark Calcavecchia (-25), Jonathan Kaye (-22), Carl Pettersson (-21) and
Brian Baird (-21). Marco Dawson’s -16 GNS tied him with Geoff Ogilvy but Dawson
took home $130,950 while Ogilvy took home $9,270. In fact, in spite of his -16
GNS, Ogilvy finished a full 60 places behind Dawson. What accounts for these
results?

If you are a regular follower of Colonel Bogey’s statistics, you already know
the answer. In the Buick the Gross Positive Score (GPS) was, as usual, the most
important statistic column. Dawson had a GPS of only +7, while Ogilvy’s GPS
was +19. Thus, the $120,000+ difference on payday.

Guess who had the lowest GPS for the tournament? Tiger, of course, with just
+4. Tiger had one bogey in each round so his GNS of -20 and GPS of +4 was good
enough to beat the rest of the field by 4 strokes in net score.

If driving distance (DD) interests you, here are some figures to consider.
Tiger finished 4th in driving distance and took home $810,000 for winning the
tournament, while Brent Geiberger finished first in driving distance and took
home $43,000+ for his tie for 21st finish. Carl Petterrson finished 42nd in
driving distance but took home $486,000 for second place in the tournament.

There were some good signs for Mickelson fans. Despite all of the media hype
over Phil’s GOLF magazine interview plus his playing with Tiger in the last
round, Phil’s GPS was only +7. Phil had, for him, an unusual first round in
which he had no bogeys or double bogeys. The mystery is why Phil had a double
bogey in each of his middle rounds on an admittedly very difficult golf course
but a course on which there were not many double bogeys by those who made the
cut.

Keep your eye on Arron Oberholser who had the worst GNS (-15) in the top ten
but who tied for 4th because his GPS was only +5, second only to Tiger.

Name
Finished
Winnings $$$
Net Score
GNS
GPS
DD
Woods
1
810,000
-16
-20
+4
4
Pettersson
2
486,000
-12
-21
+9
42
Faxon
3
306,000
-11
-19
+8
T46
Baird
T4
186,000
-10
-21
+11
15
Oberholser
T4
186,000
-10
-15
+5
T43
Mickelson
T4
186,000
-10
-17
+7
T2
Dawson
T7
130,950
-9
-16
+7
13
Calcavecchia
T7
130,950
-9
-25
+16
8
Kaye
T7
130,950
-9
-22
+13
17
Geiberger
T21
43,521
-4
-12
+8
1
Ogilvy
67
9,270
+3
-16
+19
26

Legend:

GNS (Gross Negative Score) – this statistic looks only at holes where
the player scored below par. This number is the total number of strokes
below par from all of the sub-par holes for the tournament.

GPS (Gross Positive Score) – this statistic looks only at the holes
where the player scored above par. This number is the total number of
strokes above par from all of the over par holes for the tournament.

DD (Driving Distance) – this statistic ranks the players by average
driving distance. In all situations, other than longest drive contests,
this statistic is the least relevant in predicting the outcome of golf
tournaments.

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