The Golf Handicap Dilemma…To post or not to post?

I often see people debating the idea of posting or not posting their score for their golf handicap. Here is the dilemma, on one hand they want to brag about their handicap and want to see that index go down so they can brag more. On the other hand, the more your handicap goes down the more difficult it is to compete and win, because a higher handicap would give you a higher advantage.

Before we go on, let me set one thing straight -“You should post ALL of your scores”. Otherwise, you are not following the USGA guidelines. And one more important thing -“You should always try to do your best effort on every shot on every round”. Having said that I recognize that many people just wont post all their scores.

Now, you should not mind the braggers, but do mind the hiders. Let me explain… If you only post your good rounds and discard the bad ones, the only person you are cheating is yourself. Your handicap will be lower than it should really be and you will have more trouble beating the people you compete with. However, when you don’t post your good rounds your handicap will be higher than it should really be, and you would be basically cheating with an unfair advantage above others.

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Moreover, bad scores don’t always count towards your golf handicap, but all good scores do count. Let’s remember that only the best 10 scores of the last 20 rounds are the ones who count towards the handicap index. Therefore, if you don’t post a bad round, you are basically ignoring information that would have not count anyway, so your impact is only indirect. On the other hand, by not posting a great round, you are directly impacting the number because that score would have counted toward your golf handicap calculation.

But this dilemma is actually a good thing, because regardless of how easy it is to cheat, people have such a high incentive to post good golf scores (i.e. ego) that almost everyone will prefer to post good scores over bad scores.

So in conclusion, my opinion is that we should post all of our golf rounds. That would give us a better idea of our own performances even if it is worse than what we want to believe. And would give us a fair shot at beating others. Additionally, I believe that not posting good scores is completely out of the question, and no one should be even thinking about it.

Enjoy your golf

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