2011 Rookie Preview
by hound dog on Jan 28, 2011 3:00 PM PST
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PrintLast year I did a study on how previous performances might indicate how successful a rookie will fare on the LPGA Tour. I listed the 27 rookies who finished in my year-end Top 40 dating back to 2001 and noted the primary achievement which secured their rookie status. 2010 added only one player to that dataset - Azahara Munoz, the Rookie of the Year. Aza earned her card by finishing fifth at Q-School, giving a boost to the data for "Top 10 at Q-School" among others.
And it needed a big boost. I must confess that most of my numbers in that post were grossly incorrect. While I only counted rookies as "successes" I short-cutted my way to adding up the "failures", leaving in many players who were not rookies the following year. This time I did it right, recalculating the table using the complete rookie lists from every year going back to 2003 (I couldn't find a list for 2001 or 2002). Here are the correct numbers broken down much as I did before, including the results from 2010:
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Won as a non-member Futures Tour #1 Q-School #1 Top 10 at Q-School 2-10 at Q-School Top 5 Futures Tour Top 10 Futures Tour 6-10 Futures Tour 11-20 at Q-School 21-30 at Q-School 2-5 Futures Tour |
4-5 3-5 3-6 11-43 8-37 4-21 6-41 2-20 3-33 3-34 1-16 |
.800 .600 .500 .256 .216 .190 .146 .100 .091 .088 .063 |
Fortunately (for the integrity of last year's post), the categories line up in a similar fashion. The top three achievements remain head-and-shoulders above, but the rest of the Q-School Top 10 does pretty well too. You may have noticed that the numbers in the top category remain unchanged even though Bo Bae Song won in 2009 and did not finish in my 2010 Top 40. Song's choice to remain in Japan shouldn't count as a "failure" in this study. It is due to the small dataset that "2-5 Futures Tour" comes in behind "6-10 Futures Tour". The margin between the two is only one player over eight seasons. The significant results here are those of the top five achievements.
Using these groupings, here is how the 2011 rookies can be categorized:
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Hee Kyung Seo Jessica Korda Danah Bordner Belen Mozo Jennifer Song Jenny Shin Ryann O'Toole Tiffany Joh Kimberly Kim Stephanie Sherlock Jenny Lee Christel Boeljon Sara Brown Alison Whitaker Jenny Suh Shasta Averyhardt Dori Carter Becky Brewerton Sarah Brown Jodi Ewart Caroline Hedwall Jennifer Johnson Ayaka Kaneko Stephanie Kim Amelia Lewis Junko Nakada Harukyo Nomura Jaclyn Sweeney |
non-member victory Q-School #2 Q-School T4 Q-School T8 Futures #2 Futures #4 Futures #7 Futures #8 (Q T22) Q-School T14 Q-School T14 Q-School T14 Q-School T14 Q-School T14 Q-School T22 Q-School T22 Q-School T22 Q-School T22 n/a n/a n/a n/a n/a n/a n/a n/a n/a n/a n/a |
This list isn't a ranking (that comes next) but a display of how these players will be grouped for inclusion into this study at the end of the season. Tiffany Joh earned her card by finishing eighth on the Futures Tour but improved her status by seven spots by finishing T22 at Q-School. The Futures Tour performance rates slightly better so I list her above the other Q-School T22s. Starting with that list and adjusting for other factors (like expected playing opportunites and KLPGA, LET and amateur performances), here are my Top 10 choices for Rookie of the Year in 2011.
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1. Hee Kyung Seo 2. Jennifer Song 3. Jessica Korda 4. Belen Mozo 5. Jenny Shin 6. Kimberly Kim 7. Tiffany Joh 8. Becky Brewerton 9. Jennifer Johnson 10. Danah Bordner |
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Although I'm not saying she'll win ROY 2011...
I think leaving Sara Brown off your Top 10 list may be a mistake, and here’s why:
Her Big Break experience is a wild card in this scenario. While there’s no way to quantify what it means and it certainly doesn’t prove she can play the kind of consistent golf that continued Tour success requires, her high finishes on two different shows definitely show some serious mental toughness that Tour life demands. Add the fact that she got her LPGA and LET cards in two weeks’ time… I think those accomplishments should count for something in your calculations.
She may not win ROY, but I bet she’ll still be in the conversation at the end of the year.
Mike Southern
www.ruthlessgolf.com
The main reason I set it there was because I have year-end Top 40 lists generated by my rating system, making it easy to identify “success”. I might have set it for the Top 70 if I had used my advanced (current) system for the seasons prior to 2008 (I plan to do that eventually). Nearly every season in the study wound up with 2+ rookies in the Top 40 (2010 was the exception with only one) so I think my definition is a fair one. To your point – Beatriz Recari probably considers her rookie season a success because she won a tournament. The fact that this study doesn’t agree with her shouldn’t invalidate the results it gives us.
Ask Jhonattan Vegas.
Is being one of the Top 10 rookies really that much of a stretch? That’s all we’re talking about here.
Mike Southern
www.ruthlessgolf.com
Dark Horse
I’d add Dori Carter to my Top 10 rookie list. As a rookie on the FUTURES Tour last year, she had one win. The day I followed her around she hit fairways like a machine.
"(I)f you think you've got an inside track to absolute truth, you become doctrinaire, humorless and intellectually constipated." Saul Alinsky
I'll have to keep watch on her this year...
I checked her FUTURES Tour stats. She was 9th in Rounds Under Par, 5th in birdies, as well as that win at the FUTURES Tour Pennsylvania Classic. If she can carry that over to the LPGA, she just might have a good chance!
Mike Southern
www.ruthlessgolf.com
by Ruthless Mike on Jan 31, 2011 4:50 PM PST up reply actions
Sara Brown and Dori Carter
From my chart at the top, I would estimate they each have about a one-in-ten chance to have a Top 40 season – about the same as players 6-10 on my list. In that range I had to pick five players out of about a dozen choices so I wouldn’t be surprised if three or four of them turn out wrong. We’ll see, won’t we?
What are the odds that two rookies would enter the LPGA membership in the same season, one named Sara Brown and the other named Sarah Brown? And some people complain about all those Kims and Lees….
I thought about that too...
Although they’re getting off kinda lucky. When I was in high school, there were three other guys with the same first and last name as me… and they were all spelled the same! ;-)
Sara may have found a way to distinguish herself already. If I understand things correctly, she’s going to be sponsored by Loudmouth. Sara Brown and John Daly with the same sponsor? Who’da thunk it?
Mike Southern
www.ruthlessgolf.com
by Ruthless Mike on Feb 1, 2011 2:19 PM PST up reply actions
2011 ROY
Did I miss her name? What about Gerina Mendoza? She finished 5th on Futures $$ list in 2010.
Gerina Mendoza
Sorry, I think I get it now. After looking over table #1 again I see that Futures 2-5 players have not done anything much in their rookie years so I can see why Gerina wouldn’t be considered likely to do well.
Gerina
Gerina was a rookie in 2010 although she never player a round.
check out Jennifer Song's 1st round in the Aussie Women's Open!
Only player in the field to match Ji-Yai Shin’s bogey-free 67—she even had 3 birdies per side, just like Ji-Yai!
http://mlyhlss.blogspot.com/2011/02/jennifer-song-says-not-so-fast-ji-yai.html
good comments at Seoul Sisters.com, too:
http://www.phpbbplanet.com/professionalgol/viewtopic.php?t=5990&mforum=professionalgol
by The Constructivist on Feb 3, 2011 9:58 AM PST reply actions
Jennifer Song convinced me last year
More rounds in the 60s than 70s on the Futures Tour despite a poor opening event.
She would be my pick for ROY among this group. I think Korda will eventually be the best player of the bunch but I’m not picking a 17 year old.
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