DG Points Ranking | Data Golf Newsletter #74

Before we start talking about rankings, here's what we've been up to since the Ryder Cup:

1. Rebrand
Amid a small website redesign, Letzig has been retired from the newsletter. He served us well but has sadly been surpassed by generative AI. For those upset, not all hope is lost for a Letzig return—we prompted ChatGPT to write a summary of our rankings last week and it began referring to someone named Brendan Griffin, a "contemporary proxy" to Bryson DeChambeau... #slop.

2. Projected Major Fields
A new page has been added to the site that shows everyone who has qualified, or is on track to qualify, for each of the 2026 Majors. Player profiles also show which tournaments the selected player has qualified for (top right). This is part of a larger project to predict player schedules and simulate season-long FedExCup points, which will be added to the site in early 2026.

3. Tournaments
We redid our schedule page, which we now call "Tournaments" in the site menu. It includes filters by tour/year and the ability to see completed tournaments. It takes a bit of getting used to but we think it is a valuable addition. On a related note, past results pages have been added back to 2004 for PGA Tour tournaments and 1983 for Major Championships and The Players. And lastly, summary pages for PGA Tour tournaments and Majors were added and can be easily accessed via the site search bar.

4. Presidents Cup
Presidents Cup player profiles have been added to the site.

5. Will visited The Old Course
I made a quick stop in St. Andrews during a trip around Scotland to pay tribute to Old Tom and his "major" wins, relive the greatest commericial ever made, and also to do some logistical recon before we make the trip to live blog the 2027 Open Championship.

Points Ranking

Last fall we introduced DG Points, which assigns a point value to every finish position based on the size and quality of the field. They can be thought of as our version of OWGR points. A natural next step was to create a ranking system based on these point values. To go from DG Points to a ranking list, several arbitrary choices have to be made: the time period to consider, the rate at which points decay, and whether to use total or average points. For that reason, we’ve mostly followed the OWGR’s parameters—their choices seem reasonable, and there is no real justification for us to deviate from them.

In the DG Points (DGP) Rankings, players are ranked based on their average decayed DG Points over the last two years. Points earned in the most recent 13 weeks retain their full value, after which point values decay by an equal amount each week. This is the same time period and decay rate used by the OWGR. One difference between our rankings and the OWGR is that we use a minimum divisor of 35—that is, if a player has played less than 35 events in the last two years, their point total is divided by 35—while the OWGR uses 40. We used a lower minimum divisor to accommodate LIV players, who typically play lighter schedules.

Here are the top 20 players in the current DGP Rankings:

There are a few key differences between our main rankings (which we’ll refer to simply as the DG Rankings) and the DGP Rankings. The DG Rankings are based on a player’s recent adjusted strokes-gained performances and are meant to be predictive: they tell us who the best players would be if a tournament were held tomorrow. The DGP Rankings, on the other hand, tell us about what a player has accomplished recently. They put more weight on wins and high finishes in big events, and less weight on a player’s poor performances. They are also more long-term focused than the DG rankings (which is an arbitrary choice, but we have followed the OWGR in that regard).

The plot below highlights some of the differences between our two ranking systems:

Players who sit above the red line are ranked more favourably by DG Points, while players below the line are ranked more favourably by strokes gained. Justin Rose is the best example of a player who has shown up at the biggest events over the last two years while not consistently performing at a high level. Harry Hall has done the opposite: Hall had a 13-event stretch this summer where he finished no worse than T28th and no better than 6th.

Interestingly, the two biggest rankings outliers—proportionally speaking—are both LIV golfers. Jon Rahm’s 2025 season was remarkable mainly for how little he accomplished relative to how well he played: he posted the 5th-highest adjusted SG in 2025, yet his best finish by DG Points was only a T7 at the U.S. Open. Joaquin Niemann, meanwhile, won five times but also lost strokes in eight events. He has missed the cut against weak fields in his last 3 starts, a stretch that cratered his DG Rank from 23rd to 70th.

Points-based systems align more closely with most people’s intuitions about what a ranking should capture, which is why we felt it was important to add them to the site. The regular DG Rankings provide a snapshot of who’s playing the best golf right now, while the DG Points Rankings highlight who has achieved the most—in the form of wins and high finishes at big events—using a longer timeframe.