OED's "bogey" and "par"

[Dan Goncharoff]

I don't see what you see.

5b says nothing about a line. It says, "The starting-point in a
handicap of a competitor who receives no odds", which I believe to be
correct, at least about golf. In golf, a scratch golfer has a handicap
of zero; a golfer with a twenty handicap has 20 points subtracted from
his score.

Bogey is more complicated, as the use of bogey changed over time, and
several terms (bogey, par, scratch) were used to represent the concept
of a typical score. Par is traced back to 1870 Scotland in the golfing
histories, as a prediction of the winning score at The Open at
Prestwick. Bogey was older, but became an English club standard at the
end of the 19th century.

Starting in 1893 in the US, standards for handicapping on a national
basis were developed, and the definitions of bogie as one over par for
a hole, and par as the expected score of a scratch golfer arose and
were accepted by golfing authorities.

Because the definitions changed over time, all of them are correct in context.

DanG

On Wed, Jun 1, 2011 at 3:57 PM, Joel S. Berson <Berson at att.net> wrote:
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> Sender: Â  Â  Â  American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster: Â  Â  Â  "Joel S. Berson" <Berson at ATT.NET>
> Subject: Â  Â  Â Re: OED's "bogey" and "par"
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> At 6/1/2011 11:50 AM, Dan Goncharoff wrote:
>>Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit
>>
>>What is wrong with any of this?
>
> Bogey (U.S.) is defined in terms of par, which is
> defined in terms of a "scratch player". Â "Scratch
> player" is not defined, and its meaning derives
> from games/contests where there is a (starting)
> line (the "scratch line"), from which the scratch
> player starts and in front of which the player
> given a handicap starts. Â E.g., foot races. Â But not golf.
>
> Bogey sense a. I am not sure about. Â If bogey is
> the score of a good player, what kind of player
> gets the better "par" score? Â And I wonder if
> this sense is still in use in golf anywhere worldwide.
>
> Joel
>
>
>>5b does not refer to a "scratch-line".
>>
>>DanG
>>
>>On Wed, Jun 1, 2011 at 11:28 AM, Joel S. Berson <Berson at att.net> wrote:
>> > ---------------------- Information from the
>> mail header -----------------------
>> > Sender: Â  Â  Â  American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
>> > Poster: Â  Â  Â  "Joel S. Berson" <Berson at ATT.NET>
>> > Subject: Â  Â  Â OED's "bogey" and "par"
>> >
>> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>> >
>> >>I wonder if the definitions of "bogey" (etc.) and "par" need revision.
>> >
>> > Bogey:
>> > a. Â The number of strokes a good player may be
>> > reckoned to need for the course or for a hole.
>> > ...
>> > c. A score of one stroke over par for a hole. U.S.
>> >
>> > Par (June 2005):
>> > 4.a. Golf. The number of strokes which a scratch
>> > player should need for a hole or for a course
>> > (freq. with that number as postmodifier). Also:
>> > (as a count noun) a score of this number of stokes at a hole.
>> >
>> > And now for the final term needed to understand "bogey" and "par":
>> >
>> > Scratch player:
>> > s.v. scratch, n., 1.: -- no definition!
>> >
>> > So I go up to "scratch" -- the most relevant definition(s) seem(s) to be:
>> > 5.a. Â a. Sport. A line or mark drawn as an
>> > indication of a boundary or starting-point; †in
>> > Cricket, a ‘crease’ (obs.); in Pugilism, the line
>> > drawn across the ring, to which boxers are brought for an encounter.
>> > b. Â The starting-point in a handicap of a
>> > competitor who receives no odds; sometimes
>> > colloq. used ellipt. for such a competitor. Also
>> > fig.; esp. in phr. from scratch, from a position
>> > of no advantage, knowledge, influence, etc., from nothing.
>> >
>> > But surely there's no scratch line in golf!
>> >
>> > Joel
>> >
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