Golf Compendium

Which golfers finished the year 2012 in the Top 50 of the Official World Golf Ranking? Who was No. 1 at the end of 2012? Below is the year-end list of 2012's top-ranked golfers.

A "worst ball scramble" is a type of golf tournament format (or, as we'll see below, a practice game for individual golfers) in which the bad shots are the ones you have to play. It's the opposite of the regular scramble format, in which golfers' best shots are the ones that are used.

Which golfers finished the year 2013 in the Top 50 of the Official World Golf Ranking? Who was No. 1 at the end of 2013? Below is the year-end list of 2013's top-ranked golfers.

John Ball Sr. was an important figure in the history of golf in Hoylake and Liverpool, England. He owned the Royal Hotel, which was the first home of Royal Liverpool Golf Club. And he was the father of John Ball Jr. , who won a British Open and won the British Amateur Championship a record eight times from the 1880s into the 1910s.

Which golfers finished the year 2014 in the Top 50 of the Official World Golf Ranking? Who was No. 1 at the end of 2014? Below is the year-end list of 2014's top-ranked golfers.

What is the all-time best score posted for 18 holes during an LPGA Tour tournament? That record is 59. There are also a handful of LPGA golfers who have recorded tournament rounds of 60. Notably, though, the first 59 on the LPGA happened before the first 60 did!

Miller Barber played more tournaments combined on the PGA Tour and Champions Tour than any other golfer — ever. His PGA Tour career started in the 1950s, his Champions Tour career ended in the 2000s. He won 11 times on the PGA Tour, then was the dominant golfer in the first decade of the Champions Tour's history.

Which golfers finished the year 2015 in the Top 50 of the Official World Golf Ranking? Who was No. 1 at the end of 2015? Below is the year-end list of 2015's top-ranked golfers.

Which golfer(s) holds the record for most consecutive birdies — most birdies in a row — during a round in an LPGA Tour tournament? And what is that record?

Which golfers finished the year 2016 in the Top 50 of the Official World Golf Ranking? Who was No. 1 at the end of 2016? Below is the year-end list of 2016's top-ranked golfers.

"Flaps" is the name of a golf game in which a golfer who is playing from off the green — a chip shot, lob shot or short pitch shot — can wager that she will hole out her next stroke. But that wager has to be made while the ball is still in the air. And her playing partners can double the bet if they think she can't do it.

Which golfers finished the year 2017 in the Top 50 of the Official World Golf Ranking? Who was No. 1 at the end of 2017? Below is the year-end list of 2017's top-ranked golfers.

Have you ever heard the expression "hit it on the screws" used on the golf course? It's a phrase that was once more common than it is today, because it originated with a specific piece of golf equipment that is no longer used. The expression itself survives, however, and even branched out from golf into a wider usage.

Which golfers finished the year 2018 in the Top 50 of the Official World Golf Ranking? Who was No. 1 at the end of 2018? Below is the year-end list of 2018's top-ranked golfers.

You can think of the "metoo" (as in "me, too") as a sort of a mulligan on steroids. A mulligan in golf is a do-over: If your group is playing mulligans, and you get one mulligan per nine holes, then you can play one stroke over per nine. But if your group is playing "metoos," then you get to claim another golfer's shot as your own .

Which golfers finished the year 2019 in the Top 50 of the Official World Golf Ranking? Who was No. 1 at the end of 2019? Below is the year-end list of 2019's top-ranked golfers.

Jerry Barber was a PGA Tour winner in the 1950s and 1960s. Remembered as one of the tour's great short-game artists, he sank a series of long putts over the final holes to force a playoff in the 1961 PGA Championship, which he then won. Barber continued making appearances on the PGA Tour all the way into the 1990s.

Which golfers finished the year 2020 in the Top 50 of the Official World Golf Ranking? Who was No. 1? Below is the year-end list of 2020's top-ranked golfers.

The golf betting game named Buckshot is something like the opposite of a Straightest Drive game: Rather than rewarding accuracy off the tee, as in Straightest Driver, Buckshot punishes inaccuracy off the tee.

The term "desert swing" is often applied, by both tour golfers and golf fans, to a stretch of tournaments played on desert-style golf courses.

The Ladies English Open was a women's professional golf tournament on the Ladies European tour, played sporadically from the early 1990s into the first decade of the 2000s. Given its status as a national open, it won't be a surprise if the event is revived again in the future.

What is "maraging steel" in golf clubs? That question is soon going to have to be asked this way: What was maraging steel in golf clubs. Because maraging steel is no longer the whiz-bang new golf club material it once was. But the key thing to know about maraging steel is this: It's a material that is superior to stainless steel in key ways that make it better than stainless for use in the clubfaces of golf clubs — but not as good as titanium for the same uses.