The U.S. Open’s top 10 players for peak performance
By Bill Felber
Fittingly for the American national championship, the U.S. Open has provided a stage for most of the greatest players in golf history. Which were most dominant?
This is a peak rating of the Open’s 10 most accomplished names. A peak rating assesses players over a defined span of consecutive seasons: in the case of this rating, 10 consecutive years of Open play.
You can also rate performance over the span of a player’s career, and if you do you will get a different result. We’ve done that; search this site for U.S. Open career rating and you’ll find that list.
The important thing to understand is that a peak rating is not a career rating in the same sense that pie is not cake. Both are good – indeed, you may love both – but whether one is better than another is largely a matter of personal preference.
The peak rating system assesses each player based on the average standard deviation of his performances in his U.S. Opens during his best decade of Open play. With each entry you will see a number ranging from -1.24 to -2.01. That’s the player’s average standard deviation; golf being a game where lower is better, the more negative the number the higher the player ranks.
It is very likely that in reading this list, the first question you will ask – perhaps angrily – is “where’s Arnold Palmer?” Among the most popular players in history, he barely misses out on this list, ranking 11th for his play between 1958 and 1967. Palmer’s average score is -1.23, literally a fraction short of ranking.
https://progolfnow.com/2021/02/24/measuring-greatness-tiger-woods-numbers/
If that seems odd, consider that as great as Palmer was he won only one Open. He came close in 1962, 1963 and again in 1966, losing playoffs to Jack Nicklaus at Oakmont, to Julius Boros at The Country Club, and to Billy Casper at Olympic.
But Palmer’s best decade also includes a missed cut at Bellerive in 1965, doing mortal damage to his overall average.
If we could somehow delete that missed cut from the statistical bank, Palmer’s score would rise to -1.48 and he would rank eighth on this list.
Since we cannot do that, here’s the full top 10.