Master’s week starts April 8th. As usual all the news outlets will be doing its forecasting on who the potential winner maybe. It got me to thinking about my choice,about who the winner maybe but instead looking at it from the perspective who is playing well leading up to the tournament I decided to take a more scientific approach. Ya right, me and science!
A few year’s back, a brilliant author by the name of Malcolm Gladwell wrote a book called Outliers. In it he takes a deep dive into why some people’s achievements falls outside the normal experience. Gladwell points out that most hockey players who get drafted, a large percentage have January to April birth months. Interesting fact, so I thought why not use this thought process to pick my winner of the Masters. So here it goes!
Below is a chart with data from the World Golf Rankings. With a little bit of leg work I was able to find birth months for the top 50 players in the world. It revealed some interesting facts.
| World Golf Ranking 1-25 | January-March | April-June | July-September | October-December |
| Number of Players Birthdays | 5 | 7 | 4 | 9 |
| Percentage | 20 | 28 | 16 | 36 |
| World Golf Ranking 26-50 | January-March | April-June | July-September | October-December |
| Number of Players Birthdays | 6 | 11 | 5 | 3 |
| Percentage | 24 | 44 | 20 | 3 |
| Overall 1-50 % | 22 | 36 | 18 | 24 |
In the 1-25 bracket the October to December months had the highest number number of players at 36% . Players in this bracket include 2023 Masters winner Jon Rahm,US Open Champion Wyndam Clark, Xander Schauffele, and former PGA Champion Jason Day. The next block was the April, May, and June at 28%. Players in that bracket include Rory Mcllroy who has won four majors, former PGA Champion Keegan Bradley, and last years Master’s Champion Scottie Scheffler.
As we move down to the 26-50 bracket the numbers shift. The April, May, June sections now becomes the most popular at 44%, followed by January, February, and March bracket at 24%, July, August, and September comes in at 20% and the October, November, December comes in at 12%, which is a total shift from the 1-25 bracket. The April, May, June bracket has three major winners with a total of eight majors. Kopeka has five, Thomas has two and Shane Lowery has one.
If we look at the top fifty players overall the April, May, June bracket leads the way at 36% or 18 of 50, followed by October, November, and December at 24% or 12 of 50, followed by January, February, March at 22% or 11 of 50, and finally July, August, and September at 18% or 9 of 50.
If we look at the last five Master’s winners, two have come out of April-June bracket, two from the October- December bracket, and one from the January- March bracket. These numbers fall into line with top fifty birth date brackets.
So if your looking to find your winner you may look at these numbers I am picking Scottie Scheffler and Rory Mcllroy from the April-June bracket, Jon Rahm and Wyndam Clark from the October-December bracket and Collin Morikawa and Sun Jae IM from the January- March bracket.
I guess that is a scientific as it gets with me . Who would thought that 55 years ago!
Until next time.
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