When you come to think of it that is the secret of most of the great holes all over the world. They all have some kind of a twist. C.B. MACDONALD
I jump on the Q&A with Mike Davis bandwagon on the eve of the U.S. Open. In this session for Golfdom Magazine, I ask Mike how he sees his ideas impacting everyday course setup and maintenance. We also get into the groove issue, Bethpage's architecture, his post Oakmont memo to supers about excessive rough primping and the USGA's TruFirm device.
And in advance of Bethpage, editor Larry Aylward asks me a few questions for a special Golfdom podcast.
Jason Sobel interviews Mike Davis about Bethpage and one of the more interesting subjects is the current USGA's notion of trying to prepare the course conditions to play similarly each day, instead of the old mentality of starting at a point and, weather permitting, letting the rough grow and the conditions speed up over four days. Obviously there are compelling cases for both sides, though if it means debacle-free tournaments, the current approach is obviously more attractive.
But on the other side of things, you'll see Bethpage probably play a bit more consistent than it did in 2002, with respect to our intent of not making it harder every single day, which I think was the case back in '02. The rough got higher every day, the greens got a little faster, maybe firmer, so that shouldn't happen this go-round.
Q: Well, if it's not the USGA's belief that the course should be set up more difficult for each progressing round, is it possible that we could see Bethpage actually play easier Sunday than it does Thursday and Friday?
A: I think it could. To a large extent, it's going to depend on what Mother Nature gives us; if it's windy, then obviously it will play tougher. But yes, that is a definite possibility. I think if you look back at Torrey Pines last year, you'd find that Sunday was actually the easiest of all four days and that didn't just happen out of coincidence. There was a mindset that on certain holes we really wanted to give the players some opportunities to score, give them a little bit more risk-reward, and I think that certainly bears out in how they played.
And Sobel asked Davis about players he seeks out, player input in general, and this about the debate over Bethpage's design lineage. Mike should run for office with an ability to answer like this!
Q: I know there's been some debate about this, but is the USGA sticking with the idea that Tillinghast was the original and sole designer of Bethpage Black? A: Yeah, on the materials that we have put out, Tillinghast has been the architect of record. I think we have also said we don't really want to get in the middle of that debate, but having said that, we have certainly seen drawings that Tillinghast did of Bethpage Black. We know that [Joe] Burbeck had a big part in the construction, but I think that we're going to try to stay out of that argument. If asked, we certainly would want to give Tillinghast some credit. Certainly, Burbeck during the construction should get some credit, and I think Rees Jones during the renovation should get some credit.
I love starting the day off with a big chuckle and how can you not giggle reading Doug Ferguson's story about last year's over-the-top setup at Muirfield Village. I only laugh because I know from talking to various folks at the tour that there are two courses where they have much less course setup say: Bay Hill and Muirfield Village.
And of course, there is that evidence of Jack's bunker furrowing concept to reinforce his role. And his hatred of flogging. And there's that minor detail that Phil Mickelson would have skipped the week regardless of his wife's health, all because of the excessive setup ploys.
Ah...Slugger's taking one for the team...
"We were over the top last year," said Slugger White, the PGA TOUR official in charge of setting up the course.
The fault fell to Jack Nicklaus -- at least that's the perception of most players.
After all, this is the course Jack built for a tournament he has hosted since 1976. Nicklaus built his career around the majors, and he wants the Memorial to be the next best thing.
But even Nicklaus was troubled by the high grass, not to mention the complaints.
"The one thing I never liked as a golfer was hack-out rough," Nicklaus said Tuesday. "I've always felt that if you put the ball in the rough, there should be some chance of playing a shot to reach the green, but not be able to control the ball like you would normally. I think recovery is a beautiful part of the game."
Just not on my course!
"I don't think Mr. Nicklaus or the TOUR liked what came out of last year," said Steve Rintoul, the TOUR official who oversaw the course setup this year. "The rules committee, in conjunction with Jack, thought it better to have shorter rough."
Ultimately, the TOUR has the final word in how the course plays.
But if Nicklaus is the one taking the heat whenever someone complains, then why not just take full authority of his golf tournament?
Nicklaus chuckled at the suggestion.
"We are part of the TOUR," he said. "What I want to do is cooperate the best I can, have middle round on what I want to do and what the players like. My feeling is, do I want them to not like it? Of course not. I want everybody to be happy, everybody to enjoy it. But not everyone thinks the way I think. I'm 69. Guys are 40 years younger than I am, or more. They haven't been brought up the way I was.
"It's more my job to adjust to them than their job to adjust to me."
Uh huh.
Don't miss Derek Lawrenson's entertaining European Open game story on Christian Cevaer's painfully slow win on an even painfully worse setup.
What a curious event this was, where the seven-under par winning score was exactly the same as the leading figure on day one, despite the fact the last three rounds were played out in glorious sunshine; where the winner returned a score of 74 and had one birdie on his card.
Why? With the fairways narrowed, they became just too hard and bouncy for anyone to hold in the testing breeze, with the consequence that the day’s proceedings became something of a lottery.
Neat to see the tour setting up the sixth major at Quail Hollow in a way that helps prepare the players for next week's fifth major. Or maybe it's just part of the plan to mix things up and more importantly, play a better form of golf where accuracy is rewarded with firm greens instead of chip-out rough? Either way works.
From Jim Furyk's press session Wednesday:
We've come here a lot of times where the rough has been very deep, thick. It's been a huge premium on accuracy, and the rough is very low this year, as low as I've ever seen it and probably as low as I've seen it in almost any TOUR event I've ever played, outside of Harbour Town. It's obviously a different style.
I assume the greens are going to get very firm and quick, and it's a good golf course. I think that it'll play well in both styles. I'm anxious to see how it pans out through the week.
Q. Are you surprised to see it that way?
JIM FURYK: Well, I'm not, because we got a little heads-up in our green sheet or information sheet that the rough was going to be cut at two inches, and that kind of -- and the green speeds were targeted a little quicker than they were in the past. They were talking about possibly 13, which they're not right now, but if they get these greens firm and fast I don't think it matters if there's rough out there or not, it's going to be really difficult. But it's definitely a lot different setup than we've seen in the past.
I was going to start this post asking why course setup was such a major topic (again) going into this Masters and yet, how few actual details we learned about what went into the committee's efforts to finally make Augusta National resemble its old self.
Sure, the committee will never be the chatty types, but how about some basic observations on tee and hole locations based on observation (you know, by leaving the press center). Or true player/caddy insights into what they actually saw? (And not just that the greens were clearly soft. We at home could see that.)
But then I saw this USA Today headline on a Jerry Potter story:
Players say scoring at majors often dictated by course setup
Rumor has it that tomorrow they've got a grabber titled, "Players say lowest score at majors often wins."
From what I've seen so far of the post Masters issues, the weeklies offer little in the way of details. However, a few reviews are in and, as warranted, they are quite positive.
Doug Ferguson rightly praises the overall change in tone. "The magic of the Masters, however, is not so much about the score as it is the opportunity."
Ron Sirak noted this detail, which seemed to have been overlooked but which was apparent on television (and almost noted on-air by Feherty at No. 15 before he realized the club has snipers trained on him in case he reverts to his true self):
Also, grass was allowed to grow ever-so-slightly longer, preventing balls that in the past may have rolled into water to hang up just short.
Steve Elling had a different take, not convinced just yet that the course is all the way back.
Even with abnormally idyllic weather, softer greens, easier pin locations and front tees that were used liberally throughout the week in a notable departure from the norm, the low score was 12 under par, marking the third time in eight years that the Masters winner finished at that exact number. Thus, it was hardly a sub-sonic total, yet it required perfect conditions and plenty of course tinkering to pull it off.
That represents a flashing yellow light.
Regular readers here know that after Shinnecock, Oakland Hills and way too many other recent rounds, I am fascinated with the idea of courses becoming silly when it's 75 and the wind is clocked at a whopping 15 mph.
So last week for me that "flashing yellow light" came in the form of intentionally soft greens. We should applaud whoever made the call to make the greens slower and softer, because it helped mask the deficiencies in the architecture and gave us a memorable week.
In recent days I've polled folks in the know, asking who deserves the most praise for making this call. They unanimously say Billy Payne deserves it for setting a new tone and essentially overruling the committee charged with setup. Still, let's nod our caps to Fred Ridley, course super Marsh Benson and the committees who found a few new hole locations and did the dirty work.
Of course they should not have to work so hard if the architecture was in better condition. Yes, it was clear the second cut has been negated in many key areas by a discreet widening out of holes. And the frontal additions to several tees clearly helped based on comments by Crenshaw and Weir. But still, is this quote from an AP notes column (nice spot reader David) really what the club wants to read:
"We played the ladies' tees two days in a row." – Steve Williams, caddie for Tiger Woods, on the course setup.
There were a few times I was worried about player safety on No. 11 when it looked like a Palmer follow-through might lead to a plunge off the front. Then again, wasn't it wonderful Sunday to see the 15th play so short that players were able to bomb it past the abhorred Fazio/Hootie tree farm?
Which is the issue at hand. The committee had to work their tails off to offset the glaring deficiencies: the decrease in width, the second cut, the still-missing ebb and flow of the back nine, and the lack of genuine tee "elasticity." (Oh and we'll give a shout out to Brandel Chamblee who rightly questions the deepening of key fairway bunkers to the point that they eliminate the temptation factor.)
Minus the rough, minus the Christmas trees that are turning into monsters (shrewd planting work there!) but with a few old tees and corridors widened out to their old selves, firmness could be restored. Remember, Bobby Jones HATED soft greens, even writing an essay about it that originally appeared in the USGA Green Section Bulletin and subsequently in Masters of the Links.
Wider and firmer does not necessarily mean players would be put back on the defensive. On the contrary, it should lull them into a false sense of security, a primary tenet of great risk-reward design. And best of all, the committee wouldn't have to work so hard covering up the mistakes made in changing the course.
But can we all agree, the overall change in tone the last few years was not merely a product of the weather?
From what I watched today and pick up in Doug Ferguson's round two game story, it sounds like the U.S. Open-light setup at Bay Hill is keeping The King happy. But there seem to be quite a few big names taking a pass. I wonder if he makes the connection?
Seems Jack Nicklaus has gotten the message, according to Rex Hoggard at GolfChannel.com.
According to tournament director Dan Sullivan, the 2009 Memorial, played June 4-7, will feature shorter rough, two rebuilt greens and none of the furrowed bunkers that were introduced in 2006.
“Last year we made it a little more severe than the Tour was comfortable with,” Sullivan said. “Jack is very reasonable about the way he wants the golf course to perform. He is a player and he’s built the tournament and the golf course to be a fair test.”
The first step in that direction was the length of Muirfield Village’s rough. Weather permitting, Memorial officials plan to have the rough at about 3 to 3 ½ inches to begin tournament week, at least an inch shorter than it was last year.
“We paid particular attention to rough length and how the golf course was performing,” Sullivan said. “Because of the density and length it was very tough.”
Cameron Morfit conducts an entertaining Q&A with Steve Flesch, covering all sorts of good stuff.
Let's talk Tour policy. You've slammed course setups. What's your beef?
It's the same every week. Having every par-3 at 230 yards is boring, as is having the rough at five inches. The greens don't always have to be 12 on the Stimpmeter. They water the fairways and around the greens, forcing you to hit a high spinny shot in. We've gotten away from the fact that golf can be played more than one way.
But that's exactly how Tiger and Phil and most of the top players like to hit the ball. Maybe the rest of you guys should learn to live with it.
But let's not set up every course so it's like a major. The public wants to see us make birdies, so let's set up the courses so we can display our skills and show everybody how good we are.
Seems the boys really are in love with the Memorial these days.
Jack Nicklaus upset the pros when he toughened Muirfield Village for The Memorial and furrowed the bunkers. Who's going to call up Jack and say, "Enough!"?
It's hard. Jack should have his input, but is it really in the best interest to play the course like that? That was eight-inch rough that obviously hadn't been topped off the day before the tournament, as Jack indicated in the papers.
Are you calling Jack Nicklaus a liar?
No, I'm not, but it was eight inches on Monday and it wasn't touched the whole week. Whether it's the tournament director or whatever, don't tell us it's four-and-a-half-inch rough. I can put my foot in it and see it's over my shoes. It's the same at Arnold's event. That rye-grass rough is sticky and it's five inches long. Muirfield is one of my favorite courses, but from the first time I played it in '98 to 2008, it's gotten harder, not better. The greens are 14 on the Stimpmeter and they're not big; do you need ruts in the bunkers, too?
This may be the first time someone dared to note the issue for Phil Mickelson and his joint instructors Butch Harmon and Dave Pelz.
Your fellow lefty Mickelson had a quiet 2008. What's wrong with him?
Phil Mickelson is fantastic. I have learned so much from watching him play. He knows I respect his game, and I don't want to say anything that would upset him, but right now I think he's got two different kinds of coaches. I worked with Butch Harmon for five years, and his way of thinking about the game is a lot different than how Dave Pelz is. Dave's very analytical, very scientific, and everybody respects that. Phil is trying to find a balance between two methods that seem to pull him in different directions.
And of course, slow play...
What else is on the PAC's radar?
Pace of play. There are a dozen guys out here who are habitually slow. It's not that our fine structure isn't strong enough — it's that our officials should be more assertive. We all know who's slow and who's not, and while half of the slow guys say they want to get faster, the other half say, "I don't care if I'm slow or not." Well you know what? You've got 144 guys out there that week and most of them feel you're disrespecting them by taking that attitude. You have 40 seconds to hit the shot, and if you can't do it, you're not playing out here.
Is this why weekend golfers seem to think a glacial pace is okay?
My 10-year-old Griffin now plumb-bobs. I go, "Dude, what are you doing?" He goes, "I don't know, I see you guys doing it on TV." That's exactly why it's wrong for us to be playing that slowly.
It's comforting to know that the shallow love for rough and narrowness at the expense of strategy is not relegated to PGA Tour course setup. Derek Lawrenson on the setup last week in Dubai:
The Emirates Course in Dubai is one of my favourites but I do think the way it was set up last week meant it lost some of its charm.
Architect Karl Litten cleverly designed it so players would have numerous options both from the tee and with their approach shots. Many of those options, however, were taken away by growing the rough.
Take the par 4 sixth, where Litten's idea was to hit your tee shot as far to the left as you dare to get the best line into the green. Not last week.
That would have left you in the thick rough, meaning the only option was to aim for a thin strip of fairway.
Those in charge could point to a high quality leaderboard for validation. But players don't get better in the long-term if they stand on the tee and are not required to exercise their imagination.
Over the four days of the FBR Open at TPC Scottsdale, I heard several mentions of newly narrowed fairways. And the rough was cited as being particularly difficult this year due to a wet spring (and what sounded like an aggressive overseed).
I know of two other PGA Tour venues that are seeing narrowed fairways. This would not seem to jibe with what some players believe is going to be an end to the old school U.S. Open approach of the last few years at select venues. Nor does it really fit with the Commissioner's remarks about introducting more risk-reward (unless he thinks rough creates interesting risk-reward golf, which I doubt).
A highlight from Geoff Ogilvy's teleconference call today, answering a question about sameness on the PGA Tour:
GEOFF OGILVY: It wasn't really a comment about the architecture of the course we play; it was more about the setup we play. The last few years we've got stuck in this narrow fairway, long rough kind of setup that's really quite similar every week we play, I think. Kapalua is the exact opposite of that: wide fairways, rough is really not in play, big greens. Everything is just different about Kapalua than we play a lot of the year.
I just think a bit more variation in the setup. The TOUR, there was a big player meeting at Charlotte last year where the players and the TOUR got back on the same page about how we think we should set our golf courses up. Maybe we've got a bit off track trying to set them up as extremely narrow, as extremely hard as we can recently, kind of chasing the U.S. Open model, can we add a bit more interest back into our courses? Over the next few years, the TOUR is already taking about a bit more interest in the setup, maybe a little bit less rough. They've already done it at Sawgrass by cutting the rough down and changing the course. I think we're on the right track. I think for a while we got stuck in the narrow fairway, long rough kind of golf course. I think, to be honest with you, there's definitely a time and place for it, but every week it kind of gets boring. That was my point. It's more of a setup thing than an architecture thing.
SI Golf Plus's excellent year-end issue featured a roundtable with scribes Garrity, Van Sickle, Bamberger and Shipnuck joining the "anonymous tour pro" for a discussion about 2009.
It's all quite entertaining in an pared-down sort of way, but one comment from Mr. Anonymous made me hurl my magazine across the room.
ABOUT THE MAJORS
Bamberger: Augusta National sets up for some semiobscure guy — like Zach Johnson or Brandt Snedeker — to have a great driving and putting week. To me, they have taken the emotion out of the tournament by toughening the course so much.
Van Sickle: The course negates ability because now you make birdies only by accident. They pushed the course to the brink of difficulty, and weather conditions can push it over the edge.
Garrity: If they fix the course the way we want, they may be left, once again, with ridiculously fast greens as the course's only defense. I didn't like that, either. Ease back on the course, and a Masters-regulated ball may be the only solution.
Anonymous Pro: I hate to say this, but Augusta is now one of the purest majors we play. With the length, the rough and especially the trees, it's less of a bomber's paradise. The trees have changed the course. They have Tiger-proofed it. They've taken a lot of the risk out of the course. You have to plod along and play to point A and B and C.
So let me get this right. It's the purest major they play, yet it takes away risk and you have to plod along and play to committee-dictated points of interest?
That's what a pure major does? Yikes.
Geoff Shackelford is a Senior Writer for Golfweek magazine, a weekly contributor to Golf Channel's Morning
Copyright © 2022, Geoff Shackelford. All rights reserved.
