Pins, Grounding And Suspending Play

Lawrence Donegan (here) and Steve Elling (here) sum up the player complaints from Friday's second round. They fall into two categories: hole locations and suspending play.

From what I saw of the course, the holes were fairly reasonable and not cut on high spots as several players have claimed. There were undoubtedly a few very difficult locations, like the 11th, which was almost inaccessible along with the 8th and 10th on high spots. But does every hole location have to be accessible? I think not.

As for the decision to suspend play and restart in conditions that soon were just as bad as they were when play was stopped? That's a trickier proposition.

I'm not buying the "they did it for Tiger" conspiratorial venting of players who were understandably cranky about getting in their playing zone and then having to pull up, only to face the same or worse winds when they went back to the course.

The issue of green speed is certainly on the table in this debate since the greens look faster than they were in practice rounds and it takes so little to put these greens over the edge. But ultimately, this may just be about the quirkiness of the rules of golf, as Bob Harig notes.

The reason for such consternation over a golf ball that rolls is the penalty that can be incurred if you ground your club. A player who rests his putter behind a ball is deemed to have moved the ball if the wind blows it.

"I understand the rule, but it's such an unfair rule because you haven't really done anything wrong and the ball starts to roll and you incur a penalty," said Trevor Immelman, who shot 74. "That was the kind of thing you had to be careful of today."

"Before they had the fairway up the left side of 11 where it should be, now it's over to the right over here."

Tom Watson was pretty upfront about his dislike for the fairway contour on No. 11 and he was correct to question it.

And you've got to think about putting the ball in the fairway at 11. Before they had the fairway up the left side of 11 where it should be, now it's over to the right over here. That's where you would kind of normally hit it, now you're aiming too far to the right and you're still fanning it off to the right, now you're in worst position.

Some background: 11 is one of those holes always written off as ordinary and I believe set up properly. It's a wonderful example of an architect getting the most out of an awkward transition from the ideal portion of the property to the stretch of land that returns you to the clubhouse.

Its strategy is simple: Drive it left over the bunker and flirt with a small canyon fall off (sadly now bordered by cart path), and you open up the best angle to the green. Drive right and you must play over bunkers, which, after years of build up, make the approach quite difficult. By eliminating the left area of fairway, there is no real strategy.

However, after looking at the sparse left rough today and watching one player roll it up from there while a player in the middle of the fairway caught the bunker backslope and saw his ball take a horrible bounce to the back of the green, the best way to play the hole remains up the left side into the rough.

It's one of the rare instances I've seen Mike Davis take strategy out of the golf course. Thankfully he's injected so much into the rest of the layout that the occasional blip is no big deal.

Here's the view from the fairway, followed by the left rough view.

 

USGA Tweaks Pebble's 14th

Mike Davis kindly reported back about the troublesome 14th at Pebble Beach and the extreme chipping area that led to AT&T final round dramatics.

After studying the 14th green situation for about 45 minutes today, we decided to bring the rough up on the left side about half-way.  I think that will, on balance, provide the fairest outcome.  It will allow balls just left of the green to roll down about 5 paces and then be caught by rough.  The player would have an uphill shot that could be played with a bump and run or a high-lofted pitch.  It will give the player under the tree down on the flat area a play (which he never had before with thick rough) – hit a low pitch out of the rough onto the closely mown area and run it up the hill.  I think this scenario will challenge the players from all four sides of the green … try to get their ball up onto what might be the smallest (effective) green for any major competition (that I know of). 

Once again, great to see Davis and the committee unafraid of making adjustments this close to the tournament in the name of common sense. Not that the 14th still won't keep Davis and championship committee chair Tom O'Toole up at night, but this modification should cut down on some extreme goofiness. Though the front hole location will still be a beast.