Patrick,
I agree that comfort has a great deal to do with how a particular player plays the game. In my opinion, the most strategic of golf courses create levels of discomfort, which may even be slight, while offering an option that is much more comfortable. The best of strategic golf courses create ebb and flow of such throughout the round in a way that makes even the more simple holes more challenging mentally, due what is coming up or what has come. In my mind a course that demands a certain strategic approach is not that strategic at all, because it lacks option - the heart of great strategy. As such, Wannmoisett may on the surface seem to not provide the defense that does not allow it to be overpowered, but the underlying strategy and comfort with which to play the holes does. I have to admit that my initial comment relative to the course being "one that cannot be overpowered", was my perception from my experience at the Northeast Amateur. I played pretty well there this year (73-71-67-69-280 ~ 19th I think - 7 shots back) and did not feel indimidated by the golf course, so my perspective was not one of having a bad tournament and trying to justify it somehow. After giving it thought from responses, I feel the same way. I would suggest that I am not alone in my thinking. I make a point of going out and watching players play when I am at the Sunnehanna, Porter Cup, US Amateur, etc., to see how others play the course and to have a chance to study the course without having to concentrate on my own game. At the Northeast, I saw the best amateurs in the world playing the course the same way, basically, that I was playing it, with a few exceptions where youth and abandon was not too often being served.
When designing a golf course, the hidden agenda of the most talented architects is recognizing what makes the good player get out of their comfort zone and "retreat" to shot making that is more comfortable. This can be done visually or simply with angles and slopes. For what it is worth, Wannamoisett gets the best amateur golfers in the world to play a less aggressive game and take what the course gives them, which happens to be a more conservative approach. The reasons for this are obvious to me and has everything to do with approach angles to the green and/or the contour in the greens, and the way the driving areas are presented.
As for taking somthing off my wedges and 9 iron, you could write a book about the changes in equipment and course maintenance that have changed shot making. With today's ball, I find it much more "comforting" to hit full shots under pressure than to be getting "cute". You often see the best players in the world pulling of these cute shots when they have no other option, but I can assure they are not regularly playing these shots as a part of a plan when there was another option. I like to endice a player into thinking they gain a considerable advantage by giving them a shorter, but "cuter" or highly feel oriented shot, while offering a more simple shot from a greater distance. It is the enticing of a player to hit the wrong shot that we are trying to accomplish. I have had many conversations with a client in Memphis about defining the wrong way to play instead of the right one, while somewhat "masking" the more comman sense ways to play.
With regard to the 30 yard shot with a lot of RPM's, it is a shot that is not that reliable, especially on the contours of a Wannamoisett, and competitive play, and the objective is to get it close. Another thing those 30 yards shots can do is make you feel you have to get them close. For instance, an uphill birdie putt on the 5th hole at Wannamoisett is a bonus, but very few players will actually ever be doing more than trying to get the ball up top. With the short high spin shot, the underlying desire is to get it close which opens a can of worms I want to avoid.
Great strategy would be more appreciated today by the better players if they did take more risk. I think most of today's competitive golf centers on making fewer mistakes rather executing thrilling shots. I think this is large part due to the equipment which makes risk taking less necessary due to the reliance of being able to hit the ball straighter. I grew up working the ball and still see the game that way.
It is much harder to work the ball today, especially with short irons, than it used to be. This is somewhat a continuation of what I was speaking to earlier in that the new ball does not let you move it as much and I find, and see other players doing too, that it is much better to be hitting full shots, as if you are trying to work the ball it is more easily accomplished while hitting the ball harder.
I guess I may have been tricked a little by the speed of the greens and how they set pins at Wannamoisett, but even in observation I don't see how anyone could in general call the greens at Wannamoisett anything less than severe. Wild may not be the right word, but they are severe. I found them every bit as difficult to play to, around and on as when the US Amateur was at Oakmont.
I would play anyone at Wannamoisett if I could give them 50 yards past my drive, but had the option to place their ball, in the fairway, wherever I wanted.
At Fresh Meadow we are working on the 14th green, softening the slopes to give them back the pins they had - also enlarging the green to closer to its original size (they can't cut a pin on this green now where a ball will stay on the green if you are above it and I saw two balls from under the hole roll up and then make a 360 right off the front of the green - this green rarely gets over 10 on the stimp). And we are working on the 18th green to enlarge it and bring the greenside bunkers more back into play.