[Tommy_Naccarato]

Watching today's Toshiba Classic at Ted Robinson's proclaimed, Augusta of the West, Newport Beach CC. (Go Ben!)

I hope I never have to see another Ted Robinson-designed course for the rest of my life. I'm sorry, but this isn't golf architecture, its just plain old dog shit.

[cary lichtenstein]

Tommy:

Don't hold back on how you feel

Cary

[Tommy_Naccarato]

Cary,
Recently, I emailed Kristi, Ted Robinson's secretary so she could help out a friend on a story he was doing about golf architects with over 200 courses to their names. I felt Ted was a perfect subject for it, simply because I don't think there are 200 original Ted Robinson courses in the world, (a claim he regularly makes) I think he is counting courses he has worked on--and even then he is pushing it.

So, just to let you know the love TRGCD and I share, I still have yet to hear back from them. I don't blame them one bit either. I really don't. It isn't personal, it just about how bad of a course designer that Ted Robinson really is.

There are in fact golf courses I have played of his that I do in fact like, but they have asterisks next to the names.

For example:

Asterisk #1 *Temecula Creek/Rainbow Canyon--Original back nine is the best work Ted ever did. The original front nine is some of the most boring golf architecture you will ever see--its that mundane, while the newest Stonehouse Nine holes (27 hole facility) is simply a mish-mash of designing the worst golf holes imaginable in a pretty cool setting.

Its GOOD, BAD and UGLY in one 27 hole setting. Sort of like a smorgasboard of Ted Robinson.

Asterisk #2 *Mission Bay Golf Course--18 of the funnest, if not most brilliant Ted Robinson greens on a executive style layout. Just a kick to play too.

Unfortunately, while even being on right on San Diego's Mission Bay where you would think the drainage is just oh so perfect, especially with the sandy, loamy soils that the course is built on, it drains like a cement pond, which, many of the water hazards are actually built out of. (The course is directly across the street where they filmed that scene in the movie, Traffic, where Catherine Zeta Jones fears here children have been kidnapped.)

So why couldn't have Ted ever designed something with greens like this on a regulation course? WHY? WHY? WHY? Don't get me wrong, I love neat little executive courses as much as the next guy, but come on! You've claimed you've designed over 200 courses in your career. You mean to tell me you couldn't design greens like these ever again?

[Wayne Freeman]

 Newport is in every way just a very average course.  It has only a couple of fairly good holes, the 17th being one of them, although the pros are playing it at 152 yrds.  Not much of a challenge even with the water there.  And putting that huge sign in the middle of the water is awful. But it's in a very affluent area and the corp. sponsors love it there. I played in the pro am one year with Larry Laoretti and it was awesome.  They put on a pretty good show.

[Tommy_Naccarato]

Wayne,
Being that your a member of a Ted course, do you agree that Ted's original designs were actually not bad, or at least as I make them out to be in comparison to his newer works?

[Andy Doyle]

Based upon the last picture, it looks like it might be bird shit.  

AD

[Tommy_Naccarato]

Andy,
Your much more observant then I am!

[Pat_Mucci]

Tommy Nacarrato,

Did he design Tokatee ?

[Tommy_Naccarato]

Yes, Pat, We've been through this before.

But how does a Tokatee excuse a Tustin Ranch, Trilogy, Sierra Lakes, Tijeras Creek, Riverwalk and more?

Why is it that the City of Rancho Mirage has decided to remodel their two 18-Hole, Award Winning, Championship Ted courses and have chosen Clive Clark to completely redesign them--routing and all?

[Tommy_Naccarato]

BTW,
This is my yearly Ted rant. This is my time! MINE!

And with that, and this is no made-up logo done by me in Photoshop.....You just can't make this stuff up!

The Ted Robinson Official Company Logo! (Waterscape Edition) Enjoy!

[Pat_Mucci]

Tommy Naccarato,

I'm not familiar with any of those golf courses.

One could define Tokatee as being a minimalist golf course.  As I said, I liked it and thought it hadn the potential to be improved.

You might respond that that means that he could have done a better job in the first place, and I wouldn't contest that.

Perhaps, that's his forte, minimalist designs, and when he ventures away from that category, the results are less then desirable.

What year was Tokatee designed ?

It's not uncommon for architects to experience changes in their design theories.   Many times I hear comments that a given architect's best work was early/late in his career, meaning that his style evolved for the better or deteriorated.

Perhaps Tokatee was designed during a favorable transition.

[Evan_Green]

How do you folks think Ko Olina on Oahu compares with the other Ted Robinson courses mentioned here?

[Tommy_Naccarato]

Evan,
I haven't played it, but I do know of one GCA particpant that has admitted to me it was a good course.

I, of course chastised him and then disowned him and then had him beaten with whippy stick. I feel I was completely justified in doing so and thankfully, I didn't feel bad about it.

Pat,
Tokatee I believe was around 1976 maybe? Who knows!  But you bring up a really good point. Most of Ted's early work was good enough where one actually could see some slight changes being made to make it even better. The oroginal back nine at Temecula Creek/Rainbow Canyon is a perfect example. Some really neat stuff that just needed some better finishing touches. Instead, Ted added really finely-shaped concrete for the small fake pond on #11 (Or was it #12? I can't remember.)

How about that logo though?

Did you catch the waterscape in there? Where's Mike Cirba when you need him to make a comment?!?!?!

[Mike Erdmann]

Tommy, Tokatee actually dates all the way back to 1966.

[Wayne Freeman]

I'm a member of a Robinson design in Seal Beach Calif. first done by Ted in the 60's, Old Ranch.  It was pretty plain then and he designed almost a completely new course about 3 years ago, and it's not much better.  Granted it is in a flood plain, and the land company that owns it appartently cut off his funds early, but there are only a few good holes, although the green complexes are a vast improvement over the old.  I don't want to be too critical about his work at our course, but I will say that of the 5 or 6 courses I've played of his, I am mostly very underwhelmed. Of the above mentioned courses, only the back nine at Tijeras Creek is decent, as he  did some very nice work weaving in and thru a canyon and creekbed.  

[Tommy_Naccarato]

Wayne,
I will agree with you there. Holes #9, 11, 13, 14, 15 & 17 are very good golf holes at Tijeras Creek. I have still yet to see Old Ranch, old or new, but I do like the Destroyer Course right next door, where El Tigre Woods grew up. However its greatness is overephasized a bit too much. It's not that good. Just adequate.

Thanks Mike. As Maxwell Smart used to say, Missed it by that much!"

Thank God no one from the great Northewest is bringing-up that damn Trysting Tree again! I hate to bring that era back up, but it shows you how far we all have come!  

[Mike_Golden]

BACK TO WORK, TOMMY.  BACK TO WORK, NOW!!!!!!!!

[Tommy_Naccarato]

Yeah, Yeah!

[Evan_Green]

Tommy

I'm headed to the hotel at Ko Olina next week, so I figured why not get a round in while the gal is at the spa...

I hope you dont hold it against me And I certainly hope you won't be coming after me with a hickory shafted Niblick if I have a positive thing or 2 to say about it!  

Actually I heard its a pretty good course as well ... At the very least, you cant beat the weather- and I'd certainly rather play a course with a waterfall than sit in a tub of $#!)...errr mud


I'll let you know....

[Tommy_Naccarato]

Fair enough Evan.

But if it was me, I would rather be looking at naked women bathing in a tub of pineapple and coconut-flavored yogurt, but that would be a whole other issue.

[Evan_Green]

Well now that you put it that way....

[Jim Thompson]

This seems to fit-

In the beginning, there was the Plan.
And then came the Assumptions.
The Assumptions were without form,
And the Plan without substance.

Darkness was upon the face of the Workers
And they spoke among themselves saying, "It's a crock of
shit, and it stinks."

The Workers went forth unto their Supervisors and said, "It
is a pail of dung, and we can't live with the smell."

The Supervisors went unto their Managers saying, "It is
a container of excrement, and it is very strong, such that
none may abide by it."

The Managers went unto their Directors saying, "It is a
vessel of fertilizer, and none may abide it's strength."

And the Directors spoke among themselves, saying to one
another, "It contains that which aids plant growth, and it
is very strong."

Thence they went before the Vice Presidents saying unto
them, "It promotes growth, and it is very powerful."

And the Vice Presidents went to the President saying unto
him, "This new plan will actively promote growth, and vigor
of the company with very powerful effects."

And the President looked upon the Plan, and said that it
was good, and the Plan became Policy.

This is how shit happens.

The course does seem to fit the resort criteria of being very well manicured for its feculant nature.

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