It was slow today at work, so I did a little reading and came across this nugget. Any of you care to guess who said it? And no it was not JakaB!
What's wrong, I ask you, with the Jones style of that era? Too predictable? (Unlike Dye, Fazio or Nicklaus of today, who build their pet favorite holes ad nauseam?) Doesn't demand shot-making? (Granted, it didn't reward many bouncing balls, but it sure as hell did reward aerial shot making, especially high fades and draws. And it always rewarded a long straight ball. Given the sort of budgets Trent worked with, $100 grand for 18 holes, and the limited amount of earthmoving he could do with such budgets, I think Trent did some very nice stuff. It may be out of vogue these days, but so what. That's what's great about golf. You don't like his stuff, go elsewhere! And he was so far ahead of the game with regard to the evolution of equipment and talent, we're just now catching up. Long long tees (which he put in primarily for maintenance, by the way) are definitely needed if you want to make a course that some 20-year-old college bomber and I can both play. His multi-level greens still make sense to me. His use of water is still some of the best risk-reward stuff in the game. Don't like his bunker left and right fairways? Hey, it certainly makes the long hitters think. (It's fashionable these days for architects to sniff that such bunkering punishes long hitters, that length should be it's own reward. Bullshit. Yes, if I hit it 3 degrees off line and Freddie Couples hits it 3 degrees off line, his ball will end up farther off line than mine. Why put trouble in such an area? Because Freddie Couples shouldn't be hitting any shot three degrees off line. He's a professional. We should expect him to be more accurate. We should demand that he be more accurate.)
I agree that Trent overdid such bunkering. But it depresses me that no architect bunkers both sides of any hole any more, out of fear, I guess, of being accused of living in the past. (The recent past, not the distant past. Living in the distant past is apparently okay.) If I ever design a course, it'll have one hole where the absolute middle of the fairway will be the only safe spot. And it'll have another hole where the middle is the worst position to be in. Trent's only problem is that, in his assembly-line business, he got lazy and quit being inventive. Or, more accurately, the guys who designed for him got lazy and uninventive. Or Trent wouldn't let them be inventive. Or the clients wanted no surprises. Whatever. But I look back fondly at Trent's work, and Dick Wilson's too. For its time, it made sense. Some of it still does today.