"It is amazing how everyone on this site respected Tom's request not to disect who did what.
Now Whitten gets the exclusivity on that front?"
Adam:
That's why Ron Whitten gets paid the big bucks for golf architectural writing.
Seriously, that's a good article because it gets into a whole lot of what most were wondering about---ie how did the two diverse architects inter-relate with each other? Obviously, a pretty neat little addendum twist to the creation of Sebonack both actually and in the article was Mike Pascucci's tertiary part in the design.
I love some of those quotes and the way Whitten presented them. From listening to years and years of interviews with Nicklaus the tenor of his remarks and reactions sound right on the money. And I know Doak enough to know his actions and reactions sound just like I've seen him.
Obviously Pascucci and Jack must know each other pretty well with that needle by Jack over the redudancy remark by Pascucci.
But the little side-story on the collaborations of Sebonack by the trio that's apparently going to become real currency, maybe even legend about the course, is the alteration of the 18th hole despite Pascucci's original agreement with that "tiebreaker" understanding. I really like how he just told Bodington to clear that dune farther back on his own and when the architects became livid Bodington retorted "You're not the ones who sign my paycheck."
I sure don't know what Doak/Nicklaus's long par 4 iteration looked like but I sure do know that hole as a par 5 with its new back tee on the dune behind the par 4 tee is just stunning. The way golf holes play should always be the first priority in design, in my opinion, but when you have a potential setting like that 18th has, I say for God's Sake use it to it's visual potential if you can get a good hole to fit into it at the same time.
It sounds like Doak and Nicklaus might've been trying to pull off the now sort of cliched ball-busting long par 4 finisher so the course and its reputation could get in its last licks on those playing it.
I really like Pascucci's sensibility to go the other way, make it a par 5, give the members and players an easier par, a chance at a birdie (rather than perhaps a long par 4 double bogie), so they'd leave the course happy and in a good mood.
But once again, where was the tee on the Doak/Nicklaus long par 4 iteration? If Pascucci's new back tee par 5 gained even 10-12 feet of elevation on that jaw-dropping scene along the coast-line it would've been worth it for that reason alone, in my opinion.
Congratulations to the two architects and their crews for working together as well as it seems they did and certainly congratulations to Mike Pascucci for having the imagination to compromise (if that's what it was) and figure out a way of getting both. It sounds like all three of them probably had a better time working together to create Sebonack than they at first may've thought they would.
Lastly, I just can't wait to see that golf course in play and particularly to see where it's maintenance/set-up limit may be! It seems to me just walking around there looking at it that if and when they get some real speed on that course particularly "through the green" it just might be funner than a barrel of monkeys.