Eric, That is what they think the justification is, but obviously things are not speedy in the current set-up.
They should take a chance and have a normal set-up. 6 easy 6 reasonable and 6 hard. It wont translate to 7 hour rounds, it may even pick up the pace since many more ams will be out of the hole sooner. 
Most, and reiterate most, of the ams are very good about picking up when they are no longer a potential assist in their team score. But there are a few stuborn souls who need to putt out on every single one of the 54 holes.
Part of me understands this was Bing's party, and the pros were not the highlight, no matter how much they think they are. Big business networking is now the party's primary premise.
Adam,
I'll try to dig through my files and locate the AT&T hole location sheets for my time there. I recall them being in the same zone every year (1996-2000).
Looking at 18 today, it was darn close to where Payne hit his 5 iron to about 18" in 1999 as darkness fell on the third round. Going through the locations I remember:
1: center back
2: center
3: middle right?
4: usually back but, one year (1998?) above the tier. OUCH!
5: back right
6: center back
7: mid-left
8: mid-right
9: back left
10: ? I think back right
11: right
12: frontish-center
13: back right and left
14: right (over lake and bunker)
15: right of center
16: left of center
17: usually middle toward front, 1999 was front above the approach.
18: same as today, back center.
I'll try to verify. Most of the locations were also determined by the weather forecast. The golf course, as you know, can be setup much more difficult than it is for the AT&T.
That would be an interesting exercise....setting up the hole locations to bring out the most in Spyglass' design.
Out for now.
Eric