A New Way to Prioritize Praise of Golf Courses?

[Tiger_Bernhardt]

Tom, I am so pleased you did not adopt the UCLA's baby blue boys. I think I know one Lynn S. who will be watching the game with interest. I am embarassed to admit that I will not be in Indy for the games. The kid will be playing Athens CC Saturday(with the great Mike Young), Cuscowilla Sunday and shopping at ANGC(for Dan Taylor) and playing at Sage Valley on Monday, then its all Masters all the time, either in person or on TV for the rest of the week. lol The Tigers Ladies and Men are evening fun. It is a great time to be Tiger Bernhardt

[Tom Huckaby]

Dave - it was conversations with Jay that got me to crystallize this.  In essence this is what he does with his ratings, more or less.  I just think he doesn't give enough value to walkability... or at least he doesn't classify courses like I want to here.  But yes, his comments would be very valuable for sure.

Tiger - I took the baby blues only as far as I could, and that is to the final four.  Sadly I had them losing to my big sleeper pick (relative to the rest of the pool I am in anyway) and that was.....

TEXAS.

I know, I am ashamed.  But money won out over heart.  In the past it was the other way around and I always lost anyway.  This was gonna be the year my head won out... just goes to show live by the heart, one ought to die by the heart.

In any case, hell yes it is a great time to be a Tiger and THE Tiger.  And I don't mean Woods.

 

[Tiger_Bernhardt]

Tom Tom tom, Texas to beat LSU. Nope did not happen. The smart money is on Big Baby. It has been a fun week. I was in Houston yesterday and omg it was so fun to smile and talk the talk. Yes I am wearing a purple shirt again today as well. Those guys in the University of Virginia system must be thinking they gave GW too much money if they are this good and UVA isn't.

[Mike Benham]

It is a great time to be Tiger Bernhardt

Hold on, I'm checking the record books to see how many times Santa Clara has beaten LSU in Men's or Women's Basketball ...

[Tiger_Bernhardt]

Mike, the Lady Tigers had/beat Stanford last night in a pie eating contest in San Antonio. Santa Clara went home a bit early for the really hot girl fun this year. All in all I would rather be golfing in San Antonio than Indy this time of year though.

[Tom Huckaby]

If I were Pat Mucci I'd read you guys the riot act for hijacking my otherwise worthwhile, directly-related-to-architecture, wonderful topic here.

I am not Pat Mucci.  I know Pat Mucci and I know I am not he.

Thus I am loving this digression.

As for my failings taking Texas, dammit I should have known... I just figured after football occurrences they were a school of destiny.  Freakin' sips.  Let me down now as they broke my heart in January.

 

[Mike Benham]

Tiger -

Huckaby and I bow to the greatness known as LSU as the Tigers remain unbeaten against both basketball programs at SCU.

We need a tiebreaker ...

Mike

[Tom Huckaby]

Tiger -

Huckaby and I bow to the greatness known as LSU as the Tigers remain unbeaten against both basketball programs at SCU.

We need a tiebreaker ...

Mike

Is that true?  Of course it's no surprise but I was damn well hoping we got them back in the late 60s, the glory years of men's hoops.

OK, so we own them in football, which matters most to them, so that ought to win the tiebreaker in and of itself.  

Let's just say I don't want to peruse the baseball records... they are traditionally damn good.

 

I suggest soccer.

 

[Tiger_Bernhardt]

Mike and Tom, I am not sure what geezer on the Sugar Bowl committee invited them to New Orleans in the 30's. Santa Clara  beat us 21-14 and 6 zip in 37 and 38. We were 2nd ranked in 37 and 8th in 38.

[Tom Huckaby]

Mike and Tom, I am not sure what geezer on the Sugar Bowl committee invited them to New Orleans in the 30's. Santa Clara  beat us 21-14 and 6 zip in 37 and 38. We were 2nd ranked in 37 and 8th in 38.

Tell us something we don't know and don't have tattooed on our chests.  We were wondering when you'd figure out Benham's tagline though.

 

[Marty Bonnar]

Me young Huckmeister,
I am genrally liking the cut of your jib on this one but I feel a third dimension is necessary to allow proper full categorisation of our chosen subject. I have proposed fun/challenging, but it might just as easily be two other divergent yet similar polar extremes...



Yours in the 4th dimension ,
FBD.

[Craig Sweet]

Walking isn't always easy for many golfers, and I'm sure Bandon is NOT an easy walk for every golfer....caddy or no caddy....and why exactly should a course that does not allow carts recieve any special praise from an architectural point of view....or for that matter, any reason?


Does this go back to the whole idea that if you aren't walking it's not real golf...and if you aren't playing hickories and the ground game it ain't real golf?  

[Tom Huckaby]

WHOA!

OK Martin, you too now get 25% of the royalties.  That leaves me with 50% and I am fine with that.  

That is really cool.  Fun/challenging out to be factors as well.  And again, this is just for categorization, as some prefer one part of that, others the other.  But that's how all of this goes....

Very well done.

 

[Tom Huckaby]

Walking isn't always easy for many golfers, and I'm sure Bandon is NOT an easy walk for every golfer....caddy or no caddy....and why exactly should a course that does not allow carts recieve any special praise from an architectural point of view....or for that matter, any reason?


Does this go back to the whole idea that if you aren't walking it's not real golf...and if you aren't playing hickories and the ground game it ain't real golf?  

Craig:

Perhaps "easy walk" isn't the best terminology.  As I've said previously, each of the Bandon courses would have to score VERY far to the right, as carts are prohibited.  Perhaps "attention to the walking game" would be better phrasing?  We'd sure have to abbreviate though.  

And no, there is no one way to play this game.  Of course I personally do believe the courses most praiseworthy would fall in the northeast quadrant, toward the fun side in the new axis Martin added, but this is left to the beholder.  It's really more of a categorization than a judgment.  If things like cost and walkability mean nothing to you, then just consider it accordingly.  Use the Doak scale on its own, or whatever you see fit.

TH

[Steve Lang]

 

Huckaby,

Ya really need to get into a space-time continuum... quality vs quantity with time as z axis coming out of page


                                quality   ^
                                             |
                                             |
                                             |
                          Complex   |        Real
                       ------------------------------->  quantity
                                             |
                      Imaginary     |       Complex
                                             |
                                             |
                                             |

Does the imaginary praise translate into reality through the origin (0,0) i.e, original thought.. or is it biased by the complexity of communicating what we see and are trying to know?

[Steve_ Shaffer]

Tom

Just checking in here to see how MY idea is doing. Fourth Dimension? Space-time contuium? Let's get in touch with The Institute in CA and see what they come up with and then go to GD and GW so that their rating "systems" can be revised.

Notwithstanding all this mumbo jumbo, I think the 10 point system for "walkability" could be used within the current systems. I think it's much better than "walking allowed" or "ease of routing"

Steve

[Doug Siebert]

I don't get how this helps anything.  Sure, praising Sand Hills relative to Wild Horse is difficult, because anyone can just walk up and play WH cheap, not so with SH.  Does that compenate for SH's higher ranking from an architectural perspective?  Well, yes for some and no for others.

And while I think very highly of walkability and hardly ever ride on any course that allows walking (and have walked a good portion of some courses that require riding ) that's another thing that's subjective.  Some people won't drop a course down at all for being cart only, and will drop a course to 0 if it doesn't allow carts if they are physically unable to walk 18 or are just too fat and lazy to do so.

Just dump the 2D, 3D and 4D hypercube that's undoubtedly the next step in this and try to create an equation.  Here are some of the important factors:

W=walkability
WI=one's perception of the importance of walkability
FFF=fast and firm factor
TEP=one's perception of the importance of fast & firm
GR=greenness of the turf
ANGC=one's perception of the importance of greenness
SH=size of showerheads in locker room
F=how good the food is at the turn
G=availability of Guinness at the 19th hole
C=availability of caddies
DB=availability of top notch caddies without them double bagging
SASHA=availability of good looking female caddies
E=exclusivity of the club
ED=likelihood of eminent domain being exercised to take it over
T=need for tree removal program
TL=one's perception of whether more trees are better or worse
PD=penality of the course
Q=quirkness of the course
DOG=whether dogs are allowed on the course
FEM=whether women are allowed on the course
ME=whether I'm allowed on the course


I'm sure there's some stuff I've left out, like whether the course is actually worth playing.  Anyway, just take all those factors, assign them appropriate weights, add them all together and that's the score.  Whatever course scores the highest is the #1 course and all arguments over ratings will be over for all time, right?

[Tom Huckaby]

All right, I see you guys had some fun whilst I was off being a Dad and baseball coach.  

Look, this isn't meant to be the be-all and end-all of all golf course evaluation - and all these continuums and axes have rather taken it adrift.    I just do believe that walkability and affordability are VERY important - and remember, this is just regarding PUBLIC courses - so to me the basic quadrant gives meaningful results.

My initial thought also was that this would just be applied to public courses that are ALREADY determined to be "great" in some manner - that is, take the great ones and then prioritize the praise we given them.  But it would work as applied to all public courses if one combines it with a Doak score, or some other measure of overall quality.

In any case Steve, you will notice I gave you proper attribution for the basic concept.    Re a 10 point walkability scale, you do know that that's exactly what GD did until this year, right?

TH

[Jay Flemma]

Tom...what you say in your last post and what you say in your first post don't jive.  You start by saying that if a course is unwalkable OR (not and) overpriced, it's "bad for golf."

Then you say, well walkability is to be considered after everything else.  So you'd let a little thing like walkability get in the way of an other wise excellent score...and really PUNISH the course for it.

Value is more important to me than walkability because where a bulldozer can go a man can go and where a man can go, he can find a way to drag his clubs with him.

I distill it down to this flaw.  When I studied calculus or trigonometry or any other math based course, when we had a test, we would have these problems where we had formulas and theorums and equations and all sortts of stuff.  We got grades based NOT JUST ON WHETHER WE HAD THE RIGHT ANSWER, but rather on the way we got the right answer.  Sure if the answer was x=23, y= 35 and 2d + 3xy = q and that's all we got, we got full credit...BUT if my answer was x=23.5 and 2d + 3xy = r...if I didnt show my work I got no credit...so we always showed our work...

by showing our work, the prof could see whethe ror not we had all the details right...so if I had all my formulas correct and understood and showed my process, old prof. whittlesley could see that "oh, Jay you forgot to carry the 2...that why you got 23.5, not 23...

I got 97 instead of zero.

Same for golf courses.  I mean what is this sight all about?  How to analyze the myriad shades of grey.  You'd sacrifice all the other hard work of the archotect just becuase you have a bee in your bonnet about walking...I'll dock points for walkability, but I wont throw a course under the bus for it.  I'll throw a walkable course like Atunyote under a bus gladly cause its under deisnged and too expensive.

Now price...its a factor of many issues....deisgn, natural setting, conditioning, location...I agree overpriced golf should be called out...much more than walkability, but I think a grpah of two factors with a result as black and white as = bad for golf or not, hence militant reaction is just to black and white in a shades of grey world.

Forest AND the trees guys...forest AND the trees.  Balance and even keel carries the day.

Boy are we getting technical or what?  When do we start trying to teleport chickens?

[Tom Huckaby]

Jay:

I appreciate the comments, truly I do.  Obviously all of the details of this are yet to be worked out (as I said), and perhaps there are inconsistencies.  I also made very clear that this is a work in progress.

Just do understand a few things:

1.  This really isn't meant to be a value judgment as much as it is a classification.  Sure, I personally do believe that unwalkable, unaffordable courses are bad for the game.  But others obviously do not accept this.  So look at the quadrants just as identifiers, and take them for what they are worth to you personally.  The idea here isn't so much to evaluate, but to classify.

2. I have no bees in my bonnet about anything - hopefully that is explained by the above.  Sure I personally would put great value on courses determined to be great in quality (thus the need for the Doak score) that also fall in the upper right of the graph.  But if they don't happen to fall there, that does NOT disqualify them from greatness.  That's a VERY key point to all of this, and I apologize if I failed to explain that before.  As I say, this is a work in progress.

With this in mind, can you understand better that I am NOT trying to make things black and white, but just to classify courses better?

Look at it this way - in terms of evaluating courses, take what Benham suggested on page 1 - a combination Doak Scale/Huck Scale, and that gives you damn well EXACTLY what you do in evaluating courses as you describe in your point system.  All I am trying to do is separate out the walkability and cost issues and identify courses via those alone - as I say, people can then take this for what it's worth - which may be everything to some, nothing to others.

This is meant to be a classifier, not an evaluator.  And my first take remains that it would be used to classify courses already determined to be great in quality, however one defines that.

Capice?

 

[Jay Flemma]

Si, I comprende.

The proof in the pudding is in the tasting and you know what...we are splitting hairs here among the truly great and merely good...every person is gonna have their own criteria...ours are all strong enough to know that a colleague here is not gonna send a colleague to Bushwood, Meatball Meadows, Furry creek or Atunyote.

[Marty Bonnar]

Kee-rist!
Will you two please get a room!
 
FBD

[Jay Flemma]

Kee-rist!
Will you two please get a room!
 
FBD

LOL...good thing for you you're such a rabid mackenzie-phile;)

[Tom Huckaby]

Martin - well... I've read Jay's blog - as well as other stuff he's had posted on GolfObserver - quite a bit in recent months, and I do believe he has a great take on things.  It was indeed his method of evaluating courses - quite different from the normal dogma in here, btw - that got me thinking more about all of this.  As you see, the student has strayed from the teacher at least a little, but not in terms of basic philosphy... thus to me this was quite worth pursuing, although I can see that it may have made you ill.

 

It must be difficult to understand there in Scotland... but imagine if you go back 100+ years, and EVERY course starts getting built like Kingsbarns - with the modern clubhouse and extravagant green fee... How long is it before Kingsbarns has buggies all over the place, too?  Understand I love Kingsbarns as you know, and this is just an exaggeration for effect.  But that's what's going on far too much here in the States.  So many of our most-praised newly built courses actively disdain the walker, and cost way too much to play.  I am alarmed by this, and my personal reaction is that I'd limit my praise of such courses.  Others don't see it as any issue.

Geoff Shackelford, David Moriarty, Dan King, many others I am surely forgetting have been at the front of this crusade for a long time - I am very new to it.

I just do think it's a crusade that need be fought.

Thus my quadrants and classifications are useful to me for this.  For others, they will be meaningless.  But for all, at least they are idenfiers.

TH

[Marty Bonnar]

T,
alles in ordnung!
I definitely see and agree with your point of view and you are to be admired for your evangelical zeal!
Spot on with the Scottish point too. We are sooooo locky here. Although there are always some exceptions to the rule obviously - especially more so now if the Trumpster has his wicked way in Aberdeenshire!

Maybe you need to move Fam. Huckaby to Scotland (or perhaps Ireland?)

FBD.