Long and left / Short and right

[Ted Kramer]

Misses tend be either long and left or short and right.

Bunkers placed long and left of greens should help those misses stay in reasonably good shape. However a closely mowed, sloping section of grass could really compound the long left miss.

The same can be said for the ground or hazards short and right of greens.

I'd like to hear from any architects who have given this thought in their designs . . .
Have you designed holes with this thinking in mind?
Do you even agree with my premise?
Do you think that bunkers short/left see anywhere near the action as those placed short/right?
Is there a miss that you like to penalize more than another?

-Ted

[George Pazin]

My misses tend to be waaay right or waaaaaaaaaay left - but usually pin high!

Ted, I'm not an architect, but I think I read that Jack liked fronting bunkers at one point, because he was trying to encourage high handicappers to take enough club. And I think I read that Pete Dye liked difficult bunkers behind greens because they only tend to penalize better golfers.

Hopefully some actual architects will chime in.

[Jason Mandel]

Ted-

When bobby weed built a tee almost directly behind and to the left of our 8th green, i asked him if he was worried about players being in the line of fire.  the 8th hole is a 165 yard max par 3.

In his long southern drawl he sat there and said "NOBODY'S GONNA MISS LOOONG LEFT" and so far i think he's been pretty far on target.

short right i can see.

Jason

[Pete Lavallee]

Ted,

Before Dave Pelz became a short game guru he charted the shots of tour pros hoping to learn something. He was suprised to see that the dipersion pattern for them was a figure 8, aligned from 4:30 to 10:30; indeed misses were short right or long left. Very few misses fell outside this area.

We have discussed before that the 12th at Augusta is so difficult because the green goes against this pattern for right handers. i remember that Tom Doak did mention he was well aware that bunkers short right receive a lot of action. Is any of this fair or unfair to lefties?

[Garland Bayley]

People who hit from the right side of the ball miss long right and short left! I suggest a balanced regimen of bunkering be employed.