Do scratch players see more than 20 handicaps?

[Patrick_Mucci]

George
You may be right and that is why I put the + in front of the 20.  However, I think you would agree with me that no 20+ handicapper on the planet has/envisions the same "repertoire" of shots that a scratch or better player has.   No one will ever convince me of that.   40+ handicappers are actually surprised when the ball gets airborne, from my experience.   Strategy is not something they give any thought to.  

JWL,

How do you account for Seth Raynor's understanding of the game, architecture and the vast repertoire of shots available to the most skilled golfers ?

[John Kavanaugh]

Patrick,

How do you account for your need to play a course to understand it..or anyone else for that matter if the ability to hit the shot is moot.

[George Pazin]

JWL -

I already deleted my post to you! Sorry about that. I thought a bit more about it and came to the conclusion that you're probably right on all accounts.

[JWL]

I was wondering who would be the first to bring in old Seth into this discussion.   I can't explain him.   He and his work is an enigma.   Unless I had full explanation on how he did what he did, I can only assume that he learned from CBM's use of template holes, and utilized those on some decent pieces of land.   How it worked out for him, I don't know.    How many disasters did he have we are not aware of?   I don't know.
Maybe you know the answers to these questions.   I would like to hear your explanation of SR's success.  I don't have one that is logically explainable.  I do have some guesses, LOL!
By asking the question the way you did, I am assuming that you disagree with my premise.   I would welcome your explanation of how/where my logic is faulty.
SR certainly isn't the only gca that has had some success with limited knowledge of golf.  
I am here to learn.   Educate me!

[Garland Bayley]

George
You may be right and that is why I put the + in front of the 20.  However, I think you would agree with me that no 20+ handicapper on the planet has/envisions the same "repertoire" of shots that a scratch or better player has.   No one will ever convince me of that.   40+ handicappers are actually surprised when the ball gets airborne, from my experience.   Strategy is not something they give any thought to.  

I'm sorry, but many 20+ handicappers have a far bigger "repertoire" of shots than the scratch or better player has. It is just that the scratch or better player would never think of trying to hit some of those shots the 20+ handicapper often hits.

[Paul Payne]

Garland,

LOL

Nor would the scratch player be playing form those positions that demended such creative thinking.

Seriously though, I agree in that I don't think a high handicap automatically means you are blind to the shot requirements or the nuance of the course. It may be that you are just not able to execute as often as a lower handicap player.

[JWL]

Sorry, Garland, I can't agree with your statement.
There isn't any shot that I can't hit that a 20+ handicapper can hit, and there are a multitude of shots that I can hit that a 20+ handicapper can't even conceive.

[Steve Pozaric]

George
You may be right and that is why I put the + in front of the 20.  However, I think you would agree with me that no 20+ handicapper on the planet has/envisions the same "repertoire" of shots that a scratch or better player has.   No one will ever convince me of that.   40+ handicappers are actually surprised when the ball gets airborne, from my experience.   Strategy is not something they give any thought to.  

I'm sorry, but many 20+ handicappers have a far bigger "repertoire" of shots than the scratch or better player has. It is just that the scratch or better player would never think of trying to hit some of those shots the 20+ handicapper often hits.

You should have added:  "nor does the 20+ handicapper know when he will hit one of the many shots in his repertoire - could go straight, could be a pull, could be a huge slice, maybe a worm-burner, etc."

I think everything else being equal, a better player might see more.  However, they might only be looking at it from their perspective.  How many of the bomb and gouge crowd on the PGA Tour care about architecture.  They hit it hard, maybe it goes in the fairway, maybe it goes in the rough.  They hit it again with a wedge, and putt out.  That style of golf doesn't require much appreciation of architecture to work, imho.

[Jason Blasberg]

I am curious, are there any great music composers who are tone deaf and can't play an instrument?  

Beethoven went deaf about a third into his composing career according to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ludwig_van_Beethoven

Among other things, while deaf he composed Fidelio, his only opera.  

Fidelio is also the name used for the only password to the orgiastic party in Kubrick's Eyes Wide Shut.

Not that that has anything to do with GCA.

[JWL]

Steve,
Agree to an extent.  At least the bombers give some thought to their options before bombing away, because they know what they can to with the ball, whereas the 20+ handicapper has little idea of what kind of shot is going to come off of his clubface on any given shot.
Difficult to design for either, I'll grant you that.

[Garland Bayley]

Sorry, Garland, I can't agree with your statement.
There isn't any shot that I can't hit that a 20+ handicapper can hit, and there are a multitude of shots that I can hit that a 20+ handicapper can't even conceive.

Name One!

[Lou_Duran]

According to Napoleon Hill, what the mind can conceive, one can achieve.  Apparently, Mr. Hill is not a golfer.

Perhaps the bogie man has the repertoire of thoughts and insights, while the expert doesn't see much beyond the "line of instinct".  This all may have a little bit to do with the difference between talkers and doers.  The latter being more interested in meeting the objectives of the game than finding reasons to dilute them.

I've played golf several times with a guy who can talk ad naseum with the highest eloquence about strategy and options, yet can't break 90 from the second set of tees if forced to count each stroke.  I've also played with a guy who evaluates risks instinctively and shoots around par much of the time.

Guess who I look forward to playing golf with and learn more about the game from.  The former can remember the slightest detail of a bunker 175 yards from the tee.  The latter just shrugs his shoulders about such a feature and turns his attention to his immediate goal of hitting a shot which maximizes his chances of making birdie without jeoperdizing par.

So, from this perspective, the high handicaper may actually "see more".  Which perhaps may explain why he doesn't seem to get any better, and begs the question: is more better?

[JWL]

Lou
A most eloquent presentation.
Following that line of thought, a person with even a +40 handicap has more experience around a golf course because he plays more, and a wider variety of shots each round.   Therefore, with all this accumulated experience, he quite obviously "sees more" and therefore, understands the nuances of design more clearly.
Seems logical to me.  LOL

[Lou_Duran]

Jason,

I knew the history of LvB relatively well.

Unlike Raynor and the 20-handicaper, LvB was always a great musician and had all his faculties going in.  To the best of my knowledge, there are not many golfers who were once aficionados and then became double digit handicap players.

Tom MacWood and others have made the connection between gca and art.  I tend to believe that the best architects have great artistic orientations including creativity and extraordinary imaginations.  They see what is possible that most of us simply cannot.  Some are instinctive and intuitive, while some are learned and acquired.  Could the same factors which allow some to become par shooters also provide a meaningful advantage in "seeing" what can be done on the ground to build a better golf course?  

 

[henrye]

Handicap has nothing to do with one's powers of observation and architectural eye.

They are seperate disciplines and shouldn't be confused or blended to gain credibility.

I have to agree with Pat.  Seems to me that the person who has a better eye and is more of a student of GCA is more likely to see more.  Similar to vocations such as writing or visual artistry, one not need be an artist or a writer to appreciate their strengths.

[Tony_Muldoon]

I am curious, are there any great music composers who are tone deaf and can't play an instrument?  

As an 18 handicapper I thought I should contribute something to this thread about a subject I really know, in fact it's one of my favourite stories.

Irving Berlin was such a lousy pianist he had a special one made that had a lever to enable him to shift keys.  Despite composing virtually the American songbook, White Christmas, Top Hat, I Love America etc etc etc he never improved.


Richard Rogers and Oscar Hammerstein as producers, employed him to write the songs for Annie Get your Gun and it was the talk of Broadway whether the grand old man would be able to produce hits for the new fangled style of 'book musical'.  Come the day when he had to unveil the new songs to the financial backers, he played the whole score to an increasingly loud and embarrassing silence.  At the end of it before anyone else could speak Oscar Hammerstein got up and said "Irving that was wonderful could I ask a special request? Would you play us Blue Skies?"  Irving did, it stank and the backers were persuaded to put up the money for what became his greatest Broadway hit.

Now back to the golf.

[Chris Kane]

I would guess that Tony Muldoon sees a lot more than most scratch markers.

[JESII]

I can say this, I'd prefer an intelligent, observant, imaginative 20 handicapper to design my course than an off-the-shelf Tour player. I may even prefer that same 20 to an intelligent, observant, imaginative Tour player.

I can't see any clarity in the "better players see the course better" logic.

Just the fact that a Tour caliber player can often recover from a bad position implies a reduced importance to that particular position. This train of reasoning will lead to a fairness dictated golf course. Is that desireable? Uneven stances, blind shots, frugal maintenance, deceptive features etc... will all disappear.

[Patrick_Mucci]

Patrick,

How do you account for your need to play a course to understand it..

JakaB,

Surely you jest.

Will looking at a meal determine its taste, or does one have to partake of the meal in order to evaluate the food ?

It's no different with golf courses.

Looks alone don't tell the entire story, wind, ground conditions and maintainance practices are substantive elements in understanding a golf course.  Without them, your analysis is flawed/imcomplete.

You can look at pictures of the 18th at Sebonack from now until the cows come home, but, you'll never get a sense of the shots you face without playing that hole, especially in a variety of conditions.

And then, after the cows come home, you still won't have a thorough sense of the hole unless you play it.

or anyone else for that matter if the ability to hit the shot is moot.

Designing and evaluating are seperate disciplines.

If perfection was obtained on the drawing board the leading architects in the world wouldn't need to fine tune their work.

[Patrick_Mucci]

JWL,

It's not about possessing the talent to play the game well.

It's about the mind's and the eye's ability to understand the nature of the architectural process of interfacing golfers with the field of play.

I think Jason's question was skewed from the onset.

A 20+ handicap could be indicative of a lack of interest, a lack of time, a neophyte, old age, late onset at begining the game and many other possibilities.

The broader issue seeks to identify the parties who think they see more than their counterparts, and therein lies the problem, generalizing the result.

In the 40 + years of experience of serving on a substantive number of green committees at various clubs, and I have to tell you that I've heard some horrible suggestions from both ends of the spectrum and I've heard some good suggestions from both ends of the spectrum.

I think the critical issue is "INTEREST" coupled with the eye and mind to understand golf course architecture.

Could one argue that the lower handicap is more interested in golf and related issues such as GCA.  I suppose so, but, I wouldn't want to make the quantum leap that therefore, all lower handicaps are better equiped to understand GCA.

Was Charlie Banks a good golfer ?
Certainly he didn't acquire any golfing skills from his mentor, Seth Raynor.

[JWL]

Pat

In my orginal post on this issue, I was trying to discuss the apparent question at hand, about gca's with 20+ handicaps vs scratch + gcas.  
The main area that I attempted to address was the area of "resistance to scoring".   I stated my case, and even said that I thought many 20+ gcas quite often made up for their lack in that area by excelling in the other areas of gc design, namely aestheitcs.  
I, by no means, did mean to imply that their aren't many gcas that are far from scratch players, that are terrific designers.  I am a big tent guy.   I just tend not to wander into their part of the tent very often.   Every player has a perspective of gc design that is based on their unique ability to play the game.    Scratch playing gca's, imho, have a better grip on what can and can't be accomplished with a golf ball, and then decide how and when to build that into their design.  They can create the ease or difficulty they desire.   They then are not left to the element of the unknown on whether a shot or hole is fair, fun, enjoyable, impossible, whatever.   They actually design it into the course...purposefully, not accidentally.  

[Anthony Butler]

You may not realize this but the lead in Sideways played a fool...It could have been any one of you talking about architecture.

Wait a second, wasn't he the one who got to sleep with Virginia Madsen because of how beautifully he articulated his love for Pinot Noir?

I know people who MAKE award-winning Pinot Noir who don't do that well with the ladies.  

[DMoriarty]

For reasons I dont understand, many great golfers are cursed with the inability to understand any perspective but their own.  In fact, this very thread is a terrific reminder of why gca has long been cursed by excellent players who thought that their superior playing talent automatically made them superior course designers.  

Sure there are exceptions . . . some great players can escape tunnel vision and become quality designers, but it is their ability escape their own game rather than embrace it which makes their success possible.  

Is it merely a coincidence that the superior-golfers-turned-designers are responsible for more than their fair share of the true horrors of golf design?  I dont think so.

[Robert Mercer Deruntz]

An important distinction is being missed--great golfers generally see more of a course architecturally, however, they may not have an original creative vision.  The golf course presents situations that good players react better than lesser players.  Just because some good players are mesmerized by long narrow rough and treelined courses with severe comparmentalized greens, does no mean that they will not undertand holes designed with options.  I know a tour player who prefered these types of courses, but gave a very detailed analyisis of #17 TPC Scottsdale and how various options played out.  He also stated that it scares tour players when there are 3 different shot options and how difficult it is to play such shots because the wrong shot might have been chosen.

[Lou_Duran]

David,

This predispostion to tunnel vision, does it afflict great or excellent golfers or players disproportionately?  Does the 20-handicapper escape this predicament by virtue of how much harder he has to work to get around the golf course?  

Can you give us some examples of the following:

"Is it merely a coincidence that the superior-golfers-turned-designers are responsible for more than their fair share of the true horrors of golf design?"

Other than Raynor, I am unaware of GCAs who were real duffers.  MacKenzie is sometimes described as a poor player, but he ocassionally shot in the high 70s and was known to seek the advice of solid players when designing his courses.  I don't recall if Fazio plays very well or much at all.