Besides the annual course rankings, my favorite feature in Golfweek are Brad Klein's course reviews. Recently, Brad reviewed We-Ko-Pa (Saguaro). I'd like to ask a couple questions, make a couple comments, and hopefully elicit a little general discussion about Coore and Crenshaw.
The course pictures I've seen look great. Kind of flat, short green to tee walks, no water hazards, expert shaping and compelling strategic interest. Plus the desert there looks very lush and filled with life. Very beautiful!
This is a flat course, and Brad begins his review by praising the architect's interest and expertise with small elevation changes.
"Co-designers Bill Coore and Ben Crenshaw are modest fellows who get excited about 1 or 2 feet of elevation change. A lot of course architects can't even get going unless the site they are working on has elevation changes of 50 or 100 feet."
I wondered to myself whether this remark alludes to any architects in particular, especially Tom Doak, who has been building pretty hilly courses lately. Tom Fazio gets excited about flat sites.
If I recall correctly, there's at least one long par 3, about #14 or #15, where there's a 40 foot drop over about 250 yards. So the course probably does have a 50 foot elevation change.
I believe courses without elevation change have one primary shortcoming. They fail to examine the player's ability to judge elevation change when approaching the green. I mentioned this a few months ago in a different context. When somebody (not Patrick M.) rebutted that Pine Tree, though flat, offered a complete examination of one's skills, I decided not to belabor the point and let it go.
On the other hand, I would argue that flatter courses make better ground game courses. Neither uphill nor downhill shots lend themselves very well to running approaches. A flatter course can use subtle undulation to great effect. Of course, the better player plays in the air, unless its windy.
About your ratings, Brad, I have two comments. The ten individual ratings add up to 84, or 8.4 per rating. Your overall rating is 7.5. I understand that overall and individual ratings are mutually exclusive, but that's a fairly big discrepancy, and I'd sure like to hear any comments you have about that.
I have several comments about your overall rating of 7.5. I have a couple of friends who rate courses for you, and if I'm not mistaken, a rating of 7.5 means that you think this course should be ranked about the 40th best modern course in the country. However, if all raters give this course a 7.5, it will debut at #26, between Wildhorse and World Woods (Pine Barrens). Is it really that good? Pine Barrens is very cool, but it didn't thrill me. I haven't played Wildhorse, but I've heard it's sort of flat, with lots of wind and ground game considerations.
This is the second review I recall you using your own rating in the feature. The other was Bandon Trails, which I believe you gave a 9.5-10, which means you must think it's one of 5-10 best modern courses (the cumulative rating for BT is currently about 8.1). Lately I'm inclined to believe that Bandon Trails is a really great course, just a touch better than Friar's Head. I like the three distinct ecosystems that the Trails traverses, and believe the shots presented are only slightly less interesting. However, most Oregon visitors place Bandon Trails as the third best course at the resort.
Your ratings of We-Ko-Pa and Bandon Trails indicates you believe that Coore and Crenshaw are the best architects in the business by far, heads above the competition. Your descriptions of the subtle undulations glow with admiration. I believe your opinion is shared by most of our knowledgable members. Golfweek places six C&C courses in the top 100 (at 1, 3, 17, 31, 58, and 78), and We-Ko-Pa and Colorado Golf Club will make eight.
My question to the group is: Do we really believe this to be true, that Bill and Ben excel so thoroughly at design that they deserve eight spots on the list? I would probably answer yes to this question, but the "glowing admiration" for every little undulation they create is a bit overblown. Based on my limited experience (Trails, Friar's, Hidden Creek, and mighty Sand Hills), I think Coore/Crenshaw courses are substantially similar, with the exception of Sand Hills and Kapalua (Plantation). To me, Sand Hills looks way different from their other courses.
There are 5-10 modern American architects with equal experience, with their own interpretation of shaping. To paraphrase Ben Crenshaw's quote in the article, "In architecture, variety is the soul of the game."