Help! An Unhealthy Love Affair With The "Dead Guys"

[Kalen Braley]

Tommy,

Very nice analogy on this one.  Going along the same lines which modern course would be representative of the stunning Halle Berry?

[Tommy_Naccarato]

Jeff,
As far as comparing some of the moderns to the classics, I think much of it, if not all of it has to be separated (meaning the modern end of the spectrum)

Can one compare a Pacific Dunes to say, a Pelican Hill? Both are considered resort courses; both are right on or just off of the Pacific Ocean. IMHO, I don't think Pelican Hill even belong in the same class as a Pacific Dunes?

While I know some opinions do vary--the quality of the cart and it's GPS system; the ability to place a food order from anywhere on the course and have it ready for you by the time your finished playing the 9th hole? The choice beer cart girl with a fine selection of Cohiba's and CEO's...... Yes, Pacific Dunes sucks, because it doesn't have all of those, and I even know people who have actually cancelled trips up there when they found out it was walking only! But also, it's been designed and built by someone that was inspired by dead guys when compared to someone that is in the market to create something that appeases the less then appreciative "core" golfer. God forbid if there should ever be an ounce of strategy set into the mix, let alone, associates--on bulldozers or shovels in hand--trying to get every slope right. But this is the mindset many of you are designing for nowadays.

Count me as one that thinks there is a huge difference between commercially successful and artisically successful--who are now becoming more commercially successful golf architects--enabling people to appreciate the quality of what a classic course brings, as well as a thoughtfully designed and constructed modern is all about. (and hardly even a containment mound to go with it)

As far as me being a celebrity, well, I loath any sort of celebrity that hasn't been earned for some reason. (hence my thoughts on Paris Hilton, who has parlayed her family's wealth and security into a business of "I have it, you don't therefore I am." yet has never done anything, constructed, never even had a legitimate job other then one to further expose how great it is to never do anything for yourself.

As far as me, I don't think I am a celebrity. Over-indulgent, compulsive passion, yes, but being being compared to Paris Hilton's style of fame, well, I just as soon be on a golf course then waste the time, given how fleeting fame can be. (and is)

[Tommy_Naccarato]

Kalen,
Looking at the slit in that gown, Chambers Bay!

[David Stamm]

and I would love to drive one of these


 

Ciao

Unfortunately Sean, it handles like a brick, even taking into account that that Vette was from 40 years ago. I'll take this...... the ultimate evolution of the air cooled 911.

[Kalen Braley]

Kalen,
Looking at the slit in that gown, Chambers Bay!

Hey Tommy,

Not sure if that is a good or a bad thing....but CB to me is pretty unproven, very much unknown.  I think Halle Berry is bigger and more proven than that.  I would put her more closely to a Bandon Trails or even maybe, just maybe a Pacific Dunes.

Here is a Chambers Bay in my mind...pretty much unknown, but wow, she sure works for me.  Now on the 1st tee, Rosario Dawson.

[Tommy_Naccarato]

Wimmen? We ain't never coming close to an agreement there.

Not true at all!

We've always agreed on Catherine Deneuve, and you know how many times I've been bummed Renee didn't have an available sister!

We've also agreed that Carol Bouquet is oui magnifique.



Of course I've always thrown in the Greta Scacci into the mix, and honestly, she is my kind of gal. Not overly a knockout, but sophisticated. Intelligent too. She's also Italian and English which is big points for me. Only problem is that she's a heartbreaker. Did you know she was originally going to play Catherine Trammel, the main character in Basic Instinct?

[Jeff Doerr]

Tommy,

Re Hollywood Starlets: Back in the day, you had to do something to be a celeb, like make an actual movie or something.  I guess PH has done a TV show, but Jerry Hall, Nicole Richey, PH, etc. all are famous for being famous, for the most part thanks to the PR machines.  For that matter, even you have been described as an "internet celebrity" and I doubt several thousand postings would have qualified as such in Hollywoods golden age either!

As to the classics - I seriously doubt, if we survey holes before and after 1960, that there are more holes that don't allow the runup game in EITHER era.  As always, I could be wrong, but the tendency is to compare the moderns we see on TV for tourneys to the classics.

I agree with Mike - No one says the best of the old guys isn't great.  However, we should also say its been improved by the supers over the years, the history, the growth of trees, overall maturity, and overall exclusiveness.  Its a treat to play even before you walk in the gate, and that gets confused with the actual gca.  

For that matter, the old guys are getting certain things of genius attributed to them that just didn't exist to any greater degree than it does today.

As an example, I have said it before, but I have examined hundreds of Ross plans and field notes. None said anything about swales in front of the green for visual deception. Nearly all said something about swales in front of the green to build up the back for a front to back slope, small backing mounds, and just to get fill from the nearest spot.  Someone notices that there might be some visual deception (although I have never felt that at the most cited example - No 2 Course hole 15) and all of a sudden, its a Ross "trademark" that never really existed.

Now, there is a certain genius to the simple and practical design, and many prefer that to other, more "concocted" schemes, all of which I understand completely.  Less can be more.  But, overall, the strategies aren't that much different, and the biggest difference is that succeeding gcas owners and supers have taken out much of the superfluous bunkering that was so nice in the name of cost and speed of play.


.....Now, that is the history of American GCA in a nutshell!

Jeff, this may be one of my favorite posts on here that does not include pictures!  

The thing that works for me on the classics is time. TOC may be the best example of this as the years have increased the greatness of accident and subtle changes in the course until we have the course of today.

Some of the moderns are "too" strategic and thought out for my taste at times. More moderns need that quirk or "accident looking" factor that exists in some of the works of the dead guys.

[TEPaul]

MichaelH:

Is some really good architecture getting built these days?

Definitely, and in all kinds of ways---aesthetically, functionally, strategically etc, etc.

In my opinion, two I just saw recently in Georgia---Mike Young's Long Shadow and Paul Cowley/Davis Love Co's Rice Fields are certainly great examples.

[Tony_Muldoon]

Greta Scacchi was amazingly hot in "Presumed Innocent".  By "The Player", she was past her peak...

and now "Greta Scacchi as Mrs Thatcher"

[Mark_Rowlinson]

My experience is largely limited to the UK, but if I'm about to visit a course for the first time and see that it's by Braid or Fowler, MacKenzie or Simpson, Abercrombie or Herd or another of that era I know that the course will be, at worst, interesting in some way as long as nobody has messed around with it (Sitwell Park, Bramall Park and Hazel Grove being unfortunate local examples of Mackenzie's work being destroyed).  There are an awful lot of rather bland, anonymous courses out there by some of today's architects, and I don't just mean the low-budget projects.  I have to say that I remember little of The London, Carden Park, The Oxfordshire apart from the obligatory water holes at Carden and Oxfordshire.

[Mark_Rowlinson]

PS, If you are going to drive to TOC in a classic car, do try to obtain a right-hand drive model.  And if it is to get you into the right frame of mind for TOC then it should require a few long-lost driving skills, too, the equivalent of using gutties and hickories.  So no automatic transmission, no power steering, no synchromesh, advance-and-retard, no air-conditioning and probably no heater.....

[john_stiles]

Dead and live guys have all done a lot of good courses.

The live guys get the benefit of all the constant advertising in all the magazines and TV and all the golf event television.

Pick up any magazine, watch most of the PGA Tour events, get any email from magazines, and you see the live guys.  Golfweek has really resulted in the new live guys getting a lot of notice.  Other than the list of top 100 classics, and a  review of the old,  everything is about the new.

The live guys are getting their due, make no mistake about it.
And the quotes are the same as the dead guys,  'oh this land was meant to be a golf course.'

Folks are investing millions in the golf & real estate of the live guys.     Live or dead they are getting their pub and notice.

Same for the above women.  Can we have a picture of Grace Kelly with the pearl necklace ?

Mike,  

You are playing some of the new but prefer the old.  Nothing unhealthy in that.  I'll add that I like quite a few of the new myself.  Cuscowilla comes to mind immediately.  I have one or two pretty new ones in my neighborhhood.  

I'll just mark you down you down as loving the old on your chart.   It's more important that you do love someone.

I charge $200 a session. Please forward a check.

Myself,  I am usually okay until I travel to GB&I where I require 24 hour care.  

[Mike Hendren]

I charge $200 a session. Please forward a check.

John, if that includes a playing lesson at HH, it's a bargain!

Mike

[Tommy_Naccarato]

John,
I think I identify more with you and Hillbilly Hendren, butas far as the old dead guy quotes, MacKenzie and Ross where probably guilty of some hubris, but take a George Thomas, and it was just pure intellect. He was a very humble man, yet people knew and respected him for his knowledge. You wouldn't see him make such brash statements only if it was really true.

But most: How could we be so lame and forget Grace?

Given her Philadelphia roots which were transplanted outside the boundries of South Eastern, PA........I would equate her Golf Architecture terms, Captain George C. Thomas. At least in their bodies of work!

Pure class!