"the course whisperer" (doak)

[james soper]

nice piece on doak in the august 21st edition of 'golf plus' (sports illustrated supplement) by michael bamberger. covers his history, fedex course critiques (honest as ever), and his laments on today's architecture. also a seperate story on 'the confidential guide to golf courses'. good read.

[Andrew Mitchell]

Is it available online?

[james soper]

not right now. may appear on golf.com under bamberger or doak at a later date. if anyone would like a copy, send me a message with your e-mail info and i will get it to you.

[Andrew Mitchell]

Now online here

[Willie_Dow]

Thanks, Andrew:  Once I figured out to hit here !

A great commentary by Michael !  Both pages.

[Jeff_Brauer]

 ...Doak lists the Augusta National holes he "could do without." There are four of them: numbers 1, 9, 15 and 18, although he also has problems with numbers 2, 5, 7, 10, 11, 12 and 13.

I would love to hear Tom D's reasons, not recalling why he wrote that.  And, whether the same problems still exist.

Perhaps 1 is just average?

9 has the "putt off the green problem?"

I never thought 15 (straight across pond and who knows how the fw slopes now) was as good as 13.

Yes, 18 is uphill and blind, but I suspect Tom D's problem is the narrow chute of trees?

[Dan Kelly]

Tom Doak --

Is Bamberger's opening a true story? How did you happen to call him?

Bamberger's opening:

"One evening last month, while I was playing the Old Course, the cellphone in my golf bag went off. There was plenty of light at 9 p.m., and not another soul was out there, not where I was, a mile or so from downtown St. Andrews. The ancient links is confounding, with greens the size of an Iowa Wal-Mart and disorderly holes and strange toothy animals darting among the gorse bushes. Somewhere between the 7th tee and the green, I got lost. On the other end of the line, as luck would have it, was a former St. Andrews caddie, Tom Doak.

"I gave Doak my bearings, and he could see, over the phone, what I had done: taken the wrong line off the 7th tee. He got me back on track. He had me aim over the highest point of a nearby hill, sending me over one hole en route to another. 'Seven's a double green — it shares with 11,' he said. 'You play the white flags on the front nine. Your shot's more uphill than it looks.' "

[Adam Clayman]

Dan, A perfect illustration how cell phones can be (should be illegal) used to assist a golfer.

[JESII]

Despite the good work being done by Crenshaw-Coore and Doak and a few others, this is not the Golden Age of Architecture, Part II. (The Dead Architects dominated the real Golden Age.) Since the height of the Palmer golf boom, courses have often been built for the wrong reasons, and Doak, in an unwitting way, has contributed to the problem. Doak, admirably honest, knows it too.

The problem stems from the high-profile lists that rank courses, particularly the Golf Digest list of the 100 greatest U.S. courses and the Golf Magazine list of the 100 best in the world, a list that, from 1983 to '95, was Doak's brainchild.

"The client will say, 'Build me a course that gets on the list,'" Doak said last month while we walked his Scottish course. "Or, 'Build me a course that can get me a major tournament.'" The developers, usually rich men in a rush, want instant cachet. They aren't typically worried about slow play, lost balls, high greens fees, cart golf, scorecards crowded with X's. "They want long, hard courses. I've never had a client say, 'Build me a short, wide, playable course.'" A famous example of short, wide and playable is Augusta National — or it used to be. A famous example of a course that is still like that is the Old Course.

I thought this was interesting because if you looked at the lists today, 5 years ago, 10 years ago or 20 years ago the Golden Age courses dominate.

Why would it be difficult to show a client asking for a product that will "get on the lists" the lists? I am not sure, does the list focus limit the architects creativity? How so? Do you think the courses on the lists were the result of limiting the architects creativity? Why should the owners think that?

[George Pazin]

Does anyone think that the owners of the 20s weren't interested in a well received course? Or one that could host championships?

I hate shoddy logic.

[Jay Flemma]

it was a super piece.  Go Michael!

[Richard Boult]

Good article and very admirable guy!... willing to say no, stick to his ideals, and not let success change who he is. I especially appreciated that "he'll never become a tie-wearing member of the golf establishment".  I certainly plan to find a way to play Pacific Dunes (next month), Kidnappers, and Barnbougle Dunes someday. I imagine I'll have to skip his private courses though.

[Tom_Doak]

I still have not seen the article yet, although the fact-checkers for SI read a good bit of it back to me over the phone a couple of weeks back.

But, no, I didn't call Michael Bamberger while he was playing The Old Course.  He called me while he was out there.

As for my commentary on Augusta National, that's a quote from The Confidential Guide (1996).  Three of the four holes have been changed a bit since I wrote it.  But, I've never been a big fan of the VERY uphill approaches on 9 & 18, trying to hit over water to a shallow green off a downhill lie on 15, nor the first hole which is a super-hard green but not much of a hole otherwise.

[Dan Kelly]

I still have not seen the article yet, although the fact-checkers for SI read a good bit of it back to me over the phone a couple of weeks back.

But, no, I didn't call Michael Bamberger while he was playing The Old Course.  He called me while he was out there.

As I suspected. Thanks, Tom.

Now there's something I hate with a white-hot passion: fiction masquerading as journalism.

Is the rest of the anecdote accurate, from your perspective? Did  Mr. Bamberger tell you he was lost on the Old Course, and did you redirect him?

Click here to read the story:  "The Course Whisperer"

Dan

[Tom_Doak]

Yes, the rest of his story is accurate [as far as I know ... he told me he was on the Old Course, but I couldn't verify that].  But, he was calling to set up a meeting with me the next day down at Archerfield, and that wouldn't have made as good of a lead as the phone ringing in his bag, so let's forgive him for that one.  It's not like he took a bad drop or anything.  

[JESII]

Or failed to give a one footer...

[Dan Kelly]

Yes, the rest of his story is accurate [as far as I know ... he told me he was on the Old Course, but I couldn't verify that].  But, he was calling to set up a meeting with me the next day down at Archerfield, and that wouldn't have made as good of a lead as the phone ringing in his bag, so let's forgive him for that one.  It's not like he took a bad drop or anything.  

Very funny, Tom.

But before I let this go:

You can forgive him -- but I can't. Or, at least, won't.

There is no excuse, the way I see things, for a journalist to make stuff up. None. Achieving a "better" lede, by way of fiction, is not even close to acceptable.

Having said that:

Mr. Bamberger wants us to believe he was lost on the Old Course, and that you telephonically redirected him -- an anecdote designed to show your intense and intimate knowledge of the Old Course (and of, by implication, the history of the game, and all of its great courses, etc., etc., etc.).

How is what he did write any "better" than what he could have (presumably) honestly written: "I was lost on the Old Course, etc. Iowa Wal-mart, strange toothy animals, etc. So I grabbed the cell phone out of my golf bag and called Tom Doak, former caddie, etc., etc."?

The answer is: It's not any better.

Of course, I still have numerous doubts:

Has Michael Bamberger never played the Old Course? If he has (and he certainly must have): How in the heck did he get lost out there?

Did you really tell him that 7 and 11 share a double green? (Hard to imagine your thinking he didn't know that already. He's Michael Bamberger, for heaven's sake. You might just as well have told him that St. Andrews is in Scotland.)

Hadn't he figured out in the first six holes that you play the white flags on the way out?

Are there really times in the summer when, under "plenty of light," a single can play the Old Course -- and, doing so, find "not another soul" out there?

My B.S. detector is still glowing Orange.

[Rick Shefchik]

So is mine.

Though I'm tempted to call it my "Mitch Albom" detector.

[PThomas]

Yes, the rest of his story is accurate [as far as I know ... he told me he was on the Old Course, but I couldn't verify that].  But, he was calling to set up a meeting with me the next day down at Archerfield, and that wouldn't have made as good of a lead as the phone ringing in his bag, so let's forgive him for that one.  It's not like he took a bad drop or anything.  

There is no excuse, the way I see things, for a journalist to make stuff up. None. Achieving a "better" lede, by way of fiction, is not even close to acceptable.

well said Dan

[Brad Tufts]

So where are the fedex course critiques?

[Dan Kelly]

So where are the fedex course critiques?

Somewhere at golf.com.

Search for "It architect."

[K. Krahenbuhl]

So where are the fedex course critiques?

Fedex Courses