Calling Mike Cirba and his mobile camera

[TEPaul]

I think this website needs you to drive down Ardmore Ave AGAIN and take a few shots of Merion East and its bunkers and post your photos.  

They're transitioning pal, right before your eyes.

Merion's bunkers are famous but their transtion over the last ninety years in style and look is totally fascinating and well worth a comprehensive architectural and maintenance analysis.

WAYNE---YOU'RE ON.

[Mike_Cirba]

Tom,

If you recall, I'm not the one who originally posted the "drive-by" photos, but I'm happy to accept this assignment.  

If this a good thing or a bad thing?

btw, what did you think of the PM writeup?   You can let me know privately, if you wish.

The Roving Reporter

[TEPaul]

"If this a good thing or a bad thing?"

What are you asking me for?

This is for you to decide.  

PM feedback following the mowing of a few fields at Featherfield Farm.

[Adam Clayman]

Mike,
 I think he's asking you for a visual evaluation, in one dimension.

My advice would be to hold out until you can test all the dimensions.
Afterall, what can one gleam about playability from a photo?

[Mike_Cirba]

Mike,
 I think he's asking you for a visual evaluation, in one dimension.

My advice would be to hold out until you can test all the dimensions.
Afterall, what can one gleam about playability from a photo?

Adam,

Yes...sort of like a taste test.  

I'll likely need to get in there and not only see them, but touch, and smell, and taste them....  

can you hear them?  

[Dave_Miller]

"If this a good thing or a bad thing?"

What are you asking me for?

This is for you to decide.  

PM feedback following the mowing of a few fields at Featherfield Farm.

Tommy:
You're mowing the fields at Featherfield Farm Do you know how to start the tractor
Best
Dave

[wsmorrison]

Come on, Dave.  Tom has one of the farm hands start the tractor for him and bring him his cigarettes and glass of red wine (his Kubota came equipped with a custom red wine glass holder not the typical hoi polloi cup holder)  

[Mike_Cirba]

C'mon Tom Paul...it's dark...no more baling the hay and mowing the fields.  

Where's my PM feedback??  

[TEPaul]

"Tommy:
You're mowing the fields at Featherfield Farm   Do you know how to start the tractor   "

Dave:

Do I know how to start the tractor??

What kind of question is that?

I've been mowing fields all my life. There's nothing better in life than mowing a field out here around day break. It's positively Hegalian.

But on that starting a tractor deal---my old Ford tractor (1954)---I'm afraid I had to retire it last year. It's now sitting out in front of the barn acting as something of a rusting art form. It apparently developed something of a mind of its own in the starting department in the last few years and it became too unreliable. When I feel the need to mow fields I don't want to sit there rattling wires and massaging chokes and shit.

So I got me a new Kubota tractor two years ago. It's the greatest and I like everything about it except perhaps its slight Japanese accent when it talks back to me.

BTW, the Kubota dealer tried to sell me a bucket and I told him in no uncertain terms did I want something like that because if I had something like that I would just figure out a way to make work for myself.

What I didn't bother telling him is---if I had a bucket there's no doubt in my mind I'd start building golf holes out here and then I'd have to keep going and maintain them every day.

[TEPaul]

Wayne:

Speaking of cup holders on the Kubota tractor that's unfortunately one area those clever Japanese gentlemen were not thinking clearly when they designed it.

I don't know what kind of fields they mow in Japan but out here on Featherfield Farm in Pennsylvania they can be pretty rough and me and my Kubota do a certain amount of bouncing around.

To date I've mowed up about ten of those fancy plastic coffee mugs (mostly of the WaWA variety) that have bounced clean outta the cup holder and perhaps a gross of Perrier water bottles. (the 20 oz or larger WaWa coffee mugs make one helluva racket when they get diced by the Kubota).

But if Slonis and his buddy give me a good enough deal on some good red wine tomorrow I'll see if I can cram a bottle of Cabernet into that cup holder on the Kubota and make it stick. Maybe I'll even bring the cup holder to the wine tasting to see if the fit is tight enough. Do you think a wine merchant has ever experienced that kind of wine tasting analysis? It's gonna have to be real tight though because if a nice bottle of Cab bounces out and goes flying I'm afraid I might go flying off that tractor myself in an acrobatic attempt to catch it mid-air and that might result in the Kubota mowing me up.

By the way, Wayne, speaking of mowing and fields and such out here, yesterday my Lyme tick analysis came back and I have an unusually high Lyme disease level right now. This is the eighth time I've had Lyme's disease so if my memory is failing and I can't hear very well anymore don't blame it on me.

[Dave_Miller]

Wayne:

  This is the eighth time I've had Lyme's disease so if my memory is failing and I can't hear very well anymore don't blame it on me.

Tommy:
Time to stay out of the fields and the high grass.  Let someone else mow those fields.
Dave

[wsmorrison]

Tom,

Eight cases of Lyme's disease?  Whoooah!  Soon Susie is going to have to pin a "My name is Tom Paul.  Please return me to Featherfield Farm.  Generous reward." tag on your shirts.

But that does explain why you think PV wins 6 up over SH  

[Eric Franzen]

This is what they looked like a couple of weeks ago. I'll better leave the smelling and tasting to the one and only Sir Mike Cirba.

[Mike_Cirba]

Bumping so I can hopefully discuss tomorrow.

[JSlonis]

The fescue around the bunkers is extremely tough in spots.  We had some situations in our group during the recent Philly Open.  One of my playing partners nearly lost a ball a few steps off the right edge of the 3rd green in the fescue above the  right bunker.  He ended up having to take an unplayble lie.  IMO, that is too severe a penalty for a ball hit a few yards off line on a 225 yard par 3.  A ball missed 30 yards right is in much better shape.


Looks like you guys got my favorite caddie at Merion.."Yamen".  I'm not sure how he spells his name, but that is how it sounds.  He's a great caddie and an even better person.  

[Mike_Cirba]

Tom Paul,

Am I seeing correctly?

From Eric's pics, it looks as though the long grass faces on a number of bunkers are getting a shearing, and a bit beat up in a good way?  I'm referring to the faces on 8, 10, and 13 in the pics.  

Are they setting off the depth charges on them like I recommended?  

On the other hand, the bunkers on 4, 14, 11, et.al. still look like Abbie Hoffman.  

Hasn't anyone told them that bald is in??  

[TEPaul]

"From Eric's pics, it looks as though the long grass faces on a number of bunkers are getting a shearing, and a bit beat up in a good way?  I'm referring to the faces on 8, 10, and 13 in the pics."

So, based on that how do you like this evolved look?

Or do you need to get in there and feel and taste them too?  

[Mike_Cirba]

"From Eric's pics, it looks as though the long grass faces on a number of bunkers are getting a shearing, and a bit beat up in a good way?  I'm referring to the faces on 8, 10, and 13 in the pics."

So, based on that how do you like this evolved look?

Or do you need to get in there and feel and taste them too?  

Tom,

Is that "evolution" or Liposuction??  

Is there a way they can do that stomach stapling thing so they never get so obesely puffy again??  

[RJ_Daley]

Tom, you on a Kubota tractor?  I'm surprised at you.  
I bet you your old pal Fireball would only drive a Ferrari tractor.  Just like Merion's wicker pins, they have a wicker Chianti bottle holder and a semenzi seed dispenser.  




I am also waiting on a Lyme test result...  

[Mike Hendren]

Regardless of whether this is faithful restoration, I can't help but ask:  is this good architecture?  Really?

.

Mike

[Mike_Cirba]

Regardless of whether this is faithful restoration, I can't help but ask:  is this good architecture?  Really?

.

Mike

Michael,

I've long-debated with my good friends Wayne and Tom about this very issue.

The "restored" front bunkers on the 4th hole, and worse yet, the bunkers "guarding" the creek on the 5th hole, are probably the most superflously unnecessary bunkers on the planet on a great course.  

[Mike Hendren]

Not only that but the shaggy bunkers and vivid green trees remind me to make sure I don't wear a brown belt with black shoes.

[Adam Clayman]

Michael, If the canvas were a differnt shade, say green with a hue of brown, would you still feel the same way?

I say, it's not the bunker that's wrong, it's the rest of the MM.

If that's true, it could be the work of mother nature's watering scheme.

Mike Cirba, This is a par 5, correct? What is so wrong, with the fronting bunkers? Looks like a Tillinghast strategy at work, even if it were Flynn.

[Mike_Cirba]

Mike Cirba, This is a par 5, correct? What is so wrong, with the fronting bunkers? Looks like a Tillinghast strategy at work, even if it were Flynn.

Hi Adam,

During the years from Merion's inception in 1913 til about the year 2001, those bunkers between the 4th green and the Baffling Brook running in front  were evidently there for about 15 minutes.  

For much of the early years, the green ran down to the edge of the water, and I imagine it was even possible to chip or putt into the creek from the greenside.  

In later years, probably because of flooding, some rough grass marked the delineation between creek and green and the strip was maybe 3 paces wide.

They are a stupid hazard.

THe hole is over 600 yards.   If someone is so bold as to attempt to reach it in 2 shots, just imagine how silly to hit a lovely flush, BLIND, 3-wood shot that...clears the creek....going right at the pin....and....running up to see the result...

thud...watches as the ball crashes into a bunker.

That's all.  

[TEPaul]

"Regardless of whether this is faithful restoration, I can't help but ask:  is this good architecture?  Really?"

If it isn't good architecture in the opinions of the questioners it would be interesting to know why they don't think it is.

Has it occured to observers that those grass bunker surrounds in that photo above look remarkably similar to some of the bunkers of Royal County Down?

Do the questioners of the architecture in that photo above also question if the architecture of the bunkers of Royal County Down is good architecture? Really?  

By the way, the look of those Merion bunkers above are not similar to the look of the bunkers of Merion East in any of their approximately 2-3 different evolutionary looks over the history of the golf course. So, in that sense, the most recent bunker project of Merion's was not a bunker restoration---at least in look.

But that fact does not automatically mean that the bunkers of Merion East today are not good architecture in either look or in play.