Doak Rating for SI Story

[brad_miller]

What's the Doak Scale Rating for the story, comments and reasons are welcome.

[Chris Kane]

Solid 7...I found it entertaining.  From the outside, we must look like freaks.

[Paul Richards]

Chris:

No doubt, the story was great.  But it really did make us look a little bit strange and geeky!

But, that's OK.  If the shoe fits, wear it!

[Chris Kane]

I have no problem with people considering me a freak, geek etc., if thats what visiting this site makes me.

Tommy N summed it up perfectly: "its a sickness, make no mistake about it".

[Ed_Baker]

Doak Scale 8.

Mr. Silverman did his job well.

Have you guys ever tried to explain GCA to the great unwashed? It would be easier to explain a proclivity towards latex and cattle prods.

Geeks? Maybe we are, I prefer "informed participant in the worlds greatest game."

[THuckaby2]

Great question, Ed.  I have never nor will I ever try to explain GCA to anyone in the real world.  God hope no one ever shows my wife that SI article and thank god they did that page snapshot on a day my name isn't up there 10 times, like now.

Freaks indeed.  Absolutely unexplainable.  Best for the real world not to know.  I am running scared today.  

TH

[Ran Morrissett]

My wife's take is, "Once one accepts that it is a story of a bunch of golf nerds, it is an 8."

I would be interested in reading the version that Jeff submitted to SI - it was perhaps 25% longer than the one published and I would bet some of our talks about golf as an art form was edited out, unfortunately.

Only when people view/appreciate golf course architecture as a form of art can they appreciate the passion that it generates in some people.

Cheers,

[THuckaby2]

I'd love to read that too, Ran.  There is a bit of sour grapes in this I fully admit but to me the story was a lot about your outing at Rustic, a little about what really makes this discussion group great...

Oh well.  The article was very cool as it is and the SI reader wouldn't CARE about golf as an art form, why NGLA is a masterpiece, what a redan is, etc.  

So in the end the editor likely did a great job and this is a great thing for gca.com so I shall pipe down!  They need to just get the names right, jeez.. that is inexcusable.  "Tony" can live with it no doubt but I mean, come on, this might effect Mike Miller business-wise, calling him Brad - no offense to the Miller to whom I play bitch and whipping boy every round we get together!

TH

[GeoffreyC]

Well said Ran.

I enjoyed the article although I enjoyed being at the outing even more.  I thought Jeff did nice job of capturing our antics.

Who said that Fazio supporters were faZist's?  That doesn't come across in a good light. It makes it seem as more then a difference in opinion between those who enjoy his work and those who don't.

[Ed_Baker]

Doak Scale 8.

Mr. Silverman did his job well.

Have you guys ever tried to explain GCA to the great unwashed? It would be easier to explain a proclivity towards latex and cattle prods.

Geeks? Maybe we are, I prefer "informed participant in the worlds greatest game."

[JakaB]

GeoffreyC,

I think a letter to the editor is in order explaining how Rural Route is truly the desicrator of restoration as his work has shown even the Fazist arm cannot hail the poor work done at Yale.

[GeoffreyC]

JakaB-  Thanks for reminding me  

I actually spent some time talking with Jeff about Yale and what they're doing there. He lives nearby and I hope he can join me up there sometime this year. Its not in the article but Jeff did tell me that an entire issue of Golf Plus will be devoted to all the work Roger Rulewich is doing at Yale!  

[brad_miller]

Geoff, In general I believe many on this site that might have a bias aganist RJ and TF do believe they build good-very good golf courses or to quote another "solid" but that the time they spend in the field will not allow them to create a masterpeice (world top 25) as only 2 modern archies have reached this level.

Don't believe anyone has ever said that "the sell outs" don't make their clients and members happy, in fact I bet that owning 25% of RJ and/or TF business would far and away HAVE been over the past 10 years the best investment in this business. We just hope that the balance of power will continue to turn towards the few living archies that we most enjoy.

[GeoffreyC]

Brad - I agree with you 100%.  I just thought the quote about Fazio didn't put us in a good light.

[John_Conley]

To those who take exception to the "bunch of geeks" description, allow me to share a quote from a friend attending a "Raters Cup" of Golfweek panelists.

I feel like I'm at a Star Trek convention! [/i]

[Geoff Shackelford]

I don't subscribe to the Doak scale, but I'd give the article an A- on the Golf Magazine scale, the photo caption writing a 2 on the Golf Digest scale (which the editors would bump to a 6 using the Tradition category). How SI could mess up Tommy's name and label Mike Miller as Brad Miller, well, is not impressive for a magazine with SI's resources.

Jeff Silverman did a great job balancing many aspects of the story. A sidebar with some excerpts from controversial/memorable posts would have been great, but I guess the editors assumed people would check out the site if they were interested in reading actual posts, so instead they ran a second picture of Tony blasting out of the back bunker on 15.

Fazio needs to get a new response to criticism besides his traditional "everyone is entitled to their opinions" line. But I don't know if he's capable of articulating a substantive answer to tough questions (remember the classic Augusta response: "If you have a picture, and the frame doesn't work, then you get a new frame."). Defending Riviera for instance, would require actually seeing "his" work there. Criticizing the web site without visiting falls into a similar category. Either back up your criticism or don't say anything at all.
Geoff

[Craig Disher]

Given how GCA COULD have been portrayed, I thought the article was excellent - informative, balanced, and emphasizing the love of golf that runs through all discussions. The "Fazist" quote made my skin crawl. I checked the archives over the past year and the word was used only once - by JakaB in a rant during discussions on Merion and Riviera. Placing the word in a prominent spot in the article leads the reader to think that the group is bunch of intolerant smart-asses. Although epithets are thrown around here, most of the discussion is serious and based on well-informed opinion.

Tony Naccarato and Brad Miller - sloppy work by SI.

[JakaB]

oops...I remember using the word and I was talking about the people who bash Fazio not his supporters...The things that were said about the work at Merion were for the most part not well informed opinion and at least as irresposible as my using the word Fazist in describing the attitude that I saw in describing work that was done as the members chose and deemed necessary by that same membership.   I will stand behind the thought that when nonmembers of a club try to push their thoughts and feelings from a very uninformed viewpoint based on pictures or preconcieved notions of an architects work it will be Fazist, Dyeabolical, Unreesonable or whatever you may choose.   However any comments concerning the terrible work at Yale will be fully supported in any and all forums if only even just based on the picture of the perfectly round bunker that can only be worse in person.

[Mike_Cirba]

I thought the story was fair, balanced, enjoyable, and caught the essence of the subject.  It's great to see this site recognized, and Ran deserves congratulations!

JakaB;

You're not judging the restoration work at Yale from pictures, are you?

I must also contest your statement about Merion that "when nonmembers of a club try to push their thoughts and feelings from a very uninformed viewpoint based on pictures or preconcieved notions of an architects work", etc..  MANY of us who wrote negatively about the work did so from first-hand, on-site experience, both before and after, and the last thing any of us wanted to see was some self-fulfilling prophecy based on any preconceived notions of the architect....especially to that wonderful golf course that many of us love.