Huck:
Wake up my good friend -- the sequel caused people to go to the facility even more than the original. I don't doubt the original is a very good golf course -- please make sure you keep that firmly in mind on any post follow-up comments you make. However, the gist of Bandon Dunes is what Ron Whitten indicated in his review. The course has ordinary green contours and if you size it up versus Pac Dunes the distinction between them is like night and day. Bandon does have length and at different times there are a few holes of note that are quite good -- very good in fact (see my previous comments on #4 through #6 as a clear example).
Huck, to paraphrase the ole Reggie Jackson quote from his days with the Yankees ... (Pac Dunes) is the stir that mixes the drink at the Bandon Dunes Resort. In my mind, if Bandon Dunes were a solitary golf course the immense fanfare tied to the place would be far less so. Bandon would no doubt still get people to go there but Keiser was extremely smart in making sure that his second course would be designed by someone else and that the motif of the sequel course would be totally different from what the original provides.
If people are truly honest and asked what was the reason they went to Bandon to start with it would be to play Pac Dunes first and foremost. Again, hold the two courses side-to-side and look at the details of the design with the two of them and Pac Dunes wins going away. Bandon Dunes is well done but when we are talking about the elite of elite public courses in the USA I see it as a top 100 candidate but more towards the second fifty than the first half.
One last item -- isolation is a neat thing for the real die-hards enthralled with course designs. They will visit such places and often without realizing it will throw a few more total rating points into the equation.
Final comment -- I never said that off-course views should not count for something. They just should not be the be/all end/all for the overall assessment of the course itself. In my mind, too many raters substitute the locale / setting as the primary ingredient when the actual design itself should be the first among equals.
Wide awake here.
Lots of disagreement, but a lot of agreement as well. I do think Bandon stands up quite well on its own, and thus my opinion differs from yours. I also find it difficult to say Bandon benefits from Pacific's presence IN TERMS OF PERCEPTION AND RATINGS, which is what you seemed to state at first. It's a totally separate question evaluating this in a business sense, and Kalen has taken that to another thread. Odd that you now seem to care more about business than course quality or perception of course, but you often do surprise me, Matt.
But riddle me this: you keep saying BD benefits from the "spillover" from BD. If that's true, then why has it continued to go DOWN in the ratings each year, with the largest drop occurring right after PD was built? You make no sense here, Matt. If what you said were true, it would have gone UP when PD was built - and it didn't. It went down. It debuted crazy high and it's downward trend to me is just a normal thing that happens with a lot of great new courses... I just can't understand how you can possibly say BD benefits from PD in terms of ratings, when all data suggests the opposite. In terms of the business success of the resort, oh yes, multiple courses has caused great benefits, and many do want to play PD first and then play BD also as an afterthought... but in terms of rankings? All data goes against you, Matt. You don't really mean it this way, do you?
Obviously I completely disagree also that "design" itself should be the first among equals in an assessment of a golf course, but this might be because I define that as truly what it means, and of course that entails knowing what obtacles the architect overcame to create the course, his skill in doing such, etc. which I would never dare assess given I know zero about it. But change it to say this and while I wouldn't agree with the statement that too many raters do anything, nor would I limit this just to raters, but at least I'd agree with the method. Can you live with this? Is it just a matter of definitions?
All views, both on and off-course, matter in an assessment of the course. None should ever be the be/all end/all for the overall assessment of the course itself, however. In my mind, too many raters substitute the locale / setting as the primary ingredient when how fun, thrilling, exciting, and soul-stirring the course is in the playing of it should be the first among equals.As for Bandon and its quality, we shall agree to disagree. As you can see, many find it to be quite great... many don't. Fair enough.