Before he got into designing himself, old AWT (not Tillie, but Asshole Whitten from Topeka, as he now signs his emails
- at least he keeps his sense of humor) used to rank the top 25 architects annually.
In the mold of "What have you done for me lately" the rankings changed, based on what they actually opened. Most years, I was a "tie for 26th" in Ron's words, but actually did make No. 18 one year. Talking with other architects, they really got frosted going from architect of the year to down - or off - the list, even if they only opened one course!
The ranking (or rankling) of architects is just good fun, if you accept that no one will agree, nothing will be final, and that is not the point of the lists. BV makes some valid points, but the free market pretty well determines who gets what job anyway. That is a whole other story.
As far as architects ranking goes, I think changing them annually would be the only way to go. Doak may not have made the list a few years ago, with only 10 courses to his credit, but would now. Others who were on (not to be crass, but thinkd RTJ and Desmond Muirhead) would need to be removed while others would need to be dropped in the ranks or elevated. The way the marketplace and public ranks architects changes fast. So a one time list would never work.
Even then, the nuances of how to rank an architect would be great, but I think most agree that end product - w/o excuses or acknowleding difficulty of site in most cases - would be the criteria. Even then, and using Doak as an example, what would merit the higher rating - Pac Dunes on a perfect site, or Texas Tech, probably a bit less of a course, but a greater technical acheivement, giving what he started with? Would Tom drop in anyone's rankings if they liked TT a bit less than Pac Dunes?
Just some food for thought while you munch your morning cheerios!