"As for a possible majority of golfers preferring the manufactured look of Raynor and Banks, I don't think that has been tested since most of their courses are very private and rarely seen outside the memberships. Why is that? Few of the courses have stood the test of time as tests of the very best players. A lack of elasticity and bunkering schemes relegate a lot of these courses to enjoyable club courses but are they championship courses that have stood the test of time like other designers have in their portfolios? In general, I think the answer is clearly no. There was, in my mind, a lack of foresight from Macdonald, Raynor and Banks that wasn't evident in Wilson, Crump, the Nature Faker, Tillinghast, Thomas, Colt, maybe MacKenzie and a few others of that era.
OK, I'm off to bed. But I will say this, you can have man over nature, but hidden out of respect for nature. That is a much more agreeable and less egotistical approach. And guess what? It looks a HELL OF A LOT better! To me, golf architecture reaches its zenith with great golf presented in a naturalistic fashion. It is simpler to create interesting and fun golf without regard to a natural aesthetic, but if you can have both, why not? The Nature Faker also thought, with his green keeper background, that natural lines and tie ins would hold up longer (Max Behrian if you like) and cost less to maintain over time. So perhaps it isn't just about aesthetics but also practical as well.
However, to each his own. As I said, my position is my opinion and it is no better or worse than anyone else's, especially Big Donnie Beck!
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Wayno:
I do hope you have gone to bed. You'll need your rest because after this post you will need all the strength you can muster for the Great Naturalistic Golf Architecture Revolution that may begin tomorrow.
You said your opinion is no better or worse than anyone else's, especially Donnie Beck's?? Are you kidding me? Of course your opinion is better than theirs. You are a true Naturalist, my friend, and you are about to take on that entire old elitist super-arrogant ruling class that thought they could not just take on but put a full court press on good old Mother Nature and pin her to some horribly artificial man-made contraption like the berm behind the "Alps" hole at NGLA until she couldn't take it anymore and cried "Macdonald/Raynor" in defeat.
These arrogant Nature dominanting wankers apparently don't appreciate the true meaning of "One never fucks with Mother Nature."
You are the new ruling class, Wayne Morrison, and don't you forget it. Tomorrow you go out and learn to shit in the wood as well as Maxie Baby Behr could while I email the Fates and Spirits and call in this next hurricane brewing in the Carribean and bring it up this way and unleash all its fury on Fishers Island G.C. that will make the 1938 hurricane look like a BURP!