[Wade Whitehead]

From 1999-2002, I was head golf coach at a large high school.  As part of our annual routine, I organized and ran a one-day clinic for the team.  I called in a couple of professionals, each of whom had a specialty.  We conducted short game and putting clinics and a rules seminar, among other things.

One of our sessions focused on course management and featured a playing professional, now in his fifties, who enjoyed a very decorated amateur career, and who has met with good success as a pro over the past two decades.  Among other things he told the team was the following:

In general, aim to the outside of the dogleg on every hole.  There's never trouble on the outside of a dogleg.

I know there are exceptions to this general statement.  I can name a great number.

However, could it generally be argued that the outside of the dogleg is preferable to the inside?  What strategies do the great ones implement that affect this?  Does the suggestion hold true, generally, on classic designs?  Modern ones?  Both?  Neither?

I'm interested in responses.  Thanks.

WW

[Ronald Montesano]

My answer is underside...however, you make sense.  The inside is the corner-cutting side, the side to which the architect, if he or she knows a squat or two, draws your attention and your aim, to make you miss and suffer.  Not to say that there is never trouble "out" there...that would be unbalanced architecture.  The outside is often the longer, safer road home.

[Steve Wilson]

I seem to remember a quote from Ben Hogan along the lines of "Who the hell puts a bunker on the outside of a dogleg."  So there's a voice far more authoritative than mine that lends credence to the concept.  Hogan's remark was in reference to the hole he was playing at the time.

[Mark Bourgeois]

Generally speaking, you will get into a lot of trouble if you try to hit to the far side of the dogleg at Ganton, but as you say that's probably because Ganton is pure excellence and 99.99% of all other courses are not.

Prairie Dunes 8 is a reverse dogleg.  The play is away from the crook of the leg.

[Matt_Cohn]

Also, people vastly overestimate how much shorter a hole plays when they play towards a "line of charm" versus safely away from that line.

[Ian_L]

I think for a great dogleg hole, the improved angle to the green is at least as important as the distance saved by cutting it close.  That way, short and long hitters face similar dilemmas off the tee.  Also, it gives the thinking golfer an advantage over the one who looks things over once.

[Sean_A]

I think for a great dogleg hole, the improved angle to the green is at least as important as the distance saved by cutting it close.  That way, short and long hitters face similar dilemmas off the tee.  Also, it gives the thinking golfer an advantage over the one who looks things over once.

Ian

I think a great dogleg hole is more than just being about angle or saving distance on the approach.  I have always liked the idea of blindness working both ways.  1. A guy hits the correct spot so doesn't have a blind shot. 2. The guy hits the correct shot so has a blind shot, but with a better angle. 

There are other considerations as well such as the lie, but you get my drift. 

Merion's 14th has bunkering on the outside of the leg which is most curious.  I think in this day and age nearly every archie would put bunkering or something down the left as much to protect the road as for a strategic philosophy.  It is one of the strangest feelings standing on the tee knowing the bailout zone on the right away from the road has been taken away. 

For most golfers, yes, playing away from the inside of the leg is the best play regardless of the better conditions that can be earned by challenging the inside trouble (which btw could be created with a view of the green from the tee as by the trouble itself), but where is the fun in that?  I think some really cool leggers have red herrings on the corner.  Hazards placed to tempt the greedy player (because often times these days hazards really act as a road map of where to go) to cut the hole, when actually there is nothing to be gained because the angle is poor.  Two classic examples of this are Littlestone's 17th and Notts' 2nd.

Ciao 

[Bill_McBride]

What do you all think about a dogleg with a gnarly bunker in the corner; you belt a drive over the bunker and get to your ball licking your chops and find it (a) in thick rough, or (b) blocked by a tree?

(Obviously on the first time around a course)

[jeffwarne]

What do you all think about a dogleg with a gnarly bunker in the corner; you belt a drive over the bunker and get to your ball licking your chops and find it (a) in thick rough, or (b) blocked by a tree?

(Obviously on the first time around a course)

the author of the quote never played #2 at Augusta. (or #13 now  )

Often a green is more approachable(better angle) from the outside of a dogleg, so a gentle reminder via a hazard wouldn't be a terrible thing

[Bill_McBride]

I'm thinking more of risk/reward than course management, thank you Jeff!

[Adam Clayman]

This is a subject that has come up a lot. Ron Prichard once told me Ross would likely never put a bunker on the outside of the leg. Back in those days it made perfect sense. Today, so many are enamored with eye candy visa vie framing that the concept has been widely accepted.

It doesn't make it right or wrong rather just is.

I suppose it's case specific because one of golf's greatest openers has them. #1 at Sand Hills.

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