Straw Poll: Change the Rule, or Change Architecture?

[Tom_Doak]

Amidst the rubble of the fallout from the 72nd hole at the PGA Championship, I've seen several people opine that the design of the course was flawed because it created such a Rules flap.  But, if the PGA of America had incorporated the same local rule, this incident COULD have happened at Kiawah, Pacific Dunes, Friars Head, Ballyneal, Chambers Bay, Old Macdonald, or many other modern courses which are highly regarded.  The only difference at Whistling Straits is the number of such areas, and the fact that all the sand was imported.

So ... either we architects are going to have to stop trying to do such a good job of making sandy hazards look natural, or the governing bodies are going to have to change the Rules.

Which should it be?  I'd like to know, because I'm starting a new course on sand this week.

[PThomas]

neither Tom...Dustin messed up, period

[archie_struthers]

 

Agreed he screwed up big time...as did his caddy...but he handled it well by all reports and will will soon

[Bill_McBride]

I am firmly in the camp that says it's a waste bunker (okay to ground your club) if there is no rake.  If there is a rake, it's a formal bunker.

This of course may not work on some great courses where the two types transition into each other and into surrounding natural areas..

Perhaps the best plan is to call it all a bunker - no grounding of the club in sand anywhere.  

[Tom_Doak]

Okay, "neither" is the third option.  But I'd be amazed if it wins.  I didn't see it live, but the result was not satisfying, to say the least.  And imagine if he had sunk his last putt!!

[Colin Macqueen]

Change the rule.

Bunkers as hazards have a rake in them. All other scrub is wasteland and part of the course unless otherwise pegged; lateral hazard, O.O.B.,  G.U.R. etc. This would work wouldn't it?

Colin

[Tom_Doak]

Colin:

I imagine if Charles Blair Macdonald were alive, he would ask you:  "If you want it to be a HAZARD, why are you raking it?"



But that's an argument for a different day, I guess.  Or perhaps not.

[Bill Brightly]

Change the rule. No rake: no hazard.

[PThomas]

Change the rule.

Bunkers as hazards have a rake in them. All other scrub is wasteland and part of the course unless otherwise pegged; lateral hazard, O.O.B.,  G.U.R. etc. This would work wouldn't it?

Colin

if I understand correctly, its either a bunker or "through the green"  there is no waste area in the Rules

and whenever I hear "waste area", i always think of what Jan Beljan, who works for T Fazio, told me once :"No part of a golf course is a waste area!"

[Greg Ross]

Ya can't have marshals and spectators standing in a bunker if it's to be designated as such. Dustin, his caddy and the rules official should have known and pointed out the ruling, but it's just a bad situation/decision all around. Outside the ropes and no rake = waste bunker or through the green.

[Ronald Montesano]

Colin and Bill and Greg,

What if someone steals the rake?

[Ben Voelker]

Tom,

I say change the rule for sand the gallery is actively walking through.  It was hard to even tell where the bunker started and ended after the gallery had their way.  If it is to be a bunker, you need to keep 50,000 fans off of it.

[Don_Mahaffey]

I'd like to know, because I'm starting a new course on sand this week.

  Are you going to get some grass planted this fall?

I'd change the rule...or at least the local rule for a competition like the PGA. Inside the ropes,  it's a bunker. Outside the ropes where the bunkers become a trampled mess and determining where they start and where they end becomes next to impossible, play it through the green. I hope you have this very problem to figure out someday at your new course.

[Greg Ross]

Tricks,
There probably wouldn't be a rake in an area outside the ropes that patrons or spectators walked in the previous seven days.

[john_stiles]

I don't think there would have been any problem if the crowd had not basically completely covered the 'bunker' before  the shot was hit 'just a bit outside' to the right,  and then the crowd made the slightest opening for DJ and caddie, and the later the narrowest opening for his shot.

In the end, DJ erred.   The PGA was part of the problem, enabling this to occur.   But DJ made the mistake.

Just have at it, and put in your bunkers.  Another vote for neither.

[Tim Bert]

Decide where they are putting the ropes for spectators (assuming it is a PGA event where they do such a thing) and have the bunkers inside the ropes play as hazards and the sand outside the ropes play through the green.

[PCCraig]

Could the other option be that every bunker and non water hazard be considered a "waste" bunker all the time, which would allow for the grounding of the club. Then it could be a local rule as to if there are rakes in the bunkers or not?

[Pete_Pittock]

Add a new definition for waste area/natural sandy areas. Be sure the scorecard, caddie or starter lets the player know how to proceed.

[Mike Cirba]

If you're in sand, or in doubt that you're in sand, don't ground the club.  

Simple.

[Tom_Doak]

I'd like to know, because I'm starting a new course on sand this week.

  Are you going to get some grass planted this fall?

I'd change the rule...or at least the local rule for a competition like the PGA. Inside the ropes,  it's a bunker. Outside the ropes where the bunkers become a trampled mess and determining where they start and where they end becomes next to impossible, play it through the green. I hope you have this very problem to figure out someday at your new course.

Don:

So does our client, I'm sure, but a future tournament is not the first thing on my mind.

And no, we won't plant any grass this fall.  I think I let them talk to Bill too much about the pace of construction.  I am dying to get something in the ground.  But Eric's down there shaping today, and I'll get down on the weekend to provide a bit more direction.

[Richard Choi]

If you are going to go through all the trouble of roping off the playing corridor, you might as well use it. I just don't understand why it is too hard to assume everything outside the ropes as waste areas.

[Phil_the_Author]

I disagree with everyone on this one, and I do mean everyone. Evidently I am the only person who feels the problem was caused by the GALLERY ROPES!

Think about it, wasn't the real problem the number of spectators and the concern for their paid entry right to observe a golf tournament from as close to the action as possible? Isn't this why there are so many "drop areas" at tournaments because of the greenside bleachers and tents and even glass-enclosed air conditioned luxury suites surrounding each green?

Seriously, we keep adjusting the game to accomodate those who show up to watch it, accept the boorish behavior of every time someone swings, even a tee shot on a 700-yard par five, that at least one voice echoes out a hundredth of a second after contact "In the hole!", all in the name of attendance and money to be given to the chosen few competing.

Just as long ago the battle over controling equipment and distance was lost, so too the battle over crowd control and how it effects the outcome of a tournament. For this we can point to those in the UK who set such a fine example nearly trampling the final pairing in the "Open" championship. How many times have we seen the replay of Palmer staggering through the crowds and thought how cute it looked rather than realize the dangerous precedent it was setting.

So today we have "stadium" golf with courses designed and built to provide massive viewing areas which create wonderful television shots and impressive noise levels when shots are holed or missed or even those, as in the case of a manufactured one in the Phoenix tournament, where players are subjected to "good-natured" drunken abuse.

There was simply no reason for those at the PGA tournament to have been allowed that close to the play when it meant that they would be directly effecting the course's playbility. It was known that they would and the proof that this is so was the pre-tournament rules sheet placed in every players locker before they hit a single ball.

Of course, that Dustin Johnson admitted not reading it has no bearing in this either. The world of those vaguely familiar with the game are now mocking it and its rules at the mouth of every so-called sports expert on their radio talk shows and TV news roundups.

Where are all those who mocked Michelle Wie when she cost herself by "NOT KNOWING THE RULES" yet for Dustin its a case of "He Got SCREWED!"

Come on guys, the problem isn't that there are 1,000+ bunkers at Whistling Straights and not 1,000+ rakes with one in each, its that there is too much GRASS! If Pete Dye had simply made large expanses of sand and called them "waste" areas this course would be more akin to a Lake Michigan Pine Valley than a mid-west Ballybunion.

The problem isn't one of design. It is one of out-of-control fans and an inability to deal with allowing too many people into an area not made for them all.

[Richard Choi]

Philip, I strongly disagree.

The fans are going where the tournament officials are telling them to go. They didn't cross the ropes to sit in the bunker, the officials who prepared the course looked at those bunkers, decided it would be fine and dandy to have 50,000 walk all over it and still play it as a bunker. i don't know how you can blame that decision on the fans.

The tournament officials and PGA screwed up because they wanted to emphasize the market drivel of "WE HAVE 1200+ BUNKERS!!! AREN'T WE SPECIAL???" Every friggin article I read leading up to the tournament mentioned those bunkers. That does not happen by accident. It was something that was used as a big time marketing tool.

If you want to blame anyone, blame marketing. If they weren't so dead set on marketing the course with frivolous bunkers, any sane tournament director would have ruled them as waste areas.

[Steve_ Shaffer]

Tom D

Don't build your new sand course with 1200 bunkers- most of which are eye candy.  It's as simple as that.

I agree with Phil Young that the PGA didn't manage the galleries on 18 at WS.

[Phil_the_Author]

Richard,

You said, "The fans are going where the tournament officials are telling them to go." That was precisely my point! The problem wasn't one of architecture, but one of fan access.

We are all already praising the amazing reconstruction work that Coore & Crenshaw have done at Pinehurst #2 and will do so UNTIL the first player, and heaven help the USGA if its Tiger or Phil, has to play a shot from the depths of a massive foot print notched 2 inches into the sand in the waste area where the crowds will have been allowed to walk... Will it then it will be a cry of "What a poor job C&C did in their restoration?"

If LARGE tournaments, attendance-wise, are continued to be held, then we must place the responsibility for results such as we just saw squarely where they belong:

FIRST on the player for being too dumb to not even bother learning the rules of the game he is playing. (On a side note I heard one radio golf show on Sunday morning calling Dustin the "Forrest Gump" of professional golf. Little did he know how prophetic he was being.)

SECONDLY on the tournament hosts for not keeping the fans away from where they could reasonably be expected to impact the play, and YES, this was a FORESEEN action at WS before the tournament began.

THIRD on the fans there who have now taught themselves that their right to view a shot is more important than the player's right to take a swing.