This probably looks like a topic that should have a big "OT" in front, but let me explain myself.
Every year around this time, a certain segment of the college football fandom in the US starts screaming for a playoff to decide the national champion (I'm one of them). There are almost always 5-8 undefeated teams left and it appears we are headed for 4 undefeateds going into the bowl season. Frankly, its ridiculous we don't have one and it should be a 16 team tournament just like Div I-AA. It would probably be the greatest event in American sports.
This got me thinking. What would a 16-course, national championship bracket look like for America's greatest golf courses. How fun would it be to take those courses, do a little match play comparison and see which course is really the best in the land. Alright, so its not really the best way to truly evaluate courses, but it could lead to some very interesting discussion. For the hell of it, I compiled the top 16 courses in the US based on an average of the Golf Digest (computer ranking), Golf Magazine (Harris Poll) and Golfweek (AP Poll) scores. The bracket would look like the following:
1 Pine Valley 8.8 vs. 16 Chicago 7.13
8 Merion (East) 7.8 vs. 9 NGLA 7.74
4 Shinnecock Hills 8.17 vs. 13 Winged Foot (West) 7.17
5 Pebble Beach 7.9 vs. 12 Fishers Island 7.21
3 Augusta National 8.26 vs. 14 Pinehurst (#2) 7.16
6 Oakmont 7.88 vs. 11 Crystal Downs 7.30
7 Sand Hills 7.85 vs. 10 Pacific Dunes 7.46
2 Cypress Point 8.49 vs. 15 Seminole 7.14
Prairie Dunes (7.08) and San Francisco (7.04) were the first two on the outside looking in. I only included courses which were ranked in all three publications. I think there would be some very interesting comparisons there and it could be a fun little (okay, maybe big) exercise.