Is this topic mean to be "which Ross courses have been changed so much that they're not worth going out of your way to play", "which Ross courses are still the Ross courses but aren't going out of your way to play", or both?
When I started the discussion, I meant it to be what the title says:
Courses you should not go out of your way to play. This was Chris Buie's bottom category on his list of six possible categories on the underappreciated Ross gems thread, and I didn't pick up that he was suggesting a particular reason.
I did not mean to suggest a particular reason either - just that for
whatever reason, you would not send someone out of their way to play the course. I did not intend to single out changed courses per se. If it's been changed a lot, maybe to the point where some might argue it is no longer a Ross course, but it's still a really good course to play, then I'd say, go out of your way to play it. On the other hand, if changes to the ground, lack of maintenance, tree planting, or whatever, have ruined the experience, then the changes would put the course in the so-named bottom category. There could also be, somewhere, a pure, unchanged in any fashion, Ross that is just a bad course and not worth playing. I don't know of one personally, but maybe someone else does.
A couple of additional points. The question of whether a Ross course has been changed so much it's no longer reasonable to call it a Ross course is not something I had in mind. That, about "Ross courses" or the courses of any other architect that have been changed over the years, is a completely separate topic I had not intended to get into. My thinking was that if one wanted to call a course a "Ross course," then it was fair game for the discussion as a "Ross course." Of course, discussions always wander around and sometimes head in new and enlightening directions.
Second, I am discounting the golfer who is simply interested in studying Ross architecture in depth. It seems to me that person would want to visit every "Ross course," even if out of the way, to see what he (or she) could add to his (or her) knowledge about Ross architecture.
Finally, I appreciate what Michael Fay had to say about Asheville Municipal, above. I'm not the expert on Ross that he is, of course, but as I mentioned above, trees, and general neglect, are big issues. Also, as Michael points out, the greens have grown small, but as I also said, you can still see how the green complexes were originally built and they give the appearance of expert design. Asheville may well be almost pure, and a Ross aficionado would want to check it out, but as a golfer I'd not go out of my way to play it.