How Long a Course would the golden age architects build today?

[BCrosby]

"It's not a crime that the ball and equipment isn't going to be rolled back. Just a fact. It's been bemoaned here for a decade now and maybe it's time to move on to that "Acceptance" part of the grieving process."

Brent -

I'm well down the road with the grieving process. Your side is clearly winning the debate in the public arena. My side seems to have been routed from the field. All in the name of placating bogey golfers.

That doesn't mean there aren't costs to your victory. Eroding the game's connection with its past is one of those costs. I believe that cost will sooner or later be seen as a heavy one. Keeping alive a sport's traditions and history is an important aspect of the health of a sport. Especially so for a participatory one. You mess with that at your peril.

Bob

[jeffwarne]

Bob,
a point I touched on earlier was regarding how much width would Golden Age designers have used.

The real problem with all the distance gains is that width has reduced, rather than increased proportionately as it should from a strategy/playability standpoint..
Ironically as a reaction to more distance.

and that's where the game comes to a grinding halt, searching for balls going 15% farther on corridors reduced 10-50%, the exact opposite of what should be happening if the game is to be played with superballs .

[Brent Hutto]

Bob,

To be clear, I think it would have been a wonderful thing if the USGA had taken action to keep golf ball distance under control 15 years ago when it was (in theory) possible to do so right before the elite levels of the game adopting the ProV1 and similar balls. They had their chance an chose for whatever reason to flat-out deny the situation that was plainly in front of them.

I just think once that window was gone, which happened by around 1999-2000 at the very latest, it's better to let the elite players go ahead and play their different game than to try and scale up the playing field accordingly.

[JMEvensky]

That doesn't mean there aren't costs to your victory. Eroding the game's connection with its past is one of those costs. I believe that cost will sooner or later be seen as a heavy one. Keeping alive a sport's traditions and history is an important aspect of the health of a sport. Especially so for a participatory one. You mess with that at your peril.

Bob

You must be a baseball fan too.

I wonder how the demographics would break down on those who agree/disagree with you.Pure speculation,but I'd guess those who are over 50 and learned to play as kids would agree with your sentiments overwhelmingly.Those a little younger who maybe learned the game later in life might not have the same connection.

[Brent Hutto]

I might as well come clean and "clarify" one other thing. I personally do not feel any connection beyond a mild interest or curiosity to those who played the golf before I was born. There are some cool old stories and I'm as curious as the next guy to see where exactly it was that Hogan or Jones played some famous shot. But it doesn't resonate in the "same game as I play" any more than watching Phil Mickelson does. There's history, there's TV entertainment and there's golf. The last of those is the only one where I feel I have skin in the game, so to speak.

[JMEvensky]

I might as well come clean and "clarify" one other thing. I personally do not feel any connection beyond a mild interest or curiosity to those who played the golf before I was born. There are some cool old stories and I'm as curious as the next guy to see where exactly it was that Hogan or Jones played some famous shot. But it doesn't resonate in the "same game as I play" any more than watching Phil Mickelson does. There's history, there's TV entertainment and there's golf. The last of those is the only one where I feel I have skin in the game, so to speak.

You mean you've never taken a drag off a cigarette,hitched up your pants,and putted knock- kneed with an 8802?

[Brent Hutto]

Now THAT'S ENTERTAINMENT!

[BCrosby]

JME -

Yes, I am a baseball fan. Seeing Fenway and the right firld fence that Williams hit so many homeruns over or The Green Monster that Yaz played to perfection, and so on and so on.

Note one thing. The distances and shape of the Fenway outfield have not changed since opening day in 1903. That's because baseball has not let the ball and bats to change in any material way over the decades. You can still match skill sets of players from different eras. That connection enhances everyone's respect and love for baseball today.

Golf is on the way to losing that source of love and respect. Largely becasue people don't want golf to be too hard to play.

Bob

[Peter Pallotta]

I can't speak for Brent, but from what he and I have posted about our games over the years, I think it may be safe to say that if even only a quarter of the modern-day golfing population was more like us, the game and the architecture would have nothing at all to worry about, neither now nor in the future. If most golfers batted and flogged and hacked the ball around a golf course (any and all golf courses) as inconsistently and frustratingly and maddeningly as Brent and I do, and still managed to enjoy the game immensely and to never give up, and still refrained from blaming any of our failings and flaws on the architects/designs or the technologies or the maintenence practices, and still came back for more (as we do) day after day and year after year, with nary a genuine hope of ever getting a whole lot better at it -- well then, golf and gca would have no problems at all, ever. Alas, Brent and I, I believe, are of a very rarest breed, and of the finest qualities!  

Jeff - yes, indeed -- as often as I can!!

Peter

[JMEvensky]

JME -

Yes, I am a baseball fan. Seeing Fenway and the right firld fence that Williams hit so many homeruns over or The Green Monster that Yaz played to perfection, and so on and so on.

Note one thing. The distances and shape of the Fenway outfield have not changed since opening day in 1903. That's because baseball has not let the ball and bats to change in any material way over the decades. You can still match skill sets of players from different eras. That connection enhances everyone's respect and love for baseball today.

Golf is on the way to losing that source of love and respect. Largely becasue people don't want golf to be too hard to play.

Bob

I agree with every word--and as a Yankee fan,you have no idea how hard it was for me to type that.

[Thomas Dai]

This thread from yee ancient chronicles of GCA regarding the introduction of the Haskell ball seems pertinent to bump - http://www.golfclubatlas.com/forum/index.php/topic,1711.msg33024.html#msg33024 - it also has some nice quotations from yee olde times.

If golf is not to create longer and longer courses for elite players there is always the much debated 'roll back the ball' option. Where do folks think would be an appropriate tournament to hold the first tour-pro event with a rolled back ball? How about The Memorial, given that it's founder has been promting the idea of a rolled back ball for years?

All the best

[JMEvensky]

Brent,that's how we imitated AP as 12 year olds.You'd go to a tournament and see half the field either putting knock-kneed and/or hitching up their pants before a shot(the parents tended to disapprove of the cigarettes).

Same as Little League--every kid wanted to wear #7,switch hit,and play centerfield.

Peter,I'm right there with you except the 8802 has been in the closet for bad behavior--for 15 years.

[David Panzarasa]

BCrosby,
 Your statement about Fenway Park from 1903 to today, doesnt have much to do with equipment. Balls/Bats are for sure different and made much better now.  The reason the dimensions haven't changed is because the Pitcher has evolved as well as the hitter. They have "evened" each other out in their progression.

 The batters for the most part are more athletic, bigger, more powerful etc.. then in 1903, which we all can recognize. If a hitter was facing the pitchers from then, with the same equipment, they would 100% need to change the dimensions of Fenway.

 But, the pitchers have changed as well. they are bigger, faster, more athletic etc..so they have evened each other out through time. If anything, the pitchers or defense today have a leg up on the offense as the relief pitchers are now in play from the 5th inning on, as when they never used relief pitchers and both winning/losing pitchers would throw complete games non-stop. (one reason you wont ever see a 56 game hit streak, the hitter isnt going to face the same and tired pitcher 4-5 times a game anymore. they bring in the specialty pitchers)

  The dimensions of Fenway would change drastically, if the pitching didn't progress with the hitters. The use of relief pitchers alone, and 4-5 man rotation has helped keep Fenway the same distances for years.

[DMoriarty]

Bob,

You suggest that we aren't building 8000 yard courses "in the name of placating bogey golfers."   But there are plenty of very good reasons to avoid going to an 8000 yard standard other than placating bogey golfers. Cost, for one.  The extra land needed, for another.  The extra time it takes to play such courses, for another.  Also there is the issue of the relevance of the great old courses.  I cannot see how rendering the great courses obsolete would do much for preserve the sport's traditions and history.  

I see tradition as very important, but frankly I don't care at all about what club Tiger Woods is hitting.  Golf isn't about professional golfers, or at least it shouldn't be.  Some of the ODG's were well aware of this.  I'd rather see the courses preserved even it means that the Tiger and friends don't get the same experience as the players of yore.

[BCrosby]

David -

I am aware of the problems that come with building 8000 yard courses. There are many.

Among them is that some Golden Age courses will fall off the US Open rota. I'm not happy about that either, but it is a price that we should own up to if we care about the kind of game now being played by golf's best players.

If an eight iron is the longest iron you hit into a par 4 on a 7200 yard course, then you are not playing the same game that great players played as recently as 20 years ago. If you are hitting a five or six iron to a 225 yard uphill par 3 (East Lake 18th), golf has become something other than the game played in 1995 and earlier.

In the face of such developments the golf world has shrugged its shoulders. Hey, folks say, equipment will not be rolled back. Nor will courses be built/stretched to meaningful lengths. We've got what we've got, they say.

I'm troubled by that state of affairs, however. I think other people should be troubled by it too. Golf, unlike other sports whose histories remain relevant, is losing touch with its own.

Bob

  

[BCrosby]

David P.

I agree that the baseball analogy can only be taken so far. Other factors are involved in baseball, not the least of which is that players on opposing sides are vying for the same ball, hence there are built in disincentives to juicing the ball or the bat.

Because golfers don't vy for a common ball, John Laing Low saw the problem coming for golf more than a century ago. Something other than human competitors were needed as constraints on the kind of golf to be played. There is a built-in temptation to find ways to make the game easier and 'fairer'. Low's hope was that that legislators would see it as their duty to make rules that would defend the traditional game. He saw architects a having a similar duty in the way they designed of golf courses.  

Those duties have been largely abandoned by modern golf legislators and architects.

Bob  

[DMoriarty]

Bob, 

I am troubled, but I view your proposed solution as way too steep a price to pay.

[BCrosby]

David -

It doesn't need to be a steep price. It could be fixed by simple rule changes. But if the powers that be have no gumption for that ....

Bob
 

[Mark Pearce]

Bob,

You appear concerned that modern equipment is losing any continuity between the current pro gamne and that played 100 years ago.  Yet on another current thread you appear to be in favour of very fast greens.  That is, greens at a speed unimaginable in previous generations.  Don't such greens threaten continuity just the same?

[DMoriarty]

David -

It doesn't need to be a steep price. It could be fixed by simple rule changes. But if the powers that be have no gumption for that ....

Bob
 

I agree that there is a simple fix available and I am all for it. It seems a mistake to me to encourage 8000+ when the problems about which we are concerned could be remedied by a rule change.

[BCrosby]

Mark -

My comments about fast greens on the other thread were meant only as observations. Good players will adjust to greens at any speed. The difficulties they have with fast greens relate more to recovery and approach shots. Not to putting.

My actual opinion about fast greens is that they are over-used and, given how consistent green speeds are from course to course on pro tours, they might make putting easier for good players. Let 'em play a course whose greens stimp at 9. The pros will eventually adjust, but I'd guess you would hear a lot of carping after rounds on Thursday and Friday.

The more important issue is that high green speeds and highly contoured greens like those designed by MacK, Simpson, Colt and others do not work together. The usual response is to flatten their greens. The better response is to slow them down.

Bob

  

[David Kelly]

JME -

Yes, I am a baseball fan. Seeing Fenway and the right firld fence that Williams hit so many homeruns over or The Green Monster that Yaz played to perfection, and so on and so on.

Note one thing. The distances and shape of the Fenway outfield have not changed since opening day in 1903. That's because baseball has not let the ball and bats to change in any material way over the decades. You can still match skill sets of players from different eras. That connection enhances everyone's respect and love for baseball today.

I don't know where you are getting this information about Fenway Park but it has changed a ton since it opened.  

• First of all it opened in 1912, not 1903.  
• Also the right field line is about 50 feet shorter than it was when the park was built.  It was originally 358' down the RF line, was reduced to 332' and then in 1940 was further reduced to the 304' and then 302' which it remains to this day.
• In 1940 the Red Sox constructed the bullpen in right-center (which Tori Hunter fell into trying to catch Ortiz's grand slam last week) which reduced the distance almost 25' and since it allowed Ted Williams to hit more homers, was called "Williamsburg" for years.
• Dead center field (not the triangle) was 488' when the park first opened, now it is 390'.
• The deepest part of the ballpark in the triangle was 550' when the park opened and reduced to the current 420' in 1934.
• There used to be a 10 ft. tall incline in front of the LF wall until 1934 that was called, "Duffy's Cliff" after Red Sox LF Duffy Lewis.
• THere was also the renovation of the press box in the late 80s that changed the air flow in the park and made Fenway much less of a hitter's park than it had been up until that time.

Duffy's Cliff


LF with grantstands built atop Duffy's Cliff at the base of the Green Monster.

 
Right Field before the bullpen, when they still let overflow crowds on the field to watch the game.


Mini-fence in RF erected for 1912 World Series


Dimensions of Fenway Park when it opened in 1912.

 

[BCrosby]

David -

Thanks for the corrections on my Fenway Park history.

It is interesting to note that Fenway's outfield dimensions are actually shorter than on opening day. I did not know that. That may have occurred for a number of reasons. But it suggests that the park has not been rendered obsolete by modern basball players who hit the ball a lot farther than their BoSox forefathers. Otherwise the shorter, modern dimensions would have become problematical.

The evolution of golf demonstrates a very different dynamic. To stick with a baseball analogy, golf courses today have become like shrunken baseball parks at which it is routine to see players hit 100 or more homeruns every year.

If that occurred, would people be concerned that the nature of modern baseball had lost touch with the generations of great players from the past?

Bob

[Brent Hutto]

So I guess our conclusion is the Golden Age architects would build courses the same length today as 75+ years ago and spend their time complaining about the ProV1 going too far.

[David Kelly]

The evolution of golf demonstrates a very different dynamic. To stick with a baseball analogy, golf courses today have become like shrunken baseball parks at which it is routine to see players hit 100 or more homeruns every year.

If that occurred, would people be concerned that the nature of modern baseball had lost touch with the generations of great players from the past?

To me, the analogy between golf courses and ballparks doesn't really work because Major League Baseball is played exclusively by professional baseball players who are the best in the world.  Even the greatest and most high profile of golf courses have 99.9% of their rounds played by golfers who are below the level of professional or expert.  In other words, the focus at Fenway Park and all major league stadiums is to exclusively maintain it for the best baseball players in the world.

Other than a few outliers (Baker Bowl, Ebbets Field, etc.), major league baseball stadiums have generally been shrinking for over 100 years.   For example, when Babe Ruth played at Yankee Stadium, left-center field was 490+', when DiMaggio and then Mantle played it was 457', after the renovations in 1976 it was 430' and since 1988 at both the old and new stadiums it is 399'.

In 1924 the Senators won the World Series but hit only 1 HR at home all season. In 1945 the Senators hit only 1 home run at home in Griffith Stadium and it was an inside the park home run.