Short Grass as a Golf Hazard

[Steven Blake]

Joe,

I agree with what the GM/pro said as I have the same feedback with my membership.  One thing I have noticed is high handicaps just reach for the putter but low handicaps almost never putt out the putter.  I think it is an ego thing for them.  When I play with some low handicaps I make it a point to putt from 20-30 yards off the green.  Most of the time I have get it inside of 7-8 feet, meanwhile they struggle to hit wedges from tight lies and my ball is closest to the hole in many instances. 

Steve Blake

[Jud_T]

Jeff,

try getting at a tough pin from the wrong spot off the green at a place like Bandon with your lob wedge and tell me how boring short grass is.  To me hitting those high lofted shots off tight fescue turf are some of the toughest shots in golf and really separate great players from the rest of us.   IMO one can use virtually any club in your bag off short grass around the green, while rough is much more limiting, and in the worst scenarios can become a simple hack and hope effort.

[Mike Hendren]

Theortically, for purposes of assigning par putting accounts for half the strokes in a round.  Why should the architecture encourage an even higher percentage?  Three putting is over-rated where from on or off the green.

Also, higher handicappers like it because it mitigates potential embarrassment (i.e., it's a cop-out) and makes defaulting to bogey routine and desirable.

Bogey

[Steven Blake]

When you have variety doesn't that equalize all players and abilities whereas hack and hope is so one dimensional that it favors only those players who can excute that shot.

Steve Blake

[Joe Hancock]

Theortically, for purposes of assigning par putting accounts for half the strokes in a round.  Why should the architecture encourage an even higher percentage?  Three putting is over-rated.

Bogey

Are you suggesting that a recovery shot played with a putter is the same as a putt?

[Mike Hendren]

Theortically, for purposes of assigning par putting accounts for half the strokes in a round.  Why should the architecture encourage an even higher percentage?  Three putting is over-rated.

Bogey

Are you suggesting that a recovery shot played with a putter is the same as a putt?

Joe (miss seeing you btw), you drive with a driver and putt with a putter.  A putt is a putt is a putt.

For example, I 3-putted for par at the 10th and 16th during a round at The Old Course. 

[Don_Mahaffey]

How the short grass is incorporated with topography is what really makes it work. Those terrible "collection" bowls with a drain at the bottom is not my idea of good use.
But areas that fall away from the green and have some uneven ground, wrinkles, ridges, bumps, lows, and especially if there is some unevenness that flows in and out of the green/short grass interface, that, to me, is when it gets really interesting. I want to see a player walk down to his ball, pull a SW, 7i, hybrid, and putter, and be uncertain of the best play.

One other note, bunkers contain, they stop the ball, often times near the target. They are high maintenance, expensive to build, and people bitch like crazy about bunkers and demand consistency. Short grass is not more expensive then bunkers. Plus, short grass with some topo may contain, repel, or run out. Bunkers are often used to keep players near the target, short grass has no such role.

I'm with Joe, the pros love perfect bunkers where they can spin and control the ball, short grass with some junk between the ball and the hole is a different story as it is about execution AND imagination.

[Edward Moody]

I think the green complexes play a critical role in the effectiveness of the short grass in regard to the short game neutralization between the low handicap/high handicap player.  Our greens have false fronts and drop off on the sides and in the back.  Additionally, the greens are filled with subtle nobs and humps which deflect poorly judged pitches, chips, and putts.  And the greens are very fast.  

I'm a low handicap player and unless my opponent misses short of the green (where the leave is a pretty straightforward, uphill putt), I believe I have an advantage because the sides and behinds of our greens are incredibly challenging and require a deft touch.

But yes, if you have generally flat greens and surrounds with tight short grass, then the high handicap player has a better chance to compete.

[Joe Hancock]

Thanks for the warmth, Bogey.

I see the use of a putter or any other club off the green as a choice, of fun or percentages. If I use a driver to play a shot from the collar, it isn't a drive at all. And as an example, a few years ago I was playing a "fun" round at Winged Foot w/ Neil Regan. It was low 40's and raining...I was using a thrown together set from Neil, and on 17 West(par 3), I played driver/ driver from collar/ driver putt for par. And...it was fun!

Joe

[Joe Hancock]

How the short grass is incorporated with topography is what really makes it work. Those terrible "collection" bowls with a drain at the bottom is not my idea of good use.

I'll coin a phrase or a term in a heartbeat, and what Don describes here is a favorite of mine. It came to me as I was looking at the golf team short game area at U of M. It has one...a "drainus".

[Mike Hendren]

How the short grass is incorporated with topography is what really makes it work.

Now we are getting somewhere.   Great post Don.

Joe, I have witnessed your bunt-cut driver and other handcrafted golf shots.  You are a freak.

Bogey

[jeffwarne]

A disenting opinion, likely reflecting bias:

Short grass is no equalizer.  It benefits the better player (yeah, yeah, I know it makes them "think" and Pete thinks you have them where you want them when you make them "think") and punishes the higher capper.  For the latter it simply becomes an extension of the putting surface as we can't pinch or nip the sand wedge, virtually eliminating that option.  Sure, we can bump a short iron, but why bother?   Short grass is effectively a half-shot penalty for the higher capper who'd prefer a little turf under the ball.  

Don't get me wrong - I love options - heck I 3-putted for par at nos. 10 and 16 at The Old Course, and I'll pitch with multiple clubs from multiple distances.  I don't mind short grass - I just can't romanticize short grass as a hazard.  

Or is it just me and my heavy handed golf swings?

I see the issue in a different context - fairways are kept too short and rough is kept too long.

Flame away.

Bogey

 

Good stuff Bogey



So if from age 11 I've dedicated my life to improving at golf, and helping people improve, why on earth am I looking for a feature that is an EQUALIZER?  I thought that's what a handicap and forward tees were for.

Remember Tom Doak wrote that in an era when long grass were very overused features on golf courses-most forward thinking courses have responded by creating more "chipping" areas and runoff areas.
I'm well aware of the potential interesting features of short grass, and like it as PART a mix of an interesting balanced TEST, particularly when a ball rolls away from the target, and the terrain alows for an interesting and judged recovery.
But as Bogey says, short grass is often too short, and generally too soft in an effort to keep turf that's too short, alive.
That is in my opinion, particularly at some high end courses, destroying the art of creative chipping and wedge play, due to the softness and tightness of lies forcing putter to be the best option, even for good wedge players.

Shorter grass on the links of the UK is great as a feature because it's generally firm and is not so super short; additionally, they often have creative undulations which requite imagination and might reward a player who hits a creative pitch or chip.
in the US, particularly on modern courses, there are no microundulations because the super is concerned about mowing the grass so short, which is hard to do with smaller undulations.

Short grass is great, so is rough, so are bunkers.
too much of any is boring.

Rough around a green does not cause "hack and hope" for a better wedge player, though a poor wedge player might feel or state that.
being able to create shots and evalute different rough (and fairway) lies is an integral part of interesting and high level golf.

Jud,
Bandon I assume has exciting well thought out short grass surrounds, and fescue may be tight, but it's generally firm like the UK.
I'm not saying ALL short grass is boring, I'm saying too much is.

As Bogey say, do we really want to be playing 40-50 shots with our putters?
and I like to putt off of the green.

Shortgrass can be an interesting feature, but there has to be thought about where to put it and how often, and what sort've features are being traversed

Balance, not groupthink

tried to post this 10 time but board blowing up with replies

[Mike Hendren]

Thanks jw, I was getting lonely.

I bet I putt the ball from off the green as much as anybody among the 1500.  Frankly, it is the act of a coward.

Bogey

[jeffwarne]

Thanks jw, I was getting lonely.

I bet I putt the ball from off the green as much as anybody among the 1500.  Frankly, it is the act of a coward.

Bogey

Bogey,
iwas trying but the board was blowing up.
though now that I'm in agreement with someone, I might switch sides

[Steven Blake]

Bogey

Coward or not ... my scorecard thanks me!

How these areas are maintained is also important soft and spongey short grass areas around greens are pointless. IMHO  And as Don stated above how they fit into the landscape is important.

Steve Blake

[Steven Blake]

Bogey,

Balance is nice but playability for all groups of players and growing the game is important.  I think more "properly" maintained short grass areas does both.

As to putting 40-50 times a round ... I guess St. Andrews isn't worth playing.

Steve Blake

[Mike Hendren]

As to putting 40-50 times a round ... I guess St. Andrews isn't worth playing.

Steve Blake

Short grass at St. Andrews is not a hazard - it is simply a grand playing field.

Bogey

[Steven Blake]

I wasn't the one who said putting 40+ would be boring. I'm saying St. Andrews is anything but boring.  Granted I get the point pulling out putter a bunch of times might be boring at some courses, no doubt. And in some cases short grass is not really a hazard but merely a playing field as you suggest.

But it does make for interesting golf and I feel it is under utilized in the game.

Steve Blake

[Peter Pallotta]

Bogey - I almost always get it out of a bunker, but I almost never get it close, and so I'm almost always 2 putting for bogey. That 'routine' is now no longer particularly fun nor rewarding. With short grass, I often use a putter but don't often get it close -- but sometimes I do, so sometimes I'm actually putting for par. That's a more varied and fun/rewarding routine, so I prefer it. But yes, I agree: my preference is that of a talentless pessimist, and my use of the putter the act of an unapologetic coward!

Yours in Bogey-hood

Peter

[Jason Topp]

The reason I think it works so well is that it is pretty easy to get down in 3 but very difficult to get up and down.  The really good players at my club are magicians with the hybrid shot, but they can also hit a wedge from a tight lie.  People with less confidence pull out putter and most of us try all options depending on the day.  You are constantly weighing the chance of getting up and down against the chance of a chunk or skull that brings higher numbers into the equation.

[Steven Blake]

Jason,

Great point! Well said!


Steve Blake

[Jud_T]

I agree that 1) short grass around boring greens just highlights how poorly designed they were 2) there's little that's more annoying than short grass that's too wet to allow you to effectively run the ball on 3) the quality and consistency of greenside roughs is also often not up to snuff which may be equally annoying 4) yet another reason that the best golf courses are built on sand- specifically the firmness and undulation presented in these type of shots on short grass.

[ward peyronnin]

Great Thread

Absolutely agree that a lot depends on the green design( topography)  respecting the position where the balls come to rest dictating the difficulty the difficulty of the next shot.

Not having this shot is a bogus excuse. Short game practice is a technical and relatively straighforward endeavor that mostly requires practice to reach acceptable levels of proficiency.

Smaller bunkers can be also used as short grass allows collection bunkers. Mowing is much less disrupted as staff aren't required to stop and change heights. Probably it is just easier for an archie to plop bunkers down than to execute these tight lie surrounds effectively

[Steven Blake]

I know we are talking mostly about short grass around greens but what about short grass in the fairway? I also prefer large fairways 40+ yards.  Maybe its not so much a hazard in the fairway as it is a cool feature.  It stops the need to search for golf balls and opens up angles and lines of attack into the putting surfaces.

Steve Blake

[D_Malley]

funny how this looks to be the exact same article, written by two different people.
which one is the original author?

Scott A. Witter, Golf Course Architect
http://buffalogolfer.com/wordpress/short-grass-subtle-but-effective/

By Tom Doak
http://www.renaissancegolf.com/selected_essays/the_best_hazard_in_golf/