My question for the Met Pga pro's in very basic terms is:
If we stipulate that Bethpage has high punitive rough and narrow fairways...does that leave players to aim for the middle of the fairways regardless of angles?
Fenway, though Tillinghast does not have fairways as narrow as Bethpage (granted much smaller scale) but does have rough a little higher than most clubs.
What I am really want an opinion on is Sleepy Hollow where angles matter (at least for most), the greens are compelling, and the hole corridors are generous (large scale) and the rumpled fairways are extremely wide.
If the rough at Sleepy Hollow becomes too punitive (like I am told it was at the Met PGA)...doesn't that encourage play to the middle of the fairway? Especially in light of the point Jeff made that angles matter little for better players and the "miss" for aiming for the "preferred side" of a fairway is 4' rough?
Corey,
I'm not sure if 4 inches is the right height of the rough for the US Mid Am but I would strongly argue against 2 inches, especially for a course where angles matter. The US Mid Am is a national championship and the best player should win. If a green on a par 4 is most receptive from the right half of the fairway, I don't think it's fair for a player miss the fairway on the right by 10 yards (but only be in 2" of rough) be in a equal/better position than a guy who hits his drive in the center of the fairway. There needs to be a reward for hitting the golf ball straight.
Part of the reason why I don't hate the new 11th at Augusta (with all the trees on the right) is because I think the drive was way too easy before. You could hit it miles right and be rewarded with a great angle and there was no reward for a straight tee shot and you were actually penalized a bit. The trees on the right may be too numerous now but for a tournament site there needs to be a reward for good shots and a penalty for poor shots.
This goes back to distance as well. Hitting a 5 iron out of 2 inches of rough would be a penalty because you wouldn't be able to hold a firm green. But hitting an 8 iron out of 2 inches of rough is not a penalty. Also it would be amazing if the golf courses were firm but I've lived in the northeast my whole life and the weather rarely cooperates long enough for our golf course to really get firm. The good golf season is May - October (26 weeks), we may get 4 weeks of good firm conditions. The fall is most conducive to firm conditions but its not a guarantee like it is on the west coast.
Lots of "not GCAspeak" in that post, but also a lot of truth/reality.
Sleepy Hollow was particularly firm last September for the MET PGA, but there are few guarantees that will be the case in 2023. The fall brings many days of rains or even tropical storms to the northeast and they simply can't assume it will be firm.
As far as 11 at ANGC, the current hole sucks, but they did need to do something for safety reasons as that was the alleyway/preferred miss for longer hitters, often dangerously into the gallery. A few trees would've solved that issue-not Sherwood Forest and the awkward dogleg they have created.
I will quibble with your point on a hypothetical hole where we agree that the right side is preferred.
You state that 2 inch rough "rewards" the guy in the right rough and penalizes the guy who hit it straight, who "should be rewarded".
But if we've agreed that the right side is the preferred spot and therefore where we are aiming, why is the ball in the middle considered a "straight" ball. He has missed his target (the right side) the same as the player just in the 2 inch right rough, maybe less. So the player in "the middle" deserves no more advantage than the guy in the right rough and the smarter player will figure that out. That is the essence of strategy, rather than point and shoot golf. 2 inch rough should take the spin off and I can assure you Sleepy Hollow's greens would not have held anything other than a perfectly struck and judged 8 iron from that 2 inch rough-the greens were that firm and that fast. Shouldn't calculated "recovery" from a preferred angle be an important skill? especially if it is not a given? Now if that same shot was possible from the left rough (on that chosen hole) I would say it renders the strategy of that hole moot.
Do they need 4 inch rough? I don't know as I stated above.
I do know that with today's players and length, more fairway means more drivers, and unless you have the genius of Alistaire MacKenzie and Royal Melbourne climate and conditions, angles simply matter less if wedges are the approach club.
When it's not firm,angles really dont matter for the elite except on a par 5 second shot or a very long par 4 due to multiple factors.
1. Equipment-the ball simply goes forever for a high speed player, and if it's firm, even longer. Wedges simply can be held on a green. Do away with rough and they really will hit driver early and often.
2.Speed of greens has forced architects to reduce tilt and slope on greens, so even though a put may be similar than it was 40 years ago, the first bounce is entirely different when an angled approach hits a green now tilted at 1.5 degrees rather than 4.
Wouldn't it be great, now that we've crawled out of the dark ages of architecture, and rediscovered the importance of width, angles strategy and options (a la the first Golden Age) if scale were returned (via equipment reduction) to compliment the great designs when played in competition so we could all enjoy and admire these great players showcasing their diverse skill set, rather than their partial wedge game. If you look at an aeriel of 1920's classic, the fairways were nearly as wide as they were long-when one could really catch an angel to green design where that mattered---hard to do when a a good drive now goes 25% farther, and the target(not always the green) is softer and flatter.....
Sort of ironic that as the Architectural Dark ages were beginning to close in the late 1990's, the Dark age of equipment was suddenly rising to neuter the skill and judgement required to thrive on the re-enlightened architecture.....