Kalen:
There was a long time caddie out here named Ray B. Ray used to be John Candy's caddie down at Bel Air a long time ago.
A few years ago a number of us were asked to describe how to play some of the blowup holes out here. 14 at Trails, 6 at Pac, 12 at Old Mac, etc.
Here is Ray's write-up for 15 at Bandon:
"I think the best way to play this hole is to play it short. I used front yardage +10 for elevation and total of the wind gust. A cut shot to the left edge of the green or whatever shot to get there."
Ray passed away a few years ago and we miss him dearly.
The four guys who played the hole yesterday each made a series of compounding errors.
Gupta - He hit a good shot but had too much club, can't fault him too much for that as it was a slight miss and at that point in the match he had to be aggressive. They reworked the left side of the green a few years ago, first removing the mounds that used to sometimes direct shots back on to the green and second putting new turf on the runout to the back hazard. That runout is now pretty quick and anything getting towards back half of the green distance is really going to take off. He was luck to win the hole after his second. He had just watched Strafaci putt his 4th shot up onto the green. Why wouldn't he just do the same thing and lie two. Instead he got too cute with a wedge, and almost gave away the match right there.
Strafaci - Just had to much cut on his tee ball, which got eaten up into the light onshore breeze. The skinny wedge from in front of the green was not a good shot, especially because of the tightness of the lies down there. With the pin in the back left, he should have had enough room to have tried to bump something into the top of the hill and tumble on to the green. But as is the norm with these guys, they go to wedge whenever they think they should.
Osborne - Just a horrible tee ball. The fact that he was still in the hole after the drop is amazing. The announcers really showed their lack of knowledge of the course when one of them claimed his direct line back drop would be 180 yards away. He dropped in light rough, and hit another horrible shot up to the green. Even though it was blind, he had a ton of green to work with and should have known that missing to the right was not going to be good.
Sharpstene - Another weak tee ball. In the light holding breeze yesterday this wasn't that hard a shot. Anywhere on the green short of the pin would have been fine, even short left would have been okay. The rest of the hole for him was a mess.
Two years ago in a match, another caddie had a 25 handicap lay up on this hole and putt up onto the green. His four with a stroke won the hole. He would have won it on gross against all four of these guys yesterday.
Sven