It seems to me that you're the one that's introducing straw men into the discussion, such as below. The whole essence of John's argument is that the changes aren't in keeping with what Ross signed off on.
Nope. John doesn't even know what Ross was aware of and approved. He makes BIG assumptions there.
They changed the bunker complex on 15. They didn't relocate it or eliminate it, they changed it have better drainage and be easier to maintain. John uses that one thing as a jumping off point to bemoan not only that, but several other things that
haven't even happened (but which he fears
may happen, despite a lack of evidence supporting either their providence or the likelihood of changes being made).
We haven't even seen pictures of the current state of the 15th hole bunker complex. I agree the first stab at it was esthetically worse (we haven't seen photos of the "bumpier" second stab), but again… esthetics weren't the main driver there. Nobody said "this bunker complex is not good strategically or esthetically, let's change it for those reasons." The reasons were drainage/maintenance, and their strategic value has been maintained.
John couldn't even ask the superintendent "Hey, that bunker complex on 15, drainage was a really big issue there eh?"
Also Erik, when is drainage not architecture ? Surely dealing with how you move water on and off a course is basic to the design ?
Not sure where this comes from… I've never said it's not.
The lack of self awareness in this post is really quite startling.
I would say that not being able to spot the differences is quite startling, but given your history, not really.
--------
Let's be clear about this. The whole topic boils down to "John doesn't like the changes made to the bunker complex on 15." but doesn't really understand why it was changed (drainage/maintenance) and uses that as a leaping off point to worry (needlessly) about a whole bunch of other things.
John goes on and on about the seventh hole… and Spence has never, AFAIK, said "Oh, I'm gonna switch that back to the initial Ross drawings and make it a single fairway." There's one of the straw men.
Let's put it this way: except for the change on 15, what other changes have been made that John finds disagreeable? Does he dislike any of the things laid out in
reply #85? For example:
#10 - Lifted the inside edge of the first fairway bunker on the right to prevent fairway drainage from entering the bunker during heavy rain events. It flooded just a week ago giving us great info for this minor adjustment, bunker remains in place.All other bunkers on 10 renovated in place
Is that a horrible thing that he's "not sure of"? How about any of the other things Spence listed in that post for the back nine?
How about this:
#12 - Shifted the directional bunker at the start of the fairway 15' right so left edge was on the center line of tee shot, per the Ross plan
No? Good?
How about:
#13 - Grassed the bottom of the Scalloped Directional Bunker off tee on right, left directional mounding in tact. This bunker is not shown on Ross' drawings, I like its purposes of delineating the right edge of the hole much like the mounds do on the left to lead the player up and over the blind tee shot.
Widened the gap between the first two diagonal bunkers about 10' to allow the substantial surface water crossing the fairway to pass between them without eroding the bunkers. The recent storms demonstrated the effectiveness of this work.
Also good? I mean, that last one is at least removing a bunker, not just improving the drainage in a bunker complex like on 15. Is that okay by John? Those are actual, real, planned changes, not the red herrings of the 7th fairway or seemingly the ninth hole cross bunker short of the green.