Consensus vs. Groupthink in Golf Course Rankings

[Michael Felton]

Tom,


This is an interesting question and I must admit it's a topic that I think about from time to time. Is there a reason that people tend to agree on what is a good golf course? All the courses I have played that are in the top 100 lists I have thoroughly enjoyed and would love to play them again. It's hard to put words to why though. I think there are parallels with this thread and one about the Confidential Guide that was going on relatively recently - we were discussing the variance among the four of you and looking for courses that the highest ranking was more than 2 different from the lowest. I think excluding the 0s, which are special cases, there were perhaps no examples where you differed by 3 or more on ranking a course. Is that groupthink? Or is there some objective reason that we all find the same courses to be similarly compelling? I'm not sure.

Michael:


For The Confidential Guide, the key is that I chose my other co-authors, because I thought they were mostly of similar tastes to mine, and I could depend on them to do ratings for courses I hadn’t seen that would be somewhat in line with my own views. 


A book where everyone disagrees would be very interesting, but I’m not sure whether it would help you decide where to play, or just scramble everyone’s brains.  Perhaps Ron Whitten and Brad Klein and I could do something like that:  I respect their opinions but I disagree with them much more than I do with Ran.  (Or, publicly, at least - Ran never offers much negative feedback even though we all know he’s thinking it.)


As for Rock Hill - I’ve never been there but it is more than possible to find a very good hole on an otherwise dull (or too extreme) course.

Fair points all - I do think it would be fascinating to find a course that you thought was an 8 let's say and someone else (Whitten or Klein perhaps) think is a 4 or 5 and watch you both discuss and explain why you feel the way that you do. I think that would be educational (for me at least) to understand more clearly what it is that you (and others) see as being part of a "great" golf course.

[Joe_Tucholski]

I recently finally listed all the courses I've played and gave them a rapid rating. The distribution here is largely normal with only 10% of my courses receiving the highest rating and another 10% getting the lowest. Median, mean, and mode are all the same.

Does this imply a ranking as well? How do I parse the 9s/8s/7s that litter my Top 100? GroupThink is a good a start as any for me to determine that the 9ness of Merion East is better than the 9ness of Old Town Club.

Try putting all the courses you've played in a rank order (maybe even just the top 200).  If you could do it, repeat the same thing in 6 months and I'd be interested to see the differences.  I think I would be unable to reproduce the same order immediately after I listed it.


I tried to make a rank order list.  I couldn't help but look at something like course 60 and realize I liked it more than course 50 but less than course 59 even though I liked course 50 more than 59.  For me there was no transitive property for golf courses, which is a tough pill to swallow for someone who likes to think of themselves as rational.

[John Kirk]

Agreement on 74/100.
Curious to know how far down a combined ranking table one would have to go before all 100 in both lists were included.

That is indeed the better question.


The GOLF DIGEST list has a handful of courses that are nowhere close to the top 100 on the GOLF Magazine list -- I can't remember for sure but I think some of them like Canyata and Rich Harvest Farm were removed from the GOLF ballot for lack of support.


I'm not sure what is the lowest-rated course by GOLF DIGEST from the GOLF Magazine list.  GOLF DIGEST goes down to 200 places now and I would be surprised if there were more than one or two courses which didn't make their top 200.

Back with a contribution...


There are three courses in Golf Magazine's Top 100 that are not rated in the Golf Digest's Top 200:


White Bear Yacht

Lawsonia Links

Trinity Forest


There are actually five (not three) new courses in Golf Magazine's Top 100 that are too new to be included in the latest Golf Digest list:


The Lido

CapRock Ranch

Old Barnwell

Ladera

Pinehurst #10



Here are the rankings for the courses in the Golf Magazine Top 100 but not in the Golf Digest Top 100:


102.  Eastward Ho!
104.  Yeamans Hall
106.  Baltimore (East)
110.  Kingsley Club
124.  Philadelphia Cricket
126.  Newport
127.  Streamsong Red
128.  St. Louis
129.  The Creek
135.  Bel-Air
145.  Fox Chapel
146.  Moraine
152.  Ridgewood (East/West)
160.  Harbour Town
164.  Old Elm
170.  Hollywood
183.  Gamble Sands
196.  Sankaty Head


The GD Second 100 courses list is fascinating.  Most of the courses are rarely discussed on GolfClubAtlas.  They tend to be big and beautiful and relatively gently contoured.



I'm not sure consensus vs. groupthink makes sense to me.  Consensus means general agreement, and it's clear there is a high degree of agreement.


The Oxford definition of groupthink reads "the practice of thinking or making decisions as a group in a way that discourages creativity or individual responsibility."


The first sentence of Wikipedia's version of groupthink says:  "Groupthink is a psychological phenomenon that occurs within a group of people in which the desire for harmony or conformity in the group results in an irrational or dysfunctional decison-making outcome."


I don't think anybody is afraid to express their opinion about golf courses, though they may become shy about it if a group of people belittle their opinions. As I've evolved on this subject, I am less tolerant of anything that suggests "people are ignorant or stupid" for why they choose different favorites.  I do believe that people's opinions about what makes golf courses great evolve with time and experience.


If there is groupthink among golf course analysts, who is to blame?  Clearly, GolfClubAtlas is one of the most influential think tanks for golf course discussion and analysis.


The only other explanation for the extraordinary consensus is there exists a well-reasoned set of ideas about what makes golf courses interesting, fun and challenging.  Once again, this skirts upon the idea that there is objective reasoning in the evaluation process.







 

[John Kirk]

I couldn't sleep.  I wanted to write down a few thoughts before Tuesday begins.

This evening I asked my best golf friend to check out my post from earlier today.  We batted the subject back and forth a few times.  I feel confident in my conclusions but they feel awkward to say.  I have a knack for awkward... and sentimentality.

I originally positioned this dilemma as between consensus and objectivity.  Tom modified that slightly to comparing consensus versus groupthink.  Here's Tom's key post on groupthink:

Groupthink is why when GOLF Magazine started ranking courses from 1-100, GOLF DIGEST had to follow.


Groupthink is why when people in the business thought certain courses like Cypress Point, NGLA, and Fishers Island appearing higher on the GOLF list made it a better list, GOLF DIGEST started re-writing its criteria to boost those courses up its own list.

Groupthink is why Pine Valley stays at #1 . . . even though it is very easy to make the case that it's basically torture for 50+% of golfers.  But most panelists argue that it is SO GREAT that we must discount that . . . because each of the holes is so compelling [if you are good enough].  In the end, all they are telling you is that if you're going to complain on those grounds, you're not good enough to judge, like they are.  God forbid that such a view would be part of the Consensus.  It must be struck down, because Groupthink.

Groupthink is why, when GOLF DIGEST panelists rate courses on seven different criteria, they give the same scores in 5-6 categories and are afraid to go too far above or below the overall number they want to give.

A year ago, someone approached me about starting another, independent rating system for golf courses, and asked how we could make it different.  My first thought was to try to rate courses based on the criteria Mike Nuzzo suggested here a few years back:


Beautiful
Challenging
Fun
[and I thought I might add, Interesting] 


What I realized was that NO course would legitimately score a 10 out of 10 in all four categories.  And if we did that, it would very much call into question whether the vaunted top 10 or top 50 on the other lists are really as far beyond the rest as they've been put up to be.

Very compelling, but as of tonight I believe that consensus is the primary catalyst to homogenizing the lists.  It's clear from multiple sources that Pine Valley has shortcomings, but all four analysts in the new Confidential Guide gave it a 10, and we amateur enthusiasts tend to follow suit because we trust the experts.


Groupthink implies a fear of speaking one's mind.  I've given my opinion about lots of things, not so much anymore.  Sometimes opinions get challenged and feelings can get hurt.  I have argued on behalf of Ballyneal's greatness many times in the past.  Ballyneal is a revolutionary course with phenomenal playing characteristics, a tactician's dream with few if any equals.  If you hit the ball pretty straight you can go days without losing a ball.  I know there are many who agree with me.  But what's the point.  And despite what it may seem, I feel Dismal River (Red) is also underrated.


When it comes to other publications following suit and presenting a greatest course list that looks more and more like the Golf Magazine list, perhaps that falls under the principle that imitation is the sincerest form of flattery.  There is consensus because course design principles have been discussed at such a detailed level for so long that there is significant agreement.  Tom wrote a great book about the subject and (tens of) thousands of golfers developed a keen interest in the subject.  Every now and then one of us amateurs makes a key contribution to the conversation, and GCA members who play lots of courses offer valuable information about them.


I'm so grateful to have participated in this website.  Tom and the other professionals (Jeff Brauer, Mike Nuzzo, Ian Andrew and many other architects and agronomists) provide a window into their methodology.  Ran Morrissett has also produced an incredible library of work.  Many past and present members have contributed detailed course analyses as well as other aspects of architecture.


In summary, I'm grateful for it all.  Consensus opinion has been achieved.  The proof is there.  Course designs have evolved in response to the stated ideals.  Tom in particular is the catalyst to all of this thinking about golf courses.  It reminds me of a line from the movie "City Slickers", where the weekend cowboys are sitting around the fire and talking about the trail boss Curly, and Ed says, "He's a mustang, we're his trained ponies.  It will do us good to be in his world for a while."

[Mike_Trenham]

Golfweek when I was on the panel had you provide a rating on each of their ten factors.  This did not add up to your final rating, that was a separate entry.  Because the scores of the ten factors were private to me that seemed like the holy grail of information.  1) How consistent is the data with out a cheat sheet? 2) is there a group of panelists that is more consistent with each other than another group 3) is the panelist a complete poseur who has no knowledge of the topic or possibly a savant? 


Because they never shared that data in articles like “Panelists best Par 5s” I’m convinced the data shows dramatic inconsistency and proves how much so many of the panel is simply copying off the cheat sheet of prior years lists.  Magazines are in desperate need of content and they don’t show us this data.  I found reviewing the inventory most interesting when the first list arrived and when it expanded to 200.

[Tom_Doak]

Because they never shared that data in articles like “Panelists best Par 5s” I’m convinced the data shows dramatic inconsistency and proves how much so many of the panel is simply copying off the cheat sheet of prior years lists.  Magazines are in desperate need of content and they don’t show us this data.  I found reviewing the inventory most interesting when the first list arrived and when it expanded to 200.

Mike:


Your conclusion might be right, but at least back in my day, all of the magazines had a belief that the readers loved to argue about lists but didn't care about architecture per se, so a long article about the "why" behind the lists would be either boring or it would cut down on the debate.


The data from GOLF DIGEST [which they used to share with their panelists, some of whom would share it with me] was TOO consistent . . . the numbers assigned to courses showed pretty clearly that everyone was afraid to give the top 10 courses anything below a 9 except for maybe one category, or to give the consensus top 100 courses more than one or two 7's.  This reinforces the status quo strongly when you spread it out over 7-8 categories; it's like giving the favorites a 7-8 point lead instead of just one point.


But, that's the whole point.  The magazines WANT the lists to be pretty stable in the short term.  If they're not, it would cast doubt on the whole idea that the ranking is "definitive" in any way.  That's also the good thing about including new courses . . . you get some new things to write about, and if those same courses fall out later you can just write it off to initial exuberance.

[Ian Andrew]

Popularity has its limits.

If you want to learn about literature you don't read just the bestsellers or the prize winners.
You read. You read what you buy on a whim. You read what gets recommended by a friend.

You may read a prize winner because in the debates leading up someone says something that impacts you.
You also read what pisses someone off and end up hyper-curious. It may even change your mind!

We are the sum of our curiosity.

If we are not curious about what's on the other side of group-think.
We become the sum of their limitations.

[Ira Fishman]

Ian,


So well stated and so true.


A practical question for all. I have played and enjoyed courses recommended by people on here of whose names I have never even heard. But that probably has contributed to my participation in gc a.com groupthink. Where does one find solid recommendations for courses that are not in the gc a.com sweetspot/fandom?


Thanks.


Ira

[Joe Zucker]

A practical question for all. I have played and enjoyed courses recommended by people on here of whose names I have never even heard. But that probably has contributed to my participation in gc a.com groupthink. Where does one find solid recommendations for courses that are not in the gc a.com sweetspot/fandom?

That's an interesting question. My answer would be to ask locals. They will get you into the second layer of courses that fly below the national and international radar.  Every city has top restaurants, but locals can probably name 10 places that are almost as good or have something interesting unique that makes them special to people who love in the area. 


Golf courses are probably the same.  For example, as a native Clevelander I could share about the courses that fall below Canterbury and Pepper Pike. You've got to see Elyria (Flynn on the west side) or Fowler's Mill (early Pete Dye featured in the Gourmet's choice of the confidential guide) or Westwood (Colt & Alison course that has 7 really good holes playing through a valley and then a lot of average holes).  As someone not from the area, you've probably never heard of those three places.  There are not as many occasions to talk about these places when we are focused on the top 1% of courses, but they are all good courses. 

[Kyle Harris]

Ian,


So well stated and so true.


A practical question for all. I have played and enjoyed courses recommended by people on here of whose names I have never even heard. But that probably has contributed to my participation in gc a.com groupthink. Where does one find solid recommendations for courses that are not in the gc a.com sweetspot/fandom?


Thanks.


Ira

Literally any golfer if you're trying to avoid any type of GroupThink. Every golfer plays somewhere for some reason.

[Kyle Harris]

I recently finally listed all the courses I've played and gave them a rapid rating. The distribution here is largely normal with only 10% of my courses receiving the highest rating and another 10% getting the lowest. Median, mean, and mode are all the same.

Does this imply a ranking as well? How do I parse the 9s/8s/7s that litter my Top 100? GroupThink is a good a start as any for me to determine that the 9ness of Merion East is better than the 9ness of Old Town Club.

Try putting all the courses you've played in a rank order (maybe even just the top 200).  If you could do it, repeat the same thing in 6 months and I'd be interested to see the differences.  I think I would be unable to reproduce the same order immediately after I listed it.


I tried to make a rank order list.  I couldn't help but look at something like course 60 and realize I liked it more than course 50 but less than course 59 even though I liked course 50 more than 59.  For me there was no transitive property for golf courses, which is a tough pill to swallow for someone who likes to think of themselves as rational.

I get around this seeming contradiction on my own list by also having a rating on other factors that largely influence my desire to return.

Plenty of 6-7 rated golf courses have a high desirability rating. Plent of 8-9 rated golf courses that have a low desireability rating.

Nothing like a muni punching above it's weight that has about a ten minute turnaround from car door to first tee. Nothing more bothersome than an 8 resort course where the fuss of getting from the car to the first tee feels longer than the round of golf itself.

[Tim Gavrich]

I get around this seeming contradiction on my own list by also having a rating on other factors that largely influence my desire to return.

Plenty of 6-7 rated golf courses have a high desirability rating. Plent of 8-9 rated golf courses that have a low desireability rating.

Nothing like a muni punching above it's weight that has about a ten minute turnaround from car door to first tee. Nothing more bothersome than an 8 resort course where the fuss of getting from the car to the first tee feels longer than the round of golf itself.

Animal spirits!

[Don Mahaffey]

Group think allows artists to get comfortable.  Comfortable art allows those who grade by consensus to be comfortable in their analysis.
In golf we are really seeing that in the maintenance side where there are these trees guided by famous NE US supts who have convinced so many that the unimaginative and bureaucratic approach is the only way - as if you’ve spent enough time planning and have a large enough budget whatever you do can be justified regardless if it is actually noteworthy. 

[Kyle Harris]

Group think allows artists to get comfortable.  Comfortable art allows those who grade by consensus to be comfortable in their analysis.
In golf we are really seeing that in the maintenance side where there are these trees guided by famous NE US supts who have convinced so many that the unimaginative and bureaucratic approach is the only way - as if you’ve spent enough time planning and have a large enough budget whatever you do can be justified regardless if it is actually noteworthy.

Seen.

[Tim Gavrich]

I seem to recall that when I joined this site 20 (!) years ago, there was a latent frustration that the things the architecture nerd population collectively believed to be true about golf course design were not being implemented by most practicing architects of the day. I wasn't there at the formation of this site, but I would guess that GCA exists in the first place partly because of that feeling of frustration that the prevailing golf course groupthink was opposed to the shared feelings of the people who contributed here.

That's part of the reason why there used to be more passionate and occasionally nasty debate around these parts. It was a latent desire, almost desperation, for our thoughts about design to be more heard.

Years later, I almost think GCA has "won." I think prevailing popular sentiment about golf course architecture more closely reflects what has been discussed here than ever before. Is that groupthink, or is it just us getting what we claim we always wanted, and starting to convert people to our way of thinking about golf courses?

I take the high degree of agreement between various ranking entities as evidence that we have helped a lot of golfers lurch towards enlightenment about the design of the courses they play in the last couple of decades.

I have my own thoughts/takes about the current state of GCA that might be seen as contrary to the new groupthink, but every time I find myself starting to wonder if the Doak/C&C/Hanse cadre of architects is occupying too much of the greater GCA consciousness and imagination, I stop myself from even approaching disappointment or dismay because I recognize that their contributions to the art form are so influential that the contemporary approach to golf course design is undeniably better than it was pre-Recession.

If there is groupthink, it's a heck of a lot better than it used to be.

So what's the problem now? I think some current frustration is coming from the fact that we have created a group of people who are interested in design, but not at a level that is as deep as the rest of us are engaged. There is a nuance gap that will probably never be bridged. People who mispronounce "Biarritz" are here to stay; we'll just have to deal with it. Surface-level interest in design has become a currency that helps a new generation of golfers access and travel in the circles of the high-end private golf set.

If you're looking for criticisms of the current rankings, the most obvious one is also the oldest: that it is extremely difficult to decouple the social prestige and exclusivity of a given golf course from its actual architectural excellence. I can speak from experience: that's a conversation few golfers - even passionate GCA heads - are currently ready to have.

[John Kavanaugh]

Tim,


Why do you think that we have won? Could you give an example besides SV?

[Tom_Doak]

Popularity has its limits.

If you want to learn about literature you don't read just the bestsellers or the prize winners.
You read. You read what you buy on a whim. You read what gets recommended by a friend.

You may read a prize winner because in the debates leading up someone says something that impacts you.
You also read what pisses someone off and end up hyper-curious. It may even change your mind!

We are the sum of our curiosity.

If we are not curious about what's on the other side of group-think.
We become the sum of their limitations.

This is probably the best post on the thread, and reminds me of one reason the rankings bother me so much . . . because they don't have room for a lot of cool golf courses.


There is a "club" of people who have played all of the Top 100 Courses in the World, who are determined to keep up to date with the current lists.  [One or two of them post here.]  Many are panelists.  Unfortunately, a lot of them don't seem to have the curiosity than Ian is talking about here, or much appreciation for "lesser", older golf courses that are only 7's or 8's on the Doak scale.  They are too busy racing around to every new modern course to judge whether it should be "in the list" or ignored from here on out.


[I am not in the club.  I've always stayed just a couple of courses short of seeing all of the top 100 at any point, because there is always some course in there that just doesn't interest me as much as the courses that aren't in the list, and because I'm too practical to fly halfway around the world just to say I have seen them all.  But I believe I've seen more really good courses than any of those guys.]


I feel like the lists devalue "very good" architecture and cause architects to go for the gold, and that's part of why so many new courses seem varying degrees of overcooked for my tastes.


Ironically, I am starting to travel a bit now in order to complete the unfinished volume of The Confidential Guide, and my co-authors' fear is that there really aren't that many courses on the Continent of Europe or in Africa that are worth covering.  There certainly aren't many 8's or 9's based on the ones I've seen being near the top of all of those rankings . . . but I am looking forward to seeing what Denmark and Finland and Portugal and Morocco have in store.  Surely, it will be different than what's all the rage here now.

[Sean_A]

Only 7 or 8? You must be joking.

Ciao

[Ally Mcintosh]

Thanks for that last post, Tom….

[Michael Felton]

appreciation for "lesser", older golf courses that are only 7's or 8's on the Doak scale.  They are too busy racing around to every new modern course to judge whether it should be "in the list" or ignored from here on out.

This is partly why I always enjoy Sean A and Thomas Dai's posts on here - they are always noting off the beaten path places that are really fun to play.

[Ira Fishman]

An inchoate hypothesis about why the consensus or groupthink emerged to elevate ODG courses and the Dr. Mac principles: (a) GD raters are good players so as hard par, easy bogey became easy par they became a bit “bored” with the courses and 5+hour rounds (b) the magazine ranking system gave them access to ODG exclusive courses whose names were placed on the list they were supposed to visit (c) the ODG courses were troubled by the initial rankings so they used their media connections to draw attention to themselves (d) the revival of interest in the Open Championship led writers and raters to travel to the UK (e) lower airfare enabled the travel of raters (including to new, remote courses in the US) and (f) the USGA and PGA generally brought championships to ODG classic courses that put them on television.

[Peter Sayegh]

appreciation for "lesser", older golf courses that are only 7's or 8's on the Doak scale.  They are too busy racing around to every new modern course to judge whether it should be "in the list" or ignored from here on out.

This is partly why I always enjoy Sean A and Thomas Dai's posts on here - they are always noting off the beaten path places that are really fun to play.

My patron saints if I ever get over there.

[Mark_Fine]

All of us love off the beaten path courses that likely won’t make any Top 100 list.  At the risk of Ira’s wrath for saying this for the umpteenth time, many of my personal favorites won’t be on any list but my own.  But we are talking about Top 100 lists here and Groupthink does prevail with all those lists.  As someone pointed out even the likes of Tom Doak and Ran and many others we all respect give courses like PV a 10 despite its flaws. It’s groupthink!

I darn anyone here who is well traveled (or who at least has seen a ton of courses) to list what they believe are the 100 best courses in the world. I could care less the order, put them alphabetically if you like.  Without question they will have major overlap with the leading Top 100 lists.  If they don’t, they will have a lot of explaining to do    Groupthink will prevail and frankly many of these courses ARE indeed the best because they have been studied by many knowledgeable people.  Most of these courses, not all, are at least the best that many of us have seen on this planet.  And remember, the ones that fall outside the top 100 and are in the top 200 or even top 300 can probably be argued to swap with many in the top 100. They are all that close. 

[Tim Gavrich]

Tim,


Why do you think that we have won? Could you give an example besides SV?

I would cite half a dozen PGA Tour courses this year (Kapalua, Waialae, Memorial Park, Colonial, Oakmont, Renaissance) that have been laid out, renovated and/or restored by members of the Big Three, plus others influenced or soon to be influenced by Big Three-adjacent architects (Philly Cricket, Detroit GC, Sedgefield, East Lake) is one example.


Another would be the sheer demand for visits to the likes of Bandon, Sand Valley, Landmand, Pinehurst No. 2 and No. 10. Are there many American courses that are fully or nearly sold out for 2025 that weren't worked on by that cohort?


Another would be the list of recently opened courses by the Big Three and their advisees.


I also would count the comments from Rory McIlroy and other PGA Tour players about why venues matter when it comes to big tournaments. Rory referred to Pebble Beach as a "cathedral of the game," which I believe is a phrase the USGA has pushed as part of its recent messaging. Gil Hanse succeeding Rees Jones as the new "Open Doctor" is definitely a sign that GCA "groupthink" has gone well beyond the confines of this message board.

[John Kavanaugh]

Then why do we watch Shell’s Wonderful World of Golf and fawn for the past?

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