[Tiger_Bernhardt]

Tommy, Great guess. We are both back home now at work. Rich, did you play the course when they had fescue? If so how much faster and link like did it play?

[Tom Huckaby]

JG:

Would you pay $120 figuring you'd only get in 15 holes?

That's what starting at 4pm is gonna mean most likely.

Guarantee me 18 holes and hell yes it's worth $120.  Damn near all decent courses around here cost that or close to it on the weekends.

Doak 5, 6, 7 all work for me.  Saying it sucks remains pretty silly.

TH

[PThomas]

JG:

Guarantee me 18 holes and hell yes it's worth $120.  Damn near all decent courses around here cost that or close to it on the weekends.

Doak 5, 6, 7 all work for me.  Saying it sucks remains pretty silly.

TH

I agree

[Tom Huckaby]

Tommy, Great guess. We are both back home now at work. Rich, did you play the course when they had fescue? If so how much faster and link like did it play?

JB - I played it when it was fescue.  Fairways were a faster, greens were slower.  I really didn't think it was that big of a deal... The problem was it wasn't FIRM nearly anywhere.

TH

[John Goodman]

JG:

Would you pay $120 figuring you'd only get in 15 holes?

That's what starting at 4pm is gonna mean most likely.

No, not for 15 holes.  But I wouldn't pay for 15 at Pebble either (at least I don't think I would).  16 or thereabouts on Cypress would be another story . . .

[Tom Huckaby]

JG - not sure you'd want to stop on 16 CPC either... 17 is one hell of a golf hole.

But I get your drift.

 

[Adam Clayman]

I think I expressed my feelings about SB above and don't feel the need to add anything other than the fact that the next time I stay at Pebble Beach, I will play Pebble 7 times, Spyglass 3 times and Spanish Bay 0.

'nuf said.

Paul, All you said was that the green fee and marketing hype led you to think you'd be getting more than you did. If thats GCA analysis, I'm Oprah Winfrey.

[Tiger_Bernhardt]

Tom, thanks that would be my guess as well.

[Paul Richards]

>I'm Oprah Winfrey


Well, well, well!


Welcome, Oprah, to Golfclubatlas.com!!!!!!!!

 

[ForkaB]

Tommy, Great guess. We are both back home now at work. Rich, did you play the course when they had fescue? If so how much faster and link like did it play?

Tiger

The greens were slower and rougher (pretty much like a porly maintained UK links courses 20 years ago) and the fairways were tighter.  The rough was abominable--like Carnoustie 1999 on steroids.  You could lose your ball a yard or so off the green.  It never did really look or play like a links. That's probably why I was so disappointed.  All the hoopla (and the potential of that great site) said otherwise.  We (the golfing public) were promised a great links and ended up with just another OK/overpriced USA resort course.

[Darren_Kilfara]

Huckster, I've been disagreeing with you a lot lately in other threads, but I agree with you here. I can't speak to its current conditioning, but I've played SB at least 15 times (back in the late 80s and early 90s) - not counting the times I snuck out from our hotel to play holes 2-4 or even 2-10 at sunset - and at the time I loved it. I'm a little more educated about GCA now than I was then, but still...anyone who truly dislikes the course is taking themselves and the "lost opportunity" aspect of the discussion a little too seriously, IMHO.

By the way, on how many holes do the "environmentally sensitive" areas come into play? From the tone of this discussion, you'd have thought each and every hole was lined with fences on both sides. (And if those areas bother you so much, create your own local rule and play 'em as out-of-bounds, no?)

Cheers,
Darren

[ForkaB]

Darren

With all due respect, any golf course is great when you are playing it as a teenager and somebody else is footing the bill!  I have great memories too of the courses I played when I was 14-15, but few of these courses have showed themselves to me to be truly "great" in the cold light of adulthood and experience.

Would you spend $250 of your own hard earned money to play Spanish Bay again, even once just for nostalgia purposes?  I wouldn't.

[Darren_Kilfara]

If I was already on the Peninsula? Indeed, I might...

[ForkaB]

Understood, Darren.

Please let us know if and when you do and what you think of the course now.

Rich

[Tom Huckaby]

Darren - agree some times, disagree some times, hey that's why we're here.  

As for the ESA's, man some have come and gone over the years, or perhaps it's my memory.... I just remember some being there sometimes, not sometimes.  In any case, you are very correct in the memory that it's not like they are on EVERY hole.  Just on the front nine particularly, you play several holes in a row with pretty prominent ESA... so it rather sticks in your mind.  Heck, it's been a few years since I've played the course, so my memory is rather inexact as well.

ESA as a golf concept is just such a pain, ANY presence of it sucks.  Yes one can just play it as OB, but OB where you can plainly see the ball in a otherwise playable area ain't much fun either.

SB just always had a lot more ESA than most courses, that's all.

As for the rest, well... if one wants to say SB is not "great" with that term being reserved for the other truly wonderful courses around it like Pebble, Spyglass, MPCC x2, Cypress, than that's just fine.  It is inferior to those.  It also is grossly overpriced, but hell everything down there is.  Yes someone else with different vision might have been able to create something better on that site.

My issue remains with those would say it sucks, call it crap, etc.  There's no way what's there now is any of those things.  

TH

[Evan_Green]

I disagree that Spanish Bay is overpriced in an economic sense. For example, if one wanted to play there tomorrow (Friday), there are only two spots open for singles the whole day (from the Pebble Beach website). Thus, it seems to be there is plenty of demand to play Spanish Bay at the current rate of $240.

In terms of bang for your buck, it probably isn't one of the best deals in the country - but then again few people go to 5 star resorts to get a good deal  

[Tom Huckaby]

Evan - 100% agreement there - they are certainly having no issues filling the tee sheet - never have, never will.  That's one of the reasons I advised not to play at twilight and expect to finish.  

By overpriced I mean "not worth the money."  And of course everyone has their own thresholds there.

Just look at it this way:  if one can play Bayonet for $75, is Spanish Bay really worth three times that?

TH

[Darren_Kilfara]

It's obviously been a while since I've been to SB, because I'm pretty sure I played the fastest nine holes of my life there. I played the front nine there in about 1:05 - in a cart, granted, although on some of the holes which were cart paths only, that was hardly an advantage! (I was hitting the ball so well that in my teenaged excitement I was running from the cart to the ball, hitting my shots, pumping my fist and running back to the cart.)

[Tom Huckaby]

Darren - of course any golf course can be played quickly if one has no other golfers in the way.  I tell a classic story of my Dad and I playing Pebble Beach in 3 hours, and feeling like we were going slow.

The point is SB is generally packed dawn to dusk.  I defy you to play in less than 5 hours these days sans blasting through groups ahead of you.

 

[Evan_Green]

The point is SB is generally packed dawn to dusk.  I defy you to play in less than 5 hours these days sans blasting through groups ahead of you.

 

There's a solution to that Tom:

Book your $2000 oceafront suite a year in advance and the get the first tee time of the day  

[Bob_Huntley]

I'm a little more educated about GCA now than I was then, but still...anyone who truly dislikes the course is taking themselves and the "lost opportunity" aspect of the discussion a little too seriously, IMHO.

By the way, on how many holes do the "environmentally sensitive" areas come into play? From the tone of this discussion, you'd have thought each and every hole was lined with fences on both sides. (And if those areas bother you so much, create your own local rule and play 'em as out-of-bounds, no?)

Cheers,
Darren

Darren,

Obviously you were much too young to remember the hype that emanated from Jones Jnr., Watson and Tatum how Spanish Bay was to be a Scottish Links course with aspects of Cypress Point thrown in. I not only felt this was a "Lost Opportunity"  but with the man made ESA's thrown in it was apparent that someone's vision was lacking.

Tom,

Darren - agree some times, disagree some times, hey that's why we're here.  

As for the ESA's, man some have come and gone over the years, or perhaps it's my memory.... I just remember some being there sometimes, not sometimes.  In any case, you are very correct in the memory that it's not like they are on EVERY hole.  Just on the front nine particularly, you play several holes in a row with pretty prominent ESA... so it rather sticks in your mind.  Heck, it's been a few years since I've played the course, so my memory is rather inexact as well.

Tom,

"Just the front nine particularly."

There probably was no more irritating ESA crap than on the 10th hole, a hundred and something yards in front of the tee. I could go on.

Bob

[Tom Huckaby]

Evan - sounds like a plan.
 

Bob - you're right re #10.  Yes my memory has become inexact.  I just did remember even more on the front nine...

TH

[Adam Clayman]

The ridiculousness of the esa's could likely fill a volume.

First off, The place was a sand pit. I never saw it in such a state, (perhaps Bob did and could share?) but I would assume it was devoid of all life, plant and animal.

So why did the principles agree to such ridiculous constraints after they had restored some semblance of a natural coastline area?

I've always suspected that the esa's were not enviro-nazi dictated, rather the Co., in their infinite wisdom, thought it would help pace.

If the esa's were truely off limits, the balls would be stacked so high, no plants could grow.

[Tiger_Bernhardt]

Thanks Rich, I can see we are getting to the basic facts of how lost an opportunity this was. I remember an old movie was filmed on this land in the 20's or 30's. The land was as wild and beautiful as any place on the coast. This was a blank canvas with history making potential.

[Tom Huckaby]

Thanks Rich, I can see we are getting to the basic facts of how lost an opportunity this was. I remember an old movie was filmed on this land in the 20's or 30's. The land was as wild and beautiful as any place on the coast. This was a blank canvas with history making potential.

Was it really?

I guess it depends on who you ask.  I thought Mr. Huntley always said it was a sand/gravel mining pit or something like that...  That is, that land was no great shakes for golf.

So if that's true... well... sure again it could have been done better.

But history-making potential?

Methinks the only land available for that anywhere nearby is up the road across from Fort Ord - and we all know the liklihood of THAT ever happening.

TH

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