McCloskey,
Correct that the golf course is not severe in terms of site. I will ignore your accusatory drivel regarding my architectural sensibilities. I am a ghost at best on GCA these days and although I do not have the time to chime in, my taste is not diminished.
That stated, my patience with arrogant idiots definitely has.
Old Greenwood is a decent golf course for a membership of low handicappers who buy into the Nicklaus philosophy of aerial approaches and slender greens guarded in front by deep bunkers.
The problem is that the majority of the people on the golf course are middle handicappers who can no more carry and stop a 4-iron (with a skinny opening between bunkers) to an elevated green than I can whistle a one-iron to a tucked pin at the edge of the drink.
The topography is similar to Lahontan - right across the meadow. Lahontan is a wonderfully conceived golf course that is enjoyable for everyone. There are OPTIONS on most every approach, and the mounding and greensite conceptions are varied and blend beautifully into the surrounds.
Old Greenwood is forced, indulgent and lacking in surprise, whimsy or visual attraction. If it was not surrounded by the beautiful Sierras it would be another one of Jack's faceless, forgetable exercises in housing prostitution. It is putrid. Not in and of itself, but as another lost opportunity, sacrificed at the altar of a "name architect" who mailed it in and flushed twice.
To compare this antiseptic examination favorably to Coyote Moon is frankly an indictment of your basic sanity - and if you have been mistakenly appointed to a rating panel I suggest you resign and relocate to a foreign country - preferably one without golf courses.
THE POINT OF GOLF IS FUN. Old Greenwood is not fun unless you are a stick. We played behind this foursome of two charming elderly couples. By the 12th hole, they were expelling brain fluid from the savage beating they were absorbing, suffering from Jack's latest bilious exercise in pompous machisimo.
They had bought into the housing hustle as a "retirement lifestyle" yet could barely finish at least six of the holes. If you cannot run the ball up SOMEWHERE, FROM SOME ANGLE, how does Winston and Agnes Havershire play the course well into their dotage?
Our pace was six hours. The Marshal (player assistant) suggested our foursome, playing two balls each, ought to "slow up a bit because we were pressing the group in front."
It was not their fault, really. Not everybody can play like Huntley at Arnie Palmer's age . . . . get it?
I know the world was sobbing during the Nicklaus love-fest at St. Andrews and I ought to tread more lightly on a legend . . . . so I'll admit Old Greenwood is not as horrible as Pasadera.
But, now that we know he is capable of genius (see Mayacama), it makes this offering even more egregious.
If left to his own devices at Sebonac - i.e. without the guiding hand of Doak - a course like this would find *even* Jack hanging from the yard arm of one of the yachts off Bulls Head Bay - 18 majors or not.
In a case like that, investors want more than a name. They want something special enough to hold up its head in the toughest neighborhood this side of Pebble Beach.
Best of luck to them . . . . glad it is not my checkbook handing over a couple million in fees.
End of Spew.
P.S. The Redhead thought it sucked.