What are WE missing? Part II

[Jim Franklin]

I played in a tournament over the weekend, and one of the courses was a restored Raynor course that has been discussed here before called Elkridge. If I heard this complaint once, I heard it a thousand times at how tricked up the course was. Thumbprint this, "Gully that" (biarritz), "I can't see the bottom of the flag" (punchbowl). 90% of the competitors hated the course, but if you put them on Fishers Island, Chicago Golf Club, Shoreacres, Fox Chapel, or any other of the top ranked Raynor's, each person would rave at how great the course was.

It befuddles me at how people think a non-ranked course is "tricked up", but if it was a name course, the greens would be brilliant. What am I missing?

[Jeff Doerr]

Jim,

I think you are speaking to the privacy/access/elite mystique.

"You actually got to play ________ ?! How was it?"

"People drive at least 5 hours just to get to this place..."

"They are talking about eventually holding a US Open here."

"This was designed by _________ and is ranked # ____ by __________."



In the end Jim, if you can't get on because of access, distance, or $$ - it must be good!

[PThomas]

kind of like buying a fancy shirt for $100 v. the same quality shirt but a different brand for half the price:  only the name is different Jim!

[JESII]

Jim,


I think Pat Mucci makes a valid point on his "making golfer's think..." thread. When the leadership of the club addresses an issue up front and promotes the reasoning behind whatever the issue is...(in his case, newly used and challenging hole locations), people seem to fall into line with at least an understanding of the percieved shortcomings. In many ways, I think golfers are like the "Lemmings" Forrest talks about, going one way and believeing one thing because it is what they were told.

If, at the dinner for this tournament, the club President or golf chairman, had spoken for a few minutes on the merits of Seth Raynor and provided examples of his holes (the ones you said there was bitching about), I bet there would have been praise for the unique style as opposed to bitching about "fairness" of "normal". Thoughts?

[JESII]

Oh, I almost forgot...did you win?

[John Kavanaugh]

Jim,

For the most part the observations of the people this weekend were probably correct.  The biarritz was not built for years for good reason...and that reason is because it is stupid and does more to take away options then provide them.  I haven't seen the course in question but just maybe it isn't ranked for good reason.  Maybe Raynor's lucky ran out on that one...The reality of the situation is that a guy who didn't even play the game was going to miss at least once.  I think we pundits are more influenced by rankings and pedigree than the rank and file.

P...who buys a discount shirt for $50?  I saw whole suits for that much in Atlanta.

[John_Cullum]

.... 90% of the competitors hated the course, but if you put them on Fishers Island, Chicago Golf Club, Shoreacres, Fox Chapel, or any other of the top ranked Raynor's, each person would rave at how great the course was.

I'm not so sure about that. Most guys I play golf with have never heard of those courses or Seth Raynor. And they would probably not like Fishers because of the conditions resultung from lack of irrigation.

[Brent Hutto]

The only way WE miss the point is if WE lose sight of the fact that the stuff that floats our boat is maybe 10%-20% of what matters in a golf course. And by "matters" I mean the things that are valued by the entire population of people who are serious about golf.

1) The setting of a golf course matters. Even if it's not overlooking Montery Bay, most golfers consider a course offering views of nice scenery better than one without.

2) The reputation of a course matters. Obviously WE get this one because a lot of us spend extra time and effort to play courses on which Open Championships or US Opens have been played.

3) Exclusivity matters. This is the one thing that WE are probably most tempted to be hypocritical about. I don't care to play a mediocre course just because it's hard to access but I must admit being invited somewhere that not many people get to play makes a great course seem a little bit extra special.

4) Conditioning matters--it matters a lot. The ideal that WE share of golf course conditioning might be browner and firmer than the great mass of golfers out there but whatever our preferred course conditions, it is silly to pretend to be able to fully enjoy and appreciate the underlying bones of a golf course if it is scruffy or damaged or boggy or inconsistent from hole to hole and shot to shot.

5) The "quirk" or "fairness" issue, including blind shots, is the one element where sometimes WE need to admit it's different strokes for different folks. Even among the hard-core GCA cases on this forum there is a lot of variability in how much of that kind of thing is good sport versus a pain in the ass. For the great majority of golfers, they need to see the course out in front of them as long as they hit it in the fairway. I would argue that a little opening of minds would be to "their" benefit but then again if I'm the sort of person who can hit my targets as often as a Tour player maybe I'd be a lot less enamored of "quirk".

6) Amenities matter to some people. I know golfers who find the infrastructure and service of a place like the Bandon resort to be a huge plus. I know of others who wish the whole place was run like the Sheep Ranch. Once again, I think WE may have more of the former than WE think although some of the no-amenity crew are more vocal about their preferences on the forum.

Just the other day I was talking to a buddy about his last trip to the UK. Just a few days apart they played Loch Lomand and Seaton Carew. The fellows he was traveling with thought Loch Lomand was one of the high points of the trip and could take or leave the links at Seaton Carew. While fully acknowledging the gorgeous setting of the former (and the somewhat unsettling industrial landscape around the latter) he would gladly have stayed in Teeside for another day or two of golf and left off the crown jewel of the itenerary all together. His comment was that no scenery and exclusivity can make it worth crossing an ocean to play a course like the ones he can play any time he likes within a few hours drive of home.

My friend is far from being a GCA geek. In fact, he probably values course conditioning and "fairness" to an extent that our little group here would deride mercilessly. But he knows what elements of a golf course are rare and valuable and which ones are just a matter of money and access. I think that is the kind of discernment that WE might be able to inculcate in our presumably less enlightened fellow golfers. If we want our friends to see the wonderful elements that we can see in classic or modern "great" courses, we can't pretend that all the other stuff doesn't matter.

[Jim Franklin]

Sully -

I played as a guest of a friend that is 70 years old and is a 12 handicap from the senior tees. The tees we played were not the Senior tees and he struggled to reach any par 4 in regulation so we did not win. I putted horribly, I think due to Mucci's thread on the cheater line. Every time I looked at "The U" on my ball, I thought, "am I cheating?" and would proceed to three putt . I did have a hole-in-one so at least I didn't have to putt that hole .

I do agree that a presentation of Raynor holes and why some greens were built like they were would have helped immensely. This particular club takes pride in being the bluest of blue blood and none of these members or their guests for that matter have a problem with access. I know quite a few of the complainers that have played Chicago, Fishers and the like and told me how much they liked them, but would go on and on about how much they hated Elkridge. Too funny.

[George Pazin]

Any chance the complaints were due to the pressures of competition?

I've noticed plenty of golfers enjoy quirk, until it affects them negatively in a competition. "Tricked up" is a common refrain of the good ball-striker who doesn't score well.

Congrats on the hole in one - must have been an expensive one.

[Patrick_Mucci]

Jim Franklin,

A [size=8x] U[/color][/size]
isn't linear.

I think the issue you raise has to do with "Branding"

I also think that JES II's points are valid.

I think of the fellows walking through someones house and seeing a painting, one says, "look at that piece of sh**", the other one says, "that's a _____ and it's worth 4.7 million.
Then the first guy says, "wow, that really is a great painting"

Some people don't know and/or appreciate art and some people don't know and/or appreciate good golf course architecture.

It seems that if something is unique, creates interest and challenge, and is fun to deal with, that it must be bad architecture today.

I hear more and more golfers context the quality of golf course architecture in one word, "difficulty".

"Difficulty" seems to have overpowered almost every other aspect of golf course architecture by the general golfing population.

[Peter Pallotta]

Jim
I think one of the most important factors in being able to truly appreciate a golf course is our ability to pay attention; and to do that we have to first WANT to pay attention and then CHOOSE to pay attention.

There's probably never been more distractions in our daily lives than there are today, and I think most of us end up dealing with that by shutting down, i.e. by choosing, consciously or not, to actually pay less attention to the world around us rather than more. And we continue that way until something or someone gives us a reason to snap out of it.

I think golf rankings and reputations work a bit like that. The people you played with had been 'cued' to think that a course like Fishers was worthy of their attention ("great example of Raynor's style") and so when they played it they actually paid attention to what they were seeing and experiencing...and voila, they SAW and APPRECIATED those very things.

But then they come to Elkridge, and without those "cues" to snap them out of it, they couldn't muster up the desire to WANT to pay  attention, and thus neither saw nor appreciated anything.

Anyway, that's just one theory. I've mentioned before that one of the unexpected things this discussion board has done for me is that it's helped me appreciate much more the "mom and pop" and public courses I most often play. In other words, it's helped me to pay more attention to gca and to what I'm seeing on a golf course, and that has led me to begin seeing and appreciating the many wonderful features that even a modest course can have.

Peter

[Jim Franklin]

Peter -

All valid points and that is what I was thinking as well. If Elkridge was on someone's list, I am sure those players would appreciate the variety of shots that need to be played.

And Patrick, my balls say "The U" not just "U". That is a little more linear, but my putting still stunk.

[Dave_Miller]

I played in a tournament over the weekend, and one of the courses was a restored Raynor course that has been discussed here before called Elkridge. If I heard this complaint once, I heard it a thousand times at how tricked up the course was. Thumbprint this, "Gully that" (biarritz), "I can't see the bottom of the flag" (punchbowl). 90% of the competitors hated the course, but if you put them on Fishers Island, Chicago Golf Club, Shoreacres, Fox Chapel, or any other of the top ranked Raynor's, each person would rave at how great the course was.

It befuddles me at how people think a non-ranked course is "tricked up", but if it was a name course, the greens would be brilliant. What am I missing?

Jim:
You're not missing anything the others are.
Best
Dave

[Jerry Kluger]

Jim: It does seem that a vast percentage of the golfing public cares little about classical architecture unless it pertains to a course which has got name recognition.  For that matter, the same holds true of modern architecture with respect to many courses.  I have gotten some of the strangest looks from guys when I tell them I am going to Nebraska to play golf.

That being said, it might be said that sometimes we are overly enthusiastic about all courses which have an impressive heritage. By no means am I implying that is applicable to Elkridge since I've never played it, but not everything done 80 years ago is necessarily great.

[Chris Cupit]

Jim,

P...who buys a discount shirt for $50?  I saw whole suits for that much in Atlanta.

Yeah the leisure suite is still going strong down here--the poly blend doesn't rustle under all our hoods--better for sneaking up on the "undesireables" ya know

Come back and we'll learn ya about the War of Northern Agression whenever you can rest a spell

PS--If you hunt at a rumage sale, you can get a helluva used suit for $20

[John Kavanaugh]

The $50 suit was a Steve Harvey designer semi-zoot suit.  Nothing leisure about it.

[Chris Cupit]

How does it fit?

[Jim Franklin]

So I just got through playing some nice Long Island courses when one of my playing partners comments that "National is nice, but have you played Atlantic or the Bridge? Those places are so much better because they are in perfect condition". This guy is a scratch player too. I almost threw up.

I get back home to my club and one of the better players at my club says the same damn thing. I was totally baffled. I had so much fun playing NGLA and the variety of shots it calls for that I cannot fathom what these people are looking at. Why do they play the game if they want everything straight forward and handed to them on a silver platter.

[W.H. Cosgrove]

I sat with the green chairman at my own club yesterday and he was commenting that after a few months on the job, he replaced me after I was 'fired' by the previous president, that the membership should be constantly shown and educated about the qualities of our course.  Well duh......