However, what I think should matter is how the other 99% of people play the game.
Absolutely. I might quibble with 99% (I don't think angles matter often a ton for anyone who can fly-it-and-stop-it, so 2 handicaps or better? 5? Something like that…), but yeah, still north of 90%.
Unfortunately, for that type of discussion, there's a lot of anecdata out there.
For example, the classic "fairway bunker left, greenside bunker short-right." The "classic" approach (I'm quoting that not as a quote of anyone but to say that "classic" and "modern" are just the words I'm using, though there may be better ones) would say "you want to hug the fairway bunker left so you have the best angle to the green." The "modern" approach may, depending on the type of golfer, say that while all bunkers should be avoided, the fairway bunker has more potential to ruin score than the greenside one, particularly since it's not like hugging the left bunker
eliminates the greenside bunker, it only slightly changes the angle to it.
The angles that we talk about are often not that big. I don't have a left fairway bunker here, but here's a 100 yard shot. I don't expect everyone to play from the literal edges of the fairway, so consider that this fairway at ~25 yards wide represents a shot from the "left-center" of the fairway versus the "right-center" of a maybe 40-yard-wide fairway.
The angle is only 15° here. From 100 yards. At 160, the angle would be ~9°.
So let's say this shot represents a bogey golfer's conundrum. He's standing on the tee of a par four that will require a 6-iron from 160. He isn't that strong, so he's going to bounce the ball up a bit. The fairway is 35 yards wide, with a fairway bunker right where his drive lands to the left side, and this green complex up ahead. In fact, for this discussion, let's pretend it's this:
Those are two lines coming in from 160 out and 25 yards apart. I've erased the left side greenside bunkers and re-oriented the perspective (rotated the image).
The golfer is aimed at the center of the green in both cases, but here are some questions:
- How much risk of the short-right bunkers is the golfer still taking on from the left line.
- In taking that left line, how much additional risk is the golfer taking on of being near the fairway bunker?
- Regardless of the origin point off the tee (including left and right roughs, left fairway bunker, and all positions in the fairway), isn't the ideal aiming point for this bogey golfer quite likely to be at the left edge of the green, helping him to avoid ALL of the greenside bunkers?
I think that GCA can talk itself in circles a little bit. Angles don't matter for good players when they can play an aerial game. So, okay, angles matter for a poorer player or really firm conditions when the ball is rolling. But those conditions, in many places (I'm not looking at you, sand belt courses in Australia, Bandon, Scotland, etc.), don't exist. So "classic" strategy doesn't exist often for the better player… and for the poorer player they often can't rely on hitting their tee shots to within 9°, and even then, their approach shot strategy really probably doesn't change very much anyway — so they're often best advised to avoid the trouble with BOTH shots. Give both shots a wide berth.
Now, this doesn't speak to the "thrill" or mindset or whatever you'd like to call it of the bogey golfer saying "okay, if I want the best look, I have to hug that fairway bunker" and the 1 time out of 5 he pulls that off, and then the 2 times out of 5 he pulls off the approach shot… he can feel good about himself, I suppose, about "meeting the challenge of the architect and besting him" or something… but the other 92% of the time, the guy's setting himself up for failure. Sure, maybe he pulls the first shot off 20% of the time, but then pulls the ball left because he's afraid of the greenside bunkers, and then hits a good chip or makes a good putt to save par.
In other words (and again excluding golf courses that are firm and fast), it seems to me that "modern" golf strategy has taught us that:
- Angles don't matter for anyone who can play the aerial game, as most "hazards" are effectively two-dimensional, and the aerial player can plot his path point-to-point.
- Angles are pretty narrow, and the guy who relies on bounce/roll to get around because he can't play the aerial game often isn't anywhere near good enough to "chase angles" or to "play for angles." They're really pretty small, and they don't have you skirting by hazards by very much more than you would if you played safely.
Now, I gave an example here, and I'm NOT proposing it's anything other than just an example: it's meant to
illustrate only, to provide some context.
I understand the feeling of staring at a flag where you see mostly sand and being 25 yards to the left where you see much more of the putting surface. I get how that
feels quite different to the player. I've experienced it myself — not as much for myself but when caddying or coaching some of my players, or my daughter.
But if you're that guy or gal standing there,
odds are, the ideal line is left of that bunker anyway. That guy shouldn't be looking at the flag over the bunker - he should be looking at the left fringe (and probably the back-left fringe because he rarely hits it as solidly as he thinks).
I bolded "odds are" because again, that's how I think, and how I've always kinda approached this stuff. Maybe I'm
massively under-valuing just how many golfers love the thrill of hitting it at every flag and pulling off the 1 in 20 or even 1 in 5 shots. But then I'd almost argue against myself (arguing against myself) that the golfer might be more thrilled to pull that shot off going over the bunker after they bail out on the tee shot (skirting a fairway bunker isn't nearly as thrilling as hitting over one to 12 feet for birdie).
People tell me I don't like Tobacco Road as much as they do because I play it too sensibly, I don't take on hero shots… and then in a topic like this, everyone acts like golfers are sensible and playing angles all the time.
So I wrote a fair bit there, and it's a bit less prepared and a bit more stream-of-thought than is usual for me, but at the end of the day I guess it feels like maybe a lot of the discussion continues because people are talking more about how things feel, while having been trained a certain "classic" sort of way, but that "modern" strategy would say angles matter somewhat, but really, very little: "modern" strategy would have someone aiming 25 yards right of that fairway bunker (the bogey golfer is still going to be in it a LOT), and well left of the center of the green on the approach shot.
In other words, angles don't matter much to those who play the aerial game, but those who play the aerial game are often the only people good enough to chase angles a little bit (and even then, they should generally avoid trying to do so), because they're the only ones whose Shot Zones tend to be small enough to care about a 9° better angle into something while taking on a bit more risk.