Quote from: mdugger on November 17, 2003, 05:36:27 PM

Everyone who has looked at that property has commented that it is inferior to the first two pieces of land.  

Ooooh,  quote quote.

I think I commented on the land after I walked it last February.  I don't think I ever said it was inferior to other two sites but I might have said (and still feel) that it is the most challenging site of the three to design on.   I have plenty of confidence in the group to impress us with a grand result... again.  It's all very exciting to think that there'll be 3 fab courses to choose from.  That's strategic golf.  

I don't think there are too many sites left that only require seeding and cutting cups to open for play.

Have C&C done anything more than the minimal amount of earthwork on any of their designs so far?

The think the term "minimalist" is a little overused, and has several degrees to it's definition. I don't think capping fairway features with sand, but keeping the same ground contours can be classified as not minamalist. It is simply creating a proper growing environment for turfgrass. If the native material was appropriate, we wouldn't be talking about this.

Have these guys done any work that could have been any more "minimal" than the site they were given? I don't think so, IMHO.


DPL11

SPDB,

I my inimitable style, I concede nothing.
This is all speculation on your part and everyone else's part.
See my reference to Brad Klein to get my true feelings on this.

You label the falloff behind the 5th green as a gentle fall off ?

The clubhouse sits on a promontory and so does the 5th green which is almost parallel to the clubhouse, and next to the sixth tee.

Perhaps the photo on page 56 of "Golf Clubs of the MGA" will refresh your memory.  In describing the 6th hole Dr Quirin writes, "the hole plays from a tee elevated FAR above a tumbling fairway."   "Where one can enjoy one of the most breathtaking vistas in Met Area Golf, with both Greenwich and Stamford in sight across the sound."

I've lost my soft draw, so the tennis courts seem safe.
I would think that photos from the left rough line, centerline and right rough line shoud provide sufficient evidence for us to settle this.

"Greens on the new course might have annual blue grass, the type of grass used on nearly every course that has been in the rotation to host the U.S. Open, Russell said."

Does anyone else interpret this to mean they see this being the course (not the first two) that would host a big event (no slight against the Walker Cup) in the future?  It is hard to tell based on how that quote is typed where Russell's quote ends.  Was he making the point about annual blue grass be used on nearly every course on the US Open rotation or was that the journalist providing background?  

 

Mike Erdman:

Thanks for your report. Amidst all the speculation, it is nice to hear from someone who has actually walked the property.

I'm going to remember your comments. Much of the rest just seems like noise.

SPDB,

Pat -If you are referring to the immediate drop behind the green, I'll concede that (see, its easy), but it is really only a 10 foot drop at most to the road that winds its way down to the beach club. And a 10 foot drop doesn't negate the view of the 100 foot high trees behind the green.

Ten foot drop ?  Look at the picture, and then tell me how far below the 5th green, the sixth green sits ??
And then tell me how much lower the beach club sits relative to the sixth and fifth greens.  When I was a kid, we searched our lives to find a steep drop off like that for toboganing and sledding


It's really a shame that you think its a skyline green. Part of the allure of the 6th Tee is it affords you for the first time a view of the sweep of the course as well as the Long Island Sound and Westchester.

AHA, now you're starting to get it.  On the 5th, all you see is skyline, not the horizon, hence, it's a skyline green.
A skyline green means that you don't see the horizon.
You're clearly confused  

If the 5th Green were really a skyline green, as you insist, it would be on that green where the view is first made.
 
WRONG, then it wouldn't be a skyline green, but a vista including everything in sight to the horizon  

Are you sure that you understand the nature of a skyline green

P.S. Did you know that Joe Dey had eliminated all but 3 bunkers at The Creek in order to make it fairer? I've tried to no avail to get Tom Doak to tell me which 3 were spared.

Sadly, as nice a fellow and a good administrator, Joe Dey fell victim of the need to make the course fairer, not really grasping the architectural intent.  One would think that visits to nearby Piping Rock and NGLA would have created a greater sense of awareness.

He reminds me a lot of TEPaul, great guys, but they just don't get it.  

"P.S. Did you know that Joe Dey had eliminated all but 3 bunkers at The Creek in order to make it fairer? I've tried to no avail to get Tom Doak to tell me which 3 were spared."

and,

"Sadly, as nice a fellow and a good administrator, Joe Dey fell victim of the need to make the course fairer, not really grasping the architectural intent.  One would think that visits to nearby Piping Rock and NGLA would have created a greater sense of awareness."

You must be joking--Joe Dey eliminated all but three bunkers at The Creek? I don't think so. He eliminated some bunkers maybe even a lot of bunkers but I sure didn't hear he eliminated all the bunkers but three. I spent a couple of days there a few weeks ago and it seems like I met and spoke to everyone there who's responsible for the golf course and nobody said he eliminated all but three bunkers. Nobody said he eliminated those bunkers in the name of fairness either and this from people who knew Joe Dey well and worked with him on the green committee and such. Joe Dey eliminated some bunkers simply because he didn't like spending the money to maintain some of the bunkers. Joe Dey also apparently couldn't stand to even hear the name C.B. Macdonald--basically he couldn't stand the guy, saying things like;

"Don't talk about that man--he didn't know anything about golf course architecture."

The word is during the tenure of Joe Dey's oversight of the course at the Creek the course became somewhat neglected and sort of rundown and Joe did the things he did at the Creek not in the name of fairness but because he was an unusually penurious man! There's a story that Joe recommended (a recommendation the club accepted) dropping a land option the Creek held for eons that was so attractive I don't even want to think about it much less talk about it. But in fairness to Joe Dey and the Creek at that time they just felt they did not have the money and did not feel like going into debt. Easy for us to say they should've excercised it back then and gone into debt at that time but then again Joe Dey was an unusually penurious man. Damn shame, though, because had they excerised that option back then they could've sold a single acre of that massive chunk today and payed for that whole chunk of land about four times over! And with all that money they could've done God knows what to the course--certainly they could've used some of it to restore the sand to the bunkers Joe Dey removed the sand from in the name of saving money! Probably would've had a ton left over too for all kinds of whiskey and wine money to keep people like me oiled for free when I was there and when I go back. But Joe Dey was just an unusually penurious man so it wasn't to be. That kinda thing happens in the annals of some clubs sometimes.

All this penuriousness at the Creek is frankly unbelievably ironic as the group of men who founded the Creek Club back in the 1920s were without question the biggest collection of heavy hitters the world of golf clubs has ever known, bar none, end of story, period, exclamation mark! They were the absolute creme de la creme of the New York and Long Island financial, legal and social world. So it's ironic as hell that the Creek would've ever devolved into penuriousness of any kind but they did under Joe Dey's tenure.

For any of you out there who don't know what penuriousness means---it means rock bottom, bottom of the barrel Scottish/Calvinist CHEAP! But what the hell, maybe none of us need to get on Joe Dey's case at this point particularly the way some of you Golfclubatlas.com contributors and brilliant golf architecture analysts are throwing some terms around recently. Maybe it'd just be a better and a more proper thing at this point to call Joe Dey a "Minimalist" and leave it at that!"    
 

This whole thread is ridiculous, and I've tried not to say anything about it (I haven't even read the middle half).  But, as to the above, when we restored The Creek it still had a lot of bunkers, though quite a few had been changed.

We were told by the superintendent (Bill Jones, now at Friar's Head) that when Mr. Dey was green chairman, he had his own master plan for the course, and that eventually he would have eliminated all but four of the bunkers.  Bill never said which four; he just said that Mr. Dey liked to talk about how Augusta only had 22 bunkers to start with, and he thought that was the right idea (even though Macdonald's Creek had about 150).

As for the new course at Bandon, I think it's absolutely pointless for any of you to be speculating and arguing about it.  Unless Bill Coore or Mike Keiser comes on here to discuss what they're doing, everything is pure gossip.  All you can do is wait and see what they come up with.

I'll be excited to see the result.

P.S.  For the record, the most-photographed hole at Pacific Dunes, #13, was blown down to the sandstone when we started, and we had to cap it.  We didn't have any trouble tying it in, though ... we capped it from the cliff on the left to the edge of the bunkers all along the right.  Is that minimalist?  Why should I care??

This whole thread is ridiculous... I'll be excited to see the result.

Mr. Doak,
Thank you for the "Posting of the Year"  

Pat -

How is this possible, really? Think about it for a second. We are not talking about the view from the fairway (the criteria for a skyline green), but the view once you reach the green. If you think about it, your response is absurd. :

If the 5th Green were really a skyline green, as you insist, it would be on that green where the view is first made.

WRONG, then it wouldn't be a skyline green, but a vista including everything in sight to the horizon  

This whole time I have been laboring under the assumption that you knew what a skyline green was.

Let me ask you a quick question:

If you had to characterize the shape of #5 would you call it gentle left, straight or gentle right? Same question as to the green orientation.

"P.S.  For the record, the most-photographed hole at Pacific Dunes, #13, was blown down to the sandstone when we started, and we had to cap it.  We didn't have any trouble tying it in, though ... we capped it from the cliff on the left to the edge of the bunkers all along the right.  Is that minimalist?  Why should I care??"

TomD;

You definitely should not care--no one should. This whole subject and discussion of "minimalism" is going on quite a ride--a really ridiculous ride on here!

You know who I envy in all of this.  Baby Erin.  Here we are, a bunch of middle aged+ white men typing away in our pajamas.  We were here when Baby Erin finally fell asleep, and we are here before she wakes.  Now Margaret, are you sure you want to get yourself tangled up in this sort of sleepless exchange of prattle?  

Dr Katz, what do you have for inducing a coma? I'll take a years supply, thanks...

RJ:

Absolutely!  What's not to love about being cuddled, kissed and spoken to in warm, lovey hushed tones the majority of your waking hours intermingled with food and warm baths?

I really enjoy this web site and wish that I had more time to lurk & learn and occasionally post.  That said, regardless of my degree of interest, were it not for precious Erin, I can assure you that I would not have been on this site late last evening/early this morning.  She is a wonderfully good-natured baby.  Neither she nor her twin brother cry unless it is really important, but, at least once a week, Erin wakes up between 10p-11p full of energy and just wants some action for a few hours.  No matter how long she stays awake, her wake up time never changes.  Thankfully, twin brother, Ennis, seldom wakes up during the night.    

Strangely, last night, she fell asleep well-within 90 minutes of getting up.  I assure you, that the next time Erin wants some late night action, either Mom or Dad will again sign onto this web site!  She was really engrossed for about 30 minutes.  She fought sleep for a while, but not too long.  Magic!    

I'll never argue with success!  

My curiosity is, what will he build on the fourth site, and who will he choose to design it.

Pat, I know one thing:

Coore and Crenshaw won't do it

Someone had to.

Jeff Goldman