Are angles of attack obsolete?

[George Pazin]

Has the combination of long drives and high spinning wedges rendered the notion of favorable angles of attack for a green obsolete? If so, can anything be done other than reining in technology?

[Gary_Nelson]

I suppose if the greens are firm enough it would put back an emphasis on angle of attack.

[Matt_Ward]

George:

The answer in a word -- NO !!!

There are plenty of modern designs I have played in '04 which demonstrate that the player needs more than just the gorilla tee shot and superior wedge game skills to achieve success.

The onus is on architects to design greens that do require positioning and to have superintendents provide for a playing site that is not heavily watered and allows for the bounce of the ball to be an integral element when playing.

[W.H. Cosgrove]

As sorry as this seems at the very top levels technology has rendered strategy irrelevant.

For you and I......the game maintains all of it's mystery difficulty and strategy.  

These are the reasons that professional golf holds little or no interest for me.  Watching the pros play is liking watching paint dry.  The networks don't help with their inane commercial filled coverage.  

[David_Tepper]

Clearly, the PGA Tour has tried to keep angles of attack  relevant by pushing pin positions closer and closer to the edges of greens over the past few years.  This past year, it has seemed that many pin positions were within 3 or 4 paces of the greens' edge.  Between doing that and firming up greens, there is not much else that can be done.  

[DMoriarty]

Obsolete in the minds of most modern architects and the people who play their courses?  Yes.  

[Paul Richards]

dave


> I can't think of a single hole on a single course anywhere in the world where, given a wedge-in-hand and nae wind, throwing a wedge in the air isn't a better play than bumping it in.  Can you?


I can think of lots of examples.  However, most involve me and my LOFT (lack of f@#$^&g talent) with a wedge!  


But seriously, on any 'real' links course, I'd much rather putt it up than risk wedging into a rock-hard green.

[Patrick_Mucci]

George,

Has the combination of long drives and high spinning wedges rendered the notion of favorable angles of attack for a green obsolete?

Obsolete, NO, greatly diminished, YES.[/color]

If so, can anything be done other than reining in technology?

NO[/color]

[Steve Lang]

 

George,

You could plant some strategic shaped trees..

oh my gosh.. would that really be a sin?

[Patrick_Mucci]

Dave,

I'd say from every distance.

Just replay each hole at NGLA and you can see that strategy remains in tact at many of the holes, from the tee to the variety of approach shots.

[George Pazin]

Paul, from what distance?

I agree, but without nearly inhuman amounts of practice, I'd say there are hugely diminishing returns even on links courses once you get outside 30 yards.  You can putt from 70 yards.  I'll take the LW.  Don't forget, even if the pin is tucked, you can always just hit it at it, and be 25 feet past or whatever.  That's about as good as I could even compreheld with a putter, even from the best angle.

Interesting, as my tapes of the Open Champ. in '00 show numerous players, from Tiger to Ernie to Westwood, putting from as much as 50 yards off the green on TOC. And most would say the weather that week was rather serene.

Additionally, Tripp Davis, a nationally ranked amateur golfer, indicated on the Wannamoisett thread that he felt there were greens (I think he mentioned #6 Engineers) that were more suited to a club that you could hit with less spin and allow it to release, as opposed to throwing up a lob wedge. Aaaah, what does he know?

Furthermore, this year Phil stopped flopping everything in sight at The Masters and actually won!

Several of the fallaway greens at Oakmont would seem to be more receptive to bump and runs than lob wedges.

[Doug_Feeney]

George,

Reading your last post I agree that often it is much better to "bump and run" or sometimes simply run the ball to certain greens, but this assumes firmness.  

Matt Ward mentioned this in an earlier post - saying it was up to the super not to overwater.  Unfortunately, this is not the case at the majority of the courses in the US.  I played at Nantucket this past weekend and it was the first time I've run a shot up from 80 yards in quite some time - it was pretty fun I have to admit.

Soften the greens and I'll take the L Wedge every time.

[Kelly Blake Moran]

George,

As a player on my courses, and on other courses I attempt to play to a favorable side, and seek a favorable angle into the green.  Whether I really need to or not, in other words, whether this approach to the game really benefits my score in a big way or not is not the real issue with me.  It is a matter of choice to play the game in a manner that gives me the most pleasure and that is trying to exploit the little nuances that exist.  I could just bang away and get satisfaction out of hitting it big with little regard for what part of the fairway I find, but that would diminish the tremendous satisfaction I get in trying to exploit the hole by shot placement.  Of course it doesn't help that I still play blades and have gone back to my perssimon woods, except for the ball I guess I am still playing by 1970's standards but I found you really don't need more than that to still draw pleasure from the game.  At my age it is not only the score that counts anymore, it is the pleasure gain from how you play the game that matters too, and it is more of a pleasure to hit my persimmon driver than it is to clang my Titelist metal down the fairway.  I don't know if I answered your question, I am still suffering from watching Senator Jesus at the last debate.

[Patrick_Mucci]

George Pazin,

Do you feel that the playing conditions at TOC are representative of the playing conditions in the United States, taking in to account, the Southeast/west, Northeast, Midwest, and Far West ?

[George Pazin]

Patrick -

I can't really say, having not played TOC or, in fact, many courses around the US. I was simply pointing out to DS that there are instances in which others don't just automatically pull out the lob wedge. I do think it would be better for everyone if they were to frequently play the conditions as they appeared to be at TOC.

Dave -

I find the points that you make quite interesting and telling. I personally can tell you 2 of the most satisfying shots I've hit in my 8 year golf career were bump and runs that rolled up to within 10 feet of the hole (one was a 7 iron from 100 yards and the other was a 6 iron from about 130 - I should add these distances are quite a bit short of my normal distances for these clubs). And, in the interest of full disclosure, I'd say I've tried intentionally bump and runs less than 10 times in those 8 years. And I have not ever really practiced the shot. Both instances were pure feel shots, and boy did they ever feel good. I don't doubt that a competitive player should go with his strengths, but maybe if conditions and courses were a little different (i.e. not so predominantly favoring the aerial drop and stop game), more competitors would actually practice and play these shots.

-----

I tend to agree with Patrick - I don't think angles are obsolete, but they have been greatly diminshed. I do, however, think that courses built differently and conditioned differently might enhance other options and bring back angles.

Sadly, I don't think that's what most people want. And I don't see many people out there advocating otherwise.

[George Pazin]

there is often an inverse correlation between satisfying and smart.

I can't really argue with this.

I guess I'm lucky, because I'm so lousy, I just play the game for fun.

I do think there is an element of design and conditioning that would encourage the bump and run and actually make it the smart play, but I don't see us heading that way anytime soon.

[Patrick_Mucci]

Dave,

You're confused, or, I'm confused, or we're both confused.
We're talking about two different things.

I'm talking about strategy and the impact of high tech, distance, loft, aerial approaches, and you're talking about putting from off of the green.

[DMoriarty]

Yeah, Dave, I agree.  See, here's the thing.  You throw wedges and short irons at the flag, too, even on highly strategic courses.

Honestly, I can't think of a single hole on a single course anywhere in the world where, given a wedge-in-hand and nae wind, throwing a wedge in the air isn't a better play than bumping it in.  Can you?

Not sure you are agreeing with me or with David Tepper, but it is me you should know that I was being sarcastic, attempting to point out that it is difficult to say much about the strategic courses because there arent that many that have been built in the last 70 years.

Yes I can think of plenty of holes where one has a real choice of whether to bounce it in rather than fly it in from wedge distance, or for that matter from any distance.  My home course has plenty, but you guys are sick of hearing about it.  

As for my play at SA, some of the shots you saw were simply bad swings, not attempts to run it in or do anything else but hit it straight.  I did try to run it through the biarritz (and probably would again) and I did bounce it in to the front of a green as opposed to going for a tucked pin.  Other than that I think it was just crummy play.

[Mike_Young]

I think that greens with enough slope from right to left or left to right depending on the preferred approach angle can still create difficulty in the approach.  I also think a more vertical transitionfrom chipping area to green on the high  side of such greens increases risk from a wrong angle.  Even if you can stop the ball it will still release to the downhill side.

[Willie_Dow]

Thanks for this subject!

This is a an important feature for the golf architecture of the future.

We have narrrowed the trail of the ball, which has narrowed the future of golf - I think.

The USGA has protected PAR - agreed ?  By doing so they have tightened fairways, portrayed a wide fairway as too easy, which has resulted in all designers and clubs trying to match an Open design.

Willie

[Patrick_Mucci]

Willie Dow,

Most times a band aid, or quick fix, doesn't cure the patient in the long run.

I would take your statement a step further.

Clubs, average clubs, are now trying to emulate difficulty as viewed in the context of Open set-ups, on their golf courses, with narrowed fairways and rough that is beyond their member's ability to cope with.

[TEPaul]

In my opinion, the angles of attack are not obsolete despite the distance some players hit the ball and particularly how high most long hitters hit the ball today. But the same maintenance practices cannot prevail on greens as have for many decades after WW2---eg softer and far more receptive greens.

Basically Gary Nelson has it exactly right in reply #2. The degree to which greens and angles of attack today are NOT rendered obsolete is the degree to which the green surfaces are firm and also the degree of the speed of the greens.

If you have greens surfaces that only very lightly dent to a really well struck short iron off a fairway the angles of preferrable attack and the angles that are not preferrable WILL NOT be rendered obsolete.

This was specifically the point Nick Faldo made while playing Merion for the first time a few summers ago. The course was very wet and the greens extremely receptive to aerial shots. He said in that condition and good player will score well and the various angles of attack basically have no influence or effect on him. But he said if the green surfaces were firm and the greens running at a really good speed all the strategic ramifications of something like preferrable angles of attack (or not) are very much back in play.

It's all part and parcel of the maintenance practices that MELD "ideally" into particular types and styles of golf architecture.

[BCrosby]

The other day I ran across a Bobby Jones piece that talks about how important green "firmness" is to preserving angles of attack.

The money quote goes:

"When one goes to the trouble of placing a bunker across the left side of the green in order to force the tee shot toward the right side of the fairway, why destroy its effect by soaking the green so that any sort of pitch over the bunker will hold?...

It seems to me that the ideal green would be sufficiently soft only to hold a properly played pitch - and by "hold" I do not mean to say within a very few feet. To carry out the intention of the designer, conditions ought to be such that a definite penalty should be sustained by the player who has played himself out of postion.

In this connection, I think one of our greatest needs is a fairway grass or treatment that will make the ground in front of the green more reliable. If the greens themselves are maintained in a firmer condition, the need must arise on occasions to drop the ball short of the putting surface, allowing us to roll the remaining distance. I know of very few courses where this is possible without great uncetainty."

All of that strikes me as exactly right. You can kill the strategic interest of a golf hole with too much watering. And, as Jones notes, its not just the greens that need to be kept firm. It's the green surrounds as well.

Jones doesn't use TEP's felicitous phrase "maintenance meld", but he comes darn close. He certainly agrees with the concept and how important it is.

Jones was also aware that soft greens gave better players one more way to ignore the strategic defenses of a course:

"Our expert players are in the habit of playing long irons and spoons and brassie shots bang up to the hole. As long as they can do this, no architect can expect them to worry much about placing tee shots."

(Jones didn't contemplate 150 yard PW approaches after 320 yard drives, but the distance issue is a topic for another discussion.)


Bob

P.S. As if any were needed, but this is further proof of how smart Jones was. What an extraordinary man.

[TEPaul]

Bob:

That's terrific to see those quotes from Bob Jones on this subject. The proper degree of green surface firmness certainly will keep angles of attack relevent but one does need to remember when a course puts real pressure on golfers approaching pins from wrong angles through green surface firmness it really does need to keep approaches in front of greens firm too to give those golfers maximum alternative options to an aerial shot to the pin or even the green.

The worst combination I've ever seen that way for very good players was Bay Hill a few years ago, particularly the 17th hole. The green was rock hard, nixxing the possibility of flying the ball to the green and holding it but then the approach was completely soft nixxing the possibility they could use that area to bounce the ball onto the green.

[A_Clay_Man]

DM- Does saying yes, mean RC doesn't have the goods, strategywise?

Once again the better player bias comes into play, so why do we talk about it?