Just for the heck of it, I'll describe a short four that fails in almost every regard. (It's not the architect's fault, but a failure to build what he designed, IMHO.)
It's too long. 369 from the tips, 330 from the whites, 310 from the reds and 290 from the rarely used golds.
There's a lake all the way down the left side of the hole, and steep hill on the right, with a fairway that mostly slopes toward the water. Even a "safe" shot to the middle of the fairway sometimes rolls into the hazard, so most players aim at the hill. But many of them don't come back to the fairway.
For those whose shots hang up, it means hitting to a nearly blind green off a hanging lie, over huge trees, with water behind the green, which slopes toward the water
And balls hit short from up there either bound off the hill, or hang up in the rough or trees.
From the back tee, the hole plays as a totally blind dogleg right, with a reverse camber fairway. Essentially, you're hitting a blind shot directly at the lake, with the landing area sloped away from you.
Nearly all the big hitters end up aiming WAY right, hoping to catch a decent lie from which they can flip a wedge on the green from the top of the hill.
The ideal landing area about 100 yards from the green in the left side of the fairway, is a large hollow with a drain at the bottom, so the tee shots that do stay in the fairway often end up there.
Because of the contours, there's little beenfit in trying to hug the water for a better angle. In fact, the easiest way to find that hollow is to hit your tee shot on the cart path down the right side. Otherwise, unless you hit a hard fade, shots to the left half of the fairway are a great risk of going in the hazard.
At the green, the hill on the right has a big knob that projects out toward the right front of the green. Combined with the water hazard being only three feet off the green left, means it's an all-or-nothing shot. In fact, missing the green by 6 feet on the right commonly kicks the ball across the green into the water.
The sensible play would seem to be a bump and run but the sticky Zoysia fairway combines with a fairly steep upslope at the front of the green to make that shot almost impossible.
All in all, it turns a hole that should be an exciting opportunity at a birdie for golfers of all levels into a battle to prevent a double.
I have talked to the architect who designed the hole during a remodel, and I am pretty sure it's not what he had in mind.
If the tees were 300, 270, 250, 220 everyone would be enticed to try to drive the ball up near the green.
Providing a wider, somewhat flatter landing area that ran from about 150 yards from the hole in to about 100 yards, before narrowing, would mean that players could challenge the water for a better angle at the green or play away from the water knowing that it made the second more difficult.
Finally, taking back the knob on the right front of the green could have provided room for a challenging chipping area or bunker for those who had a failure of nerve on the second shot.
It was a great idea that seems to have failed in the execution.
K