Golf Magazine: Top 100 You Can Play 2008

[Matt_Ward]

Just a quick comment on the ratings that I have just gleaned a look at.

All of the Bandon courses are not in the top quarter of all courses you can play in the USA from my collective experiences.

If anything Pacific Dunes has served to bump up their standing because of it's qualities.

One other thing -- I really enjoy Pac Dunes but is it really #1 ?

p.s. Tim, too many times you get courses from areas of the country which glom onto the benefit of being "in the neighborhood" of where a more bonafide course resides. Sad to say, but often times the course(s) which are somewhat separate can often get lost in the sauce.

[John Kavanaugh]

John,

I wish there was some great analyis performed that led our crew to the Golf Magazine list.  However if I remember correctly one of the guys wife bought have a 'Top 100 You Can Play' plaque and that decided it.  I also think the Golf Mag list was always more 'current' and would include new designs that would take years to be included in the Golf Digest list.    Even if I look at the list today there must be some guys from GD on some nice Myrtle Beach Golf Holidays.  In no way should there be (9) courses from Myrtle Beach in the Top 100.

I agree on the Myrtle Beach statement.  Digest requiring 24 ballots for each course listed must skew the results.  You better throw in an Ocean or a US Open in the mix if you are going to get 24 Golf Magazine raters to a public course.

[Tom Huckaby]

All of the Bandon courses are not in the top quarter of all courses you can play in the USA from my collective experiences.

If anything Pacific Dunes has served to bump up their standing because of it's qualities.

From a previous lengthy thread debating this issue, one and all just note that Matt's is only one view; and this reasonable mind quite strenuously disagrees with this take - the second statement anyway.

Matt, no need to debate again.  I just wanted the disagreement noted.

 

[Tim Leahy]

I was not disappointed to see Pine Hill fall off.  Without question one of the most difficult courses I have ever played.  With renovations at Cog Hill & Mauna Kea, that makes sense.  I was suprised to see Dark Horse and Forest Dunes fall off.  I played both within the last couple of years and really enjoyed both, especially Dark Horse.

I live in Sacramento and I hear from good friends that Dark Horse is in bad shape. Course has been on the market for a couple of years now with no takers and still doesn't have a club house. Sand in traps is getting thin and lack of water on the course is hurting. Also pro shop staff is surly, maybe lack of ownership has them on edge. Too bad, great layout and maybe the best in Sacto area when it is in shape. As a side note, Winchester CC(RTJones family) in the same area is now open to the public and up for sale also.

[Tim Book]

Tim,

I drove down from Truckee ,last Thanksgiving, to play Dark Horse.  At the time it was in pretty good shape, but it was obvious that everything but the course was in need of a new owner.  My playing companions explained that the course was going to be sold.  It must have fallen on harder times since November because the course itself was fantastic. 

How about the course that used to be called Twelve Bridges.  I played there some time ago and also thought very highly of it.  It almost looks like you could put togther a nice Sacromento trip with Twelve Bridges, Dark Horse, Winchester CC, and Yocha-De-He G.C?

[Jason Topp]

All of the Bandon courses are not in the top quarter of all courses you can play in the USA from my collective experiences.

If anything Pacific Dunes has served to bump up their standing because of it's qualities.

From a previous lengthy thread debating this issue, one and all just note that Matt's is only one view; and this reasonable mind quite strenuously disagrees with this take - the second statement anyway.

Matt, no need to debate again.  I just wanted the disagreement noted.

 

Anyone have a link to that thread?  I can see debating whether Pacific is number 1 but cannot see anyone rating Trails and Pacific outside of the top 25.

[Tom Huckaby]

All of the Bandon courses are not in the top quarter of all courses you can play in the USA from my collective experiences.

If anything Pacific Dunes has served to bump up their standing because of it's qualities.

From a previous lengthy thread debating this issue, one and all just note that Matt's is only one view; and this reasonable mind quite strenuously disagrees with this take - the second statement anyway.

Matt, no need to debate again.  I just wanted the disagreement noted.

 

Anyone have a link to that thread?  I can see debating whether Pacific is number 1 but cannot see anyone rating Trails and Pacific outside of the top 25.

The debate was far more about riding coat-tails than it was about exact placement of the other Bandon courses.  Matt thinks that their high placement is primarily due to the coat-tail effect from Pacific; I think if anything they get hurt more by this than they get helped.  Neither side convinced the other nor budged an iota.  Can you believe it?

 

[Steve Kline]

I haven't played Pacific but I've played Bandon Dunes and Trails. I thought Trails was absolutely magnificent. I would play it ahead of Pinehurst #2 - the course on the list I've played the most - any day. But, I prefer Scottish style golf. I liked Dunes as well but I thought it was much more simplistic - especially around the greens - than Trails. I think it says something that I didn't miss the ocean on Trails.

[Sean_A]

I hate to answer like Pat Mucci, since I dislike the way he does it, but you have left me too many statements to comment on, therefore, I must answer like Mr. Mucci

Duke is touted as one of the best college courses in the country.  That places it in good company, but I don't believe Duke can hang with the best. 

I can't really comment on that, I have only played 3 University courses and Duke, IMO, is better than the other two, UNC Finley and Methodist College. I eagerly await the NCSU course to be built.

1. The course doesn't even have a sniff of a reachable par 4 even from the second set of tees which I think is about 6200 yards (its been a while since I was there).  Yet there are a good handful of driver wedge holes.  One of the best candidates for a drivable hole is #13, but there is so much water about (a pond and two streams) plus the bunkering that there is no point in having a go even if the hole were made shorter.


Is the lack of a reachable par 4 really a deal breaker? Oakland Hills is widely regarded as great and it barely has what could be considered a reachable hole (6) and Pinehurst #2 is also considered to be great and only #3 out there can be considered reachable at 327 yards. ANGC does not have a reachable par 4 either, unless you think the 350 yard 3rd is reachable.

2. Two par 5s are reachable, but water is directly in front of the greens. 

13 and 15 at Augusta National come to mind and sound exactly the same as (I think) 7 and 11 at Duke. 13 and 15 at Augusta National are widely regarded as great holes on a great golf course.

3. There are about 6 holes with water in play on the approach.  More than a few of these require a direct carry.

Sounds like Augusta National again. 5 holes with water in play on the approach, 3 requiring direct carry (4 if you count 16, I don't)

4. Many of the green sites didn't match the surrounds very well.  Chipping and putting  sometimes feels dopey because shots can't be read.  Not a bad ploy once in a while, but overdone at Duke.  I think this is what can happen when so much earth is chucked about like is obviously the case at Duke.  I can understand that there are low parts to the course and the greens need to be built up a bit, but a better job should have been done. 

I guess we just disagree here, I thought, for the most part, the greens fit in quite well. I especially liked #7 with the way it was situated on the side of the hill and with the amount of internal contour in the green itself.

5. There are too many times when I thought I was hitting the same shot.  This may have something to do with softness of the course as the aerial game is how the course was designed to play. 

I played in winter, that may affect things a bit. But I recall using every club in the bag for all types of shots. I had 3 wood into a par 4 (#1, it was playing into a stiff wind), I had 3 iron into a par 5 (#9), I hit anywhere from 8 iron up to 2 iron into the par 3's, and used nearly every club in between for approaches to the par 4's and 5's. I do need to get back and play when the course is in excellent shape though.

6. The bunkering is too predictable.  I can recall only four holes with bunkering to one side or the other of the green.  Many low sides of the greens had bunkering which I think was unnecessary.  There are also instances of bunkering between the green and water - just dopey.

Not sure what to say about that one. I didn't really notice the bunkers all that much. I only hit in one, and that was on #8.

7. The 4th is a visual nightmare.  Water all over the place and much of it only penalizes a terrible shot.  There are a few other holes with water around the tees as well.  Generally, I think this is a waste, but in the case of Duke there is so much water its hard to know where it all should go. 

I fully agree with #4, its probably the poorest hole on the course. I would suspect however, that the pond on 4 and the big one on 13 are to allow run-off some place to go as I seem to recall those two places being the lowest points on the course.

8. There isn't a single incidence on the course where water is used diagonally for a bite off as much as you dare shot.  That is criminal when one considers the amount of water on this course. 

I can buy this a bit, though I think that on 13 you could bite it up the left side of the fairway and have a short wedge into the green. There are many great courses that don't have a Cape hole as you describe, the before mentioned Augusta National, of course, being one. And I may be inclined to say that Pebble Beach does not either, considering that 8 doesn't require you bite off anything on the second shot and 18 only moderately tempts a player to bite off something on the tee shot. And from an aerial, it doesn't seem that Pacific Dunes has a Cape across the ocean either.

9. While trees aren't really an issue for playability, I don't recall a hole where a dogleg was left open from the tee for a view of the green.  Instead, the player is guided down a road and can't be tempted by a viewing line to the green even if it is a stupid shot. 

None of the dogleg holes, with the exception of 16, are short enough for it to matter if there are trees on the hole. Now, I think 16 would be better without any of the trees.

I spose in short, the course is one of those stock jobs that really doesn't have any character of its own.  There isn't a lot of clever stuff built in to make me want to revisit.  Not a bad place at all, but I don't have much time for Duke. 

I didn't feel that it was very stock at all. I felt it was quite interesting, no two holes seemed similar to me. And while I am not even attempting to compare Duke to Augusta National or Pebble Beach, those courses lack many of the things you say Duke lacks and are still widely regarded as very good, if not great, courses. If there are 20 public golf courses in North Carolina better than Duke, I certainly have not seem most of them.
Ciao

JKM

1. Duke ain't no Augusta.  The use of land at Augusta blows Duke out of the water for any comparison sake. 

2. Duke ain't no Augusta where water is concerned.  The use of land in conjunction with the greens blows Duke out of the water for any comparison sake. 

3. Reachable par 4s to me are a mark of clever design AND variety.  When I say variety I don't mean hitting every club in the bag.  I mean variety in terms of options, lies, use of land, water etc.  I found it very perplexing that a 6200 yard course didn't have a drivable par 4 even though  there are at least four driver-wedge type holes. 

4. When I was on about open inside doglegs it doesn't matter if the green is drivable.  There is always a certain lure to lean toward the green if it is in sight.  Instead, the archie hides the green and effectively creates a road on every dogleg.  Another sign of lack of variety.

I don't have much time for Duke especially given the prices they charge.  That isn't to say its a bad course, just not my bag.

Ciao 

[A.G._Crockett]

John,

I wish there was some great analyis performed that led our crew to the Golf Magazine list.  However if I remember correctly one of the guys wife bought have a 'Top 100 You Can Play' plaque and that decided it.  I also think the Golf Mag list was always more 'current' and would include new designs that would take years to be included in the Golf Digest list.    Even if I look at the list today there must be some guys from GD on some nice Myrtle Beach Golf Holidays.  In no way should there be (9) courses from Myrtle Beach in the Top 100.

I agree on the Myrtle Beach statement.  Digest requiring 24 ballots for each course listed must skew the results.  You better throw in an Ocean or a US Open in the mix if you are going to get 24 Golf Magazine raters to a public course.

This debate has been done before, but keep a couple of things in mind here before you consider "Myrtle Beach" to be overrepresented.
     
     1. There are NOT nine courses from Myrtle Beach.  There are FOUR from the entire area if my count is correct, and the distance between Tidewater on the north end to Caledonia on the south end is close to an hour's drive.   It's not like these courses are on top of each other; they're in two states, and cover a bunch of mileage.   

     2. The Dunes has been on the list forever, and Tidewater was for many years and is only at #100 now.  Caledonia has been on the list for awhile and is hardly a candidate to be considered "overrated", so that leaves only...

     3. The Love Course at Barefoot Landing is the 4th course on the list, and if anything, is underrated.  I think it is that good, and I like it much better than several very good courses rated above it.  I'll offer Great Waters and both Troon North courses as examples, and I liked all three of those a lot.

Very popular to bash Myrtle Beach here, but I find that specifics are often lacking.  This might be one of those times, no?

[Richard Choi]

A.G,

I believe Tim was talking about Golf Digest ranking and not Golf Magazine ranking when he said there are 9 courses from Myrtle Beach.

[John Moore II]

Sean--We'll just disagree here. I think Duke is a very good golf course and easily in the top 20 in NC.

[John Moore II]

Without seeing the list, I would say there are any number of courses better than Southern Pines. I would likely agree that its not top 20 in NC, I could probably think of 20 better in NC that I have played, though I really like it and would probably say its one of the top 10 in Pinehurst/Sandhills.

You could be right.  However, it is vastly superior to some on the list.

As to NC, keep in mind it is a public list.  Do you think Tot Hill Farm is better?  I enjoyed the course but for my taste Southern Pines kills it by miles.  It is 11 on the NC list.

Jason-Having seen the NC top 20 list, I will say that there are 3 courses in the top 20 that I say are not as good as Southern Pines-those being Pinehurst #7, Mid Pines and Legacy. And I am not sold on Finley being better than Southern Pines, though its been 8 years since I played Finley. Bryan Park (Champions) I say is better than most on the list, and certainly should be top 20. I also think The Neuse in Clayton, Nags Head Golf Links and Currituck Club could be on that list, certainly above Legacy and Mid Pines. Oh well, rankings are rankings, very few people really agree on then, so thats cool. Southern Pines may or may not be in the top 20, I'm not sure. I'll see what I can do to play all these and get back with my full answer

[Matt_Ward]

Jason:

You said the following, "I can see debating whether Pacific is number 1 but cannot see anyone rating Trails and Pacific outside of the top 25.

You incorrectly stated my comments previously -- I have no issue with Pac Dunes being in the top quarter -- no doubt it's one of the ten best public in the USA -- some have it at the top spot.

My statement is that both the original Bandon and Trails are not slam dunk choices for a top 25 in my book. I base that on the wide range of top tier public courses I have played. I also believe -- as Huck correctly noted -- that Pac Dunes has served to elevate the standing of the other two. Take them away from the spillover aura of Pac Dunes and their overall standing would likely be less so.

When you say "you cannot see anyone rating Trails and Pacific outside of the top 25 -- I actually meant the original 18 at Bandon and the Trails layout. The public scene has dramatically risen over the last number of years. Bandon gets plenty of rightful publicity and kudos for its contributions to golf design but there are deficiencies at both of the courses I just cited. I see the Trails as being particuarly weak in the middle portion of the round there. I also see Bandon's original 18 as having few holes of vintage quality -- the ending is also quite a stepdown. No doubt people will see things differently. I can say this for sure -- Black Mesa is easily beyond the likes of the original 18 at Bandon and the Trails. Sometimes location and who designs the course(s) have a far greater impact than they should.

Just my opinion ...

[A.G._Crockett]

A.G,

I believe Tim was talking about Golf Digest ranking and not Golf Magazine ranking when he said there are 9 courses from Myrtle Beach.

Richard,
Thanks; I had missed that. 

I looked at that list as well, and I would certainly question King's North.  I haven't played Heritage, so can't comment on that one.  However, River's Edge and Tiger's Eye are both excellent, and their presence on a Top 100 public list is not an embarrassment to the magazine in any way.  River's Edge sometimes has conditioning problems, though it was superb this summer, and Tiger's Eye is superb.

In other words, even at six or seven courses, in an area that big with nearly 90 courses (even after a number of NLE's), I don't feel that is automatically over-representation.

BTW, two courses at MB that have closed are coming back.  The property owners at Eastport apparently have won litigation, and the course (very short but fun Denis Griffiths track) is supposed to reopen next year some time, as I understand it.  Also, Ocean Ridge Plantation (4 courses, including Tiger's Eye) is opening a 5th course by utilizing a lot of the better corridors from the 36 hole complex at what used to be Angels Trace.  They weren't bad courses, and Tim Cate should be able to put together an excellent track there, if you've seen any of his work.

[Tim Book]

A.G.,

Richard was correct.  I was referring to the Golf Digest list.  I have only played Tidewater, Caledonia, & The Dunes from the list you described.  I would agree that there are a high number of quality courses down there, however 10% of the best public courses in the U.S. can't possibly be in the Myrtle Beach 'region'.  As I quickly glance at both the Golf & GC lists it would appear the Arizona gets the slight on the Golf Digest list.  No We-Ko-Pa, Boulders, Grayhawk, Talking Stick etc..  Maybe this just means that I need to get back to Myrtle Beach.

[Tim Leahy]

Tim,

I drove down from Truckee ,last Thanksgiving, to play Dark Horse.  At the time it was in pretty good shape, but it was obvious that everything but the course was in need of a new owner.  My playing companions explained that the course was going to be sold.  It must have fallen on harder times since November because the course itself was fantastic. 

How about the course that used to be called Twelve Bridges.  I played there some time ago and also thought very highly of it.  It almost looks like you could put togther a nice Sacromento trip with Twelve Bridges, Dark Horse, Winchester CC, and Yocha-De-He G.C?

Twelve Bridges is trying to go completely private and has changed it's name to Catta Verdera CC. It is only open to the public after 11 weekdays and 12 on weekends and has raised greenfees dramatically for this area to over $100. They have made some course changes, but I haven't heard anything that would make me pay those greenfees. Turkey Creek and Whitney Oaks are  just up the road and are very similar and a much better bargain.

[Andy Troeger]

A.G.,

Richard was correct.  I was referring to the Golf Digest list.  I have only played Tidewater, Caledonia, & The Dunes from the list you described.  I would agree that there are a high number of quality courses down there, however 10% of the best public courses in the U.S. can't possibly be in the Myrtle Beach 'region'.  As I quickly glance at both the Golf & GC lists it would appear the Arizona gets the slight on the Golf Digest list.  No We-Ko-Pa, Boulders, Grayhawk, Talking Stick etc..  Maybe this just means that I need to get back to Myrtle Beach.

In my opinion the most overrated course on the Golf Mag list is Troon North Pinnacle. Maybe the Troon courses were great prior to the housing influx, but its bowling alley golf now between backyards. Many of the great views that probably existed seem to be blocked by housing. I couldn't justify putting Talking Stick in the top 100 publics either. We-Ko-Pa Saguaro (haven't played Cholla) definitely should be there though. The folks I know that have played Grayhawk have been generally unimpressed (at least in the sense that its a top 100 public course--its certainly supposed to be a nice place to play if you have the $$)