The Soft Sand at Bay Hill: Good or Bad?

[John Keenan]

As noted earlier in this post a sand trap is a hazard, something to be avoided. These are the best players in the world if they take a chance and go after a pin and miss yes they will end in the sand so be it. They were all very aware of the sand condition when they teed off.

They all face the same sand so figure it out. I think what really bothers many is they could not be 12 under par. This was a hard set up and that is what they should face each week. The best in the world playing for big money.

I would note that sand is pretty tough for the memebrs as would the hardness of the greens but that is a very different issue.

[Michael Wharton-Palmer]

I am just not convinced that a plugged lie in the bunker is what the game is all about...as for "not a perfect shot if it did not hit the green"
only 16 players hit 17 green on Sunday..that means 16 of the worlds finest players at least close to their "A' games could not hold the green in any shape or form.

I am just not sure that is what the game should be all about, plugged lies are too unpredictable in their occurance and as such it may not be the same for everyone...I just think it is an unfair, manner in which to make the game tougher...I will go along with furrowed bunkers anytime..that is the same for everyone!!!

[JR Potts]

Thanks Michael...I was beginning to think that Terry and I were the crazy ones (not the first time that has happened though).

Maybe it is just a dichotomy of what we want out of professional golf.  I have no interest in watching guys, in the final group, on the final holes, have to hit 50 feet away from the hole to hold the green or hit shot after shot that lands on the green and rolls off the green.  I don't know, maybe I'm a simpleton when it comes to my entertainment but I like to see the best players in the world have a chance to make a birdie on the second-to-last hole of a tournament.

But that's just me....a drama-king.

[Jeff Evagues]

I'm in the group that agrees that bunkers are hazards. Where does it say that a ball that lands in a bunker must be sitting up perfectly?

[George Pazin]

Thanks Michael...I was beginning to think that Terry and I were the crazy ones (not the first time that has happened though).

Maybe it is just a dichotomy of what we want out of professional golf.  I have no interest in watching guys, in the final group, on the final holes, have to hit 50 feet away from the hole to hold the green or hit shot after shot that lands on the green and rolls off the green.  I don't know, maybe I'm a simpleton when it comes to my entertainment but I like to see the best players in the world have a chance to make a birdie on the second-to-last hole of a tournament.

But that's just me....a drama-king.

How do you feel when someone goes at the Sunday pin at the TPC and puts it in the drink?

[Rob Bice]

Thanks Michael...I was beginning to think that Terry and I were the crazy ones (not the first time that has happened though).

Maybe it is just a dichotomy of what we want out of professional golf.  I have no interest in watching guys, in the final group, on the final holes, have to hit 50 feet away from the hole to hold the green or hit shot after shot that lands on the green and rolls off the green.  I don't know, maybe I'm a simpleton when it comes to my entertainment but I like to see the best players in the world have a chance to make a birdie on the second-to-last hole of a tournament.

But that's just me....a drama-king.

Easiest solution would be to just call it a par 4...Marino bogeyed and Laird birdied...

In all seriousness.  If the greens had been a little more receptive would the sand have bothered you as much?  What is interesting is that given the firmness of the greens it is questionable whether Marino's approach would have held if it had cleared the bunker.  He was up one/tied at the time so very aggressive strategy.

It would be interesting to know the percent of shots hit on the fly into greensde bunkers that resulted in plugged lies throughout the tournament.    

[Michael Wharton-Palmer]

Rob..hold on a inute..
you said that even if Marino's shot had hit the green it would not have stayed on...so please explain to me where is any risk/reward?

If he hits the ball three more feet, which would have cleared the trap and been arguably the perfect shot...he is in the back bunker
he 'misses" the shot by three feet and ends up plugged...so there is not any risk reward...where is that real golf?

George...I am not aware of any pin placements and ensuing rock hard greens have ever resulted in a shot less than ten feet from what one consider ideal on #17 at Players ending up in the water.

You can say golf is not supposed to be fair...but really it should be remotely equal for everybody.

[jeffwarne]

Rob..hold on a inute..
you said that even if Marino's shot had hit the green it would not have stayed on...so please explain to me where is any risk/reward?

If he hits the ball three more feet, which would have cleared the trap and been arguably the perfect shot...he is in the back bunker
he 'misses" the shot by three feet and ends up plugged...so there is not any risk reward...where is that real golf?

George...I am not aware of any pin placements and ensuing rock hard greens have ever resulted in a shot less than ten feet from what one consider ideal on #17 at Players ending up in the water.

You can say golf is not supposed to be fair...but really it should be remotely equal for everybody.

Is the architecture that bad that rock hard greens and plugged lies are the way to "protect par"?
Firm greens are good, but do away with the bunker and give a guy a chance to run the ball on.
Then you'd see the water come into play.
That hole called for a super high shot to have a chance to hold the green with no other option.
Difficulty is good, but how exactly do you seperate players if everybody goes over (or buries)

For the record, I have no problem with soft sand as it makes sand a real hazard.
Now just the player some other option
and get rid of 1/2 of those ugly bunkers

[JR Potts]

Thanks Michael...I was beginning to think that Terry and I were the crazy ones (not the first time that has happened though).

Maybe it is just a dichotomy of what we want out of professional golf.  I have no interest in watching guys, in the final group, on the final holes, have to hit 50 feet away from the hole to hold the green or hit shot after shot that lands on the green and rolls off the green.  I don't know, maybe I'm a simpleton when it comes to my entertainment but I like to see the best players in the world have a chance to make a birdie on the second-to-last hole of a tournament.

But that's just me....a drama-king.

How do you feel when someone goes at the Sunday pin at the TPC and puts it in the drink?

I feel fine.  That is, assuming they actually have a chance to land and stop the ball on the green and that the shorter hitters and longer hitters each have a reasonable opportunity to make the same score in the same manner.

[Rob Bice]

Rob..hold on a inute..
you said that even if Marino's shot had hit the green it would not have stayed on...so please explain to me where is any risk/reward?

If he hits the ball three more feet, which would have cleared the trap and been arguably the perfect shot...he is in the back bunker
he 'misses" the shot by three feet and ends up plugged...so there is not any risk reward...where is that real golf?

I wrote "it is questionable whether Marino's shot would have held".  I am obviously not certain what the outcome would have been which is why I described it as "questionable".  Maybe it would have held, maybe it wouldn't have held.  I believe it is reasonable, given the known playing conditions, to be uncertain.  No?  The player's view on this impacts strategy - risk/reward.  I would assume that Marino thought a shot going at the pin would hold which is why he went at the pin.

If you are saying that there was no way to hold the green going at the pin then I believe the correct strategy, assuming you prefer a long putt to a chip, is to aim for the fat part of the green.  What is wrong with playing for par?  Laird may have appraoched things differently on his tee shot had he been tied with Marino.

As mentioned in my prior post it would be interesting to know the percent of shots hit on the fly into greenside bunkers that resulted in plagged lies throughout the tournament.  Was this an outlier and therefore more bad luck than anything else?  Or was this a common enough event to be taken into consideration when deciding strategy?

[Will MacEwen]

I say this without having watched the event.

I don't like seeing pros have it too easy, but sometimes the pendulum swings too far the other way.

I would imagine that Bay Hill wasn't designed for the sand to play this penal.  Had that been contemplated, I imagine the size, number and location of the bunkers would be much different.

If they are going to be that difficult and produce that many bad lies, there shouldn't be too many of them.  Green firmness and pin location also guard against par, if par needs such protection.

[astavrides]

The problem was not the sand, it was that you couldn't hit the green no matter how good a shot you hit--at least when i was watching.
Like a lot of the stuff Palmer puts his name on, this came out bad.  It seems they tweak the setup, maintenance, or design of that course every year for that tournament and they never get it right.  For years now (including this year), if you hit a yard in front of a green, it stops.  If you hit a green, it bounds on 10-20 yards.

[Richard Choi]

I agree, the problem was not the sand. The problem was that greens were too firm for what it was designed for. Hazards did its job.

[Bill Hyde]

It cracks me up that people on this board want rock hard greens AND ridiculously penal sand. I don't know about you, but that isn't fun golf for me. I think rock hard greens are appropriate on certain types of courses...ones where the ground game is an option. That is definitely not the case at Bay Hill. Here's a qupte from Davis Love re: the bunkers at Bay Hill...this is why my club changed the sand--we have deep bunkers and that alone is penalty enough:

Love: They want the sand to be more of a penalty, and sometimes they go a little far. At the Memorial, the bunkers are so deep now that [Nicklaus] backed off on the rakes. At Bay Hill, the sand is soft most years. They both seem to like Augusta. I wish all the sand on Tour was like Augusta, where just the bunker depth or pin position makes the shot hard, not a buried lie.

Read more: http://www.golf.com/golf/tours_news/article/0,28136,2061747-3,00.html#ixzz1HvnvEPTN

[Gary Slatter]

the sand will firm a bit I assume.   Bay Hill has been changed, more than any other Wilson course, for the one week the Tour is there.  I thought the hard greens and tough bunkers are fine for the Tour (you don't have to go for the pins every hole).

But when you get sand like this on a regular course being played by regular players, is it "unfair" or do they know the difference?
I found the bunkers at Banff were very difficult, in fact I'll wager tougher than BH.

The last time I played Bay Hill the  17th was a high faded 1 iron.  Missed the putt.

[Bill_McBride]

Even as popular as Arnie is, they will not attend his tournament if they dont get those bunkers sorted out.
The firm greens..great..but not with those bunkers.

You're kidding, right?  Even with his struggles, Marino made $648,000 for second place.

If that amount of money is up for grabs, those guys would play in soft sand WITH furrowed rakes.

[astavrides]

Even as popular as Arnie is, they will not attend his tournament if they dont get those bunkers sorted out.
The firm greens..great..but not with those bunkers.

You're kidding, right?  Even with his struggles, Marino made $648,000 for second place.

If that amount of money is up for grabs, those guys would play in soft sand WITH furrowed rakes.

by comparison, innisbrook last week paid out a paltry $594K for 2nd.

[BCyrgalis]

I loved the plugged lie Marino got.  Yes, that green (No. 17) was ridiculously hard -- too hard.  But Marino still hit it in a hazard and the next shot SHOULD be tough.  That's why sand is so much better than water as a hazard: you have the chance to play out of it. 

http://golfguidesusa.com/index.php/news/1-latest-news/764-column-celebrating-the-buried-lie

[Randy Thompson]

Everybody has a right to voice their oppinion on soft sand or plugging or not plugging but I can tell you this. This was not done intentionally and somebody is getting reamed now for dropping the ball. Arnie nor any individual can dictate the set up of the course for a PGA tour event. It is in the hands of the PGA tour officials and they strive for consistent conditions week to week in general. They donīt like to trick up the course and what this thread is describing in relation to the sand at bay hill is 100% tricking up the course in the PGA TOUR set up book. I am sure the sand was new and something happened where it was not installed six months before the tournament as they normally require and recommend. Donīt expect to see this often or again unless somebody else screws up again in the future.

[john_stiles]

Am more in favor of a half shot penalty, and  plugged lies amounted to much more with the hard greens.

If you rolled or bounced in, you were usually okay, or so it seemed for the shots that that I noticed on TV.

But if you flew in high, high so the ball had a chance to stop, it seemed a plugged lie was certain in the bunkers.

I imagine most at the site would tire of this over a season at any oft played course.

Seemed like the course was tricked up to keep scores high.

[Jason Topp]

One article I read asked the question "Does it tempt?"  This course definitely did.

Players were tempted to go at pins when they probably should not have done so.

  I would prefer to see variety in tour setups and this one definitely varied from many others.  Players were tempted to be agressive but most paid the price for their agression.

I also liked having bunkers that varied from the heavily watered firm bunkers that one sees nearly every other week of the year.

I did not mind seeing a champion determined from a set of challenges that were different from those seen nearly every week on tour.
 

 

[Sean_A]

You can put me in the Warne camp.  The problem isn't firm greens or sand texture.  The problem is the bunkering scheme if firm greens is a goal to achieve...and it most definitely should be. 

I hear all the time how folks want one set of rules to cover all golfers and presumably this would extend to the same hazard fill.  In other words, I don't understand guys saying its okay for tour players to play from soft sand, but not for club players.  Are folks really advocating sand be changed for tour events now?  Whats really bizarre is advocating for natural bunkers to be soft, but man-made bunkers not to be.  I have no idea what that line of thinking is about.  Nor do I ahve any clue what guys are talking about when they mention "fair".  That is a hopeless argument which is about as effective as the levees in New Orleans. 

Finally, if the PGA is gonna err its better to err on the side of firm greens regardless of how the course was designed.  There should not be the same setup week in and week out so I see nothing wrong with Bay Hill's set-up.  Perhaps, designers will then figure out that corseting a course in sand when firm conditions is the goal is bad design.  I take it as an encouraging sign when I hear people bitching about firm greens.  Who knows, maybe there is renaissance of design afoot. 

Ciao

[Dan Herrmann]

Sean - I HATE playing with soft sand, but they're hazards and you get what you deserve.  But I do agree 100% on the firmness of the greens.

[Steve Lang]

  I'd expect the greens and the sand to improve over the next few years after aging a bit...

 

[jeffwarne]

Everybody has a right to voice their oppinion on soft sand or plugging or not plugging but I can tell you this. This was not done intentionally and somebody is getting reamed now for dropping the ball. Arnie nor any individual can dictate the set up of the course for a PGA tour event. It is in the hands of the PGA tour officials and they strive for consistent conditions week to week in general. They donīt like to trick up the course and what this thread is describing in relation to the sand at bay hill is 100% tricking up the course in the PGA TOUR set up book. I am sure the sand was new and something happened where it was not installed six months before the tournament as they normally require and recommend. Donīt expect to see this often or again unless somebody else screws up again in the future.

Exactly what I meant earlier.
I seriously doubt this is what Palmer (or anyone else) was trying to acheive)
Sometimes shi@#$ happens and things aren't perfect.
The sand will setlle and life will go on.
Very doubtful Marino birdies 18 if he doesn't double 17.
Can't really blame the sand for the double
He was done leaking oil and the pressure was off when he got to 18.