If you could restore TPC Sawgrass to its original design

[Mark Bourgeois]

Which hole(s) *or features* would you choose and why?

 http://golfcoursehistories.com/TPC.html

[Matthew Essig]

I don't see a lot of changes between the two images, but one feature that surprised me was how small the 16th green was compared to now. I would be interested to see the smaller green used today as I think the green is too big for a fairly short par 5.

[Jay Flemma]

Due to me in an interview:

"They made me give them the same course 25 years ago.  I thought about telling them that and then thought never mind."

[Matt Kardash]

I believe the bones of the golf course are still the same. I think there have only been two major differences since 1980:

1. The green countouring has been altered and soften over the course of time to be more forgiving. From what I have heard the original greens were very severe and it was hard to get the ball to stay close to holes. Was it too severe or were the pros merely complaining too much because the course was unlike anything they were used to? I don't know! Maybe Tom Doak knows since he was at the first tournament played there.

2. As the aerial shows, the 1980 version was a lot scruffier. from that aerial it almost looks Pine Valley-esque. I have honestly never seen pics of the TPC during that era. If anyone has any i would love to see them!

I don't see the green contoruing reverting back to being more severe, so maybe the only hope is that one day the course goes back to being a little less manicured and Augusta-like.

[Tom_Doak]

I have a bunch of pictures of the TPC at Sawgrass from January, 1981 in my slide collection at home, but I'm on the road for another week before I can try to post anything.  If someone wants to sitemail me in a week to remind me, that would be great.

The course was way, way scruffier in the early 1980's.  In fact, I showed a picture of it in my presentation for the Olympic job ... I cited it as a sustainable design, years before we knew the word.  But all that went out the window when the PGA Tour made it their headquarters and wanted everything to look perfect [and maybe my shot at the Olympic job went out the window, too ].

A handful of the greens were MUCH more severe than the present version, especially the sixth green which I'll never forget.  But, most of them were no more scary to putt than the modern greens with less slope and much faster speeds.  Recovery shots were trickier, though.

[Ronald Montesano]

In another 40 years, Bill Coore Jr. and Ben Crenshaw Jr. will be called in to return the course to its 1981 state.

[Matt Kardash]

Tom,

I am curious to what differences you can remember? What was the 6th green like? I have seen one old photo that showed that the 16th green was quite different and it had a long waste bunker between it and the water.

On a somewhat simmilar note, look at how raw Kiawah looked during the Ryder Cup. I kind of like that convex bunker next to the 18th green that Langer hits next to.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hy5ZRIdkzVc

[Matthew Essig]

I believe the bones of the golf course are still the same. I think there have only been two major differences since 1980:

1. The green countouring has been altered and soften over the course of time to be more forgiving. From what I have heard the original greens were very severe and it was hard to get the ball to stay close to holes. Was it too severe or were the pros merely complaining too much because the course was unlike anything they were used to?

It was unlike anything they were used to. It is the same reason the players rank Dove Mountain as one of their least favorite. The greens are super severe and they don't like it when the ball feeds away when hit  20+ feet away from the hole.

[Mark Bourgeois]

I have a bunch of pictures of the TPC at Sawgrass from January, 1981 in my slide collection at home, but I'm on the road for another week before I can try to post anything.  If someone wants to sitemail me in a week to remind me, that would be great.

The course was way, way scruffier in the early 1980's.

Tom, I originally thought the aerial was of an unfinished course. Quite surprised to discover the date was Dec 3 1980. Your Jan 1981 pics must be fascinating, like a relic of a bygone age that pops up in a strip mall construction project.

[Tom_Doak]

In another 40 years, Bill Coore Jr. and Ben Crenshaw Jr. will be called in to return the course to its 1981 state.

Ronald:

Bill Coore doesn't have kids.  Ben Crenshaw has three, all of them daughters.

And no, none of my kids are interested in golf course design either.

[Tom_Doak]

Tom,

I am curious to what differences you can remember? What was the 6th green like? I have seen one old photo that showed that the 16th green was quite different and it had a long waste bunker between it and the water.

On a somewhat simmilar note, look at how raw Kiawah looked during the Ryder Cup. I kind of like that convex bunker next to the 18th green that Langer hits next to.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hy5ZRIdkzVc

Matt:

I can't give you a laundry list of changes, because my memory is not as good as it used to be, but also because I haven't seen or played the course since all the work they did 2-3 years ago.  Allan MacCurrach told me they really did a lot of work there.

I CAN tell you about the original 16th hole, which had a long waste bunker between the approach/green and the water, as you say.  In the first year of the tournament (March 1982), one of the contenders in the final round [I think maybe it was Bruce Lietzke] went for the green in two, hit the bank of the bunker, and skipped through the bunker into the water.  That bounce was almost universally considered unfair by the players and by the Tour brass, so after one more year they redesigned the green and built it right out to the water's edge.  I remember that well because I did the drawing for the new green for Mr. Dye [not that anyone really looked too hard at the drawing while it was being built!].

The other thing that was WAY different about #16 was that there was a big long peninsula spectator mound out in the water between #16 and #17, that was maybe twenty feet high.  It was great viewing of one hole or the other but not both, but it proved to be a big distraction, because people on 16 couldn't see what was happening on 17, and players would try to putt on 16 just as the gallery went crazy on 17.  So, when they rebuilt the green, they also drained the pond and took out that spectator mound.  It wound up being way more costly than anticipated, because it was only after they started digging that they remembered they had buried a lot of the clearing debris under that mound, so they had to dig all of THAT out, too.

[Rich Goodale]

Tom

I too am looking forward to your early 80's TPC photo gallery!

I remember well the greensdie bunker on 16, and I think that its elimination has been a positive thing (particularly as the hole has become easily reachable fror the pros in recent years).  The only other softening change I can remember was to 4, where the green used to be like the roof of a VW beetle (rather than the hood of a 1958 Buick...).  Great hole where the flat-bellies looked at the card, saw 340, thought 3-iron and a wedge and sulked away with a 5 (or more).  Finally, as others have said, the most "radical" of the Pete's design ideas were the "waste areas" along many fairways (e.g. 1, 14, 15).  They were grungy and Pinehurst #2'y and even Merion'y and put much more pressure on the drive that even now.  Last time I played the course (10-15 years ago) the waste areas were oases of choice for the discerning pro.  Bomb it there, spin it out of the hard packed sand to 10 feet and hopefully make the putt.  Ho hum....  This is something that could be changed easily, but will it be?  Very much doubt it.

Rich

[BCrosby]

Rich -

For all the good things that "grungy" waste areas and bunkers can do, it's curious how rarely they last in a state of "grunginess". Or maybe there's  no real mystery. The impluse to over-maintain courses is almost irresistable. Very few can resist doing it. I would include Merion.

Watching PII evolve over the next several years will be interesting. My predication is that it becomes more and more domesticated.

Bob

[JMEvensky]

Rich -

For all the good things that "grungy" waste areas and bunkers can do, it's curious how rarely they last in a state of "grunginess". Or maybe there's  no real mystery. The impluse to over-maintain courses is almost irresistable. Very few can resist doing it. I would include Merion.

Watching PII evolve over the next several years will be interesting. My predication is that it becomes more and more domesticated.

Bob

I agree about the impulse being irresistable but I wonder where it starts.

At a member owned club,there frequently exists the lowest common denominator syndrome--if enough members bitch about something,it's usually easier to just placate them rather than do the right thing.Boards and Green Chairman are supposed to put the club/golf course above a few member complaints.

Like you,I think Pinehurst will succumb.But it makes you wonder--if an owner of an iconic golf course has to put aesthetics before historical accuracy,what chance do the rest of us have?

[BCrosby]

JME -

Whatever the architectural merits of "grungy" (and I think the merits are real), sooner or later a club's membership perceives it as a maintenance failure. Pressure is then brought to bear to "fix" it.

Bob

[JMEvensky]

JME -

Whatever the architectural merits of "grungy" (and I think the merits are real), sooner or later a club's membership perceives it as a maintenance failure. Pressure is then brought to bear to "fix" it.

Bob

I know you're right.My issue has always been the "failure" of the people charged with protecting the golf course from the membership.If it's a sin when a Green Chairman does something stupid like building a fountain,isn't it just as egregious when he caves in to a group of members whose ideas may not be in the golf course's best interests?

[BCrosby]

JME -

It does involve a failure of leadership. That's the other side of the same coin. The problem, hovever, is the abysmal level of memberhip understanding of fairly basic architectural concepts. For most people outside our circle of nut jobs, architecture equals course conditioning. End of discussion. The grunginess gets "cleaned up". That dynamic is hard to overcome.

Bob 

 

[JMEvensky]

JME -

It does involve a failure of leadership. That's the other side of the same coin. The problem, hovever, is the abysmal level of memberhip understanding of fairly basic architectural concepts. For most people outside our circle of nut jobs, architecture equals course conditioning. End of discussion. The grunginess gets "cleaned up". That dynamic is hard to overcome.

Bob 

 

Sadly,there's not a damn thing to argue with in your statement.

The only way grunginess will get a chance is if it can be proven measurably cheaper to maintain.In today's world,lowering a maintenance budget is every club's goal.

[Mark Bourgeois]

One reason scruffiness may not endure is its look of incompleteness. The human mind instinctively fills in gaps and completes the incomplete. It is hard for the hands to ignore the mind forever.

It's a Gestalt ("figure in ground") thing.

[Mark Bourgeois]

Here is how Dan Jenkins described the changes in a 1984 SI article:

"And the pros weren't willing to give the place a chance to mature or themselves a chance to learn how to play it. So last year a committee of PGA Tour players was appointed to 'recommend' changes to Dye and Beman....

"Those alterations might not have been obvious to the casual golf fan, 100,000 of whom traipsed around the grounds last week, but 16 of the holes were 'touched up' in one way or another. Eleven greens lost some serious contours. The putting surfaces were also overseeded with rye grass and slowed down. Much of the rough and the expansive waste areas were cleared out, almost entirely eliminating lost balls. The only balls lost last week were the ones that got wet. The slower and flatter greens not only equalized things for everybody, but they also made getting "up and down" much easier. And when the weather calmed for the last three rounds, the Players Club lost a good bit of its personality.

"Sure, there was still a lot of water and sand out there, but you had to play pretty badly to get in it, as is the case anywhere else. That little horror, the 17th, the 132-yard, par-3 island hole, held up its end, though, and claimed almost enough golf balls to dam up the Intracoastal Waterway, 64 on Thursday alone."

Full article: http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/vault/article/magazine/MAG1121964/index.htm

I found some pics in this 1982 SI article...
http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/vault/article/magazine/MAG1125311/index.htm

...and shamelessly screen-grabbed them below.

11th in 1982


11th in 2013



12th LZ in 1982 -- POV towards tee


12th LZ in 2013 -- POV towards green


16th in 1982 -- note spectator mound beyond and greenside "buffer" bunker


That mound is also very visible in the aerial comparison here:
http://golfcoursehistories.com/TPC.html

Here is a view of the 16th green and beyond today


And the 17th green -- note 16 green off to the left and 17 tee to the right

[Tony Ristola]

I have a bunch of pictures of the TPC at Sawgrass from January, 1981 in my slide collection at home, but I'm on the road for another week before I can try to post anything.  If someone wants to sitemail me in a week to remind me, that would be great.

The course was way, way scruffier in the early 1980's.  In fact, I showed a picture of it in my presentation for the Olympic job ... I cited it as a sustainable design, years before we knew the word.  But all that went out the window when the PGA Tour made it their headquarters and wanted everything to look perfect [and maybe my shot at the Olympic job went out the window, too ].

A handful of the greens were MUCH more severe than the present version, especially the sixth green which I'll never forget.  But, most of them were no more scary to putt than the modern greens with less slope and much faster speeds.  Recovery shots were trickier, though.

Would be interesting to see the photos... especially the 6th green.

I recall reading or hearing Pete Dye call the original course a "low maintenance torture track".

Tom, you knew Pete some... was he trying to move golf a little in that direction?

[Tom_Doak]

I recall reading or hearing Pete Dye call the original course a "low maintenance torture track".

Tom, you knew Pete some... was he trying to move golf a little in that direction?

Tony:

I'm in Asia this week, will try to remember to look up my old photos when I get back home in two weeks.

The quote from Pete about the TPC is accurate.  It opened just as I was starting to work for him in college, and I got to spend a lot of time there early on -- I went to the first two tournaments and walked with Mr. Dye quite a bit, and I also had several discussions about it with Commissioner Beman, who was one of several people who'd answered my letters asking for advice while in college.

I think it was Beman's idea just as much as Pete's to make the course extremely difficult -- which the players did not understand.  Both Pete and the Commissioner thought that making the course so hard would show how GOOD the players were -- that it provided opportunities to pull off great shots you'd never see anywhere else.  And it did.  When I walked with Pete, he would go sit at the first hole and watch some approach shots until somebody hit one close, smile and say "that hole's playable," and move on to the second, and so on around the course.  We also followed Jack Nicklaus for all 18 holes of the third round in 1983, and I have never seen Pete more upset than when Jack shot 5 under on the back nine (he started on the back) and then got conservative on the front nine and only shot 68.  Pete was really hoping he'd shoot 63 so that everyone would quit bitching about how tough the course was.

Many of the players were quoted as saying that "Pete doesn't understand our golf games," but in fact, he understood them perfectly.  He was just asking them to play better than their average in order to score well, and the pros took it as Pete trying to show them up, which was not at all the case.

[Matt Kardash]

Tom, you around those pics of yours yet?