SL - I have no reason to doubt Phil's views on this: he's a smart fellow, and he knows Augusta (and the regular tour stops) about as well as anyone. Also, his thesis seems to be bolstered by the fact that for the last 20 years or so we've seen a lot of first time winners at the Masters; the mantra I remember hearing as a youngster - i.e. that veterans/past champions have a big advantage over the newcomers, because you need to play the Masters many times before learning how to putt those greens effectively -- doesn't seem to hold true anymore. I think that's partly because, in JN's younger days, he may have been the rare golfer who went to the course a week early, whereas today it seems that everyone -- even 14 year olds from China -- have the money and time and access to come play it for weeks beforehand, and 8, 9, 10 times. As well, I seem to remember watching the tournament years ago when it was routine to see tour pros miss, and miss badly, on both line and speed. Even a great like Ben Crenshaw would talk about those scary greens, and you'd see pretty often the putts that would keep breaking way past the hole and then roll on for another 10 feet -- but I don't see them so much anymore, from anyone, veteran or rookie. Either everyone is a better putter now than in the past (doubtful) or it's that no one is afraid of or unfamiliar with the speed anymore because they experience it week in and week out on tour. The reason they seem to shoot the lights out in Arizona is because the greens are Augusta-fast but relatively tame at most stops (or at least, easily readable) -- and so in that sense Augusta greens still present the greater challenge (and lower scores). I don't have any idea how this new standard of greens speeds affect/plays out at the hundreds of quality private clubs across the U.S., but for tournament (e.g US Open) venues, it sure seems that the pre tournament renovation talk is never about adding more contour to the greens -- it's always about flattening them out, presumably so that the greens can be made to run even faster than at the Masters. I don't know where it stops, for certainly there is some young and ambitious brain/company out there researching agronomy/turf/maintainance issues so as to one day have greens running at 18!
Peter