Jim,
I played Pine Valley 20 years ago.
To be fair, my memory has faded a bit. though my recollection is often jogged by all the fantastic photos and discussion we see of PV here on GCA.
I remember not being blown away by it, and having a feeling of merely trying to keep it in the fairly large corridors, without straying by a lot. Many holes looked and played similar to me)i.e. hit something in a 40-60 yard corridor), and while I felt it was an excellent course, it did not stir nearly the same emotions in me that I felt when I played NGLA, Shinnecock, ANGC, Royal County Down for the first time.(courses I was first exposed to in that era)
My criticism of it would be that it is quite one dimensional, but that's a 20 year opinion with no specific reasons
other than the emotions I can recollect from the experience.
Since then I have been blown away by such places as Eastward Ho, Portsalon ,Pennard St, Enodoc and a few others, but perhaps that was a question of expectations.
Most recently I was exposed to Merion and would rate it as least as high as PV, if not higher, but that's not really a crazy revelation.
What I'm saying is, I could easily see giving Pine Valley an 8 or even a 7.
I think if you took your average player, or even your average rater, and didn't tell them where they were, they could come up with similar feelings. Now with some serious tree work, and opening up some long views and vistas, I'm 100% sure my excitement about the course would greatly increase.
many can pick apart a course and tell you one or three "weaker" holes prevent it from greatness, or that setting doesn't matter, or scenery, or the feeling you get when you take it all in on the first tee or walking off #18, but it all factors in for me, and it's certainly completely unscientific.
In a nutshell, perhaps the raters who gave it a 7, didn't succumb to all the preround expectations and peer pressure of recognizing the #1 ranked course in the world, and truly felt it was a 7.
Conversely, extremely high expectations can work against a course, and leave one feeling disappointed if they didn't feel a connection after playing.