My non-golfing wife rants on the 17th at Sawgrass

[Criss Titschinger]

I showed this hole to one of my non-golfing work colleagues last year. He called it a "D!#$ hole".

However, I'm in the camp that it serves its purpose. Penultimate hole, short iron in hand, must hit green. Yesterday's Players was one of the most entertaining golf events I've watched in a long time, and a big reason for that was the drama that happened on 17 between Fowler, Kisner, and Sergio.

I loved the aggregate playoff finish with 16-18. Take arguably the most exciting finish on Tour and make that the playoff. I hated the immediate sudden death on 17, which becomes immediately dull if one hits the green and one hits the water. I like it after you've gone through 16-18 and still don't have a winner. Professional golf is, after all, entertainment. Kisner and Fowler both showed stones on both their shots into 17 in the playoff.

I wouldn't want every course to have one of these holes and I wouldn't want a course full of them. That being said, I'm okay with it and a handful of knock-offs.

[Mike Nuzzo]

Stanky girls, werewolf movies and island greens. A category unto themselves.

[Benjamin Litman]

Jason's wife wasn't the only one to have expressed negative emotions toward the ongoings at 17 yesterday.

This, from Erin Walker, wife of Jimmy, via Twitter:

Btw @JimmyWalkerPGA -- we need to work on our post win kisses. 😘💋👄 Get it @RickieFowlerPGA! #yowza!

[GLawson]

This is an awesome thread to start off a Monday morning.  The finish was exciting and I love watching the Players but have to say that TPC Sawgrass isn't too high on my priority list to actually play.  It does feel contrived.

[Andrew Buck]

Funny, I could almost hear my wife making those comments if she was frustrated with me sitting and watching golf on mothers day while she wanted to do something else ... and it would really have nothing to do with the hole.  

This is one of the rare examples where we are playing the pro's course, as opposed to the other way around, and the finish is great theater.  The issue, of course, is that every course developer in the decades after it was built wanted a replica.

[Mike Hendren]

The golf course and the 17th are indeed contrived - brilliantly so.  For the record I finished 5-3-5 in my only round there.

Bogey

[Carl Nichols]

Jason's wife wasn't the only one to have expressed negative emotions toward the ongoings at 17 yesterday.

This, from Erin Walker, wife of Jimmy, via Twitter:

Btw @JimmyWalkerPGA -- we need to work on our post win kisses. 😘💋👄 Get it @RickieFowlerPGA! #yowza!

One could start a thread comparing TPC Sawgrass to Ms. Randock.

[Paul Jones]

We needs pictures of your wife to form a valid opinion.

That is funny Sam !!!

[Paul Jones]

Most complaints I heard from the Pros is the placement of the hole in the round.  If this hole was on the front nine, they would be a lot less complaining from the Pros. 

I like the hole because it is short and easy (if the wind is not blowing) - too many Par 3s these days are 185 - 225 yards.

[Andrew Buck]

Jason's wife wasn't the only one to have expressed negative emotions toward the ongoings at 17 yesterday.

This, from Erin Walker, wife of Jimmy, via Twitter:

Btw @JimmyWalkerPGA -- we need to work on our post win kisses. 😘💋👄 Get it @RickieFowlerPGA! #yowza!

Sergio seemed to miss the memo that tour players only date blondes,

and his girlfriend missed the memo that tour WAG's cover themselves, not that I'm complaining.

[cary lichtenstein]

I showed this hole to one of my non-golfing work colleagues last year. He called it a "D!#$ hole".

However, I'm in the camp that it serves its purpose. Penultimate hole, short iron in hand, must hit green. Yesterday's Players was one of the most entertaining golf events I've watched in a long time, and a big reason for that was the drama that happened on 17 between Fowler, Kisner, and Sergio.

I loved the aggregate playoff finish with 16-18. Take arguably the most exciting finish on Tour and make that the playoff. I hated the immediate sudden death on 17, which becomes immediately dull if one hits the green and one hits the water. I like it after you've gone through 16-18 and still don't have a winner. Professional golf is, after all, entertainment. Kisner and Fowler both showed stones on both their shots into 17 in the playoff.

Criss...right on...pure entertainment, great clutch golf, drama, playroll concept worked brilliantly, loved it

I wouldn't want every course to have one of these holes and I wouldn't want a course full of them. That being said, I'm okay with it and a handful of knock-offs.

[John Kavanaugh]

At the start of the playoff my wife asked me to go help her with the landscaping.  After my denial we spoke no more that day.  I have no regrets.

[Sam Morrow]

17 at Sawgrass and 16 at Phoenix are 2 of the best things for professional golf.

[Mark Pritchett]

17th at Sawgrass (as well as the other 17 holes) are brilliant. 

News flash-all golf courses are contrived.

[Andrew Buck]

Stanky girls, werewolf movies and island greens. A category unto themselves.

If nothing else, Jason should invite his wife to post on GCA ... that's better material than most of the posts here.

[Mike Schott]

I get that a non-golfer and one particularly not interested in the strategic aspect of the game would see TPC 17 that way. But short par 3's are all about hitting a specific part of the green and in that sense this hole is perfect.

Watching the top players on a windless day eat up the hole just shows how brilliantly they hit their yardages. That they do this under pressure is even more amazing.

[JLahrman]

How much of the tournament did your wife watch, Jason?

My wife likes to unwind with some cheap reality shows at the end of the day. No judgment, I've got my guilty pleasures too. But she has had to kick me out of the room so many times for making snarky comments during The Bachelorette that I'm not effectively banned from watching it with her.

[Tim Gavrich]

Jason--

Your wife and my girlfriend would get along famously. She doesn't like sports, and I've never seen a non-sports person root harder than when I explained that Kisner's putt on 18 in regulation was to avoid another hour or so of golf.

As for the 17th at Sawgrass - hell, the entire finishing trio - it's phenomenal, as proved time and time again at The Players Championship. To deny its excellence is to be willingly blind to the idea of context in GCA. The course seems time and again to serve exactly the purpose the PGA Tour wants it to.

[DMoriarty]

Jason's wife may not like golf, but she understands it.

[John Nixon]

To deny its excellence is to be willingly blind to the idea of context in GCA. The course seems time and again to serve exactly the purpose the PGA Tour wants it to.

That pretty well sums it up. Nicely done.

[Brent Hutto]

As for the 17th at Sawgrass - hell, the entire finishing trio - it's phenomenal, as proved time and time again at The Players Championship. To deny its excellence is to be willingly blind to the idea of context in GCA. The course seems time and again to serve exactly the purpose the PGA Tour wants it to.

Tim,

I think you need another big dose of the Golf Club Atlas Kool-Aid because you're totally failing to miss the point.

Our creed here is there is only one, true form of Golf with a capital G. And all courses are judged by how they serve that form of the game. The fact that televised golf entertainment thrives on the 16-17-18 closing stretch at TPC Sawgrass simply proves that such entertainment is not Golf.

The capital-G form of the game must suit a guy with a dodgy swing, playing hickory-shafted clubs and a lumpy rubber band wound ball. As such, there's no place in Golf for an island green or any other feature that would reliably produce high drama when played by the likes of Rickie Fowler or Sergio Garcia.

I'm having a hard time remembering any final rounds at St. Andrews that were half as compelling to watch as yesterday's at the Players. But since the Old Course suits my game 100x better than does TPC Sawgrass I guess that proves the latter is a bastard abomination that ought to be bulldozed and replaced by tract houses and strip malls.

[John Kavanaugh]

Brent,

When John Daly won at St. Andrews it was every bit as compelling as yesterday.

[Brent Hutto]

Wasn't that the year the Italian guy flubbed a chip then holed out to force the playoff?

I remember that more as a very surprising outcome happening suddenly at the end. Not the sort of tightly bunched sprint to the finish we saw yesterday.

[John Kavanaugh]

I found it interesting that the most imperfect major champion in the history of the game won at the greatest course every conceived by God or man.  That should dispel any ideas that how the ball bounces matters.

[Bruce Wellmon]

I am waiting on what the skanky girl at work said about the tournament to complete this thread.