Golf Magazine ideas for changes to Augusta National

[Jason Topp]

http://www.golf.com/tour-news/video/2018/04/18/masters-2030-what-augusta-national-might-look


My take:


1.  Trees on 8 is a terrible idea - the trees would be in the same place as the most favorable pitch position to certain pins.
2.  Lengthening 10 is a good idea -
3.  Shortening 17 seems like a bad idea to me - it seems to me that there is not enough risk associated with pulling out driver so as to force a decision on the player.  I think the hole would turn into a less interesting version of 3.

[MClutterbuck]

Who did this? A 19 year old graphics intern?


Really silly.

[jeffwarne]

pretty sure it was a collaboration by Clifford Roberts, RTJ, George Cobb, Tom Fazio, Hootie Johnson and Billy Payne.


I mean no one would tinker with a Mackenzie/Bobby Jones original would they?

[Jim Nugent]

Why would shortening #17 by 100 yards bring double bogey into play?  Seems to me it would mostly lead to more eagles and birdies. 

If players keep hitting the ball further and further, ANGC will face problems on lots of other holes.  15 and 13, e.g., could become drive and pitch par 5s.   

[Kalen Braley]

I agree with the other sentiments.... completely uninteresting ideas.


Moving that tee back on 10 won't do much, they can still find that speed slot with the driver as I saw a ton of 3ws being hit from the current tee a few weeks ago.


But one persistent theme remains... both in that presentation and all the discussions here of late.  Length....

[Jeff Schley]

Why would shortening #17 by 100 yards bring double bogey into play?  Seems to me it would mostly lead to more eagles and birdies. 

If players keep hitting the ball further and further, ANGC will face problems on lots of other holes.  15 and 13, e.g., could become drive and pitch par 5s.

I totally agree.  There is no bunker and no Eisenhower tree now.  If anything replant a tree where the Ike tree was and your done.

Planting 3 pines on 8 right of the green is a terrible idea as that is the bailout side if you go for it in two.  There is so much undulation around that green you would force players to thread the needle there artificially.  It isn't a for sure eagle opportunity like 13/15, thus let it be.

[Kalen Braley]

Looked up some stats on the 2018 Tournament.


3 easiest holes were 8, 15, and 13 in that order..  (13 being the easiest in relation to par, 8=4.71, 15=4.67, 13=4.61)


Given how they already mangled 7 into a penal beast, 8 doesn't need be same.


P.S.  17 only had 4 Double bogeys all week and played as 5th toughest.  Exactly how will shortening it by ~75 yards make it harder? Perhaps a peninsula green surrounded by a moat/soggy ditch on 3 sides...perfect!!!

[Tom_Doak]

Who did write it?  No byline??


A couple of years ago SPORTS ILLUSTRATED asked me to write the same piece.  I hated to turn down a chance to write in SI, but I have no more to say about Augusta after all these years.

[Carl Rogers]

Do the powers that be at ANGC have nothing to do, and just need to do something?

[Jim Nugent]

Do the powers that be at ANGC have nothing to do, and just need to do something?

The question the article raised is a good one: how ANGC keeps the course relevant to the world's top players, as the ball carries further and further.  TPTB there constantly face that problem. 

As everyone here points out, the so-called solutions GM offered seem absurd.

Tom Doak, have you ever explained why you don't rate ANGC a 10?   

[Ronald Montesano]

A) There's a reason that these guys are writers at GM, and not members at ANGC, and not the reason you might think;


B) Why would anyone plant pine trees intentionally? What a wretched tree. Terrible for the soil.

[Peter Pallotta]

If no changes have ever made Augusta better and all proposed changes would only make it worse, that original Augusta must've been one hell of a perfect golf course.
Did the experts and cognoscenti back then consider it so?
Could it be so today, with just the 'right' changes?
If it got the best and truest possible restoration by the greatest living architect working today, what would Augusta be?
Perfect? A 10?
Or was it never that?

[Jim Nugent]

Peter, I think the answer to your questions mostly comes down to who the course is set up for.

For just about everyone except top elite players, the course as originally set up probably worked better.  Compared to now, there was more room to hit your ball.  Less chance of losing it.  Still plenty of challenges, but less penal, with more reasonable green speeds, less water (and more bailouts away/around it), fewer traps, fewer punch-outs due to nearly nonexistent trees and rough. 

The guy often considered the best architect ever designed it -- a guy who also designed two other courses usually counted among the five best ever (CPC and RMW).  The best golfer of the era helped and advised him.  They aimed to build a course that suited all class of players.  Sounds to me like they achieved their goal admirably, at least for the game back then. 

Today's top pro game is a different story.  The original ANGC would be too short for them.  They would drive several par 4s (3, 7 and 10 leap to mind), and have wedges or short irons into every par 5.  Par for them would be around 65.  We'd see some scores in the 50s.   

Since the course is mostly a tournament course for the world's elite, 99% of the changes have been made to keep it competitive for them.  I've never played ANGC, or seen it in person, but my sense is those changes, while probably necessary for the Masters, have made the course harder and less inviting for average golfers. 

[Jeff Schley]

Probably worth posting the GD link of ANGC changes over the years visual map. I'm more visual person as opposed to reading, thus nice compilation.

https://www.golfdigest.com/story/the-complete-changes-to-augusta-national

[MikeJones]

Of all the courses in the world ANGC is one of the least in need of any alterations. It's just fine as it is.

[Tom_Doak]

Tom Doak, have you ever explained why you don't rate ANGC a 10?

Well, first of all, getting to 10 is a matter of what did you do to deserve it, not what didn't you do.


But I thought I explained my feelings about the course very well in my review.

[Carl Rogers]

My own feeble brain turns these issues around and around.


Other elements in this discussion:
- are the elite golfers of today better because they are just better? ....
- or are the elite golfers better because the equipment improvement and personal conditioning allowed them to get so much better?


thus ANGC has to "change" the course in order to provide a "relevant" test???


Or what is wrong with 25 under par golf??

[MClutterbuck]

Lets assume for a second that shortening 17 was a positive thing (I don´t). Why would you move the green forward instead of working on the other end of the hole?

[Erik J. Barzeski]

Other elements in this discussion:
- are the elite golfers of today better because they are just better? ....
- or are the elite golfers better because the equipment improvement and personal conditioning allowed them to get so much better?

Both.

[Pat Burke]

My own feeble brain turns these issues around and around.


Other elements in this discussion:
- are the elite golfers of today better because they are just better? .... yes
- or are the elite golfers better because the equipment improvement and personal conditioning allowed them to get so much better?     Yes


thus ANGC has to "change" the course in order to provide a "relevant" test???


Or what is wrong with 25 under par golf??

[Jeff Schley]

Other elements in this discussion:
- are the elite golfers of today better because they are just better? ....
- or are the elite golfers better because the equipment improvement and personal conditioning allowed them to get so much better?

Both.

What about all the great instructors nowadays?  That has to be a factor for golfers being better.   

[Jim Nugent]

Or what is wrong with 25 under par golf??

What's wrong is the way they get there: hitting wedges and short irons into par 5s (on their 2nd shots)... driving par 4s that were never designed for that... turning ANGC into a pitch and putt course. 

[Steven Blake]

Why change anything at all? It is the best tournament in golf period.  So some players at times hit short irons on some holes however disaster still lurks i.e. Sergio this year on 15 and Jordan on 12 in the final round a few years ago. Making it harder by lengthening the course is a mistake.


Here are some changes that are small but impactful:

• Take away the first cut.
• Possibly get rid of the rye grass fairways and surrounds making the place play firmer and faster.  This would make shots the trickle off the green more delicate.
• Move 13 tee to the left to create more of and angle so that players cannot drive it over the trees.  This seems to leave shots over +200 yards.  This does not require addition of length but more of an angles game.

The fact that double bogey and eagle are very possible on a number of holes at ANGC is what makes it so interesting.  Par should be irrelevant.  We already have the US Open we don't need another tournament like it. 


Steven Blake

[Doug Lionberger]

Why change anything at all? It is the best tournament in golf period.  So some players at times hit short irons on some holes however disaster still lurks i.e. Sergio this year on 15 and Jordan on 12 in the final round a few years ago. Making it harder by lengthening the course is a mistake.


Here are some changes that are small but impactful:

• Take away the first cut.
• Possibly get rid of the rye grass fairways and surrounds making the place play firmer and faster.  This would make shots the trickle off the green more delicate.
• Move 13 tee to the left to create more of and angle so that players cannot drive it over the trees.  This seems to leave shots over +200 yards.  This does not require addition of length but more of an angles game.

The fact that double bogey and eagle are very possible on a number of holes at ANGC is what makes it so interesting.  Par should be irrelevant.  We already have the US Open we don't need another tournament like it. 


Steven Blake

I agree - no changes are needed.  It’s a wonderful course and terrific tournament.  I do not believe further changes are needed to “protect” the course.  I also wish more courses would stop worrying about the four days a tournament is held there and focus more on the 99% of players that are most important.  ANGC is in a unique position to lead the way here.

[Adam Lawrence]

I have said this before on here, but the issue is not the scoring per se, although I do understand the reluctance of those in charge of our greatest championship courses to see 58s on their courses, but it is the way in which those scores are achieved.


Throughout the history of championship golf, the supreme test of the greatest players has been the ability to hit long approach shots into tightly guarded greens under the most extreme pressure. There would not be a plaque on Merion's eighteenth if Hogan had hit a seven iron.


Today, the long approach shot hardly exists. Without extreme weather, only on par fives -- and those that are ridiculously long by historical standards at that -- extremely long par threes and 'drivable' par fours, a class of hole that basically did not exist until ten or fifteen years ago, are the top players required to hit a long iron or a 'wooden' club into the green. And that is the single biggest difference in championship golf between this generation and every other one that has preceded it.