Rory, hard to say how Flynn's time as a superintendent impacted his design styles. Our expectations for todays maintenance versus his time as a super are incredibly different. Old photos of various courses show water draining right through the bunkers and washing sand. Something not accepted at many clubs these days because of the expense of constructing bunkers. I have come to find many of the back slopes to the rear of his early plateaued greens were quite severe and deep. A few clubs have softened the banks. This was likely true of the NLE par 4 that played along the current entrance drive at LCC toward New Holland Pike. I think LCC is the perfect example of how he evolved as a designer considering some of the features evident in the early years of the current property. Over the next 26 years, you saw many of those "eye-candy" features eliminated for the more subdued (for lack of a better term) features that we see today.
We all can speak to his use of width and angles/diagonals in his designs. This does certainly play well for a variety of playing abilities, even as the game was growing in the roaring twenties. Room for error for a less controlled golfer, and a heroic line for those inclined to take on the strategic angles. Since we are discussing RG in this thread, I find many of this bunkers to be perfectly placed on the land. IMO, holes like #2, #5, #8 (the ditches), #10, #14, and #18 to present the eye-candy some are looking for. They just don't have the dramatic impact at first glance. I believe Mike is acknowledging that in his comments, to a degree. Flynn takes a second and sometimes third glance to really "get" it. The two Flynn courses I have had the longest consulting relationship with are LCC and Philly. Yet, after all this time and I don't know how many walks over those properties, I am still learning from his work. Pure Genius.
I liken Flynn to Hugh Alison from the standpoint that both often (not all the time) were economical in their use of fairway bunkering but presented the golfer with a challenging approach to a green that was angled one way or another and often bunkered to both sides. I like Michael Moore's thought that Flynn used bunkers whereas Travis used internal contours.
To Maydays point "Using slope on greens rather than undulations enables the putting surface to stand the test of time. Those knobs in the green suffer at today’s speeds."[/size][size=78%] [/size]As for overall pitch being more maintainable that undulations that depends on the overall size of the greens and severity of the undulations. I have worked on many of the greens at RG when they were expanded in '14. Believe me there are plenty of areas of those greens that do not stand up to todays green speeds. A 3.7% slope may have been acceptable a few years ago, but with todays standards, that's really pushing it. Flynn built some pretty severe greens with little internal undulations. There isn't a single Flynn course that doesn't have multiple greens that have lost significant cupping areas because of todays green speeds. Not saying they all need to be rebuilt but there are some excessive slopes out there. They to have fallen victim to today's speeds.