Consensus vs. Groupthink in Golf Course Rankings

[Ben Sims]

I’m starting to sense a pattern here and it’s slightly frustrating. John Kirk gave us a definition of groupthink and I think most are glossing over what groupthink is and arguing for they *think* groupthink is.


Ian says “we are the sum of our curiosity” and I say….eh maybe? Perhaps if we’re accepting what everyone here is mistaking for groupthink. But I’d rather accept John Kirk’s quoted definition of groupthink.


It’s not groupthink to study and accept opinions from smart people. That’s just called research. Or another field might call it best practices. Or maybe, consensus?

[Mark_Fine]

Ben,
Your definition is how I am thinking about it.  I don’t view this as overly negative at all.  As you said, there has been a lot of research done by “mostly” well traveled knowledgeable people.  It is still a subjective exercise and there is no correct list but there are many well deserving candidates on these lists most worthy of the distinction. And yes every list will have some head scratchers but so would all our own personal best and/or favorites lists.   

[Jeff Shelman]

Someone earlier mentioned the second 100 list. I find myself more inclined to see the courses on the Second 100 list - whether it is GD or either of the GW lists - as they are often times a bit more of a mystery.


You know that they are certainly pretty good, but they sometimes haven't had the same level of exposure. Sometimes I agree that they aren't top 100 courses, but other times I wonder how in the world people like X course better than Y.


I like the Best in State lists for some of the same reasons.

[Mark_Fine]

Jeff,
You said those second 100 courses are “pretty good”!  I would say most of them are more than pretty good, most are exceptional.  I would venture to say we could name a different course a day for a year and each one would be amazing and we would find it hard to argue why it couldn’t be a member of a Top 100 list.  Most courses in the top 200 or top 300 would likely be one for the best courses the average golfer would ever play if they could get access to play it.  They are all 7s and up on the Doak scale and that is a pretty darn good golf course.  There are that many of them out there. 

[Tom_Doak]

I would cite half a dozen PGA Tour courses this year (Kapalua, Waialae, Memorial Park, Colonial, Oakmont, Renaissance) that have been laid out, renovated and/or restored by members of the Big Three, plus others influenced or soon to be influenced by Big Three-adjacent architects (Philly Cricket, Detroit GC, Sedgefield, East Lake) is one example.


Another would be the sheer demand for visits to the likes of Bandon, Sand Valley, Landmand, Pinehurst No. 2 and No. 10. Are there many American courses that are fully or nearly sold out for 2025 that weren't worked on by that cohort?


Another would be the list of recently opened courses by the Big Three and their advisees.


I also would count the comments from Rory McIlroy and other PGA Tour players about why venues matter when it comes to big tournaments. Rory referred to Pebble Beach as a "cathedral of the game," which I believe is a phrase the USGA has pushed as part of its recent messaging. Gil Hanse succeeding Rees Jones as the new "Open Doctor" is definitely a sign that GCA "groupthink" has gone well beyond the confines of this message board.

This post is incoherent.  Somehow you're counting Oakmont and Pebble Beach as results of the modern design revolution?  And at various points counting Andrew Green and Rob Collins and others as "Big Three Adjacent" ?  Is that because I sat next to them at dinner once?


P.S.  Please, please stop talking about the Big Three.  Talk about our courses, individually.

[Mark Pearce]

Only 7 or 8? You must be joking.

Ciao

Like

[Mark Pearce]

It’s not groupthink to study and accept opinions from smart people. That’s just called research. Or another field might call it best practices. Or maybe, consensus?

It is group think to be unwilling to challenge those opinions.

[Mark_Fine]

Mark,
Just because there is agreement doesn’t mean there isn’t or wasn’t any challenge or debate.  Multiple researchers can draw the same conclusions. 


I did that Pine Valley thread as one example.  There was plenty of debate about the flaws in the golf course but at the end of the day it seemed most ended up with the same conclusion.  Tom Doak criticized the course as brutally hard for most golfers but still gives it a 10.  He can comment as to why.  Is that groupthink or just an individual coming to their own conclusion?   I did the same. Maybe the group reviewing these courses is just thinking the same way    Groupthink doesn’t have to be a negative concept. 

[Tom_Doak]

I have no qualms that Pine Valley is heralded as a great course . . . it is the idea that it is clearly superior to anything else and has to be #1 that is most definitely Groupthink.


Note that the rankings systems don't ask panelists to identify their #1 course.  Pine Valley is #1 in the GOLF Magazine system because it gets a higher % votes for the top three / top ten than any other course . . . it is #1 in GOLF DIGEST because it gets higher numbers for their various categories [but, again, those numbers are impacted by Groupthink].


For me, the point of any listing of great courses is not to demonstrate how they conform to a bunch of arbitrary rules, but to draw light to how they differ, and that there is more than one approach to greatness.  Pine Valley is great at what it is, just like The Old Course and Royal Melbourne and Sand Hills are great at what they are.  I personally prefer the latter three, but chacun a son gout

P.S.  If Pine Valley is so perfect then why is Tom Fazio flexing about blowing up several greens and rebuilding them?

[Ira Fishman]

I’m starting to sense a pattern here and it’s slightly frustrating. John Kirk gave us a definition of groupthink and I think most are glossing over what groupthink is and arguing for they *think* groupthink is.


Ian says “we are the sum of our curiosity” and I say….eh maybe? Perhaps if we’re accepting what everyone here is mistaking for groupthink. But I’d rather accept John Kirk’s quoted definition of groupthink.


It’s not groupthink to study and accept opinions from smart people. That’s just called research. Or another field might call it best practices. Or maybe, consensus?

Ben,


I subscribe mostly to the gca.com ethos which now dominates the GM rankings, but the smart people who created and drive that ethos are not the only knowledgeable people. There are two Fazio, one Jones Sr, and one Nicklaus course left in the GM Top 100. That reflects the ethos which produces great modern courses and dominates the current fashion, but it also reflects groupthink.


Ira

[Mark Pearce]

Mark,
Just because there is agreement doesn’t mean there isn’t or wasn’t any challenge or debate.  Multiple researchers can draw the same conclusions. 


I did that Pine Valley thread as one example.  There was plenty of debate about the flaws in the golf course but at the end of the day it seemed most ended up with the same conclusion.  Tom Doak criticized the course as brutally hard for most golfers but still gives it a 10.  He can comment as to why.  Is that groupthink or just an individual coming to their own conclusion?   I did the same. Maybe the group reviewing these courses is just thinking the same way    Groupthink doesn’t have to be a negative concept.

Aren't you defining and then ignoring the difference between consensus and group think?  There was a time when the consensus was that the Earth was flat.  At that time multiple experts had come to the same conclusion.  Of course the consensus can be (and most often is) correct.  But it becomes group think when it can't be challenged.

[Tom_Doak]

I subscribe mostly to the gca.com ethos which now dominates the GM rankings, but the smart people who created and drive that ethos are not the only knowledgeable people. There are two Fazio, one Jones Sr, and one Nicklaus course left in the GM Top 100. That reflects the ethos which produces great modern courses and dominates the current fashion, but it also reflects groupthink.

Ira:


Yes, to some extent, but don't discount that it also reflects marketing $.  The Fazio and Jones and Nicklaus courses you are talking about are mostly just sitting on their hands, while new courses are spending $ on marketing [which includes getting raters there], and classic courses are spending $ on restorations, which are another form of marketing [which includes getting raters there].


There is also a recency bias in the voting [I'm not talking about a shift in tastes here, just that people remember things better that they saw more recently]. Courses from the 1950s through the 1980s are the main victims of that, because nobody is going back to see them again, because they aren't in the news and they aren't being renovated [and also because a lot of them were respected for being very tough, and with new equipment they aren't so tough] . . . so they just slowly slip further down the list until they're gone.

[Ira Fishman]

Tom,


Agree. My post 70 above tried to capture some of these factors. However, it still strikes me as groupthink when particular names become excluded pretty much as a category. And that means the Wilsons, Lees, Weiskopf/Morrishs, Maples, Foughts, etc don’t even get to the starting line.


Ira

[Tom_Doak]

 it still strikes me as groupthink when particular names become excluded pretty much as a category. And that means the Wilsons, Lees, Weiskopf/Morrishs, Maples, Foughts, etc don’t even get to the starting line.

Yes, but they are also hurt because there was never a clear consensus [ha!] on which was their "best" course, except for Sand Hollow for Fought, which is indeed overlooked. 


But there is another Groupthink factor in play that's holding many of these courses back . . . that they have some associated real estate development.  Many panelist types have become convinced that a great golf course must be pure and free from any real estate on the periphery.  [If you look at the Best New results from last year, you'll see that all of the courses without real estate beat any of the courses that had any.] 


That 1950-2008 era of golf courses were mostly driven by real estate development . . . even most of the Jim Engh courses and half of the Mike Strantz courses . . . and that provides another data point for their lack of recognition today.


Note that panelists are free to ignore the real estate where they see fit:  there are no houses at Pine Valley, as far as they know! 

[Ira Fishman]

I saw that you have Sand Hollow in the CG Gourmet Choice which prompted me to realize that without being conscious of it, I have played 15 of them across the four volumes (although only a small number of the US privates and not Sand Hollow). Among those 15, there is great variety in design and designer. I strikes me that it is a model to fight groupthink.

[Tom_Doak]

I saw that you have Sand Hollow in the CG Gourmet Choice which prompted me to realize that without being conscious of it, I have played 15 of them across the four volumes (although only a small number of the US privates and not Sand Hollow). Among those 15, there is great variety in design and designer. I strikes me that it is a model to fight groupthink.

One of the criteria for The Gourmet's Choice is that we only have one course by any one designer in each volume.  Hopefully I am not attacked for this obviously DEI-adjacent policy.

[Ben Sims]

When I worked in mission planning cells, we generally had accepted TTP’s (tactics, techniques, and procedures) for various tactical problems. These TTPs are *regularly challenged* and re-jiggered for evolving threats and new technology as well as evolving aircrew skills. If the white hat provided a problem and you worked all day to provide a solution and then presented it publicly at a “murder board” (where a bunch of equally experienced operators get to try and kill your plan), you better have a damn good reason for not executing an accepted TTP.


Bottom line is this, if you were the type of planner that regularly said stuff outside the box cause it’s sexy and makes people think, you generally weren’t considered cognitively talented enough to be good at that gig. Challenging convention had to be met with a an equally compelling argument. If you didn’t have that, you were just tossing poop at the wall and hoping for art.


I think if someone was regularly saying Pine Valley is too hard to be a 10, Pasatiempo is too hard of a walk, Oakmont is one-dimensional, Dornoch’s greens are too severe to be a 10, etc., we’d all question that enthusiast’s ability to talk about golf courses. No?

[Tom_Doak]

I think if someone was regularly saying Pine Valley is too hard to be a 10, Pasatiempo is too hard of a walk, Oakmont is one-dimensional, Dornoch’s greens are too severe to be a 10, etc., we’d all question that enthusiast’s ability to talk about golf courses. No?

Some people are one-issue voters.  And who's to say their perspective isn't right?  So if your take is that great courses should be playable for everyone, that's a valid take, and it wouldn't be excluded from the formation of consensus . . . if consensus is what you're really trying to form.


On the other hand, if you've just got someone objecting to every older golf course for a different reason every time, and they refuse to apply the same standards to other courses they prefer, they should get lost.

[Ben Sims]

I think if someone was regularly saying Pine Valley is too hard to be a 10, Pasatiempo is too hard of a walk, Oakmont is one-dimensional, Dornoch’s greens are too severe to be a 10, etc., we’d all question that enthusiast’s ability to talk about golf courses. No?

Some people are one-issue voters.  And who's to say their perspective isn't right?  So if your take is that great courses should be playable for everyone, that's a valid take, and it wouldn't be excluded from the formation of consensus . . . if consensus is what you're really trying to form.


On the other hand, if you've just got someone objecting to every older golf course for a different reason every time, and they refuse to apply the same standards to other courses they prefer, they should get lost.

That’s a tough one. I think I would prefer to make a judgement on whether the objection was compelling rather than looking for ad-hominem style rejections. That’s happened in the past around here. I remember Matt Ward’s opinion being roundly ignored due to his preferences.


There’s a whole other topic that I’m pushing someone to start about modern courses vs older courses. Generally speaking I prefer the playing characteristics of modern courses. If I sit here and make a compelling argument for why Ballyneal, Pac Dunes, Sand Hills, and Friars Head are ALL better than Pine Valley, are you going to dismiss it because I’ve found different reasons why the moderns are all better? Or should I have stuck with just saying they’re all better for the one reason?

[Tom_Doak]

That’s a tough one. I think I would prefer to make a judgement on whether the objection was compelling rather than looking for ad-hominem style rejections. That’s happened in the past around here. I remember Matt Ward’s opinion being roundly ignored due to his preferences.

There’s a whole other topic that I’m pushing someone to start about modern courses vs older courses. Generally speaking I prefer the playing characteristics of modern courses. If I sit here and make a compelling argument for why Ballyneal, Pac Dunes, Sand Hills, and Friars Head are ALL better than Pine Valley, are you going to dismiss it because I’ve found different reasons why the moderns are all better? Or should I have stuck with just saying they’re all better for the one reason?

1.  I was one of the few who didn't dismiss Matt Ward.  [You could ask him.]  He had a valid perspective.  He was way too narrowly focused, so I took everything he said with a large helping of salt, but he had his points.


2.  Certainly not going to dismiss your individual reasoning, as I prefer reviews to rankings.  Every course needs to have a reason why it's better than the norm.  The one thing we can all agree upon about Pine Valley is that it has its own reason.

[Ben Sims]

Tom,


What I’m trying to illustrate is that we are ALL, even you, dancing around this mesh point of groupthink and consensus. I think getting the collective to admit the existence of groupthink in our ideas about golf courses is in itself a win. But discounting the validity of consensus about certain ideas that have formulated over the years is a loss.


Learning while also re-attacking is the key here. I assume you don’t see a lot of re-attacking of the GCA.com consensus thoughts and ideals and this thread (and others) is the result.

[JBovay]

Okay fine. You want guts? To see the really great places, you have to be hosted. Someone is taking the time to be with a likely stranger. And you’ve been told, as an enthusiast, that this course is the one to which all others should aspire. People you admire also think this course is the greatest. And then you play it. You buy the course history and spend half a mortgage payment in the shop. You read, for YEARS, how good the place is. But this feeling gnaws at you…it’s just not what they all say it is. Is it me that’s crazy? Yeah probably. I’ll just mark it a 10 cause Brad said my rating gets thrown out if it’s too far off the norm anyway. Groupthink is powerful!

Try putting all the courses you've played in a rank order (maybe even just the top 200).  If you could do it, repeat the same thing in 6 months and I'd be interested to see the differences.  I think I would be unable to reproduce the same order immediately after I listed it.


I tried to make a rank order list.  I couldn't help but look at something like course 60 and realize I liked it more than course 50 but less than course 59 even though I liked course 50 more than 59.  For me there was no transitive property for golf courses, which is a tough pill to swallow for someone who likes to think of themselves as rational.

For years I maintained a personal ranked list of the top courses I’d played. A couple of years ago, I went somewhere I’d always dreamed of playing. For the first few hours onsite, I felt like I was in heaven. (Then I stopped hitting fairways and completely lost focus and came back down to earth.) And yes, the whole experience (accommodation, transportation, golf, caddy, a couple of hats) for this one round cost me about half a mortgage payment.

Afterwards, I couldn’t decide whether it was the best course I’d ever played, or came out somewhere below my home course in my personal rankings. It is almost impossible to have transitive rankings of (good) golf courses that are insensitive to factors like weather, your score, and your playing partners. Thus, it seems to me that panelists/raters/golfers in general will err toward groupthink, and rank PV (for example) ahead of whatever course is #40 on The List every time, even if they think both courses are about #15 on their own personal lists.

[Kalen Braley]

I think John Kirk's original premise holds up 4 pages into this thread.

As Mark alluded to if you're feeling brave, show us you're not subject to groupthink and give us your list and include reasons why its its better.  I'd bet dollars to donuts its not going to be much different top to bottom than the existing stuff from the mags.

P.S.  I miss Matt Ward's descriptions like "This course isn't steak and potatoes, its more like exotic Thai Food" which I believe is the line he used to defend Wolf Creek in Mesquite

[John Kavanaugh]

A gentleman can no longer embrace his inner troll. The jump to bully became too easy. No one wants to be a bully.

[Tim Gavrich]

I would cite half a dozen PGA Tour courses this year (Kapalua, Waialae, Memorial Park, Colonial, Oakmont, Renaissance) that have been laid out, renovated and/or restored by members of the Big Three, plus others influenced or soon to be influenced by Big Three-adjacent architects (Philly Cricket, Detroit GC, Sedgefield, East Lake) is one example.


Another would be the sheer demand for visits to the likes of Bandon, Sand Valley, Landmand, Pinehurst No. 2 and No. 10. Are there many American courses that are fully or nearly sold out for 2025 that weren't worked on by that cohort?


Another would be the list of recently opened courses by the Big Three and their advisees.


I also would count the comments from Rory McIlroy and other PGA Tour players about why venues matter when it comes to big tournaments. Rory referred to Pebble Beach as a "cathedral of the game," which I believe is a phrase the USGA has pushed as part of its recent messaging. Gil Hanse succeeding Rees Jones as the new "Open Doctor" is definitely a sign that GCA "groupthink" has gone well beyond the confines of this message board.

This post is incoherent.  Somehow you're counting Oakmont and Pebble Beach as results of the modern design revolution?  And at various points counting Andrew Green and Rob Collins and others as "Big Three Adjacent" ?  Is that because I sat next to them at dinner once?


P.S.  Please, please stop talking about the Big Three.  Talk about our courses, individually.

Tom, I was responding to John K's request for a list of examples of where GCA has "won," as I articulated it (with partial tongue in cheek) - i.e., influenced popular thinking about golf course design. So those examples are different from one another, but they are meant to point to the influence that this board and the topics it has discussed for a quarter of a century have exerted into the practice of designing and building golf courses.


Apologies if "Big Three" seems reductive from your position, but it is nothing more than shorthand to list you, Coore & Crenshaw and Hanse & Wagner, who have received considerable attention for your respective individual golf course design projects in recent years. "Big Three-adjacent" would encompass a number of talented and exciting architects who are also active at the moment.


FWIW, I agree that it's worthwhile to discuss individual courses - that is by far my favorite sort of piece to write - but art criticism has also historically included higher-level discussion of trends, movements, genres, etc. Your particular art form is not exempt, IMO, though I understand your ambivalence towards it.

[Tags:]

Tags: