OT: The Open Course

[RockyMTblue2]

It is an interesting spectacle to watch the world's best golfers play a Muirfield course in absolutely wretched condition. The fairways have gone dormant as have major portions of each green. One commentator said at least of third of the greens are dead! It is a challenge to great golfers to adapt, but we have witnessed many really terrific shots turn into disaster because of these conditions and that is very unfortunate.

 

[Alydar]

I'd love to play the course. But when a course needs to go bizarro to keep today's stronger and technologically advanced players from dominating it it's time to move on. A 440 yard hole was driven today.

 

[geordi]

That course is not dormant. Nor is it poorly conditioned. It's a European links course. European golf and especially links courses are not overwatered like US courses. They are not as lush and don't play that way. That's what makes the Open the best golf tournament in the world. Players have to have imagination. They have to improvise. They have to read the weather. On an American course, they can play the game in the air and they play the same course every week. They are all too long, too lush, same speed of the greens, same cut in the fairway. They complain about the Open because the 'best players in the world' can't play golf the way it was meant to be played. Play one sometime. You'll change your mind.

 

[Alydar]

Like I said, I'd love to play it. I played for years on a course that had no fairway irrigation and understand how concete fairways play. I also used to play on a 9 hole course with rock hard greens that required you to bounce the ball onto them.
I think that a national championship should be decided with as little random luck as possible. I have no problem using links course but they intentionally let the greens turn to concrete here. The Masters has the toughest greens in golf and yet they hold a well hit shot to the correct place. Most of the greens at Muirfield right now simply won't hold anything. And it's done by design to keep scoring around par. And that's the problem. Too much emphasis on maintaining par results in tricked up courses. They hit baseballs today further than 60 years ago and yet the stadiums are smaller. All these players at the Open are champions. I'd like to see them display their talent rather than have them hit 3 irons off 450 yard par 4's in order to avoid random bounces. JMO.

And once again I love the course. Just not for a championship anymore.

 

[RockyMTblue2]

geordi, your tone and all the rest of it is drivel. I have played Muirfield, but I would not play it in this shape. Links golf is a different breed of play, but this course now is something else entirely. Of course you are right about the over watered over manicured PGA course that make up so much of the tour, but this course in its current shape is unworthy of a casual day of golf let alone an Open.

 

[boontonbomber]

That course is not dormant. Nor is it poorly conditioned. It's a European links course. European golf and especially links courses are not overwatered like US courses. They are not as lush and don't play that way. That's what makes the Open the best golf tournament in the world. Players have to have imagination. They have to improvise. They have to read the weather. On an American course, they can play the game in the air and they play the same course every week. They are all too long, too lush, same speed of the greens, same cut in the fairway. They complain about the Open because the 'best players in the world' can't play golf the way it was meant to be played. Play one sometime. You'll change your mind.

totally agree with your points. i played Royal Dornoch in the highlands years ago, and
it was firm and fast and the most memorable round of golf that i have ever played. after a few holes, i figured out to go with the 5 wood off the tee, and ran lots of 4 and 5 irons in the direction of the greens. great fun , great challenge.the cream came to the top on sunday, with phil, adam, lee, and tiger in it almost to the end. the best golfers were identified by this course, which is what you want to happen in a major. every year at the u.s. open and british open the best players seem to find a way to adjust, while the rest just bitch and moan about the setup and conditions, along with lots of fans. phil somehow managed to shoot 66, so i guess the course was playable.

 

[vtcwbuff]

The complaints that I read were all about pin placement, not about course conditions.

 

[Alydar]

Fantasy news release:

PBA announces that national bowling championship will be held on lanes that are a foot narrower than those used by amateurs and that the lanes will be lengthened by 20 feet. "We are trying to identify the best bowler" was the only comment from the tournament committee. "We discovered that in the 17th century the game was played on this size lane. It was always a big part of the game till modern times."



We are protecting the sport by awarding championships for skills that no one uses at the top levels of the game and that have no relationship to the style of golf played today. And by that I don't refer to links golf but to what they did to a wonderful links course in order to protect the course's scoring reputation. 325 yard 4 irons, pinball machine fairways and concrete greens keep scoring down but turns the game into a lottery. Phil played great yesterday but his win was due as much to the favorable bounces he got as to his skill.
I saw one twosome play 2 approach shots from similar spots on the fairway that landed short of the green within 2 feet of each other. One landed on a soft spot and stopped short of the green. The other hit a hard spot, and bounced once onto the green and then rolled completely over the green and down a hill behind. Two well struck shots. Two entirely different results. Fun for a casual round with friends but not the way to identify the champion.

 

[boontonbomber]

Fantasy news release:

PBA announces that national bowling championship will be held on lanes that are a foot narrower than those used by amateurs and that the lanes will be lengthened by 20 feet. "We are trying to identify the best bowler" was the only comment from the tournament committee. "We discovered that in the 17th century the game was played on this size lane. It was always a big part of the game till modern times."



We are protecting the sport by awarding championships for skills that no one uses at the top levels of the game and that have no relationship to the style of golf played today. And by that I don't refer to links golf but to what they did to a wonderful links course in order to protect the course's scoring reputation. 325 yard 4 irons, pinball machine fairways and concrete greens keep scoring down but turns the game into a lottery. Phil played great yesterday but his win was due as much to the favorable bounces he got as to his skill.
I saw one twosome play 2 approach shots from similar spots on the fairway that landed short of the green within 2 feet of each other. One landed on a soft spot and stopped short of the green. The other hit a hard spot, and bounced once onto the green and then rolled completely over the green and down a hill behind. Two well struck shots. Two entirely different results. Fun for a casual round with friends but not the way to identify the champion.

favorable(or unfavorable) bounces, aka "rub of the green", are part of the game. if you've played the game for very long, you're very much aware of those bounces, open courses or not. it's always been a part of the game, and always will be. it's not a lottery; it's called golf.

 

[Alydar]

Yes, I am aware of what rub of the green means. That refers to random events like what happened to Tiger at the Masters 15th hole, or a ball that ends up in an old divot hole. What happened for 4 days at Muirfield was planned to happen. The course was intentionally tricked up to keep scoring above par and not done to test the players. That's not rub of the green. Links golf implies balls running on the ground rather than in the air. Fine. How many tournaments are played this way now? I can only think of one, this one. You don't dry out and harden greens until any ball laning on them bounces 10 feet in the air and then call it "rub of the green".

I'm all for tradition and I'm all for links golf. But top level golf is a different game than it used to be. They don't allow stymies' anymore because they are unfair, despite the fact that they used to be an intrinsic part of the game and considered "rub of the green".

It would be like the NBA calling strict travelling and palming only in the finals of the playoffs. It would be legitimate but the wrong time to do it.

 

[RockyMTblue2]

No golfer would publicly complain about this course, but you can bet many were mightily POed at what they were asked to deal with. For all of their tradition, one of the most annoying things, beyond the bizzare asphalt golf course, was their willingness to allow large groups of fans to tromp all over large sections of rough. While "necessity" dictates that on some course, here it seemed to be dictated by nothing more than caprice.

 

[boontonbomber]

Yes, I am aware of what rub of the green means. That refers to random events like what happened to Tiger at the Masters 15th hole, or a ball that ends up in an old divot hole. What happened for 4 days at Muirfield was planned to happen. The course was intentionally tricked up to keep scoring above par and not done to test the players. That's not rub of the green. Links golf implies balls running on the ground rather than in the air. Fine. How many tournaments are played this way now? I can only think of one, this one. You don't dry out and harden greens until any ball laning on them bounces 10 feet in the air and then call it "rub of the green".

I'm all for tradition and I'm all for links golf. But top level golf is a different game than it used to be. They don't allow stymies' anymore because they are unfair, despite the fact that they used to be an intrinsic part of the game and considered "rub of the green".

It would be like the NBA calling strict travelling and palming only in the finals of the playoffs. It would be legitimate but the wrong time to do it.

unlike other sports, golf is basically no different than it's always been. equipment is different, courses are different, but it is still the same brutal mental and physical test it has always been. and, by the way, it's not a game.

 

[Icebear]

I loved Muirfield and the ever changing setup as the winds shifted and dried and altered conditions because I loved watching the best in the world struggle to control themselves and their emotions in the face of the brute injustices that are golf. In major it is the skill of mental discipline that is most critical of all. It was the first golf I have watched in awhile and it was great.

 

[MilfordHusky]

I was at Merion and saw "Sunday" pin placements all week. In a major, I am perfectly fine with that. On the 15th at Merion on Saturday, players who were 30' beyond the hole had 20' coming back. Tiger played the hole pin high below the hole and had a tap-in for par. You need to
make excellent shots ALL the time. The only possible exception I recall was the 7th at Shinnecock in 2004, where multiple players putted into the bunker, and the USGA had the green watered between groups. Maybe, just maybe, that was over the top.