WEBVTT - Fried Egg Stories (Rerelease): Making TPC Sawgrass 0:00:00.360 --> 0:00:03.240 Hello, and welcome to another edition of the Frida Egg Podcast. 0:00:03.640 --> 0:00:07.480 Today we have a documentary episode for you on the 0:00:07.480 --> 0:00:10.479 story of how TPC Sawgrass, the venue of the Players 0:00:10.560 --> 0:00:15.520 Championship was designed and built. We actually released this episode 0:00:15.920 --> 0:00:19.000 this week last year as the fourth installment of our 0:00:19.000 --> 0:00:22.280 Frida Egg Story series. Now, of course you remember this 0:00:22.360 --> 0:00:23.160 week last year. 0:00:23.200 --> 0:00:23.599 We all do. 0:00:24.320 --> 0:00:27.480 It was when the seriousness of the COVID nineteen pandemic 0:00:27.960 --> 0:00:31.440 really became clear in the US, and the Players Championship 0:00:31.480 --> 0:00:34.559 was canceled after Round one. In the midst of all 0:00:34.560 --> 0:00:38.080 of that, we released this episode and people did listen 0:00:38.080 --> 0:00:40.519 to it. We really appreciated that, but we thought we 0:00:40.520 --> 0:00:42.440 would give it another chance this week, given that the 0:00:42.440 --> 0:00:47.559 Players Championship, by all indications, will actually happen. This episode 0:00:47.560 --> 0:00:52.120 has interviews with Dean Beeman, Jerry Pate, Vernon, Kelly, Tom Doak, 0:00:52.200 --> 0:00:56.680 Sean Martin, and Adam Shuepack, and we thought they said 0:00:56.800 --> 0:01:01.280 some really interesting and valuable things about Pete Dye, about 0:01:01.280 --> 0:01:05.399 the process behind TPC Sawgrass, and about the influence of 0:01:05.440 --> 0:01:09.760 both Die and what has become his most famous design. So, 0:01:10.040 --> 0:01:14.240 without further ado, here is episode four of Fried Egg Stories. 0:01:14.720 --> 0:01:18.039 Alligator Pitt the making of TPC sawgrass. 0:01:18.360 --> 0:01:21.240 The fried egg requires a different technique. 0:01:21.400 --> 0:01:22.640 What you need to do is. 0:01:22.640 --> 0:01:26.160 Actually square the face so they'll dig down underneath that 0:01:26.280 --> 0:01:29.479 bad lie and propel that ball right out onto the green. 0:01:30.480 --> 0:01:31.000 Here's the thing. 0:01:31.120 --> 0:01:33.560 Playing out of a buried lion of bunker is completely 0:01:33.600 --> 0:01:36.000 different than playing out of a night and clean lion 0:01:36.080 --> 0:01:37.000 a greenside bunker. 0:01:37.959 --> 0:01:40.240 You need to be aggressive on any show weather it's 0:01:40.240 --> 0:01:42.399 sitting cleanly for its fried egg. 0:01:42.920 --> 0:01:44.119 Well, we've all faced it. 0:01:44.280 --> 0:01:46.479 The dreaded fried egg not. 0:01:46.520 --> 0:01:48.600 To be cleared, though, it's actually a pretty easy shot 0:01:48.680 --> 0:01:48.920 to hit. 0:02:07.640 --> 0:02:10.920 Sailing out of Gravesend, England on the trade route, Captain 0:02:10.960 --> 0:02:15.040 William Hilton, one August morning in sixteen sixty three came 0:02:15.120 --> 0:02:17.040 upon an island peaceful and serene. 0:02:17.919 --> 0:02:20.720 What you're hearing is the telecast of the nineteen sixty 0:02:20.800 --> 0:02:24.160 nine Heritage Golf Classic. It was a new event held 0:02:24.160 --> 0:02:27.240 at a new golf course, Harbortown Golf Links had been 0:02:27.240 --> 0:02:30.800 built by a forty three year old architect named Pete Dye. 0:02:31.280 --> 0:02:34.480 Back then, Pete Dye wasn't well known in a mainstream way, 0:02:34.960 --> 0:02:37.760 but his collaborator had a more recognizable name. 0:02:38.800 --> 0:02:41.440 Hello, I'm Jack Nicholas. This is Pete Dye. 0:02:42.120 --> 0:02:45.400 The two men lean against the balustrade of an outdoor stairway, 0:02:45.680 --> 0:02:48.399 both looking a little flushed in their full suits. 0:02:49.000 --> 0:02:52.360 Pete and I worked together to design and build the 0:02:52.360 --> 0:02:54.840 Harbortown golf Links here at Seapin's plantation. 0:02:55.560 --> 0:02:57.280 We're here on the eve of the. 0:02:56.919 --> 0:02:59.960 First Heritage Golf Classic to be played over the Thanksgiving weekend. 0:03:01.080 --> 0:03:03.160 Having a golf tournament on the first year of operation, 0:03:03.880 --> 0:03:06.120 it's a dream come true for both of us. 0:03:06.360 --> 0:03:07.760 And the golf course looks great. 0:03:07.800 --> 0:03:09.120 Dunnie looks beautiful. 0:03:09.240 --> 0:03:09.480 Jack. 0:03:10.040 --> 0:03:13.000 Really, it's been a lot of fun here and well, yes, 0:03:13.120 --> 0:03:16.880 that's a great contrast today the beautagrasses with a beheas 0:03:17.080 --> 0:03:20.880 centipede pin strong brings you back to Pinehurst and some 0:03:20.919 --> 0:03:24.000 of the old British golf links looks great. 0:03:25.480 --> 0:03:27.520 It was quite a coup for Pete Dye to be 0:03:27.639 --> 0:03:30.560 there on TV side by side with the greatest golfer 0:03:30.600 --> 0:03:33.080 in the world. If you were a golf architect in 0:03:33.160 --> 0:03:35.680 nineteen sixty nine, he didn't get an awful lot of 0:03:35.720 --> 0:03:39.080 press unless your name was Robert Trent Jones. So the 0:03:39.080 --> 0:03:42.440 opening of Harbortown marked a turning point in Pete Dye's career. 0:03:42.840 --> 0:03:45.960 Here was a course to be discussed. It was quirky 0:03:46.040 --> 0:03:49.640 and challenging, and it proved popular among the pros. One 0:03:49.640 --> 0:03:52.560 of those pros was Dean Beeman, who played his first 0:03:52.560 --> 0:03:54.400 Heritage in nineteen seventy one. 0:03:55.000 --> 0:04:00.800 My favorite golf course was Harbortown, and Harbortown was today 0:04:01.280 --> 0:04:03.960 is many players' favorite golf course. 0:04:04.080 --> 0:04:04.960 They really like it. 0:04:05.920 --> 0:04:09.680 Harbortown is a golf course that has just as many 0:04:10.000 --> 0:04:13.640 right to left as left to right holes. It has 0:04:13.760 --> 0:04:19.520 small and green, It demands accuracy. It doesn't favor a 0:04:19.600 --> 0:04:22.400 long hitter versus a shorter hitter. So I thought it 0:04:22.440 --> 0:04:25.679 had a great balance and it was a great test 0:04:25.680 --> 0:04:27.760 of golf and a fair test to golf. 0:04:28.200 --> 0:04:31.360 By nineteen seventy eight, Beaman was commissioner of the PGA 0:04:31.480 --> 0:04:34.719 Tour and he had just negotiated the purchase of a wild, 0:04:35.040 --> 0:04:39.599 soggy property near Jacksonville, Florida. There he intended to build 0:04:39.720 --> 0:04:43.359 a new venue for the Tournament Players Championship. He wanted 0:04:43.400 --> 0:04:45.880 the course to tax the abilities of the world's best 0:04:45.880 --> 0:04:50.159 golfers while providing a better viewing experience for spectators. It 0:04:50.200 --> 0:04:53.560 would be a stadium golf course, and he knew the 0:04:53.600 --> 0:04:59.680 man to build it was Pete Dye. Today, on Frida 0:04:59.720 --> 0:05:02.960 Egg's Stories, we are going back four decades to the 0:05:02.960 --> 0:05:06.360 building of the stadium course at TPC Sawgrass in the 0:05:06.440 --> 0:05:10.480 nineteen eighty two Players Championship. This story has been told 0:05:10.560 --> 0:05:13.880 and retold over and over, and since it's Player's Week 0:05:13.960 --> 0:05:17.360 right now, you'll no doubt be reminded by various journalists, 0:05:17.440 --> 0:05:20.640 TV hosts, and podcasters of the usual bits of lore. 0:05:21.120 --> 0:05:24.559 Dean Beeman purchasing the property for one dollar, Pete Dies 0:05:24.600 --> 0:05:26.799 sketching a routing on the back of a place mat, 0:05:27.080 --> 0:05:30.200 the creation of the island Green, the complaints of the pros, 0:05:30.560 --> 0:05:33.640 and Jerry Pate after his victory in eighty two hauling 0:05:33.680 --> 0:05:36.640 both Beman and Die into the pond next to the 0:05:36.680 --> 0:05:40.200 eighteenth Green. Don't get me wrong, we'll replay a few 0:05:40.240 --> 0:05:42.520 of those hits in this episode. We're not about that. 0:05:43.160 --> 0:05:46.040 But the real reason I'm curious about the TPC Sawgrass 0:05:46.080 --> 0:05:49.400 story has to do with the personalities involved in the 0:05:49.480 --> 0:05:55.120 contrasts between them. On the one hand, you had Pete Dye. 0:05:55.360 --> 0:05:58.440 Golf architecture was a passion for him, not just a 0:05:58.440 --> 0:06:00.960 business enterprise, and as we know in the way he 0:06:01.000 --> 0:06:05.200 designed courses. He was intensely hands on and independent. He 0:06:05.240 --> 0:06:08.200 was an artist. On the other hand, you had the 0:06:08.200 --> 0:06:12.080 PGA Tour under the leadership of Dean Beeman, thirteen years 0:06:12.080 --> 0:06:12.839 younger than Pete. 0:06:12.880 --> 0:06:13.200 Die. 0:06:13.480 --> 0:06:18.240 Beeman was energetic and assertive, a deal maker. TPC Sawgrass 0:06:18.320 --> 0:06:21.000 was his venture, and he had ideas of his own 0:06:21.200 --> 0:06:24.440 about what it should be. No less an authority than 0:06:24.520 --> 0:06:28.440 Alice Dye, Pete's wife and most trusted design consultant, had 0:06:28.440 --> 0:06:32.520 her own doubts about the partnership between Dean and Pete. Oh, Pete, 0:06:32.640 --> 0:06:37.000 you're crazy, she said, you can't build for Dean. He's particular, 0:06:37.160 --> 0:06:40.080 he's efficient, he's all the things you aren't. He'll have 0:06:40.160 --> 0:06:42.640 his hands in there trying to tell you what to do. 0:06:42.640 --> 0:06:47.720 Don't do it. But he did, and oddly enough it worked. 0:06:48.440 --> 0:06:51.320 In this episode of Frida Egg Stories, we'll try to 0:06:51.320 --> 0:06:59.240 figure out how today the PGA Tour is the eight 0:06:59.320 --> 0:07:02.120 hundred pound rilla of the golf World. Back in the 0:07:02.200 --> 0:07:05.719 nineteen seventies, it was more like a newborn COMPUTIONI. The 0:07:05.760 --> 0:07:08.279 Tournament Player's Division as it was then known, had just 0:07:08.320 --> 0:07:10.840 separated from the PGA of America, and it was a 0:07:10.880 --> 0:07:11.840 scrappy operation. 0:07:12.760 --> 0:07:13.240 Yeah, it was. 0:07:13.280 --> 0:07:15.880 Really a mom and pop shop back then. 0:07:16.360 --> 0:07:19.320 Adam Schupak is a golf journalist and the author of 0:07:19.440 --> 0:07:22.640 Golf's Driving Force, a biography of Dean Beaman. 0:07:23.640 --> 0:07:26.560 When the Tour moved its headquarters to Panaviter Beach, it 0:07:26.640 --> 0:07:29.440 was working out of a four bedroom home with Dean's 0:07:29.480 --> 0:07:32.840 office was the master bedroom. The garage had the copier 0:07:32.920 --> 0:07:35.680 and postage meter, and you know for an intercom, they 0:07:35.720 --> 0:07:37.560 just yelled at each other. It was. It was a 0:07:37.600 --> 0:07:41.800 really small staff and Beaman took over in nineteen seventy 0:07:41.800 --> 0:07:44.840 four and used to say that, you know, the largest 0:07:44.920 --> 0:07:47.800 capital ast that they had was an IBM Selectric typewriter. 0:07:47.920 --> 0:07:50.800 They had about twenty walkie talkies and they did it on. 0:07:51.160 --> 0:07:54.040 They had three Budweisers and the Canna Beans. I mean, 0:07:54.560 --> 0:07:57.400 it was a time period where bowling was still attracting 0:07:57.480 --> 0:08:00.400 higher ratings than golf, and tennis was the sport surging 0:08:00.400 --> 0:08:02.600 and popularity, so you know, he had a lot of 0:08:02.640 --> 0:08:04.880 work cut out for him when he took over his commissioner. 0:08:05.480 --> 0:08:08.480 It didn't take long for Beaman to start making aggressive moves. 0:08:08.960 --> 0:08:10.640 He was in his mid thirties and he had a 0:08:10.680 --> 0:08:13.000 background not only as an elite golfer who had won 0:08:13.040 --> 0:08:16.440 two US Amateurs, but also as an insurance broker. He 0:08:16.520 --> 0:08:20.000 knew his way around tax documents as well as boardroom negotiations. 0:08:20.240 --> 0:08:22.720 You know, he was an intense man. He's got these 0:08:22.760 --> 0:08:25.400 piercing blue eyes, and you know, his friends used to 0:08:25.480 --> 0:08:27.800 say that, you know, he could deliverer a look that 0:08:27.840 --> 0:08:32.319 could exterminate headlce And it was a job that required toughness, 0:08:32.880 --> 0:08:34.880 because you know, he had this quest to kind of 0:08:34.960 --> 0:08:38.200 roll over the status quo in this traditional game, make 0:08:38.280 --> 0:08:41.280 golf a bigger sport. And you know, he wanted to 0:08:41.280 --> 0:08:43.440 create a fan base that was much broader than just 0:08:43.480 --> 0:08:46.000 its own participants, and that meant doing things a little 0:08:46.000 --> 0:08:47.800 differently than they'd been done in the past. 0:08:48.400 --> 0:08:51.719 In his first year, Beaman converted the tour into a nonprofit, 0:08:51.920 --> 0:08:55.720 exempting it from paying income taxes and changing its financial fortunes. 0:08:57.480 --> 0:09:01.360 Beeman's other signature project was the new Turn of Players Championship, 0:09:01.600 --> 0:09:04.800 later known as the Players Championship and now apparently as 0:09:04.960 --> 0:09:08.640 just the Players Anyway. From the beginning, Beeman had big 0:09:08.679 --> 0:09:11.920 plans for the event. The USGA had the US Open, 0:09:12.240 --> 0:09:15.200 the PGA of America had the PGA Championship and the 0:09:15.320 --> 0:09:18.120 RNA had the Open, why shouldn't the PGA Tour have 0:09:18.160 --> 0:09:21.560 its own major. Well, for one, it's not easy to 0:09:21.640 --> 0:09:25.920 manufacture prestige, but Beeman tried his best. After staging the 0:09:25.960 --> 0:09:29.640 first three tournament players Championships at three different courses, he 0:09:29.720 --> 0:09:32.680 decided to stick with one. It had worked for the Masters, 0:09:32.720 --> 0:09:36.360 after all, So starting in nineteen seventy seven, the players 0:09:36.440 --> 0:09:39.480 absorbed to the Greater Jacksonville Open and set up shop 0:09:39.600 --> 0:09:42.040 at Sawgrass Country Club, which was. 0:09:42.000 --> 0:09:45.800 A very dynamic golf course that was played in March 0:09:45.840 --> 0:09:49.160 where the wind blew. It was as close to an 0:09:49.200 --> 0:09:52.120 ocean side course as you could get, and so it 0:09:52.200 --> 0:09:53.679 had all those elements in it. 0:09:54.480 --> 0:09:57.800 But while Beeman liked Sawgrass as a course, he thought 0:09:57.800 --> 0:09:59.280 it could be improved as a venue. 0:10:00.040 --> 0:10:03.520 There was going to have to be a substantial investment 0:10:04.280 --> 0:10:07.800 made in the golf course and the facilities to accommodate 0:10:07.840 --> 0:10:11.280 both the players and the gallery and what we wanted 0:10:11.280 --> 0:10:11.600 to do. 0:10:12.360 --> 0:10:15.800 So Beaman attempted to buy Sawgrass Country Club, but for 0:10:15.840 --> 0:10:19.400 a variety of reasons, the deal never happened. Instead, he 0:10:19.520 --> 0:10:22.400 set out to build a new course, a home course 0:10:22.440 --> 0:10:26.200 for the tour. Just across the road from Sawgrass Country 0:10:26.200 --> 0:10:30.240 Club was a huge tract of wilderness. The owners knew 0:10:30.280 --> 0:10:32.760 that being in business with the ascendant golf tour would 0:10:32.800 --> 0:10:35.240 raise the value of their land, so they sold four 0:10:35.360 --> 0:10:39.400 hundred and fifteen acres to Beaman for one dollar. From there, 0:10:39.520 --> 0:10:43.080 the commissioner pieced together financing from a non recourse loan, 0:10:43.400 --> 0:10:46.760 a few dozen expensive founding memberships, and a few thousand 0:10:46.960 --> 0:10:50.880 cheap annual memberships. It was a tidy sum acquired at 0:10:50.880 --> 0:10:53.000 minimal risks. 0:10:53.080 --> 0:10:53.480 PG tour. 0:10:53.520 --> 0:10:56.200 Commissionary's working for a board, he's working for the players, 0:10:56.559 --> 0:10:59.880 and they had a lot of doubts and they pretty much, 0:11:00.440 --> 0:11:01.959 you can't risk any of our assets. 0:11:01.960 --> 0:11:03.120 They didn't have a lot of to day. 0:11:03.000 --> 0:11:04.880 But they didn't want to put anything on the line, 0:11:04.920 --> 0:11:06.760 and if he failed, it was his neck. And so 0:11:06.800 --> 0:11:08.880 he went out figured a way to do it where 0:11:08.920 --> 0:11:11.880 they just couldn't say no, and it was you know, 0:11:11.960 --> 0:11:14.520 that is one of the most brilliant deals ever in 0:11:14.880 --> 0:11:15.760 the game of golf. 0:11:19.280 --> 0:11:22.400 After all of that, though, Beeman found himself in possession 0:11:22.400 --> 0:11:24.640 of a piece of land that, to put it mildly, 0:11:25.040 --> 0:11:28.400 seemed ill suited to golf. Here's how Pete Dye described 0:11:28.440 --> 0:11:31.160 it in his autobiography Bury Me in a pop Bunker. 0:11:31.920 --> 0:11:35.040 When I first inspected the proposed site for the player's course, 0:11:35.440 --> 0:11:40.520 my only compatriots in the impenetrable swampy jungle were deer, alligators, 0:11:40.760 --> 0:11:44.559 wild boar, and deadly snakes. In order to cut a path, 0:11:44.720 --> 0:11:47.440 I followed deer tracks that led me to dry areas 0:11:47.440 --> 0:11:50.480 in the swamp before I nearly drowned in the depths 0:11:50.520 --> 0:11:52.040 of the marshland well. 0:11:52.080 --> 0:11:54.000 The property was. 0:11:54.920 --> 0:11:58.400 It was dead flat, It had a lot of standing 0:11:58.520 --> 0:12:05.640 water on it'bstantial rainfall here in Jacksonville following rainfall. 0:12:04.720 --> 0:12:05.840 Until to dry it out. 0:12:05.920 --> 0:12:07.760 It was a pretty wet piece of property. 0:12:08.400 --> 0:12:12.760 It hadn't always been that way. The array of oak, pine, sweetgum, 0:12:12.800 --> 0:12:15.560 and magnolia trees on the site indicated that it had 0:12:15.600 --> 0:12:18.839 once been in upland, But when the Intracoastal Waterway was 0:12:18.880 --> 0:12:22.040 built nearby in the early nineteen hundreds, water began to 0:12:22.080 --> 0:12:25.280 collect on the site. By the nineteen seventies, it was 0:12:25.320 --> 0:12:29.200 a Florida forest mashed up with a Florida swamp. But 0:12:29.320 --> 0:12:32.120 Beeman didn't mind that the property was flat and would 0:12:32.160 --> 0:12:35.240 need to be almost wholly re engineered. To him, it 0:12:35.280 --> 0:12:37.920 was a blank slate where he could realize his vision 0:12:38.080 --> 0:12:39.520 for a stadium golf course. 0:12:40.480 --> 0:12:43.360 No golf course up to that point had been bought, 0:12:43.600 --> 0:12:49.040 had been built that more interest was concentrated on the 0:12:49.080 --> 0:12:53.080 gallery than the players. Most golf courses are built for players. 0:12:53.480 --> 0:12:56.000 We needed to build build one for the players, but 0:12:56.120 --> 0:12:59.319 we also had to we want. I wanted to build 0:12:59.320 --> 0:13:02.280 a golf course that would be the first what I 0:13:02.400 --> 0:13:04.560 called a stadium golf course. 0:13:05.520 --> 0:13:08.679 Well, I wanted. I wanted two things. There were two elements. 0:13:08.240 --> 0:13:12.080 That I thought were extremely important in making a stadium 0:13:12.160 --> 0:13:16.080 course as successful as it could be. One is that 0:13:16.160 --> 0:13:21.920 you did all you could to build the spectator areas 0:13:22.240 --> 0:13:24.720 in the highest places on the course and the golf 0:13:24.720 --> 0:13:28.760 courses in the playing services on the lowest point of 0:13:28.840 --> 0:13:33.800 the golf course, so that the spectators were actually walking 0:13:33.840 --> 0:13:36.800 with you, and they would be above the players, and 0:13:36.840 --> 0:13:39.960 so more people could see. And that's the concept of 0:13:40.000 --> 0:13:43.600 a stadium. The second part of the concept that I 0:13:43.640 --> 0:13:47.559 thought was very important was the routing of the golf 0:13:47.600 --> 0:13:51.600 course should be in a way that produced the most 0:13:51.960 --> 0:13:56.280 what I call areas of activity. Instead of spreading the 0:13:56.280 --> 0:14:00.559 golf course out and stringing the holes out. They shared 0:14:00.640 --> 0:14:04.079 wind back and forth in a way that created us 0:14:04.320 --> 0:14:09.719 hubs of activities where a spectator could maybe walk two 0:14:09.760 --> 0:14:13.440 or three hundred yards and see four or five different 0:14:13.480 --> 0:14:18.000 shots close to a couple of tees, a couple of greens, 0:14:18.080 --> 0:14:22.440 and maybe a fairway, and not have to walk five 0:14:22.520 --> 0:14:26.160 miles to watch a lot of golf. Because there are 0:14:26.200 --> 0:14:29.200 some spectators that want to follow their favorite player and 0:14:29.280 --> 0:14:30.880 others that just want to watch golf. 0:14:31.640 --> 0:14:34.760 It's striking how these ideas, although novel at the time, 0:14:35.040 --> 0:14:37.840 call to mind the features of certain time tested tournament 0:14:37.880 --> 0:14:41.520 golf courses. As Pete Dye pointed out in his autobiography, 0:14:41.760 --> 0:14:44.680 the Links courses of Great Britain and Ireland have dunes 0:14:44.720 --> 0:14:48.120 that form natural spectator mounds along the fairways and around 0:14:48.160 --> 0:14:51.840 the greens, and Beeman's notion of hubs of activity reminded 0:14:51.880 --> 0:14:56.240 me of how Augusta National returns to certain landforms, creating 0:14:56.280 --> 0:14:59.800 gathering spots where spectators can see multiple greens and tees 0:15:00.080 --> 0:15:04.680 at once. Perhaps in part because he appreciated these historical references, 0:15:05.080 --> 0:15:07.800 Pete Dye took beeman stadium concept and ran with it. 0:15:08.440 --> 0:15:11.920 Over dinner at the Homestead restaurant in Jacksonville. Die sketched 0:15:11.920 --> 0:15:14.680 a back nine routing on that now famous Place Mat 0:15:14.960 --> 0:15:18.520 and Beeman knew he had the right architect. Granted a 0:15:18.560 --> 0:15:21.040 Place Matt is a lot easier to work with than 0:15:21.080 --> 0:15:23.160 a four hundred and fifteen acre alligator pick. 0:15:27.920 --> 0:15:32.960 We killed rattlesnakes and moccasins all the time, almost every day. 0:15:33.440 --> 0:15:37.920 Were also alligators and spatters and all kinds of stuff 0:15:38.320 --> 0:15:41.200 out on the side, and you wore snake boots or 0:15:41.600 --> 0:15:43.000 or you didn't really go out there. 0:15:43.600 --> 0:15:47.440 Vernon Kelly was the project manager at TPC Sawgrass. 0:15:47.720 --> 0:15:51.760 There was something out there we called blue gumbo clay. 0:15:52.160 --> 0:15:55.760 What it was was almost a plastic kind of play 0:15:55.840 --> 0:15:59.880 It was like quicksand. And when you were digging san 0:16:00.080 --> 0:16:04.080 and out of the pits, because wherever you found sand, 0:16:04.520 --> 0:16:06.920 we excavated it for the golf holds, and that's how 0:16:06.960 --> 0:16:10.320 we created seventeen. Of course, almost anyway you see a 0:16:10.400 --> 0:16:12.880 lake out there, it's because there was sand in that 0:16:12.960 --> 0:16:15.600 area and we didn't have the money to buy sand. 0:16:16.360 --> 0:16:19.400 And once you excavated the sand, sometimes you would hit 0:16:19.440 --> 0:16:23.800 this gushy kind of play material and it didn't seem 0:16:23.840 --> 0:16:26.240 to be in the bottom to it and out on 0:16:26.840 --> 0:16:29.680 I think it was number seven. One night we went 0:16:29.720 --> 0:16:33.520 a backo when we were digging building the green, and 0:16:34.000 --> 0:16:38.040 he got into that stuff, and I mean literally, without 0:16:38.480 --> 0:16:42.000 a couple of hours, it completely covered the tracks of 0:16:42.080 --> 0:16:44.840 the back hoe and was up to the cab, which 0:16:44.880 --> 0:16:47.600 is about five feet. We were able to pull it 0:16:47.640 --> 0:16:52.520 out with a dozer, but it just showed how treacherous 0:16:52.520 --> 0:16:53.320 the sight was. 0:16:53.960 --> 0:16:56.880 Early on, it could seem like the land itself was 0:16:56.920 --> 0:16:58.200 rejecting the golf course. 0:16:59.200 --> 0:17:01.840 The first thing we had to do was to find 0:17:01.880 --> 0:17:05.320 the property, so we had the boundary surveyed, and the 0:17:05.400 --> 0:17:09.240 surveyors actually went out there and cut the survey line 0:17:09.440 --> 0:17:13.119 with machetes, and then you know, went from point to 0:17:13.160 --> 0:17:17.560 point and marked the points with the survey steaks and 0:17:17.880 --> 0:17:21.880 survey tape. Well, the vegetation grew so fast out there, 0:17:22.720 --> 0:17:24.560 literally within a couple of days. 0:17:25.160 --> 0:17:26.080 You could barely. 0:17:25.800 --> 0:17:29.520 Find the cut lines, which were the pass from state 0:17:29.600 --> 0:17:33.200 to streak, and you couldn't find the steaks at all. 0:17:34.280 --> 0:17:36.320 And then there was the wildlife. 0:17:38.440 --> 0:17:41.080 So one day we were walking along it as hot 0:17:41.080 --> 0:17:43.760 as could be, and the bugs were about to carry 0:17:43.800 --> 0:17:46.600 off the skews and the rest, and I was talking 0:17:46.600 --> 0:17:47.080 to David. 0:17:47.480 --> 0:17:51.399 That would be David post Away, Pete Dye's construction superintendent. 0:17:52.000 --> 0:17:54.439 He said, do you think there are any alligators out here? 0:17:54.520 --> 0:17:56.720 I said, oh, yeah, they're all over the place because 0:17:56.760 --> 0:17:59.720 they can travel in this water. It's about knee high 0:18:00.160 --> 0:18:02.240 and they can move from place to place. And he said, 0:18:02.480 --> 0:18:06.520 those are step on one it's all. We won't do that, 0:18:06.600 --> 0:18:10.640 but you can find them because there'll be an alligator pit. 0:18:10.800 --> 0:18:13.440 And what they do is they'll be in an area 0:18:13.440 --> 0:18:19.239 of saw grass and they'll root around and make an 0:18:19.600 --> 0:18:23.520 alligator pit that's probably twenty feet square around where they 0:18:23.640 --> 0:18:27.280 ripped up the vegetation and kind of dug them but 0:18:27.600 --> 0:18:30.879 a little bit deeper, and that's where they live and 0:18:30.920 --> 0:18:34.480 that's where they sleep in the water. And all they're scavengers. 0:18:34.480 --> 0:18:38.160 They don't eat live meat. They kill things and they 0:18:38.200 --> 0:18:41.440 put it in that pit to rot and when it's 0:18:41.640 --> 0:18:44.959 real gamey, then they'll eat it. So when you come 0:18:45.040 --> 0:18:47.239 to one of those pits, you can tell what it 0:18:47.359 --> 0:18:50.600 is because it stinks to high heaven. And he said, boy, 0:18:50.600 --> 0:18:52.600 I hate to be in something like that, and I said, yeah, 0:18:52.680 --> 0:18:55.840 me too. So in the meantime, we're pushing through. We're 0:18:55.880 --> 0:18:58.600 pushing through the saw grass and it's about five feet ah, 0:19:00.119 --> 0:19:00.680 so thick. 0:19:00.840 --> 0:19:02.119 I mean, you can't. 0:19:02.240 --> 0:19:04.400 It just wears you out to push against it, sort 0:19:04.440 --> 0:19:09.560 of leaning leaning into it. I was in front and 0:19:09.680 --> 0:19:12.560 Dave was following me, and all of a sudden I 0:19:12.640 --> 0:19:14.239 was leaning. All of a sudden it just parted and 0:19:14.280 --> 0:19:16.679 I fell in this hole. And I knew immediately what 0:19:16.720 --> 0:19:19.320 it was because it's stunk to high of it and 0:19:20.320 --> 0:19:24.440 I'd fallen into an alligator. H Fortunately the alligator went home. 0:19:25.080 --> 0:19:29.960 But you know, so I'm lad of this thing, and 0:19:30.000 --> 0:19:34.600 my full concentration is on keeping my alpha order. All 0:19:34.600 --> 0:19:37.040 of a sudden, David comes and pops right through the 0:19:37.119 --> 0:19:38.679 grass and falls right on top of me. 0:19:39.440 --> 0:19:42.560 He looks around, he says, oh my god, he says, 0:19:42.560 --> 0:19:44.480 the stinks that I have and what is this? So 0:19:44.880 --> 0:19:48.800 it's what we were talking about. It's an alligator. He's gone. 0:19:50.320 --> 0:19:53.359 He just disappeared. He took off so fast. 0:19:53.920 --> 0:19:54.800 How did you get out? 0:19:55.040 --> 0:19:55.200 Oh? 0:19:55.200 --> 0:19:55.720 I got out. 0:19:56.200 --> 0:20:00.320 I was I was right behind, but nothing happened to it. 0:20:03.520 --> 0:20:06.240 Kelly, who hadn't worked on a Pete Dye project before, 0:20:06.440 --> 0:20:10.200 quickly got a taste of Diye's creative process. 0:20:10.080 --> 0:20:12.119 When we first started working with him. We had to 0:20:12.119 --> 0:20:14.959 get upset of plans for the bank in order to 0:20:15.280 --> 0:20:18.560 cheer a loan. It was the hardest thing to get 0:20:18.560 --> 0:20:22.480 a set of plants. Beat resisted and just didn't want 0:20:22.520 --> 0:20:25.600 to give us a set of plants. And finally we 0:20:25.600 --> 0:20:27.479 were able to secure a set of plants from him. 0:20:27.520 --> 0:20:30.200 We gave them to the bank and everything's ready to go. 0:20:30.680 --> 0:20:34.439 So we were on the site the first day. We 0:20:34.440 --> 0:20:37.320 were walking out to the first t I said, oh, waitmen, 0:20:37.400 --> 0:20:39.600 I forgot something, and I went running back to the 0:20:39.640 --> 0:20:42.639 truck and got the plans. And so I come running, 0:20:43.440 --> 0:20:46.360 come running back, and Pete says to me, what's that 0:20:46.600 --> 0:20:49.000 And I said, Oh, these are the plants, And he 0:20:49.040 --> 0:20:51.320 said put them back in the truck, and I don't 0:20:51.320 --> 0:20:56.480 want to see him again. That was the last time 0:20:56.560 --> 0:20:58.000 we had the plants on the job. 0:20:58.520 --> 0:21:01.439 And that it seems to me exactly where Pete Die 0:21:01.480 --> 0:21:04.320 and the tour could have found themselves at loggerheads, the 0:21:04.400 --> 0:21:08.680 craftsmen versus the corporation, the improviser versus the plan followers. 0:21:09.160 --> 0:21:12.040 But as it turned out, Dean Beeman himself had a 0:21:12.080 --> 0:21:15.000 healthy regard for Die's methods. 0:21:14.760 --> 0:21:15.639 That's Pete. 0:21:15.880 --> 0:21:18.800 Pete wants to be hands on boots on the ground. 0:21:19.320 --> 0:21:21.080 I want to see it. I don't want to see 0:21:21.080 --> 0:21:22.520 it on a piece of paper. I want to see 0:21:22.520 --> 0:21:24.639 it with my own eye and my boots on the 0:21:24.680 --> 0:21:26.719 ground and get wet. 0:21:26.240 --> 0:21:28.679 And from vernon Kelly's point of view. While there was 0:21:28.720 --> 0:21:31.840 a contrast in styles between Die and Beman, there was 0:21:31.880 --> 0:21:34.200 also a crucial element that kept the peace. 0:21:35.200 --> 0:21:38.040 There was a tremendous amount of respect between Dean and 0:21:38.160 --> 0:21:41.800 det In both ways and Alice both ways. 0:21:42.520 --> 0:21:45.640 Years later, Alice I admitted that her initial fears about 0:21:45.640 --> 0:21:49.520 the partnership had been unfounded. Dean was wonderful, she said. 0:21:49.920 --> 0:21:53.200 He let Pete do his thing, and both of them 0:21:53.320 --> 0:21:56.200 let Alice do her thing. She too was on site, 0:21:56.240 --> 0:21:58.280 and she too had a knack for boots on the 0:21:58.280 --> 0:22:02.640 ground improvisation. According to plans, the par three seventeenth would 0:22:02.680 --> 0:22:06.000 have water just on the right, but around the seventeenth green, 0:22:06.080 --> 0:22:08.040 as it happened, was some of the best sand on 0:22:08.080 --> 0:22:11.480 a generally mucky property, So the crew kept digging that 0:22:11.560 --> 0:22:14.680 sand out and using it as foundation for turf elsewhere 0:22:14.680 --> 0:22:18.080 on the course. Eventually there was an enormous pit where 0:22:18.080 --> 0:22:21.000 the seventeenth hole was supposed to be. Here's how Pete 0:22:21.080 --> 0:22:24.800 Dye recounted what happened next. I called Alice over to 0:22:24.880 --> 0:22:27.320 discuss with her where we could find a new place 0:22:27.359 --> 0:22:30.320 for the green. She said, put the green back where 0:22:30.320 --> 0:22:34.000 it was and fill the hole with water. Simple enough. 0:22:35.200 --> 0:22:39.040 This sort of husband wife collaboration was common on Dye projects. 0:22:39.560 --> 0:22:42.399 One summer when he was in college, Tom Doak worked 0:22:42.400 --> 0:22:44.840 on the crew at Die's Long Cove Club on Hilton 0:22:44.880 --> 0:22:45.479 Head Island. 0:22:46.480 --> 0:22:49.240 They were renting a house three miles away and see 0:22:49.280 --> 0:22:53.160 Pine's plantation, and Pete would be there six or seven 0:22:53.200 --> 0:22:54.960 days a week at six thirty in the morning with 0:22:55.000 --> 0:22:58.560 the crew, and Alice would come out maybe two or 0:22:58.600 --> 0:23:02.040 three times a week, you know, lunchtime or in the afternoon, 0:23:02.359 --> 0:23:05.960 and she'd just come check on progress and see, you know, 0:23:06.040 --> 0:23:08.480 see what what had been done since the last time 0:23:08.520 --> 0:23:11.160 she was out there, which you know, even that would 0:23:11.200 --> 0:23:14.119 be more visits than most architects would make to their 0:23:14.160 --> 0:23:20.679 own construction sites. And it was actually a guy on 0:23:20.720 --> 0:23:23.640 our crew that would have been a college roommate of PD's, 0:23:24.640 --> 0:23:27.399 you know, Pebe was shaping on the golf course and Steve, 0:23:27.520 --> 0:23:29.960 his roommate, was out there working on the labor crew. 0:23:30.000 --> 0:23:31.639 And I get to know Steve a little bit, and 0:23:32.119 --> 0:23:35.640 at one point Steve just sort of said, really casually, well, 0:23:36.000 --> 0:23:38.680 you know, nothing's really done out here until miss Sally 0:23:38.760 --> 0:23:42.959 says it's okay. And I thought that was funny at 0:23:42.960 --> 0:23:46.480 the time, but but I really did get the impression 0:23:46.560 --> 0:23:48.840 by the time I was done working for Pete and 0:23:48.880 --> 0:23:52.359 Alice that Alice had a lot to say about you know, 0:23:52.920 --> 0:23:55.719 maybe not the final say, but she was certainly going 0:23:55.760 --> 0:23:58.359 to tell Pe if she didn't think, you know, she 0:23:58.520 --> 0:24:01.480 thought golf course is too hard or too easy, or 0:24:01.520 --> 0:24:05.200 if that feature didn't look right, and you know, hers 0:24:05.320 --> 0:24:09.639 was the most important opinion to Pete. 0:24:10.520 --> 0:24:13.200 So while Pete die was firm in his own convictions, 0:24:13.520 --> 0:24:16.400 he was also eager to gather input from others. 0:24:16.720 --> 0:24:18.960 I can stand as an architect, the hardest one of 0:24:19.000 --> 0:24:20.920 the hardest things to do when you're in the middle 0:24:20.960 --> 0:24:25.960 of a construction project is half perspective on you've sort 0:24:25.960 --> 0:24:29.440 of you've gotten away from playing golf on graph and 0:24:29.760 --> 0:24:32.840 you get to lose perspective of this is too hard, 0:24:32.880 --> 0:24:35.960 is this too easy? And it really helped out somebody 0:24:35.960 --> 0:24:39.919 out there you trust just this you know, it's okay, 0:24:40.080 --> 0:24:42.960 it's fine, or it's oh wait, Are you sure you 0:24:43.000 --> 0:24:45.640 want to be doing that? You know, and most architects 0:24:45.680 --> 0:24:46.280 don't have that. 0:24:49.880 --> 0:24:53.480 The Stadium Course opened in nineteen eighty, but as the 0:24:53.520 --> 0:24:56.800 eighty two Players Championship approached, the first players to be 0:24:56.840 --> 0:25:00.480 held at TPC Sawgrass, the pressure on both p Die 0:25:00.520 --> 0:25:02.400 and Dean Beaman ratcheted up. 0:25:02.960 --> 0:25:05.160 It was definitely a move forward for the PGA Tour 0:25:05.200 --> 0:25:07.840 because they were opening their own golf course. 0:25:08.440 --> 0:25:11.840 Sean Martin is a senior editor for PGA Tour dot com, 0:25:12.200 --> 0:25:15.280 and in twenty seventeen he wrote a feature called Leap 0:25:15.320 --> 0:25:18.600 of Faith behind the Stadium Course's wild debut at the 0:25:18.680 --> 0:25:22.119 nineteen eighty two Players Championship. It's really great and a 0:25:22.160 --> 0:25:24.040 major inspiration for this episode. 0:25:24.720 --> 0:25:27.600 So now they were getting into the golf course business, 0:25:27.640 --> 0:25:30.000 and there was debate among the players whether or not 0:25:30.040 --> 0:25:32.800 the PGA Tour should be getting into the golf course business, 0:25:32.840 --> 0:25:35.200 whether or not that was a wise business decision. 0:25:35.240 --> 0:25:35.399 You know. 0:25:35.400 --> 0:25:37.919 You look at Adam Schupack's book about Dean Beaman and 0:25:38.320 --> 0:25:41.240 the early tour was run out of basically, I believe 0:25:41.240 --> 0:25:43.919 it was a town homer, a condo at the Sawgrass 0:25:43.920 --> 0:25:46.879 Country Club. So it was a very modest organization, so 0:25:47.000 --> 0:25:49.160 to now all of a sudden get into the golf 0:25:49.160 --> 0:25:51.960 course business. It was a risky venture. 0:25:52.200 --> 0:25:54.679 And the heat on Beaman and Die got turned up 0:25:54.720 --> 0:25:56.800 when the pros started to visit the new course. 0:25:57.400 --> 0:26:00.719 So Sawgrass Country Club, which hosted the players, with literally 0:26:00.760 --> 0:26:03.840 across the street, so when guys were in town for 0:26:04.040 --> 0:26:07.040 the players, they could go over and see TPC. It 0:26:07.080 --> 0:26:09.520 was carved out of a swamp. It was much more 0:26:09.560 --> 0:26:12.280 severe than what you see today. I think some of 0:26:12.280 --> 0:26:15.800 that is just when you build slopes and you shape them, 0:26:16.080 --> 0:26:18.480 they never look quite as severe as when they get 0:26:18.520 --> 0:26:20.640 grass on them. And so just I think of course 0:26:20.720 --> 0:26:22.400 is always gonna be severe when it's new. And then 0:26:22.400 --> 0:26:25.880 also you know, combine some of that with just the 0:26:25.920 --> 0:26:31.160 wild surrounds off the fairway. If you strayed from the 0:26:31.200 --> 0:26:33.960 corridors and hit it into that stuff, I mean you're 0:26:34.000 --> 0:26:37.040 looking at lost balls, You're having trouble hacking out. It 0:26:37.080 --> 0:26:40.120 was very raw and very very penal. 0:26:40.720 --> 0:26:43.399 The players began to make their opinions known, and not 0:26:43.560 --> 0:26:48.000 long after the grand opening, Dean Beaman oversaw some significant changes. 0:26:48.680 --> 0:26:52.400 It was difficult for me to envision what the final 0:26:52.520 --> 0:26:56.119 product would be based on looking at dirt when the 0:26:56.200 --> 0:26:58.600 grasso was on it, it was far different. 0:26:58.359 --> 0:26:59.560 Than I had imagined. 0:27:00.119 --> 0:27:04.080 And clearly as soon as it opened, even before tour 0:27:04.119 --> 0:27:08.080 players came in and wanted to play it, I determined 0:27:08.080 --> 0:27:12.560 it was much too severe. The greens themselves were much 0:27:12.600 --> 0:27:16.240 too severe. So during the course of that year, before 0:27:16.280 --> 0:27:19.280 the first tournament Wilt, a lot of work was done 0:27:19.560 --> 0:27:23.600 to take some of the severity out of the greens. 0:27:26.040 --> 0:27:29.200 But when the eighty two Players Championship arrived, the course 0:27:29.280 --> 0:27:33.119 was still very rugged and very difficult. Tom Doak headed 0:27:33.160 --> 0:27:36.200 down from Cornell during his spring break to watch the tournament. 0:27:36.720 --> 0:27:40.320 When Doak remembers that era of TPC Sagrass, the image 0:27:40.320 --> 0:27:43.359 of a relatively bare bones golf course comes to his mind. 0:27:43.960 --> 0:27:45.760 You know, one of the things about the TPC that 0:27:45.800 --> 0:27:48.399 most people don't realize is, you know, in nineteen seventy 0:27:48.480 --> 0:27:53.040 ninety eighty was terrible recession time in America, and the 0:27:53.080 --> 0:27:56.520 TVC was really built to be a low meetenance golf course, 0:27:56.960 --> 0:28:00.399 in a fairly low budget golf course to build. And 0:28:00.440 --> 0:28:02.840 of course once it was opened for three or four years, 0:28:02.880 --> 0:28:05.879 they all of a sudden it was like, well, this 0:28:06.040 --> 0:28:08.000 is the headquarters of the tour. We've got to spruce 0:28:08.040 --> 0:28:10.119 it up, and we've got to make it look pretty imperfect. 0:28:10.440 --> 0:28:14.080 But that was not Pete's idea going into it. One 0:28:14.160 --> 0:28:16.240 of the quotes I remember him saying it to the 0:28:16.240 --> 0:28:19.760 original tournament in nineteen eighty two, with everything here is 0:28:19.800 --> 0:28:22.720 the dead opposite of Augusta on purpose. 0:28:23.960 --> 0:28:26.280 When Dope got to the tournament, he went out and 0:28:26.320 --> 0:28:27.919 found Pete Dye on the course. 0:28:28.640 --> 0:28:32.720 I think it was on like the eleventh or twelfth hole. Basically, 0:28:32.800 --> 0:28:34.600 he was just going around to one hole at a 0:28:34.600 --> 0:28:38.120 time and watching players come through and you know, watching 0:28:38.160 --> 0:28:41.000 shots and seeing how they reacted. He wanted to see 0:28:41.040 --> 0:28:42.920 how they played him. He didn't want to hear how 0:28:43.000 --> 0:28:45.280 what they said. He didn't care so much what they 0:28:45.320 --> 0:28:47.080 said about it. You know, he just wanted to see 0:28:47.120 --> 0:28:49.440 if the shots work the way he intended them to. 0:28:49.600 --> 0:28:51.680 And you know, so we just go to one hole 0:28:51.720 --> 0:28:54.000 at a time and watched three or four groups play through, 0:28:54.040 --> 0:28:57.400 and Pete did see somebody hid a good shot and go, oh, 0:28:57.440 --> 0:28:59.720 that hole works. We can go to the next hall now. 0:29:01.800 --> 0:29:04.440 But the pros were coming to their own conclusions. 0:29:04.760 --> 0:29:04.920 You know. 0:29:05.040 --> 0:29:06.920 Going in, people knew I think that it was going 0:29:06.960 --> 0:29:09.360 to be a high tension week. This was a players 0:29:09.360 --> 0:29:11.760 were facing something that was new, something that was very penal. 0:29:12.360 --> 0:29:15.160 Players had an opportunity to voice their opinions and voice 0:29:15.160 --> 0:29:18.320 them strongly and loudly, and the press obviously was very 0:29:18.360 --> 0:29:20.440 willing to write them. And so you had some great 0:29:20.520 --> 0:29:22.920 quotes that you know, I think players had probably spent 0:29:23.000 --> 0:29:26.120 some time thinking about. And so you had Ben Crenshaw 0:29:26.120 --> 0:29:28.360 of all people, referring to it as Star Wars golf 0:29:28.400 --> 0:29:31.880 designed by Darth Vader. Jack Nicholas after missing the cuts 0:29:31.880 --> 0:29:34.400 that I've never been very good at stopping a five 0:29:34.440 --> 0:29:35.640 iron on the hood of a car. 0:29:36.120 --> 0:29:38.560 At least one player, however, was in his element. 0:29:38.960 --> 0:29:40.760 As far as a Pete Die golf course, I was 0:29:40.800 --> 0:29:44.000 fortunate enough to play in nineteen seventy four, I played 0:29:44.000 --> 0:29:46.040 the Teeth of the Dog at Casady Compo. 0:29:46.720 --> 0:29:49.480 Jerry Pate was a twenty eight year old US amateur 0:29:49.560 --> 0:29:53.360 and US Open champion. He had a silky, powerful swing 0:29:53.560 --> 0:29:56.040 and a fearless attitude, and he felt that he had 0:29:56.040 --> 0:29:58.120 a bead on Pete Die designs. 0:29:58.600 --> 0:30:00.600 So I kind of understood Pete strategies. 0:30:00.840 --> 0:30:02.960 I had to feel for how he liked. 0:30:02.840 --> 0:30:05.800 To strategize holes, and there were just certain places you 0:30:05.800 --> 0:30:06.640 couldn't hit the ball. 0:30:06.680 --> 0:30:08.959 You just if you'd hit it there, you were in trouble. 0:30:09.600 --> 0:30:12.680 And when I saw the Stadium course for the first time, 0:30:13.160 --> 0:30:15.680 a lot of people complained about it because the greens 0:30:15.720 --> 0:30:18.240 were sort of perched up off of the grade, so 0:30:19.200 --> 0:30:21.240 you had a lot of areas. 0:30:20.840 --> 0:30:22.800 That had I would call. 0:30:22.760 --> 0:30:25.520 Them false fronts in the front, and the green ran 0:30:25.600 --> 0:30:27.640 off on the left side and the right side, and 0:30:28.160 --> 0:30:31.400 there were very very small pinnable areas that were little 0:30:31.480 --> 0:30:33.520 target areas, and if you didn't hit it there, the 0:30:33.520 --> 0:30:37.200 ball would gather some fifteen to thirty forty feet away 0:30:37.200 --> 0:30:39.960 from there into a low depression either on the green 0:30:40.040 --> 0:30:42.480 or off the greens. So you had to be extremely 0:30:42.520 --> 0:30:44.240 accurate with your iron. You had to be a good 0:30:44.320 --> 0:30:46.320 driver of the ball, which I was, and you had 0:30:46.360 --> 0:30:48.280 to be a really good iron player, which I was. 0:30:48.360 --> 0:30:51.560 So his designs sort of played right into my hand. 0:30:52.200 --> 0:30:55.600 Still, like everyone else, Jerry Pate was struck by the 0:30:55.680 --> 0:30:57.920 rawness and difficulty of the new TPC. 0:30:58.760 --> 0:31:00.880 And you know, the golf course was wild and willy then. 0:31:00.960 --> 0:31:04.200 It wasn't naturally managed and manacured light. I mean, it 0:31:04.240 --> 0:31:07.360 wasn't as manicure today it was natural with pal meadows 0:31:07.440 --> 0:31:11.960 and just you know, basically bobcats and rattlesnakes twenty foot 0:31:11.960 --> 0:31:15.960 off the fairway and Armadilla's and you name it. So 0:31:16.040 --> 0:31:18.680 that day there was nothing on earth. And I mean 0:31:18.720 --> 0:31:22.040 that with it, not with exaggeration. There was no other 0:31:22.160 --> 0:31:25.920 course on the earth more difficult and diabolical than that 0:31:26.000 --> 0:31:26.640 golf course. 0:31:27.160 --> 0:31:30.400 But unlike almost everyone else, Pet wasn't much bothered by 0:31:30.440 --> 0:31:33.680 the stadium course's severity. This was at least in part 0:31:33.800 --> 0:31:36.040 because he just wasn't the worrying type. 0:31:36.440 --> 0:31:40.800 Yeah, so he was this gregarious bass riker, just fun 0:31:40.840 --> 0:31:44.240 loving flagging shots and I guess maybe kind of cavalier 0:31:44.240 --> 0:31:46.840 in that way, aiming at flags and playing I think 0:31:46.960 --> 0:31:49.080 kind of care free, because when you're that good of 0:31:49.120 --> 0:31:51.520 a bass riker, you can kind of do that because 0:31:51.760 --> 0:31:53.040 the ball's going to go where you aim. 0:31:53.520 --> 0:31:56.240 Peate also had the advantage of having played at the 0:31:56.240 --> 0:31:59.640 grand opening of TPC Sawgrass in nineteen eighty and being 0:31:59.680 --> 0:32:03.240 pair with Dean Beaman himself. Beaman had shown him where 0:32:03.280 --> 0:32:05.640 he could be aggressive off the tee and taught him 0:32:05.680 --> 0:32:07.960 not to be intimidated by Die's visuals. 0:32:08.600 --> 0:32:11.200 Look, the fairways are much wider than they appear. They're 0:32:11.480 --> 0:32:15.720 classic Pete Die deception, you know, who build up bunkers 0:32:16.280 --> 0:32:18.320 or slopes that will make the fairway look smaller than 0:32:18.320 --> 0:32:21.040 they are. But the problem is is really the fairways 0:32:21.200 --> 0:32:23.000 or wider than you think. And if you lay back 0:32:23.040 --> 0:32:25.480 off the tee, the second shot you're going to face 0:32:25.520 --> 0:32:28.160 into the greens is harder than the shot that you 0:32:28.200 --> 0:32:29.200 just avoided. 0:32:28.800 --> 0:32:29.360 Off the tee. 0:32:29.520 --> 0:32:32.240 So by playing safe off the tee, you're not really 0:32:32.320 --> 0:32:34.320 avoiding as much trouble as you think you are, and 0:32:34.360 --> 0:32:37.120 you're just bringing that much more into play around the greens. 0:32:37.160 --> 0:32:40.520 And so it is very visually intimidating, but you're also 0:32:40.760 --> 0:32:44.200 going to be best suited if you take the challenge on. 0:32:45.080 --> 0:32:48.200 So Pete was even more confident than usual going into 0:32:48.200 --> 0:32:51.120 the eighty two players. Not only did he like Pete 0:32:51.160 --> 0:32:53.680 Die courses and do well at them, not only did 0:32:53.680 --> 0:32:56.600 he have the right skill set and disposition. Not only 0:32:56.640 --> 0:32:59.760 did he have intel on TPC sawgrass, but he also 0:32:59.840 --> 0:33:03.360 had deep family connections to Jacksonville. His father had been 0:33:03.360 --> 0:33:05.680 born and raised there, and his mother had moved there 0:33:05.680 --> 0:33:08.760 in high school. Added all up, and Jerry Pate felt 0:33:08.800 --> 0:33:10.440 that he had destiny on his side. 0:33:10.840 --> 0:33:12.640 I just knew I was gonna win it. 0:33:12.640 --> 0:33:14.840 It wasn't even a thought in my head, you know, 0:33:15.400 --> 0:33:16.360 I knew it all along. 0:33:17.440 --> 0:33:19.840 Well, he didn't exactly jump out to the lead. He 0:33:19.920 --> 0:33:24.640 hung around shooting seventy seventy three seventy. After fifty four holes, 0:33:24.760 --> 0:33:27.520 he was tied for sixth, three shots behind his brother 0:33:27.560 --> 0:33:31.800 in law Bruce Letsky and co leader Brad Bryant. Meanwhile, 0:33:31.960 --> 0:33:35.000 Pate was very aware of the rumblings among veteran players 0:33:35.040 --> 0:33:37.120 about the course and the tour's new direction. 0:33:37.600 --> 0:33:40.120 And there was talk in the locker room by the 0:33:40.200 --> 0:33:43.320 senior Hall of famers just before they were into Hall 0:33:43.360 --> 0:33:45.400 of Fame. And I won't mention names. Some of them 0:33:45.400 --> 0:33:48.680 are dead now, some are still alive in their eighties, 0:33:49.040 --> 0:33:51.160 and the talk was they were going to get, you know, 0:33:51.240 --> 0:33:53.600 have a coup and fired Dean because we had no 0:33:53.760 --> 0:33:56.680 business owning a golf course and it was crazy, and 0:33:56.720 --> 0:34:01.240 it was competing against some of the famous golfers design careers. 0:34:01.280 --> 0:34:03.960 They had their own design careers going. So they're thinking, well, 0:34:04.000 --> 0:34:07.360 wait a minute, PGA Tours hiring some outside guy named 0:34:07.400 --> 0:34:09.640 Pete Died to design their golf cours. Why didn't they 0:34:09.680 --> 0:34:14.400 hire a player. It was victrial, it was anger. The 0:34:14.440 --> 0:34:18.120 players were mad, angry. I mean, you could use all 0:34:18.160 --> 0:34:20.960 those words. It was a big deal politically for Dean 0:34:21.000 --> 0:34:21.879 and Pete Die, I. 0:34:21.840 --> 0:34:22.520 Can tell you. 0:34:22.920 --> 0:34:26.040 And there were some really top players in that, as 0:34:26.040 --> 0:34:28.319 I said, hall of fame, golfers that didn't like the 0:34:28.360 --> 0:34:31.799 golf course at all, in fact missed the cut. And 0:34:31.840 --> 0:34:34.440 then once you get something that's negative in your mind, 0:34:34.640 --> 0:34:36.600 you don't like the golf course, you're done. There's no 0:34:36.640 --> 0:34:39.040 way you're going to play well. And I loved it. 0:34:39.400 --> 0:34:43.000 On Sunday, after burdying twelve, Pate had closed the gap 0:34:43.040 --> 0:34:46.560 between himself and the leaders. The year prior, he had 0:34:46.560 --> 0:34:49.319 won in Memphis, and in celebration he had leapt into 0:34:49.360 --> 0:34:52.880 the lake by the eighteenth green. So rumors were already 0:34:52.920 --> 0:34:56.000 going around TPC Sagrass that if he pulled off the victory, 0:34:56.360 --> 0:34:57.600 he would do the same today. 0:34:58.080 --> 0:35:00.799 So anyway, as I walked back to thirteen Can, I 0:35:00.840 --> 0:35:02.680 heard somebody kind of running up behind me and they 0:35:02.680 --> 0:35:03.359 grabbed my arm. 0:35:03.520 --> 0:35:04.200 I turned around. 0:35:04.200 --> 0:35:06.920 It was Alice Die and she looked at me and 0:35:07.040 --> 0:35:09.200 she said, you've got to win this thing, and you 0:35:09.320 --> 0:35:10.719 got to throw Pete in the lake. 0:35:11.239 --> 0:35:14.840 Alice's idea, it seems, was that a little playful public 0:35:14.880 --> 0:35:17.560 come up ins might do some good. It might provide 0:35:17.600 --> 0:35:20.640 an outlet for the rising hostility toward her husband and 0:35:20.719 --> 0:35:21.920 their design business. 0:35:22.120 --> 0:35:25.080 Of course, Pete had been catching ungodly amount of heat 0:35:25.200 --> 0:35:29.279 for this golf course, and Alice, I think, was a 0:35:29.320 --> 0:35:30.160 little bit worried. 0:35:30.680 --> 0:35:32.399 Can I turn around? Looked at her just. 0:35:32.520 --> 0:35:34.799 Calm as can be, And everybody used to think, you know, 0:35:34.840 --> 0:35:36.120 when I played, I was cocky. 0:35:36.960 --> 0:35:38.160 I really wasn't cocky. 0:35:38.400 --> 0:35:40.520 I just you know, I knew in my heart I 0:35:40.560 --> 0:35:42.920 could pull it off, and I said, I'm gonna win. 0:35:43.480 --> 0:35:47.040 Pet went on to par thirteen, Birdie fourteen, and Bertie 0:35:47.080 --> 0:35:50.000 the Island seventeenth hole. He drove it right up the 0:35:50.000 --> 0:35:52.840 god on eighteen and had a five iron into the green. 0:35:53.680 --> 0:35:56.520 Until that point, the most famous moment in Pet's career 0:35:56.560 --> 0:35:59.919 had involved another seventy second hole five iron, this one 0:36:00.080 --> 0:36:03.040 at the nineteen seventy six US Open. He hit it 0:36:03.120 --> 0:36:05.760 so close to a dangerous whole location that some accused 0:36:05.800 --> 0:36:09.360 him of pulling it. Today, the approach to the eighteenth 0:36:09.400 --> 0:36:12.759 that TPC sawgrass is still a scary shot, even when 0:36:12.800 --> 0:36:15.640 pros are hitting eight or nine irons. Almost no one 0:36:15.680 --> 0:36:18.920 goes directly at the pin, but Pate did with a 0:36:18.960 --> 0:36:21.760 five iron, and he knocked it to two feet. 0:36:21.960 --> 0:36:24.760 For me to hit that shot like Ben Crenshaw hitting 0:36:24.760 --> 0:36:28.800 a six foot pot. He's not nervous. Jack Nicholas isn't 0:36:28.800 --> 0:36:31.840 nervous on a six foot pot. Tom Watson wasn't nervous 0:36:31.840 --> 0:36:35.000 on a six foot but Lee Terveno was never nervous 0:36:35.000 --> 0:36:37.319 on a nine yard wed shot, and Jerry Fate was 0:36:37.360 --> 0:36:38.399 never nervous hitting a. 0:36:38.320 --> 0:36:39.080 Long iron shot. 0:36:39.120 --> 0:36:43.200 I mean, I nerves weren't even in my vocabulary. And 0:36:43.320 --> 0:36:45.040 when I hit the five iron, and I went to 0:36:45.160 --> 0:36:48.040 the press room, and I think Tom Place was running 0:36:48.080 --> 0:36:50.120 the interview for the PGA Tour and he said, you 0:36:50.120 --> 0:36:52.120 have any opening statements, and I go, yeah, I guess, 0:36:52.200 --> 0:36:54.440 I guess I pulled another five iron. 0:36:57.200 --> 0:36:59.160 But let's go back for a moment to the eighteenth 0:36:59.239 --> 0:37:03.200 fairway after Pate had stiffed his approach and. 0:37:03.040 --> 0:37:05.640 The camera was on me, little Davy Finch, you worked 0:37:05.640 --> 0:37:07.960 for CBS and Trick Kenny and is in the truck. 0:37:08.000 --> 0:37:10.440 I knew that, and you know all my buddies and 0:37:10.520 --> 0:37:12.040 CBS were there, and I. 0:37:11.960 --> 0:37:13.280 Have no idea what they've said. 0:37:14.080 --> 0:37:17.719 But as I walked up the eighteenth fairway, Davy Finch says, 0:37:17.719 --> 0:37:19.919 you're gonna jump in the lake, and I said, Pete, 0:37:20.000 --> 0:37:21.440 die will go for a swim. 0:37:21.800 --> 0:37:23.960 As he waited for the groups behind him to finish, 0:37:24.280 --> 0:37:27.319 pet saw Dean Beaman's wife Judy, who urged him to 0:37:27.320 --> 0:37:31.640 throw Dean in the water with Pete. As that was happening, CBS, 0:37:31.719 --> 0:37:34.440 with Vin Scully calling the action, was working a bit 0:37:34.480 --> 0:37:35.400 of TV magic. 0:37:35.960 --> 0:37:38.319 There was a gator that had been seen in the 0:37:38.480 --> 0:37:42.279 pond at seventeen. So Frank Trickinny in the Great CBS 0:37:42.320 --> 0:37:45.359 producer put up a split screen and there's kind of 0:37:45.640 --> 0:37:48.960 waiting for Jerry to throw them in at the trophy 0:37:49.000 --> 0:37:51.120 ceremony on one side and the other side of this 0:37:51.239 --> 0:37:53.920 gator in the water. But what Vin said was that 0:37:54.040 --> 0:37:56.799 this gator is on the lake at seventeen. The lake 0:37:56.840 --> 0:37:59.439 on eighteen is not connected. And so the television viewers 0:37:59.440 --> 0:38:02.120 thinking they're about to jump into this gator infested pond. 0:38:04.960 --> 0:38:07.440 Now I didn't even think I was gonna go in. 0:38:07.560 --> 0:38:09.080 I thought I would just throw them both in the 0:38:09.120 --> 0:38:11.200 lake and that would be it. And then they were 0:38:11.200 --> 0:38:12.960 out there, and you know, in the lake, So I 0:38:13.000 --> 0:38:14.960 threw them both in the lake off the bulkhead, and 0:38:14.960 --> 0:38:17.480 then I jumped in behind him. But you know, I 0:38:17.560 --> 0:38:20.239 never realized how high it was, and when I jumped in. 0:38:20.520 --> 0:38:22.879 After the fact, I go back and look at those videos. Heck, 0:38:22.920 --> 0:38:25.120 it was about an eight foot off the water. That 0:38:25.200 --> 0:38:27.919 bulkhead was about eight foot, so it's a pretty big 0:38:28.040 --> 0:38:29.799 racing dive. But to be eight foot in the air, 0:38:30.280 --> 0:38:34.399 but we didn't care. There was so much, so much adrenaline, 0:38:34.800 --> 0:38:36.000 the emotion of winning. 0:38:37.840 --> 0:38:39.920 It was an exciting time and it was, you know, 0:38:40.000 --> 0:38:41.640 a memory I'll never forget it was. 0:38:41.960 --> 0:38:43.959 It was as great as winning the US Open. 0:38:44.080 --> 0:38:44.719 I can tell you. 0:38:45.200 --> 0:38:48.080 Dean Beeman that's his own way of remembering the experience. 0:38:48.640 --> 0:38:49.640 How did the water feel? 0:38:51.120 --> 0:38:52.880 It was pretty ugly. 0:38:59.480 --> 0:39:03.200 The jumping and it's theater of just desserts may have 0:39:03.239 --> 0:39:06.439 taken the edge off the player's outrage. Dean Beeman kept 0:39:06.480 --> 0:39:09.279 his job and Pete Die kept designing courses for the 0:39:09.320 --> 0:39:12.640 PGA Tour, but the pro's opinion of the stadium course 0:39:12.680 --> 0:39:15.280 at TPC Sawgrass didn't change. Right away. 0:39:16.080 --> 0:39:18.640 After the tournament was over, Pete's in the locker room 0:39:18.719 --> 0:39:21.360 changing He's just been thrown in the lake. Ed Snead 0:39:21.440 --> 0:39:23.960 and Tom Weiscoffer waiting for him, and Pete knew both 0:39:24.000 --> 0:39:26.160 of them from Ohio, and they had a question about 0:39:26.160 --> 0:39:28.960 the thirteenth hole, which is a par three. There's water 0:39:29.120 --> 0:39:33.560 left and the green is bisected by a pretty severe swale, 0:39:33.920 --> 0:39:35.759 and so the whole locations down on the left. They're 0:39:35.800 --> 0:39:37.680 by the water. But you can use that swale to 0:39:37.719 --> 0:39:40.440 funnel the tea shot towards the hole. However, if you 0:39:40.520 --> 0:39:43.160 miss on the wrong side of it, you're now putting 0:39:43.200 --> 0:39:45.360 down a very steep slope to the hole. Two putting 0:39:45.400 --> 0:39:48.480 is almost impossible. So Ed and Tom had played together. 0:39:48.600 --> 0:39:50.680 They said their te shots landed within two feet of 0:39:50.719 --> 0:39:52.959 each other. One of them funneled down towards the hole, 0:39:53.040 --> 0:39:56.279 the other state up top. And they were asking, how 0:39:56.320 --> 0:39:58.480 can we have a golf course where two shots that 0:39:58.640 --> 0:40:01.320 land within two feet of each other have such vastly 0:40:01.440 --> 0:40:04.799 different results. That doesn't seem fair. Pete looks at them 0:40:04.800 --> 0:40:07.400 and he says, well, the only reason that happened is 0:40:07.440 --> 0:40:10.279 because you guys are chicken. If you were aiming at 0:40:10.280 --> 0:40:12.560 the hole, that two feet wouldn't have mattered at all. 0:40:12.760 --> 0:40:14.400 But you're afraid of the water on the left, so 0:40:14.400 --> 0:40:16.040 you're aiming for a slope in the green to try 0:40:16.040 --> 0:40:17.840 to save you, and that has too small of a 0:40:17.880 --> 0:40:20.319 margin for error, which you just told me you're not 0:40:20.360 --> 0:40:21.080 good enough to hit. 0:40:21.680 --> 0:40:25.080 In spite of appearances, though Pete Die was not unmoved 0:40:25.080 --> 0:40:28.880 by the criticism. He wrote in his autobiography, the verbal 0:40:28.920 --> 0:40:32.239 assault against our new creation hit like a stake in 0:40:32.320 --> 0:40:35.880 my heart. Still he saw no evidence that the course 0:40:35.960 --> 0:40:38.640 was too hard. After all, Jerry Pate had won at 0:40:38.680 --> 0:40:41.160 eight under. In order to make the top ten, you 0:40:41.239 --> 0:40:44.160 had to break par. In fact, Die said at the time, 0:40:44.480 --> 0:40:46.759 when they learn how to play this stadium course, we 0:40:46.840 --> 0:40:48.920 may have to put in some more obstacles to keep 0:40:48.920 --> 0:40:55.720 them totally frustrated. But ultimately it wasn't Die's call. After 0:40:55.760 --> 0:41:00.400 the eighty three Tournament Players Championship, the pros revolted. According 0:41:00.440 --> 0:41:03.200 to Adam Shuepack's account, a group of top players sent 0:41:03.239 --> 0:41:06.680 a letter of complaint to Commissioner Beman. Among the signees 0:41:06.680 --> 0:41:11.360 were Ben Crenshaw, Taylorwin Jack, Nicholas, Craig Stadler, Tom Watson, 0:41:11.480 --> 0:41:15.400 and Tom Weiscough. Quickly, Beaman arranged a meeting at TPC 0:41:15.560 --> 0:41:19.120 Sawgrass between Pete Dye and a player committee. They toured 0:41:19.160 --> 0:41:22.279 the course and the players grilled Die about the green contours. 0:41:22.800 --> 0:41:25.439 The commissioner saw their side well. 0:41:25.480 --> 0:41:28.080 Some of the lowest areas on the greens that were 0:41:28.160 --> 0:41:32.399 pin positions were in places that the green surfaces at 0:41:32.400 --> 0:41:35.799 the higher part of those greens were so severe that 0:41:35.960 --> 0:41:38.320 the ball coming off the high side down to the 0:41:38.360 --> 0:41:40.680 low side wouldn't stay on the green at all. So 0:41:40.760 --> 0:41:44.799 it was literally impossible to not three parts, many many 0:41:44.880 --> 0:41:48.080 times from one transition. 0:41:47.680 --> 0:41:48.960 Part of a green to another. 0:41:49.719 --> 0:41:52.480 And the players were right, they were too severe. It 0:41:52.640 --> 0:41:55.719 was still too severe to be really a fair test 0:41:55.760 --> 0:41:59.799 to golf. Yeah, our feelings were still hurt, but they 0:41:59.840 --> 0:42:00.319 were right. 0:42:02.400 --> 0:42:06.000 Months later, Ben Crenshaw, the co chair of the architectural committee, 0:42:06.080 --> 0:42:08.239 presented a list of changes to be made to the 0:42:08.239 --> 0:42:12.040 Stadium course. At that point, I almost certainly saw the 0:42:12.040 --> 0:42:14.960 writing on the wall. How do you think mister Die 0:42:15.440 --> 0:42:19.719 reacted to or felt about the fact that he was 0:42:20.080 --> 0:42:22.120 modifying or had to modify the course. 0:42:23.440 --> 0:42:25.880 The answer is he was very reluctant to make the 0:42:26.000 --> 0:42:30.080 changes that we wanted made. He wanted it as difficulty 0:42:30.160 --> 0:42:32.640 could because he wanted to challenge the best players in 0:42:32.680 --> 0:42:33.160 the world. 0:42:33.840 --> 0:42:35.239 But and he didn't care. 0:42:35.960 --> 0:42:38.000 He didn't think golf was fair in the first place, 0:42:38.440 --> 0:42:43.920 so he was not He was not happy with the 0:42:43.920 --> 0:42:46.440 continual modifications of it, but. 0:42:46.480 --> 0:42:50.280 The modifications were made mostly carried out by Die's associate 0:42:50.320 --> 0:42:54.680 Bobby Weed between eighty three and eighty eight. Weed once said, 0:42:54.920 --> 0:42:57.200 one of my biggest regrets of being in the business 0:42:57.280 --> 0:42:59.040 is I was the one who had to make all 0:42:59.040 --> 0:43:03.440 the changes. Those changes did, however, mollify the pros and 0:43:03.520 --> 0:43:07.520 TPC sawgrass, which today boasts Augusta like conditions, complete with 0:43:07.560 --> 0:43:10.920 flower beds accenting the arena of the seventeenth hole, is 0:43:10.960 --> 0:43:14.200 now highly regarded among PGA Tour members. In a way, 0:43:14.320 --> 0:43:18.000 it's become a symbol of the tour the Dean Beaman built, sturdy, 0:43:18.120 --> 0:43:21.800 impressive and efficiently run. Here's Adam Schuepack. 0:43:22.520 --> 0:43:25.359 Dean came along at a time where the PGA Tour 0:43:25.600 --> 0:43:27.920 was just this mom and pop shop, and he really, 0:43:28.040 --> 0:43:31.239 during his twenty years tenures, assembled the building blocks that 0:43:31.280 --> 0:43:33.960 are the foundation of the modern PGA tour. And I 0:43:34.000 --> 0:43:36.640 feel like the PGA Tour is still running the Dean 0:43:36.680 --> 0:43:39.600 Beaman playbook. It's worked all this time, and it continues 0:43:39.640 --> 0:43:45.240 to seem almost invincible. And impenetrable to whatever comes along. 0:43:45.560 --> 0:43:48.040 It's just a well oiled machine. 0:43:50.600 --> 0:43:53.719 Now, whether the alterations Tode's original design were for the 0:43:53.760 --> 0:43:56.200 best remains a topic of debate in the golf world, 0:43:56.600 --> 0:43:59.759 one that breaks down along familiar lines. If you're a 0:43:59.800 --> 0:44:03.560 competitive or score oriented golfer, if you prize fairness and 0:44:03.600 --> 0:44:06.760 course design whatever that means, you'll likely see the changes 0:44:06.800 --> 0:44:11.239 as positive, even necessary. Others may argue that fairness is 0:44:11.280 --> 0:44:14.200 an irrelevant concern, especially when everyone is competing on the 0:44:14.200 --> 0:44:17.000 same course. These people may wish that more of the 0:44:17.080 --> 0:44:21.480 rugged quirk of Die's original design had been preserved. Tom 0:44:21.520 --> 0:44:23.680 Doak takes a fairly diplomatic view. 0:44:24.600 --> 0:44:26.560 I don't know if he can say the changes made 0:44:26.600 --> 0:44:29.640 the course better or worse. You know, it's all it's 0:44:29.640 --> 0:44:32.040 all a matter of opinion, and it's all your perspective 0:44:32.080 --> 0:44:34.640 on what the objective of the course should try to be. 0:44:35.200 --> 0:44:39.000 To me, it just made it different than the original intention, 0:44:39.560 --> 0:44:42.520 you know, in terms of how much pressure it put 0:44:42.520 --> 0:44:45.759 on the players to hit good shots consistently through the 0:44:45.800 --> 0:44:49.520 golf course. But you know, the bottom line is, you know, 0:44:49.600 --> 0:44:52.600 pros don't like shooting seventy five when they have an 0:44:52.600 --> 0:44:55.360 average to poor day. You know, they don't mind not 0:44:55.400 --> 0:44:57.520 shooting sixty seven all the time, but they don't. They 0:44:57.560 --> 0:44:59.560 don't want the numbers to get up there and the 0:44:59.600 --> 0:45:02.160 TPS see when you were having a bad day there 0:45:02.320 --> 0:45:04.160 darnwell reflected it on the scorecard. 0:45:06.280 --> 0:45:09.600 In a sense, Alice Stye's prediction had come true. But 0:45:09.680 --> 0:45:12.719 it wasn't Dean Beeman specifically who came into conflict with 0:45:12.719 --> 0:45:15.759 her husband. It was the players, and they had the 0:45:15.840 --> 0:45:19.399 last word. At some point, perhaps during that walk around 0:45:19.440 --> 0:45:22.600 TPC Sagrass with the committee in nineteen eighty three, he 0:45:22.680 --> 0:45:29.080 must have recognized that fact. After his triumph at the 0:45:29.080 --> 0:45:32.640 eighty two Players, Jerry Pate was living large. 0:45:32.160 --> 0:45:33.400 And I had a ten year exemption. 0:45:33.520 --> 0:45:35.560 It was a big deal. The most money anybody. 0:45:35.200 --> 0:45:38.440 Had ever won, ninety thousand dollars, a lot of endorsements, 0:45:38.760 --> 0:45:38.920 you know. 0:45:39.040 --> 0:45:39.719 Life was great. 0:45:39.719 --> 0:45:41.920 To have my own private plane. Jack and Arnold and 0:45:41.920 --> 0:45:43.920 I were the only three players had a private plane 0:45:43.920 --> 0:45:46.600 on the tour at that time. And I was twenty eight, 0:45:46.760 --> 0:45:49.080 you know, in pretty big tall cotton, I guess you 0:45:49.120 --> 0:45:50.719 could say for a Southern boy. 0:45:51.200 --> 0:45:52.680 And then in one swing. 0:45:52.360 --> 0:45:54.600 In the first of June that was kind of into 0:45:54.600 --> 0:45:56.400 my golfing competitive career. 0:45:56.960 --> 0:45:59.640 He was on the driving range at Pensacola preparing for 0:45:59.680 --> 0:46:02.400 the Open, and by practicing one iron stingers into the 0:46:02.440 --> 0:46:05.720 wind off of hard ground on one swing, he felt 0:46:05.719 --> 0:46:09.360 his left shoulder pop, and that injury turned Jerry Pate 0:46:09.400 --> 0:46:12.719 into one of golf's great what if stories. He never 0:46:12.760 --> 0:46:15.960 won again on the PGA Tour, but he stayed in 0:46:16.000 --> 0:46:18.840 the golf business, eventually starting a course design firm of 0:46:18.880 --> 0:46:21.600 his own. Over the years, he became close with Pete 0:46:21.640 --> 0:46:24.840 and Alice Dye. Their friendship had begun in nineteen seventy 0:46:24.880 --> 0:46:27.120 four when a twenty one year old Pate played the 0:46:27.120 --> 0:46:30.720 World amateur at Teeth of the Dog. Today, his firm 0:46:30.760 --> 0:46:33.000 looks after Teeth of the Dog and the other die 0:46:33.040 --> 0:46:34.719 courses at Casada Compo. 0:46:34.920 --> 0:46:37.600 As we've sort of taken on the role to keep 0:46:37.640 --> 0:46:42.759 the integrity of the aesthetics of the architecture and agronomics there. 0:46:42.800 --> 0:46:44.879 I go to Kasa Da Kamp, I'm going next week 0:46:44.920 --> 0:46:47.080 down there. In fact, I go go down. 0:46:46.880 --> 0:46:47.440 There a lot. 0:46:47.800 --> 0:46:50.240 And so it's a great honor to have met Pete 0:46:50.280 --> 0:46:52.719 Dye as a twenty one year old kid, and now 0:46:52.760 --> 0:46:55.120 I'm sort of stepped in his place. At one of 0:46:55.160 --> 0:46:56.520 his favorite places, and that's. 0:46:56.360 --> 0:46:56.959 Where he died. 0:46:57.480 --> 0:47:00.400 If you listen to the Fried Egg podcast, I already 0:47:00.440 --> 0:47:03.040 know that Pete and Alice I are no longer with us. 0:47:03.880 --> 0:47:06.480 Pete passed away in January at the age of ninety 0:47:06.520 --> 0:47:10.239 five after a battle with Alzheimer's. Alice was ninety one 0:47:10.280 --> 0:47:14.840 when she died in February of last year. They're longtime friends. 0:47:14.960 --> 0:47:18.239 Like Dean Beaman, Vernon Kelly, and Jerry Pate tend to 0:47:18.280 --> 0:47:21.120 speak about Pete and Alice in terms of both personal 0:47:21.320 --> 0:47:27.440 and historical. Their generosity, their accomplishments, their eccentric, nomadic lifestyle, 0:47:27.840 --> 0:47:31.600 their influence on a generation of architects, their commitment to 0:47:31.640 --> 0:47:33.480 the game and to the craft. 0:47:34.680 --> 0:47:37.479 They didn't build golf courses for the money. They built 0:47:37.520 --> 0:47:40.120 golf course because because Alice was a great amateur player 0:47:40.160 --> 0:47:43.800 in her own right, her husband was really a fine 0:47:43.840 --> 0:47:46.760 amateur player, and they gave so much to the game. 0:47:47.800 --> 0:47:49.799 I guess Alice was the first woman to sit on 0:47:49.800 --> 0:47:52.400 the PGA of America board that I remember, and I 0:47:52.440 --> 0:47:55.799 know she was head of the Architects Society. 0:47:55.960 --> 0:47:58.439 I mean they were for a woman. She did on. 0:47:58.440 --> 0:48:02.319 Incredible things in our man's world and of course Pete 0:48:02.480 --> 0:48:03.080 was a legend. 0:48:03.080 --> 0:48:03.680 Oh my god. 0:48:04.400 --> 0:48:06.240 You know the stories Pete used to tell me about 0:48:06.239 --> 0:48:09.759 how he got fired by Augy Bush or fired by 0:48:09.760 --> 0:48:11.000 herb Cooher and then they'd. 0:48:10.880 --> 0:48:13.359 Hire him back. And I'm sure Dean wanted to fire ms. 0:48:14.320 --> 0:48:16.120 He was quite a character. 0:48:15.880 --> 0:48:16.120 You know. 0:48:17.040 --> 0:48:20.000 And you couldn't help beloved Pete Dye and Alice was 0:48:20.120 --> 0:48:22.520 just gosh, she was the salt of the earth. She 0:48:22.680 --> 0:48:24.799 was like a mother to me, I'll tell you. And 0:48:24.880 --> 0:48:29.040 so I dearly miss him both. I dearly miss him both. 0:48:34.840 --> 0:48:37.799 This was the fourth episode of Frida Egg Stories. It 0:48:37.920 --> 0:48:41.200 was created and hosted by me Garrett Morrison, with mixing 0:48:41.280 --> 0:48:45.520 and engineering from Jay Eric. Our executive producer is Andy Johnson. 0:48:46.040 --> 0:48:46.840 Thanks for listening.