WEBVTT - Golf Architecture 101: The Championship Setup Wars 0:00:00.160 --> 0:00:03.120 What are we looking for in a championship golf course 0:00:03.160 --> 0:00:06.440 these days? And why can't we seem to discuss this 0:00:06.600 --> 0:00:10.560 question without wanting to kill each other. So in this 0:00:10.640 --> 0:00:14.760 episode of our Golf Architecture one on one series, we're 0:00:14.760 --> 0:00:19.800 talking about the championship set up wars. I'm Garrett Morrison 0:00:20.239 --> 0:00:29.840 and this is designing golf. As always in Golf Architecture 0:00:29.880 --> 0:00:32.800 one on one, I am joined by my Frida Egg colleague, 0:00:33.280 --> 0:00:34.000 PJ Clark. 0:00:34.200 --> 0:00:36.680 PJ, how you doing, Garrett? I'm doing great. 0:00:37.360 --> 0:00:40.400 Rare to go less than twenty four hours away from 0:00:40.440 --> 0:00:44.600 another major championship. I'm wearing my Donald Ross pine cone shirt. 0:00:44.640 --> 0:00:47.600 I figured it was topical given a Rono MinC in 0:00:47.640 --> 0:00:51.000 a little bit sense. I'm great, just just another great 0:00:51.000 --> 0:00:53.520 week of major championship golf. You only get four of these, 0:00:53.920 --> 0:00:56.200 even if you're angry about who won. I'm not, but 0:00:56.240 --> 0:00:58.040 you got to you gotta enjoy them as they come. 0:00:59.000 --> 0:01:01.080 Yes, absolutely, you would think that that would be a 0:01:01.080 --> 0:01:02.880 more common attitude, but it doesn't seem to me. 0:01:04.000 --> 0:01:05.679 You know. It's kind of like one of those things 0:01:05.680 --> 0:01:09.680 where yeah, it's uh, everybody always says, like late in 0:01:09.720 --> 0:01:12.840 the NFL season when there's a random like Jaguars Titans 0:01:12.880 --> 0:01:15.120 Thursday Night game. It's like, you're gonna be begging for 0:01:15.160 --> 0:01:19.520 this in July, and like, you know, when it's late 0:01:19.560 --> 0:01:21.560 August and we're talking about the three m it's like, oh, 0:01:21.600 --> 0:01:24.000 you want a PGA right now, even if Aaron Rye wins, 0:01:24.080 --> 0:01:26.320 right like you' that's what you want? 0:01:27.400 --> 0:01:27.640 Yeah? 0:01:27.680 --> 0:01:31.240 I don't. I'm not sure what gets into people's heads 0:01:31.240 --> 0:01:34.039 in major week, but they they want it all, you know, 0:01:34.160 --> 0:01:36.000 they want it to be perfect every single time, and 0:01:36.040 --> 0:01:40.680 it's it's just never perfect. So, you know, partly because 0:01:40.959 --> 0:01:45.800 of PGA Week and the discourse about it, we're talking 0:01:45.840 --> 0:01:49.720 about championship golf course design and set up in this 0:01:50.120 --> 0:01:53.640 golf architecture one on one episode, I feel like, you know, 0:01:53.680 --> 0:01:55.800 I feel like this is a topic where you're probably 0:01:55.920 --> 0:01:58.040 at least at a two to oh one level. 0:01:58.200 --> 0:01:59.360 Yeah, I would you agree with that. 0:02:00.080 --> 0:02:02.920 Feel decent about this, you know, I feel like I've 0:02:02.960 --> 0:02:04.560 learned a lot, have been very fortunate. 0:02:05.040 --> 0:02:06.520 You've been in these streets a bit. 0:02:06.760 --> 0:02:09.760 Yeah, I you know, I've been very fortunate to attend, uh, 0:02:10.040 --> 0:02:12.960 you know, a handful of major championships at this point, 0:02:13.080 --> 0:02:16.440 and I've been very fortunate to use some of like 0:02:16.800 --> 0:02:19.119 one oh one teachings. I was lucky enough to play 0:02:19.200 --> 0:02:20.960 Yale a couple of weeks ago. I got a big 0:02:21.360 --> 0:02:24.640 heaping of of template holes there. I figured I at 0:02:24.720 --> 0:02:27.280 least knew kind of what I was talking about there. 0:02:27.320 --> 0:02:30.200 But this one, this topic, I feel at least okayon. 0:02:30.720 --> 0:02:34.200 Yeah, yeah, And so we'll try to advance the discussion 0:02:34.240 --> 0:02:35.919 a little bit. Maybe this is not a pure one 0:02:35.919 --> 0:02:38.960 o one episode, but you know, I think that most 0:02:39.000 --> 0:02:42.640 of the audience is probably there as well. You know 0:02:42.720 --> 0:02:45.680 that this is a common topic of discussion in mainstream 0:02:45.720 --> 0:02:48.880 golf podcasts, So it's not like I'm bringing out something 0:02:48.919 --> 0:02:53.640 that's that's really unique to golf architecture discourse here, but 0:02:53.800 --> 0:02:56.080 I'm going to try to get us at a deeper 0:02:56.600 --> 0:03:00.080 level with it. And I think it's it's worth talking 0:03:00.120 --> 0:03:06.120 about it in this format because the discussion of championship 0:03:06.120 --> 0:03:10.000 golf courses, especially major championship golf courses, is one of 0:03:10.040 --> 0:03:13.120 those rare moments when everyone in golf comes together to 0:03:13.160 --> 0:03:16.600 talk about golf course design. Right, It's not just architects 0:03:16.600 --> 0:03:20.720 and architecture nerds who are participating, it's the players, it's 0:03:20.760 --> 0:03:24.639 the representatives from golf governing bodies, it's the TV personalities, 0:03:24.639 --> 0:03:28.800 it's the journalists who might not cover this topic on 0:03:28.840 --> 0:03:31.799 a week to week basis, And it's also a lot 0:03:31.800 --> 0:03:34.920 of fans and a lot of social media users who 0:03:35.000 --> 0:03:38.080 have an opinion as well. So it might even be 0:03:38.200 --> 0:03:41.040 the way that a lot of people are introduced to 0:03:41.200 --> 0:03:45.080 the notion of golf architecture for the first time, and 0:03:45.600 --> 0:03:49.000 for that reason, I think it's a potentially very fruitful topic. 0:03:49.440 --> 0:03:54.560 So my goal here is to think through championship golf 0:03:54.600 --> 0:03:57.160 course design and set up with you from basically the 0:03:57.200 --> 0:04:01.600 ground up. What's the history of championship golf course design 0:04:02.120 --> 0:04:05.080 and set up? How did we get to the spot 0:04:05.200 --> 0:04:09.160 that we are today with it? And ultimately, what do 0:04:09.200 --> 0:04:13.200 we want out of a twenty first century championship course? 0:04:13.240 --> 0:04:14.480 Do we even know what we want? 0:04:14.640 --> 0:04:16.440 I was going to say that feels like the billion 0:04:16.480 --> 0:04:19.640 dollar question right now, and I don't know that anybody. 0:04:20.000 --> 0:04:22.200 There are a lot of different answers to that question. 0:04:22.360 --> 0:04:24.880 I'm curious to I think, I know, I think I 0:04:24.960 --> 0:04:27.080 might have an idea of what your answer might be, 0:04:27.120 --> 0:04:28.960 but I'm very excited to find out. 0:04:29.600 --> 0:04:32.080 Yeah, I've got like a three part I was just 0:04:32.480 --> 0:04:34.880 working this out before we jumped on, because I'd never 0:04:34.960 --> 0:04:37.200 kind of written it down. I may do an article 0:04:37.200 --> 0:04:40.600 about this eventually, but I have my own idea and 0:04:40.680 --> 0:04:43.080 I'm curious to hear, you know, at the end of 0:04:43.080 --> 0:04:47.119 this episode where you are with it as well. But first, 0:04:47.120 --> 0:04:50.440 before we get into the history of it, into these 0:04:50.520 --> 0:04:53.880 interesting questions, we should probably talk a little bit about 0:04:53.880 --> 0:04:56.479 what happened last week, because I think in many ways 0:04:56.480 --> 0:05:00.720 it is representative. We're recording this, as you've alluded to 0:05:00.880 --> 0:05:05.520 on the Monday after the twenty twenty six PGA Championship 0:05:05.560 --> 0:05:09.560 at Ironomin Golf Club and throughout the week, the design 0:05:09.720 --> 0:05:14.960 and setup of Ironomink were big, big storylines. So let's 0:05:14.960 --> 0:05:18.400 start with what people were talking about before the tournament started, 0:05:18.839 --> 0:05:20.960 because that was different from what people were talking about 0:05:21.000 --> 0:05:23.360 during the tournament. What was it before the tournament? What 0:05:23.400 --> 0:05:24.120 was your recollection? 0:05:25.640 --> 0:05:27.560 Well, it was something kind of new. 0:05:27.640 --> 0:05:30.839 I mean, it hadn't been on the rota for the 0:05:30.880 --> 0:05:34.239 pros in eight years since a BMW, which is obviously 0:05:34.279 --> 0:05:39.159 a very different setup than a PGA Championship. Everybody's curious 0:05:39.200 --> 0:05:42.000 to see what Kerry Haig was going to do with this, 0:05:42.200 --> 0:05:47.599 given the recent run of PGAs that. I mean, Quel 0:05:47.640 --> 0:05:49.760 Hollow was not like a total birdie fest at the 0:05:49.839 --> 0:05:52.000 end of the day last year, but Valhalla was kind 0:05:52.040 --> 0:05:54.960 of a disaster, and I think people were probably scarred 0:05:55.360 --> 0:06:00.359 from that, and the PGA defenders would come back with, well, like, 0:06:00.440 --> 0:06:03.400 look at the leaderboards, look at the winners, like top 0:06:03.440 --> 0:06:07.840 players are separating themselves, which is in a sense a 0:06:07.880 --> 0:06:10.520 fair critique to me, even if it's not the It's 0:06:10.600 --> 0:06:12.800 kind of it's like that meme where like you did 0:06:12.839 --> 0:06:14.640 all the work wrong, but you got the right answer, 0:06:14.800 --> 0:06:17.880 so it's like, yeah, okay, I submit that the leaderboards 0:06:17.880 --> 0:06:21.680 have been generally pretty good in recent years, but everybody 0:06:21.680 --> 0:06:23.919 thought that that maybe it was not going to be 0:06:24.000 --> 0:06:26.400 long enough, that scores were going to be low, that 0:06:26.520 --> 0:06:29.040 weather would come in, and that I assume weather is 0:06:29.080 --> 0:06:31.360 going to be a big, at least kind of part 0:06:31.400 --> 0:06:34.560 of what we're talking about today, because not something you 0:06:34.600 --> 0:06:37.720 can control from an architecture standpoint, but something that plays 0:06:37.760 --> 0:06:41.880 a load bearing piece of a major championship. 0:06:41.320 --> 0:06:44.880 For sure, even more so in recent years. Right, I 0:06:44.880 --> 0:06:47.760 also heard a lot of people talking about trees on 0:06:47.880 --> 0:06:52.120 the right so much championship. I mean, the tree discourse was. 0:06:51.960 --> 0:06:54.080 The tree discourse I I have. 0:06:54.360 --> 0:06:56.719 I feel like I've lived like eight lives since the 0:06:56.720 --> 0:07:00.000 tree discourse, so I forgot about it until literally right now. 0:07:00.640 --> 0:07:04.320 I mean on Tuesday and Wednesday, this became sort of 0:07:03.560 --> 0:07:08.000 the flashpoint issue. Yeah, people were talking about all those 0:07:08.040 --> 0:07:10.640 other factors that you mentioned, as well, what is this 0:07:10.720 --> 0:07:14.160 PGA going to be? Are people going to just annihilate 0:07:14.200 --> 0:07:17.280 this golf course? It seemed like the consensus was that 0:07:17.280 --> 0:07:20.760 that would be the case, and I had my concerns 0:07:20.800 --> 0:07:23.840 about that as well, because I had watched the tournaments 0:07:23.840 --> 0:07:27.640 that had been held at this renovated ronom inc And 0:07:28.200 --> 0:07:30.360 I just didn't, you know, I didn't really trust the 0:07:30.640 --> 0:07:33.280 PGA to set this course up in a way that 0:07:33.400 --> 0:07:36.800 was significantly different from those PGA Tour events, because you know, 0:07:36.920 --> 0:07:41.000 in the past, a PGA Championship has typically been basically 0:07:41.320 --> 0:07:43.880 a PGA Tour event, which, by the way, is why 0:07:44.320 --> 0:07:47.119 the players who passed that test happened to be also 0:07:47.440 --> 0:07:51.040 dominant players on the PGA Tour. It's a similar test. 0:07:52.120 --> 0:07:54.600 Of course, all that turned out to be pretty inaccurate. 0:07:56.280 --> 0:08:00.320 Everybody was wrong, but trees were really a big, a 0:08:00.360 --> 0:08:03.720 big point of discussion. Now this is a common talking 0:08:03.760 --> 0:08:10.120 point among anti ball rollback people because tree lined fairways 0:08:10.800 --> 0:08:15.040 limit distance, right, they sometimes take driver out of players' hands. 0:08:15.440 --> 0:08:19.400 It's a way to roll back distance without touching the equipment, 0:08:19.600 --> 0:08:22.600 which is kind of the dream of the anti rollbacker 0:08:22.680 --> 0:08:25.800 right now. It's like, do anything anything at all, no 0:08:25.840 --> 0:08:29.240 matter how expensive it is, no matter how unreasonable, no 0:08:29.280 --> 0:08:31.160 matter how much it harms the golf course, as long 0:08:31.200 --> 0:08:34.120 as you're not going to, you know, touch the ball 0:08:34.480 --> 0:08:38.120 or touch the driver. And trees are a particularly hot 0:08:38.120 --> 0:08:41.320 button issue at Aronomic because one, many trees have been 0:08:41.360 --> 0:08:43.560 taken out over the past twenty five years at this 0:08:43.600 --> 0:08:46.360 golf course, and many trees also have died at the 0:08:46.360 --> 0:08:51.160 golf course. And two, the course itself, especially the front nine, 0:08:51.280 --> 0:08:55.480 is very short by modern Major championship standards. Yes it 0:08:55.559 --> 0:08:57.720 might be at that kind of over seven thousand yard mark, 0:08:57.800 --> 0:09:00.880 but man a lot of wedges on the front nine. 0:09:01.400 --> 0:09:04.240 And so, of course, you know, the prescription for this 0:09:04.400 --> 0:09:07.520 for some people is more trees. And we heard Rory 0:09:07.600 --> 0:09:10.880 McElroy talk about this, we heard Xander Schoffley talk about it, 0:09:10.920 --> 0:09:14.839 and what I thought was a pretty condescending but at 0:09:14.840 --> 0:09:20.319 the same time incoherent manner. So that was one factor 0:09:20.360 --> 0:09:24.840 of championship golf course design and set up that people 0:09:24.920 --> 0:09:29.000 sort of zeroed in on before the tournament began, But 0:09:29.040 --> 0:09:32.120 then once the tournament started, it became clear that the 0:09:32.160 --> 0:09:36.680 course was playing very tough, and player's complaints began to 0:09:36.760 --> 0:09:43.280 center on pin positions, or more precisely, the combination of ironomings, 0:09:43.320 --> 0:09:48.320 green designs, firmness, and pin positions, because all those things 0:09:48.360 --> 0:09:50.880 had to work together to create the dynamics we were seeing. 0:09:51.600 --> 0:09:53.640 So that was. 0:09:54.040 --> 0:09:59.600 The lead subject in the first two rounds, These pin positions, 0:10:00.080 --> 0:10:05.000 other factor of championship golf course design and setup became 0:10:05.280 --> 0:10:07.800 the primary subject. What did you make of the pin 0:10:07.920 --> 0:10:09.160 position discourse? 0:10:10.679 --> 0:10:17.360 It seemed more prevalent than it has been a lot 0:10:17.400 --> 0:10:19.800 of previous majors. I mean, at least in the two 0:10:19.880 --> 0:10:21.640 years that I've been doing this with you guys, Like, 0:10:21.679 --> 0:10:25.400 it seemed like it was the most prevalent in the 0:10:25.440 --> 0:10:29.800 discourse this week, more than any week house And the. 0:10:29.800 --> 0:10:31.880 Last time I remember it being this big of a 0:10:31.920 --> 0:10:35.079 deal pin position specifically was twenty eighteen at Shinnecock. 0:10:35.600 --> 0:10:39.200 Yeah, Like, I feel like it was really really out 0:10:39.240 --> 0:10:42.720 there in a way that you know, there was I know, 0:10:42.760 --> 0:10:45.400 there was like rough discourse and could you spray it? 0:10:45.440 --> 0:10:48.760 Could you not spray it? Like that's open for interpretation 0:10:48.880 --> 0:10:52.679 to a certain extent. But the pin position, Like immediately 0:10:52.720 --> 0:10:55.920 on Thursday, guys were coming off the course in the 0:10:55.920 --> 0:10:59.800 morning the easier wave, mind you that a lot of 0:10:59.800 --> 0:11:02.080 those guys did not cash in on and they were like, 0:11:02.120 --> 0:11:04.920 these these pins are out of control. The slope is 0:11:04.960 --> 0:11:07.199 more than we play on a week to week basis, 0:11:07.200 --> 0:11:11.200 And that is true as Andy hammered home throughout the week. 0:11:12.679 --> 0:11:17.960 But yeah, I mean, wouldn't that theoretically be true for 0:11:18.080 --> 0:11:22.280 the majority of majors that are just not at Obviously 0:11:22.360 --> 0:11:24.640 Quail Hollow is a PGA Tour course, but any of 0:11:24.640 --> 0:11:29.240 these that are not your standard tour courses, like inherently, 0:11:29.679 --> 0:11:32.880 wouldn't they just have harder greens or more slope on 0:11:32.920 --> 0:11:35.360 the greens than the PGA Tour's rules allow. 0:11:35.880 --> 0:11:37.880 I would say so, yes. I think it's something that 0:11:38.920 --> 0:11:42.160 differentiates a major championship venue of these days, because the 0:11:42.200 --> 0:11:45.840 PGA Tour has certain standards for its golf courses. Right, 0:11:45.920 --> 0:11:49.360 you can't put pins in really slopey locations on the 0:11:49.360 --> 0:11:51.920 PGA Tour. You need a certain sand in your bunkers. 0:11:52.400 --> 0:11:54.840 You know, all these things a PGA Tour course has 0:11:54.920 --> 0:11:59.160 become to an extent standardized in its presentation that doesn't 0:11:59.160 --> 0:12:01.760 apply to major championship courses, and so we get these 0:12:01.800 --> 0:12:04.240 things like you know, Southern Hills a few years ago, 0:12:04.480 --> 0:12:07.520 people were really surprised by the sand because it was different, 0:12:07.960 --> 0:12:10.320 you know, And I think that's part of what makes 0:12:10.320 --> 0:12:11.240 these courses special. 0:12:11.760 --> 0:12:14.880 Do you think, Uh, we just did like a little 0:12:15.000 --> 0:12:18.880 quick SGS Monday Monday scramble and I kind of alluded 0:12:18.920 --> 0:12:21.439 to this in a way. You're more of the expert 0:12:21.520 --> 0:12:24.720 that I am. That like, because we hadn't seen ironomynk 0:12:24.800 --> 0:12:27.560 and because it it hasn't come up in eight years, 0:12:27.600 --> 0:12:30.360 and this is kind of a way different context than 0:12:30.640 --> 0:12:34.000 where it came up last time that it is. All 0:12:34.040 --> 0:12:36.760 of this just allowed for way more latitude on the 0:12:36.760 --> 0:12:40.280 course set up discussion because it had never been seen 0:12:40.360 --> 0:12:42.920 before by a lot of these guys. So everybody who's 0:12:43.000 --> 0:12:46.560 just ripping off takes wherever whereas like you know, you 0:12:46.640 --> 0:12:49.360 know what you're getting at an Augusta or something on 0:12:49.400 --> 0:12:51.960 the US Open Rota because it comes up now and 0:12:52.320 --> 0:12:54.200 again every five years or whatever it is. 0:12:55.080 --> 0:12:57.440 Maybe so, but a lot of these guys had seen 0:12:57.440 --> 0:12:59.199 the course, a lot of these guys were at least 0:12:59.559 --> 0:13:01.920 familiar in a pass away with it. Yeah, and so 0:13:02.000 --> 0:13:04.960 I think that that same logic might apply to almost 0:13:05.000 --> 0:13:07.600 any major championship venue, aside from the ones that get 0:13:07.679 --> 0:13:12.040 visited very frequently, like the Old Course or Pinehurst or 0:13:12.040 --> 0:13:16.400 Pebble Beach. You know, most of the time it's ten 0:13:16.480 --> 0:13:20.560 years or something between visits to this type of course 0:13:21.160 --> 0:13:24.319 in a major championship, and so, yeah, there will be 0:13:24.679 --> 0:13:27.680 this element of a lack of familiarity. Guys are probably 0:13:27.760 --> 0:13:30.360 used to that crazy pin on the sixth hole at 0:13:30.360 --> 0:13:33.040 Augusta National to an extent, and so you know, if 0:13:33.080 --> 0:13:37.000 they had not seen Augusta National every year, would they 0:13:37.040 --> 0:13:39.880 complain about that pin position if it popped up in 0:13:39.880 --> 0:13:43.320 a random PGA Championship. I think that's an interesting question, 0:13:43.640 --> 0:13:46.120 and I'm not sure I know the answer, but certainly 0:13:46.200 --> 0:13:49.600 pin positions seem to be the thing that players are 0:13:49.600 --> 0:13:52.040 most concerned about. But then there was another set of 0:13:52.080 --> 0:13:55.560 complaints from another sector of the golf world at the 0:13:55.600 --> 0:13:58.560 same time, and this sector of the golf world was 0:13:58.600 --> 0:14:02.640 the data boys and the gamblers, and they were unhappy 0:14:02.720 --> 0:14:06.440 that Aronomick didn't seem to be rewarding what they interpret 0:14:06.480 --> 0:14:10.360 to be skill. Right, supposedly, the best ball strikers were 0:14:10.360 --> 0:14:13.880 not rising to the top, and instead the tournament was 0:14:14.000 --> 0:14:18.960 just a putting contest where anyone could win. And I 0:14:19.000 --> 0:14:25.479 will say probably the most sophisticated iteration of this complaint 0:14:25.840 --> 0:14:30.760 was that Ironomink did not differentiate slight inaccuracy off the 0:14:30.800 --> 0:14:35.320 tee from wild inaccuracy. Right Like a many tournaments, the 0:14:35.400 --> 0:14:39.520 rough just off the fairways was thicker and juicier than 0:14:39.920 --> 0:14:42.800 the rough way off the fairways, where it was often 0:14:42.840 --> 0:14:47.400 trampled down by galleries, and so slight misses were often 0:14:47.440 --> 0:14:51.160 penalized more harshly than wide misses. This is a problem 0:14:51.200 --> 0:14:54.880 also commonly noted at places like Oak Hill and Tory Pines. 0:14:55.400 --> 0:14:58.160 And this is where the tree the tree discourse comes 0:14:58.200 --> 0:15:00.760 back into play, because you know, if you have if 0:15:00.800 --> 0:15:03.800 you have rough and bunkers just off the fairway and 0:15:03.840 --> 0:15:06.880 then dense stance of dense stands of trees well off 0:15:06.920 --> 0:15:10.560 the fairways, then you have a kind of graduated penalty. 0:15:10.880 --> 0:15:11.080 Right. 0:15:11.720 --> 0:15:16.240 TPC Sawgrass is of course that does this kind of thing, 0:15:16.360 --> 0:15:21.720 where there's a less severe penalty for a slight miss 0:15:21.720 --> 0:15:25.920 and a more severe penalty for a big miss and 0:15:26.200 --> 0:15:29.760 TPC sawgrass uses trees to this purpose. It uses bunkers 0:15:29.760 --> 0:15:35.320 and rough it also uses penalty hazards, and so that 0:15:37.440 --> 0:15:43.320 specific genre of this general complaint struck me. As you know, 0:15:43.400 --> 0:15:46.320 when it comes to aeronomy, not totally off. 0:15:46.120 --> 0:15:52.160 Base, no, I mean when you have guys outwardly getting 0:15:52.200 --> 0:15:56.040 caught on a hot mic Justin Thomas hitting a horrendous 0:15:56.160 --> 0:15:58.720 drive and just yelling, oh, give me a good lie 0:15:58.840 --> 0:16:02.760 as it lands in a group of people, like, yeah, 0:16:02.840 --> 0:16:08.040 probably not not great. But again that's not a unique 0:16:08.040 --> 0:16:11.520 circumstance to ironomicc as you said, So, I do think 0:16:11.560 --> 0:16:14.400 it's fair, but like at the end of the day, 0:16:14.480 --> 0:16:15.960 kind of what are you gonna do about it? This 0:16:16.080 --> 0:16:19.320 comes up more more often than not, so I do 0:16:19.400 --> 0:16:22.120 think though, I know, like you got into a little 0:16:22.120 --> 0:16:25.880 bit of discourse about this recently on Twitter, Brian Schneider 0:16:25.920 --> 0:16:30.360 was tweeting about fairway speeds. Do you think maybe that 0:16:31.400 --> 0:16:33.960 is different at Aronomic that they were cut so fine 0:16:34.000 --> 0:16:36.560 that it was hard to hold a lot of these fairways. 0:16:36.600 --> 0:16:38.800 Also at Oakmont last year a good example, it was 0:16:38.840 --> 0:16:41.440 hard to hold a lot of the fairways that you 0:16:41.480 --> 0:16:45.640 would end up right in that first kind of cut, 0:16:45.920 --> 0:16:48.320 not a first cut, but in that first grouping of 0:16:48.440 --> 0:16:52.120 rough where if you hit the fairway, when if you 0:16:52.160 --> 0:16:54.720 were just blasting it all over the place, Cameron Smith, 0:16:54.760 --> 0:16:57.040 you could make par from anywhere because it didn't really matter. 0:16:57.880 --> 0:17:00.800 Yeah, I think I think the fairways were cut too short, 0:17:00.880 --> 0:17:05.080 but that's that's Ernomic and everywhere else, you know, except 0:17:05.080 --> 0:17:08.560 for maybe a couple of places, like even Augusta National, 0:17:09.240 --> 0:17:11.560 where they could cut it shorter, but they don't because 0:17:11.560 --> 0:17:16.680 they want balls to hang up on uneven lies. So yeah, 0:17:16.800 --> 0:17:19.119 I would have loved to have seen the fairway grass 0:17:19.200 --> 0:17:23.040 kept longer, and I'd love that at in fact, most 0:17:23.359 --> 0:17:28.919 tournament venues that we see. But yeah, I mean all 0:17:29.040 --> 0:17:31.760 the stuff that we're talking about, the uh you know, 0:17:32.760 --> 0:17:38.040 penalizing certain kinds of shots at a graduated level. I 0:17:38.119 --> 0:17:43.359 hear it, I get it. I appreciate courses like TPC Sawgrass, 0:17:43.359 --> 0:17:47.000 where you know, the design of the course was meant 0:17:47.040 --> 0:17:50.440 from the beginning to enforce that kind of graduated penalty. 0:17:51.240 --> 0:17:53.439 But I think when we bring that complaint to a 0:17:53.480 --> 0:17:58.600 particular course like Aronomy, we're very much at risk of 0:17:58.600 --> 0:18:02.440 saying every championship course or should basically be the same yeah, 0:18:02.480 --> 0:18:04.159 and we might as well just kind of play the 0:18:04.160 --> 0:18:07.639 majors on a grid that doesn't yield any numbers that 0:18:07.760 --> 0:18:08.840 might offend people. 0:18:09.480 --> 0:18:11.840 Isn't that just like I mean it was when we 0:18:11.920 --> 0:18:14.560 were when we did the Fairness episode of this, It's like, 0:18:14.640 --> 0:18:17.560 this is an outdoor sport, guys, Like this is just 0:18:18.200 --> 0:18:21.400 this is the game, this is how it happens, and 0:18:21.400 --> 0:18:23.679 and you're not going to get the best break all 0:18:23.720 --> 0:18:28.240 the time, Like is it the most properly constructed thing 0:18:28.240 --> 0:18:30.800 in the world, Like maybe not, but at some point 0:18:31.040 --> 0:18:33.119 over the course of four rounds, you just play the 0:18:33.160 --> 0:18:35.080 hands you dealt. And I don't think a lot of 0:18:35.200 --> 0:18:37.159 I don't think a lot of people on Twitter. I 0:18:37.200 --> 0:18:40.600 don't think a lot of the discourse really acknowledged that 0:18:40.960 --> 0:18:43.439 or got that or accepted that. And I don't know 0:18:43.480 --> 0:18:45.680 that a lot of the players Necessarsari really did either. 0:18:46.200 --> 0:18:47.320 Yeah. 0:18:47.359 --> 0:18:50.960 And you know what, we often hear this phrase a 0:18:51.040 --> 0:18:54.800 proper test, Yeah, and that the courses like Ironomke where 0:18:54.800 --> 0:19:00.560 we're driving inaccuracy is not particularly punished or not a 0:19:00.600 --> 0:19:04.280 proper test or a well balanced test. And I just 0:19:04.280 --> 0:19:07.480 think that's an oversimplification. I think it's okay for a 0:19:07.520 --> 0:19:09.920 course not to be a proper test. You know, it's 0:19:09.960 --> 0:19:13.560 okay for different courses to highlight different skill sets and 0:19:13.600 --> 0:19:18.399 to forgive certain weaknesses. It's okay for different courses to 0:19:18.440 --> 0:19:20.240 be different in these respects. 0:19:20.320 --> 0:19:25.400 This is, this is how, this is how not baseball 0:19:25.480 --> 0:19:27.480 is the only other comp really because it's not like 0:19:27.520 --> 0:19:29.479 you're building a football field in a different way. But 0:19:29.520 --> 0:19:31.840 you can play based on weather, or you could build 0:19:31.840 --> 0:19:34.240 a dome in a football field depending on the style 0:19:34.280 --> 0:19:37.320 of team you have, where you could build your offense around, 0:19:37.640 --> 0:19:39.000 whether you play outdoors in. 0:19:39.000 --> 0:19:41.239 January or not. Like this is. 0:19:41.320 --> 0:19:44.040 You know, some ballparks are bigger than others, like that 0:19:44.200 --> 0:19:47.000 is the way to go. Like TPC River Highlands is 0:19:47.040 --> 0:19:49.760 not going to give you the same leaderboard as a 0:19:50.000 --> 0:19:53.320 ginormous ballpark out there somewhere else, like you, Brian Harmon 0:19:53.359 --> 0:19:55.800 has a chance at TPC River Highlands where he wouldn't 0:19:55.880 --> 0:19:59.800 other places. Like that happens, and that's the sport. And 0:20:00.040 --> 0:20:03.600 again when it happens on a weekly basis, I don't 0:20:03.680 --> 0:20:08.120 understand how these that criticism comes up so frequently here. 0:20:08.520 --> 0:20:12.520 Yeah, you know, major championships are big deals and people 0:20:12.560 --> 0:20:15.800 invest a lot in the results of major championships. They 0:20:15.800 --> 0:20:18.760 want to see the best players win and they want 0:20:18.840 --> 0:20:21.439 there to be something memorable about it. They you know, 0:20:21.480 --> 0:20:25.240 maybe think back to their childhoods when when Tiger was winning, 0:20:25.480 --> 0:20:28.000 you know, every major, or Jack Nichols was winning every major, 0:20:28.080 --> 0:20:31.040 and they and they want that feeling to come back. 0:20:31.920 --> 0:20:35.119 But you know what, that's not going to be every major. 0:20:35.320 --> 0:20:37.919 It has never been every major. If you were actually 0:20:37.960 --> 0:20:41.760 living through the seventies when Nicholas was so dominant, or 0:20:41.800 --> 0:20:44.360 the early two thousands when when Tiger was doing his thing, 0:20:44.840 --> 0:20:47.000 you would know that there were some random major winners 0:20:47.280 --> 0:20:51.840 during those stretches as well, you know. And Aaron Rai 0:20:51.960 --> 0:20:53.840 went out and earned it. Like if you look at 0:20:53.880 --> 0:20:57.600 his back nine, it was immaculate. He hit all the 0:20:57.640 --> 0:21:00.840 shots that everybody else wasn't hitting, and they're very, very 0:21:00.840 --> 0:21:04.880 difficult shots. He is the one who hit them. And 0:21:05.520 --> 0:21:08.760 the challenge at aeronom Ink this past week was basically 0:21:08.760 --> 0:21:11.600 the greens and getting your approaches in these little sections 0:21:11.640 --> 0:21:14.480 where you could actually make some putts and then making 0:21:14.520 --> 0:21:19.520 those puts on very slopey, tricky greens. And Aaron Rye 0:21:19.600 --> 0:21:21.680 did that, and he was also in the fairway most 0:21:21.680 --> 0:21:23.960 of the time. But you know, maybe maybe not to 0:21:24.359 --> 0:21:30.080 everybody's satisfaction over four rounds, but the chorus was posing. 0:21:30.200 --> 0:21:33.480 I thought a very interesting set of questions throughout the week, 0:21:34.119 --> 0:21:38.399 including on Sunday to the whole field and to Aaron Rye, 0:21:38.640 --> 0:21:40.920 and he had the answers in those last few holes. 0:21:41.200 --> 0:21:44.760 Well that's like, you know, you can step me straight here, 0:21:44.840 --> 0:21:46.600 please do if I'm wildly off base. 0:21:47.600 --> 0:21:49.600 I don't understand the putting contest. 0:21:50.920 --> 0:21:54.280 I understand it more in a place like Amex John Rahm, 0:21:54.400 --> 0:21:58.280 you know, Piece of s putting contest, the famous video, 0:21:58.359 --> 0:22:01.040 Like I get into a place like that where everybody 0:22:01.160 --> 0:22:04.199 is hitting the fairway, everybody is hitting the green, and like, yeah, 0:22:04.280 --> 0:22:07.679 you gotta when everybody is kind of on an equal 0:22:07.720 --> 0:22:11.680 playing field there to a certain extent, like yes, everybody 0:22:11.760 --> 0:22:14.159 has to make every putt because the final score is 0:22:14.200 --> 0:22:16.240 going to be twenty four under or whatever it is, 0:22:16.280 --> 0:22:18.240 and you have to make every put available to you. 0:22:18.840 --> 0:22:21.600 But in a major especially but really any week, like 0:22:22.840 --> 0:22:24.919 you have to make putts to win at the end 0:22:24.960 --> 0:22:27.359 of the day, Like is it everything kind of a 0:22:27.400 --> 0:22:32.840 putting contest? Like yes, you can get away with putting 0:22:32.960 --> 0:22:36.000 poorly if you're putting from you know, eight feet compared 0:22:36.000 --> 0:22:37.640