Warm chuckles to be had by most reading Peter Kostis' proposal to socialize the costs of runaway technology by suggesting the USGA build two of its pricey facilities to host various national championships. If written with a trace of irony in making the USGA pay for faulty regulation, I'd say it was a brilliant column, but I think he actually believes this is a good idea and a great use of millions of USGA dollars. (Assuming they had to write a check for USGA greens with Sub-Air they might rethink their subsurface standards, and if they owned their own courses they might get tired of adding new tees and narrowing fairways).
Anyway...
Each facility would be home to three courses: one to host the U.S. Open, another for the U.S. Women's Open and a third for amateur events — the men's and women's U.S. Amateurs, the Walker Cup and the Curtis Cup.
The most elite American designers would be asked to create these courses, with input from the USGA — Ben Crenshaw and Bill Coore; Tom Weiskopf and Jay Morrish; Jack Nicklaus; Tom Doak; Rees Jones; Robert Trent Jones Jr. ; Pete Dye and Tom Fazio. Who wouldn't be honored to donate his time and expertise to such an amazing project?
Getting Morrish and Weiskopf together, now that would a miracle.
By having its own national championship facilities, the USGA would have year-round control of the speed and firmness of the greens, the thickness and depth of the rough, the trees and the width of the fairways. And because the courses would be built with modern golfers and equipment in mind, we would see challenging but logical holes instead of tricked-out versions of classic layouts. Imagine fairway bunkers that guard the fairway instead of being 10 yards in the rough because of altered fairway lines. With modern SubAir drainage systems, the USGA could control runout in fairways and firmness of greens even in rainy conditions.
Are we doing SubAir under fairways now too? That would only cost what, $40 million!
Think about all that for a minute. By creating these facilities, courses like Merion, Winged Foot, Pebble Beach and Shinnecock Hills would no longer have to be lengthened or altered to meet USGA championship standards. The crown jewels of American golf course architecture could remain exactly as they were intended.
Which was what, museum pieces?
No those great places were for the golfers first, their architecture and the bigtime events that have defined them and will continue to do so. At least, I hope.
John Barton makes this shrewd point in previewing this year's Open at St. Andrews and its many tees-played-from-other-courses.
