Talking (2010 Majors) With Rod Morri

Talkingolf.com's Rod Morri interviewed me this week about the 2010 majors and in particular, the architecture and setups we saw. It's a long one...you were warned. But Rod knows his stuff and asks some great questions.

There is also a version with media player embedded on the News And Reviews page.

Rod has also interviewed Tom Doak and Bill Coore.

Comments

[digsouth]

Geoff,

I listened to the whole thing. Will there be a quiz?

do I win the giant seafood array?

I was so glad your reflections ended up with the US Open in the nay column. the focus on 17 and 14 was good. 17 could have played ok at 165 or so, but, it was a joke. The 150 Sq. foot of available hole location on 14 was, well not enough.

Additionally, how would you like to tune in as a non fan to see the 'beautiful PB" and there are unkempt clumps of 2-3 foot tall 'weeds' [as it appeared] around the greenside bunkers? If you ever take up the game, you'll REALLY want to spring 5 notes for a trip around that goat ranch(as it appeared once the USGA had their way)

The USGA took a beautiful woman, and put a $9.95 wig on her, and called it a 'setup'. The kind you find on a streetcorner I would guess.

I thought your takes on Augusta and St Andy's were well done, and hopefully the Masters will get the roars in the Pines going again, as per your obsevations.

Now WS..... visually stunning on TV, I say 17 and 18 need to play much shorter, and the fairway runup to the greens needs to be 'linksed up', and they have it right.

Additionally , the overgrown, unmown 'green' grass along the fairway needs to be mown properly, as per your discussion..

As to the bunkers, they made their bed, now they must pay for it (lay in it without touching the sand??)

The PGAofA and WS has made golf a laughingstock of anyone who has any common sense at all. Note that I do not consider ROG anal retentives possessing any common sense. These people would give a driver a ticket speeding his wife to the hospital to deliver. Rules are rules.

Why don't they just bring the rack and waterboarding out to the scoring trailer, and cut to the chase. You KNOW they *really want to*.

play well.
digsouth

[AHW]

No rakes in any bunker? I mean, seriously. A nasty kick after a well placed shot should result in a one or two shot penalty? And you think that bunker maintenance is killing the game??? Sometimes it's a bit hard to follow your logic...

[Erik J. Barzeski]

AHW, I didn't listen to the interview but if Geoff said "no rakes in any bunker," then I like it. Pros would rather be in bunkers than not.

I think there are too many (sand) bunkers on golf courses. Amateurs would like nothing more than to do away with them, and pros would rather be in sand bunkers than grass bunkers, so it's a win for everyone - game gets a bit tougher for the pros and a bit easier for the amateurs.

John at FreeDrop makes a compelling case for removing bunkers as hazards entirely (and thus not raking them) and the downsides as I see them are simply "how do you tell when someone has improved their lie?" (probably about as well as we can now) and the added maintenance hassle of 5x more sand being splashed around on the green side of bunkers.

[Hawkeye]

The minute we stop raking bunkers, that's when I'll stop replacing divots and fixing ball marks. It's always funny to hear Americans talk about matters such as these; one immediately realizes that they only know pristine course conditions and predictable bounces. In links golf, as well as on clay courses in a dry summer, the difference between a ball finding the green and rolling into a bunker is often down to the luck of the bounce - the least we can do to offset that is to present the sand in somewhat playable condition. It's no day at the beach for most golfers anyway, and those who have perfected the technique deserve to have an advantage.