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Ed. note: Just as Augusta National is the ultimate insiders’ club, the Masters is the ultimate insiders’ tournament. Nearly nine decades after the storied venue was founded, the Augusta Experience has remained shrouded in mystery. To unlock some of its secrets, we asked those who have been part of the experience to describe one element of what makes Augusta Augusta and the Masters the Masters. The fourth installment of our “What It’s Like…” series (below) was contributed by two-time Masters winner Ben Crenshaw.

Previous installments: Caddying for a Masters winner | Hosting the Champions Dinner | Sinking green-jacket dreams at 12 | Working on the Masters grounds crew | Staying in the Crow’s Nest | Hitting a ceremonial opening tee shot

***

The year was 1972, and I had just finished as the low amateur with rounds of 73, 74, 74 and 74, finishing nine shots behind the winner, Jack Nicklaus. Which meant I would head into Butler Cabin for the post-round interview with the club chairman, Clifford Roberts.

Was I nervous? Oh my God, yes. I was petrified.

I had passed by the place a few times earlier that week. But Butler Cabin wasn’t somewhere you casually went in; it was somewhere you were invited to go in.

Lifestyle

At least my hair was short when I went in, which was a big deal for Mr. Roberts. Earlier that week, when I first met him, he started off by telling me how fond the folks at Augusta were of Texans. He mentioned Byron Nelson, Ben Hogan, Jimmy Demaret and Jackie Burke.

Then came the line I’ll never forget: “By the way, Ben, do you know we have a barbershop on the grounds?”

I immediately found the shop and got the haircut.

In the cabin that afternoon, I don’t recall him mentioning my hair. To be honest, I don’t recall anything anyone said. I was too much in awe.

I was invited back in 1973, when I was the low amateur again, and as the champion in 1984 and ’95. Not for one moment did I lose that sense of awe. That goes for Butler Cabin and everything else about Augusta National.

With reporting by Michael Arkush

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The post Streamsong is adding a fourth course. Here’s why it will be different from the rest. appeared first on Golf.

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Fore!

Wait, no.

Make that, four!

Streamsong Resort, the Florida destination that is already home to three marquee 18-hole courses, is preparing to build a fourth.

That news, which first leaked into the ether over the weekend, was made official Wednesday by resort representatives at the PGA Merchandise Show, in Orlando.

Like the property’s three existing layouts — the Red, Blue and Black — this latest addition, which has yet to be named, will sit on the rollicking, dunesy grounds of a former phosphate mine. It will also have headline architects behind it; Bill Coore and Ben Crenshaw, who designed Streamsong Red, have signed on to do the work.

For all that kinship, though, the new Streamsong venue will be shorter than its siblings, with early plans that call for alternate six- and 12-hole routings as well as a putting green. In its current blueprint, which could evolve, holes on the roughly 100-acre site will range in length from 70 to 300 yards, with its first tee within a short walk of the resort’s main lodge. The goal is to offer guests a complement to the property’s longer 18-hole courses, easy to walk and quicker to play, without specified tee markers or relative par assigned to holes.

In a statement, Coore described the parcel that the course will occupy as being “dramatically gifted for golf,” its terrain ornamented by “moss-draped oaks, lakes and sand-based landforms.”

The announcement comes as Streamsong approaches its 10th anniversary. When it first opened for play, in 2012, the resort had two courses, the Red and the Blue, the latter designed by Tom Doak. In 2017, Gil Hanse and Jim Wagner completed their work on the Black. Those three courses all reside within the top 40 of GOLF’s list of Top 100 Courses You Can Play.

The golf boom of recent years has packed tee sheets across the country, and Streamsong has been no exception. Ben Pratt, senior vice president of government and public affairs for Mosaic, the mining company that owns Streamsong, said that the new course would help build on a run of unprecedented success by offering “fun and accessible golf that will rival its bigger siblings in quality of design and condition.”

When it will open is another matter. A start date for construction has yet to be confirmed.

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The post Masters holes: Augusta National’s par-5 2nd hole, explained by Ben Crenshaw appeared first on Golf.

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In the 65 years since the Masters Tournament was first televised, golf fans have seen every inch of Augusta National’s beauty in high-def close-up. What you’ve never seen is the course — hole by hole, tee box by tee box — through the eyes of 18 living Masters champions, from Jack Nicklaus, Gary Player, Dustin Johnson, Ben Crenshaw and beyond. Until now. Eighteen holes, 18 winners, 18 ways of seeing Augusta National anew.

Hole No. 2: Par-5 / 575 yards (Pink Dogwood)

By Ben Crenshaw (1984, 1995 Masters champion)

What you see off the tee: “The primary visual is the big fairway bunker on the right. It’s a detriment to the modern player because they can reach it. In the old days, we were more worried about missing left, because without the second cut the ball would run all the way into tree trouble.”

What you don’t know until you’ve played it: “There’s a lot of strategy involved, because how you play your second and third shots depends greatly on where the flagstick is. If the pin is on the left, you want to play way right, and if the pin is on the right, you want to play way left.”

Where you will gain the greatest advantage: “Because the green is canted so severely left-to-right, you have to leave yourself an uphill putt. Get out of position and you can make a quick 6.”

Where you will make the biggest mistake: “Not giving yourself leeway for your third shot or your pitch.”

Who played it best: “In the olden days it was Raymond Floyd and Seve Ballesteros, because they were so good with their short games and wedges. The green requires skill and strategy and philosophy. They not only had all the shots, they had a knack for always being in the right spots.”

Did you know… In the final round of the 2012 Masters, Louis Oosthuizen made a double eagle at No. 2. After his 253-yard approach shot landed on the green, it took 16 seconds to find the bottom of the cup.

1/3

2/3

3/3

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Two-time Masters champion Ben Crenshaw breaks down the par-5 2nd hole at Augusta National Golf Club, so you know what to watch for on TV.

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The post This is the worst warm-up mistake golfers make, says one of the best putters ever appeared first on Golf.

The post This is the worst warm-up mistake golfers make, says one of the best putters ever appeared first on Golf.

Welcome to Play Smart, a game-improvement column that drops every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday from Director of Game Improvement content Luke Kerr-Dineen to help you play smarter, better golf.

Earlier this week, I took a look at the games of some of the best power players in Masters history. Today, I’m continuing on the same theme but shifting the focus to the green. What can we learn from the best putter in Masters history, otherwise known as Ben Crenshaw?

For golf fans who weren’t around in the 1980s, it’s easy to forget how much of a Masters stalwart Ben Crenshaw was. He was arguably the best Masters player throughout the entirety of the 1980s, with a first, second, third, two fourths, a sixth and an eighth place finish in 10 years.

Lurking on YouTube is a fantastic old video from Crenshaw’s 1986 “The Art of Putting,” which you can watch here or down below. It’s loaded with great tips and, above all else, a singular message about putting:

“I don’t think putting can be reduced to lines and angles,” Crenshaw says. “There is no magic formula … it’s a matter of touch.”

But while Crenshaw doesn’t prescribe many rules throughout the 39 minute video, he couldn’t resist on one occasion. Talking about warming up, he outlined a mistake that he says golfers make all the time — I know I do.

Crenshaw says: DON’T start with short putts

In the video, Crenshaw says that golfers often don’t leave themselves enough time for a proper warmup, which leads them to make a simple mistake:

“Many weekend golfers warm up for a round by dropping a few balls four feet or so from the hole, hitting a few short putts and racing off to the first tee,” he says. “In my opinion, that’s counterproductive. That’s the worst possible way you can do to achieve that smooth stroke that you’re looking for.”

Putting

Why? Crenshaw explains that if you feel rushed, your stroke will, too. That will hurt your feel, which will cause you to miss putts, which will wreck your confidence.

“Don’t, and I repeat, don’t start with those short putts. When you miss these short putts, and you often will because you’re not properly warmed up, it’ll hurt your confidence.”

DO start with longer putts

Instead, Crenshaw says to make sure the first putts you hit are longer putts. Something where you aren’t focusing on making the putt, but just making a smooth stroke and finding the right speed.

“Start out with longer putts, in the 20 to 25 foot range. Don’t worry so much about your line, just focus on making a good smooth stroke, work on developing your feel.

In all Crenshaw says you should spend about 15 to 20 minutes on the practice putting green. Ten of those minutes should be reserved for short putts, but only after you hit lots of longer lag putts.

Watch the full video below:

Want a truer roll on the greens? Get a putter fitting from the experts at our sister company, True Spec Golf.

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There are a number of different things that strike a chord for golfers when they say they like a certain course. Sometimes it’s the condition or the quality of the practice facilities, or they might just like the menu at the 19th hole. As they say, beauty is in the eye of the beholder.

But when it comes to what courses are the best, the rankings are far less arbitrary. Take GOLF’s Top 100 Courses list for example. Each course on the list is meticulously ranked based on certain criteria in order to inform the public on what courses are the greatest. You can read more on that methodology here.

Panelists view courses through a particular lens that differs from those of the general public. And that rings true for how the people designing the courses — the architects — as well. With these differences in mind, GOLF.com sought out the opinion of two of the great architects of the modern era, Bill Coore and Ben Crenshaw, about what makes a golf course great. Here’s what they had to say.

Bunkering

When it comes to what Crenshaw looks for in a great golf course, he made no hesitations, saying that placement of bunkers was near the top of the list. The bunkering of a course can give players a sense of the signature of the architect who built the course.

“That stamp of individuality comes from the look of the bunkers,” Crenshaw said. “No one is ever going to think of Winged Foot without thinking of its bunkers. … The bunkers are just beautiful there. It’s part of a personality of a place.”

Does it look natural?

According to the duo, the courses they enjoy the most aren’t artificial. They look like they were carved from the original piece of land and have remnants of the time prior to the course sprouting up there.

“The most interesting courses are the ones that looked like they were discovered on that property,” Coore said. “[They don’t look like] they were brought there or manufactured there. They look like the property. They have the inherent character of the property.”

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The post Ben Crenshaw’s 4 simple keys to becoming a great putter appeared first on Golf.

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When people think of the best putters in golf history, there are a number of usual suspects who show up on the list. Jack Nicklaus and his 18 majors are often mentioned, as is Brad Faxon and his silky stroke. In the modern game, Tiger Woods has to appear on the list.

Another name almost always mentioned is Ben Crenshaw. The soft-spoken Texan rode his languid stroke and deft touch on the greens to 19 PGA Tour titles and two Masters victories. There are few players who could roll the ball as well as Gentle Ben, and in a recent interview with GOLF.com, he shared his four keys to becoming a good putter.

1. Be yourself

Crenshaw was tutored by legendary teacher Harvey Penick from the time he was a boy all the way until Penick’s death in 1995. Crenshaw learned a majority of what he knows about the game from Penick, but the best advice he received about putting was also the simplest.

Tournaments

“Harvey Penick said something that I’ve never heard any other teacher say,” Crenshaw said. “He said ‘Don’t putt like someone else.’”

There are many times on the greens when you might see someone rolling the ball extremely well and feel the need to tweak your action to mimic theirs. But chasing the technique of another might put you in a worse spot than you were before. It’s important to trust your stroke and have your own unique mechanics that help you putt your best.

“I’ve seen a million putting methods work,” Crenshaw said. “I’ve seen short strokes. I’ve seen long strokes. Different grips and styles. It just has to fit you.”

2. Become a good green reader

You could have the best stroke in the world, but if you don’t know which way the ball is going to break, you’ll have no chance to hole putts. Green reading is an art that takes time to improve at it, but it’s an absolute necessity if you want to succeed on the greens.

“You’ve got to read greens properly,” Crenshaw said.

3. Develop proper pace

In order to get the correct read, you have to pick the proper pace. Crenshaw said his preferred pace was a ball that dies near the hole, but it’s important to be consistent on your pace if you want to become an elite putter.

“The key to good putting is the pace of the ball,” Crenshaw said. “In many cases, pace is more important than line. To pick out a line you have to have a pace in mind.” 

4. Get comfortable over the ball

Being comfortable when you step up to the ball is a must for rolling good putts. If you stand over the ball and can’t get into a good mental space, you have no chance at holing many putts.

“Whenever I putt poorly, I was thinking about my stroke, and not imagining a putt,” Crenshaw said. “When I putt well, I don’t even think about my stroke. I’m thinking more about what the ball does and what it’s going to look like when it arrives around the hole … Putting is as difficult as people make it.”

Need help reading the greens? Pick up a Green Book from our sister company, Golf Logix.

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The post Course Rater Confidential: What are New England’s best inland and coastal courses? appeared first on Golf.

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GOLF’s Top 100 course panelists are among the most respected and well-traveled course evaluators in the game. They’re also keen to share their opinions. In this GOLF.com series, we’ll unlock their unvarnished views on all questions course-related. The goal is not only to entertain you but also to give you a better understanding of how to understand and appreciate golf course architecture. You can see GOLF’s latest Top 100 Courses in the World ranking here, and meet all of our Top 100 panelists here.

With the FedEx Cup Playoffs underway this week at TPC Boston, now seems like a good time to talk about golf in New England. In past roundtables, we’ve discussed the best private, public and sleeper courses in the region. So that’s out. Let’s look at New England golf in another way. What, in your opinion, are the two best New England courses with water views, and what are the region’s two best inland courses?

Michael Pelliccione (panelist since 2020; has played 60 of the World Top 100): Some would argue that the wicked best golf in North America can be found within New England. The region stretches as far as Maine down to the tip of Connecticut. With the abundance of mountains, ocean and grassland, there is no shortage of new and classic golf courses you can play. So this is no easy task!

When thinking about the best courses with water views the first that comes to mind is Prouts Neck Country Club in Scarborough, Maine. I can’t think of a course that flies under the radar as much as this Wayne Stiles masterpiece. Not much has been written about the place and nor will it appear on any Top 100 list. But it should! This piece of land is just flat-out perfect. Tucked on a small peninsula just a few miles south of Portland, this course has it all. The round takes you on an adventure carving in and out of the woods with endless water views. Don’t let the length fool you. What the course lacks in distance it makes up for on the greens.

The Kittansett Club in Marion, Mass., gets my second nod as the best course in New England with water views. The name Kittansett comes from the Native American words “near the sea.” Frederic C. Hood was the founding member and the one who actually constructed the course while William Flynn provided the routing plan. The course starts and finishes at the tip of a peninsula jutting out into Buzzards Bay, which can be seen on almost every hole. The bulk of the property navigates you through the woods with treacherous greens and wonderful angles to come in from. If you catch it on a blustery day the course is everything you could ask for. Kittansett is about as pure of a golf experience as you can get.

Moving inland, the possibilities are endless. But you would be remiss without making a stop at Cape Arundel Golf Club in Kennebunkport, Maine. It’s no surprise former President George H.W. Bush vacationed here. This Walter Travis design is about as fun to play as any golf course around. Just a few yards shy of 5,900 (from the back tees) this place has everything. The variety of holes is endless. Travis was known for one thing and that’s his green complexes — and Cape Arundel’s greens don’t disappoint. It’s the true defense of this property and some could even argue it’s his best 18-hole collection.

Rounding out the best two inland courses, it’s hard not to go with Yale Golf Course in New Haven, Conn. This C.B. Macdonald/Seth Raynor collaboration is truly one of golf’s national treasures. The second you step foot on property you instantly feel like you step back in time. The topography is perfect for them to lay out their canvas of template golf holes. The fairways are wide and rolling, the greens are treacherous and the bunkers are strategically placed. There are so many blind shots and elevation changes that even the scratch golfer can be challenged. Any golf architecture enthusiast must play and study Yale. It’s truly one of the game’s greats.

Steve Lapper (panelist since 2009; has played 84 of the World Top 100): This is a no-brainer for me. Eastward Ho is the walk-off home run, even rivaling a Big Papi poke at Fenway’s mighty Green Wall. It’s a private yet warm and inviting club and rivals far more famous links found throughout the U.S. Its terrain, on a spit of land on Cape Cod alongside an Atlantic bay, is an adventurous, tactfully routed rollercoaster of joy that weaves between waterside and woods. This finest work of Herbert Fowler (on this side of the pond), and renovated by Keith Foster in 2004, is pure genius, complete with a built-in wind tunnel and nary a flat lie to be found anywhere ahead of any teeing ground. The stealthy under-the-radar and out-of-the-way nature of this place eludes even the ardent of golf course aficionados. Find a way, anyway (try the charity outing route?), to get a ticket to the first tee. You won’t be disappointed.

On the public side, and near the shadow of its famous neighbor, Fishers Island GC, Donald Ross’ Shennecossett GC sits in Groton, Conn. It’s an easily accessible municipal, rich in history, that will neither beat up an average golfer, nor concede much to a scratch player on any windy day. Technically on the tip of the Thames River, it has views that extend out to the L.I. Sound. On any typical day, it’ll yield sightings of the sleek silhouettes of the U.S. Nuclear Submarine fleet, schooners from the 1800s, the Fishers Island ferry and hundreds of sport fishing boats. Play here is swift and courteous, with good conditioning, and it’s more than reasonably priced. Make this under-the-radar muni a must-play when you find yourself with a few hours to spare.

Inland golf in New England is steeped in great golf course architecture and has dozens and dozens of viable candidates. Well-known names like The Country Club, Ekwanok, Taconic, Yale, Essex County, Hooper, Salem, Boston Golf Club, Shelter Harbor, Cape Arundel, Wannamoisett, Crumpin-Fox, Wintonbury Hills, The Orchards all qualify.

Courses

Yet nowhere else in New England, let alone the U.S., does a gem like Myopia Hunt Club exist. Its name stems from the commonality of its early founders all wearing glasses. They may have needed them for other sports, but the vision here was crystal clear. Just up the hill from its fox-hunting polo fields and steeped in golf history, this club was founded in 1882 and holds the distinction of the highest winning score(s) in the U.S. Open. Playing here today still feels like a trip back in time, and it’s a rip-roaring one at that.

The course probably has the most charming, quirky, and often penal 6,500 yards of golf existent on this side of the Atlantic. Never boring, nor predictable, it presents a wide spectrum from rustic beauty to stern test. Starting off with a short par-4, it’s ultimately followed by a well-guarded 253-yard par-3 beast and finishes off the front nine with a beautiful 136-yard par-3 over a mini Thoreau-like pond with a studio apartment-sized green. The course has a mix of exhilarating short and long par-4s and reachable par-5s, all defended by dastardly placed bunkers and tilted and crowned greens. Scoring here shouldn’t be about numbers, but instead about the experience of appealing to every intangible sensory perception any golfer could ask for. A dozen rounds later, I can still remember nearly every shot and spot on the course. Myopia Hunt is quite private, but occasionally available through various charitable outings.

Where Myopia is wonderfully historic, Old Sandwich, a Coore/Crenshaw design in Plymouth, Mass., is a brilliant representation of modern minimalism brought to New England. Set in a rolling mix of forest, field and bog, this big course takes you through a trip up, down and all over with large-scale features (wide fairways and large bunkers and greens). The nines feel interchangeable but never seem tedious or uninteresting. You need every club in your bag to tackle these holes. Hardly a walk for the meek or infirm, it’s an athletic course and although eminently playable, very tough to score on. That said, the genius of Bill and Ben doesn’t sacrifice beauty for brawn. Nor does it abuse the average mid-handicapper. The club is private and permissibly aloof, however it’s clearly a modern gem.

One quick note: Try your hardest to time any visit to New England from mid-September through the end of October. Most courses present fast and firm conditions, and once amidst the fall foliage season they combine to create an ecstatic assault on one’s senses.

Travel

Paul Rudovsky (panelist since 2015; has played 100 of the World Top 100): I think the prime reason that New England (and most of NYS) is such a fertile ground for golf has to do primarily with the glacial activity during the last Ice Age, which brought down huge rock outcroppings from Canada and created wonderfully rolling and heaving landforms. While I am not as familiar with the geological history of the Midwest, my bet is the encroaching glaciers had a lot to do with the wonderful land for golf in Wisconsin, Minnesota and Michigan as well.

My two favorite water-view courses in New England are both in Massachusetts: Eastward Ho! (fabulous example of “heaving landforms” and wonderfully fun; and Kittansett (so much improved by Gil Hanse). For courses without water views, also both in Massachusetts: The Country Club, as the Championship/Composite course is now both big and fun, a very tough combo to achieve (full disclosure — that is our club up here); and Essex County, which was hugely improved by Tom Doak and Bruce Hepner’s tree-clearing recommendations and the guts of the club’s leadership in carrying them through.

For under the radar water views: Edgartown in Massachusetts — a proud, delightful nine-holer on Martha’s Vineyard, and Cape Arundel, the easygoing home club of the Bush clan. No water: Charles River (Mass.) with its devilish greens, Ekwanok (Vt.) for sheer beauty and tranquility, and Tamarack (Conn.) for interesting fun.

Hal Phillips (panelist since 1997, has played 71 of the World Top 100): As my colleagues have so ably covered the private realm, I felt compelled to detail New England courses one can more readily pay to play. When it comes to accessible ocean views, Farm Neck on Martha’s Vineyard is tops in my book: superb terrain, mint conditions and all sorts of holes that play along (or in plain view of) the Atlantic (and Sengekontacket Pond, the saltwater inlet where the shark nearly devours Michael, the sheriff’s son, in the movie “Jaws”).

There are a half dozen nine-holers that dot the Maine coast, but none of them are that great really. Blink Bonnie Golf Links in Sorrento, just north of Bar Harbor, is the best of the lot. There are 18-holes at The Samoset Resort in Rockland; they offer great views of the Gulf of Maine but not particularly great golf. The more salient point when seeking seaside public golf in New England is not “where” but “when.” They don’t advertise the fact but even more private clubs (seaside and otherwise) are accessible in “the shoulder season,” which generally means “after Labor Day.” This is particularly relevant in summer tourist areas like Cape Cod, which, you may have noticed, is surrounded by salt water. There are dozens of coastal privates to explore in this tactical fashion, so don’t be shy.

That said, if you get a game at Prouts Neck, just south of Portland, Maine, do it. Same for the underrated Wentworth by the Sea routing southeast of Portsmouth, N.H. Inland, there are far more worthy public options. I’m headed to Western Massachusetts this weekend, so I’ll go with Wahconah CC in Dalton, just east of Pittsfield, a stellar Wayne Stiles nine coupled with one nearly as good from Geoffrey Cornish. A bit north of there, in Williamstown, Taconic GC has always been top notch. It was once ranked among the U.S. Top 100, if I’m not mistaken, and a fellow named Gil Hanse renovated this Stiles design in 2009. Closer to this week’s PGA Tour stop, TPC of Boston, check out Red Tail GC, a super-inventive Brian Silva design on stunning terrain (read: multiple former sand pits), or maybe George Wright GC, a muni whose Ross routing has always been magnificent but, following a renovation from Mark Mungeam, has never been in such good nick.

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The post Black touring caddies from a generation ago had insights you won’t find in a yardage book appeared first on Golf.

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Yesterday, today and this weekend, Bamberger Briefly returns in memory of, and in tribute to, Charlie Sifford, often described as golf’s Jackie Robinson and the winner of the 1967 Travelers Championship, nee the Greater Hartford Open. Thursday’s subject was Jim Thorpe.

***

In early June in 1979, I caddied in the Kemper Open at Quail Hollow in Charlotte. I was a 19-year-old college kid. Many of the caddies were grown black men from working-class sections of Augusta, Houston, Dallas, Little Rock, Ark., and Jackson, Miss. I certainly didn’t know that then but have learned this bit of social history over the years.

Herman “Mitch” Mitchell, famously linked to Lee Trevino, was probably the most prominent of them, but there were many others, including Sam “Killer” Foy and Dolphus “Golf Ball” Hull, who spent much of his career getting fired by Raymond Floyd and rehired by Floyd’s wife, Maria. Later that June, Hale Irwin won the 1979 U.S. Open at Inverness, Killer on the bag, in a mustard jumpsuit, despite the Midwestern heat.

News

This week, the PGA Tour is making its annual stop in Hartford, where Charlie Sifford won the first of his two PGA Tour events at age 45. You’ll be able to count the number of black caddies and players — and Tour officials and broadcasters and reporters — on your fingers, easily. That wasn’t always the case. The professional game is poorer — and far less interesting — for it.

One of the things that drew me to the “pro golf circuit” were the black men traveling it. When I caddied some in ’85, Killer was kind to me and he didn’t need to be. He knew the better motels and the all-you-can-eat buffets. Killer got his nickname as an undercard boxer in Houston. He once fought Sugar Ray Robinson, or so it goes.

“Sam was quiet on the course,” Irwin told me this week. “He gave me what I needed. He liked night. He liked his cars and he liked his girlfriends. On the course, he’d wear a stocking over his hair, under his hat. One time I saw him without it and I couldn’t even recognize him. He said, ‘This is my night hair.’”

The Tour then was a way of life. Now it’s a lucrative profession. You drop in and drop out. As it happens, the caddie yard at the Wethersfield Country, where the Hartford tournament was played for years, produced the caddie that paved the way for today’s caddies. The late Bruce Edwards was a white prep-school kid and the son of a dentist who caddied for Tom Watson through most of Watson’s Tour career. There was something charismatic about Bruce, as there was about Killer. Each had sui generis style. Bruce would wear turtlenecks on cold mornings and looked better than any player doing it, his longish hair touching the top of his collars. Killer tucked his pant bottoms into his socks on wet days. He was wearing knickers when Payne Stewart was still in high school.

For caddie style, Killer’s fellow caddie Golf Ball was the leader, not in the clubhouse but outside of it. One of Dolphus Hull’s signature looks was the porkpie hat with the brim up, all the way around. You could see the veins in his forehead. Ball, native son of Jackson, Miss., won with Ray Floyd and Calvin Peete and others. He dreamed about caddying for Ben Crenshaw, Texas golf legend, but never did. But there was a closeness between the two men. The pro game was more Southern then than anything else and caddie-player relationships were different.

My friend Mike Donald and I went to visit Ball in a nursing home in Jackson a few years ago. Ball was on his last legs. There was a wisdom about him.

“Crenshaw says to me, ‘Ball, what do you do if you love a girl but she don’t love you?’” Ball told us.

“If she don’t love you, you gotta let her go,” Ball said, as he recounted it for us that day.

“I believe you’re right,” Ben said.

“I know I’m right,” Ball said.

That’s really the difference, right there. The touring black caddies from the 1970s and ’80s didn’t have the reams of data the caddies have at their disposal today. Their specialty, from what I could see, was insight into the human condition. Killer knew I needed an early-morning nod and generously nodded in my direction. And that, as a poet of New England once wrote, made all the difference.

Michael Bamberger may be reached at Michael_Bamberger@Golf.com

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The post Is the newly opened Sheep Ranch *already* the best course at Bandon Dunes? Here’s how we see it appeared first on Golf.

The post Is the newly opened Sheep Ranch *already* the best course at Bandon Dunes? Here’s how we see it appeared first on Golf.

“So, what’s it like? Is it the best course out there?” my friends and colleagues asked.

Not, “How was your trip?”

Or, “Are you tired from the nine-hour drive?”

Insensitive louts, like so many golfers, they weren’t concerned for my wellbeing. They wanted other intel, and I don’t blame them.

With an official ribbon-cutting slated for June 1, the Sheep Ranch at Bandon Dunes, the biggest-news golf opening of 2020, was allowing limited preview play, so I’d motored up to Oregon from my Oakland home to squeeze in a few rounds.

It seemed only fair that I should field some questions.

Let’s start with that first one: What’s it like?

At a destination known for its minimalist aesthetic, the Sheep Ranch is, in some ways, the most stripped-bare of the courses, with just a smattering of trees and without a single bunker, on the smallest plot of Bandon’s five 18-holers, and by far the rawest looking swatch of land.

In other ways, though, it’s a maxed-out design, claiming more oceanfront than any of its siblings, with a mile-plus of coastline, nine greens on the bluffs and water views from every hole. The wind can whip anywhere, anytime at Bandon, but nowhere harder than it does here.

In its original iteration, the Sheep Ranch (or should it just be Sheep Ranch, without the article in front? As with Batman, I was told, you can go either way) was even smaller and rougher cut, a sleepy, semi-secretive 13-hole course that you had to access by special arrangement. To get there now, you drive to Old MacDonald, what used to be the northernmost course at Bandon, and keep going on a freshly paved road, a 10-minute ride to the new Sheep Ranch entrance. A low-slung, fog-gray clubhouse greets you, backed by a Pacific panoramic, a visual tease for the day ahead.

Bandon Dunes owner Mike Keiser, who developed the Sheep Ranch with his longtime business partner, Phil Friedmann, is not given to gushing. He calls the 1st hole of the Sheep Ranch the best opener in golf.

A broad-shouldered par 5, it plays through a wide, sparse corridor of pines, then elbows gently leftward over a ridge and tumbles toward the water. The green nudges up beside the cliffs, which, unlike the straight-edged coastline on Bandon’s other courses, zig in and out, allowing for holes that involve the ocean from all angles.

1/4

2/4

3/4

4/4

Bill Coore and Ben Crenshaw dreamed up the design, and the routing is inspired, making the most of modest acreage. As a space saving measure, a few holes start from shared tee boxes, their fairways radiating out in different directions. The course moves you through all points on the compass, but never does it merely move you up and back. While the holes along the water are sweet eye-candy, the ones that turn inland are no slouches either. They include my favorite, the par-5 11th, which spills past a patchwork of gorse on an uphill path to a crater-like green complex, its front rim blasted open to permit your approach.

I could go on, but I’ll leave the nitty-gritty to the architecture nerds.

Which brings us to the other question my pals put to me: Is this the best course at Bandon Dunes?

I won’t dodge that query. I’ll just ease into it.

It’s silly to think that Sheep Ranch will be anything but Bandon’s most sought after tee time throughout this year, and likely beyond, and that’s not due to its newness alone. The seaside holes are a powerful magnet, as is the uniqueness of the design and setting, with unruly grass bunkers in lieu of sand bunkers, and dead trees known as snags that look like ghostly gunslingers, dotting the property here and there. The Sheep Ranch is home to moody atmospherics unlike those of any other Bandon course.

Will design aficionados find cause to ding it? Maybe so. Some might gripe about the lack of bunkers (what, no sand to frame your tee shots?) or the cozy confines of the routing, which, compared to some of Bandon’s other courses, lessens the sense that you’re on a journey, transitioning from one world to the next. But design aficionados assessing courses can sound like art-house critics reviewing Marvel movies: out of touch with popular tastes.

And anyway, it’s all good. Grillroom course-ranking debates are a central part of any trip to Bandon. You play a bunch of rounds; you bat around opinions. There’s no objective truth, no right or wrong. In my view, Bandon Trails is the best course at the resort, but I’d place Sheep Ranch not too far behind, creeping up on Pacific Dunes for second.

Disagree?

We can pub-brawl about it later.

Meantime, I see you have one final question: How was my drive?

Thanks for asking.

It was long but scenic, and pending my wife’s permission, I’m hoping to do it again next month.

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