17th Hole - TPC Scottsdale

D a r e
E s s e n t i a l s
Overshadowed by its raucous neighbor,
the drivable par-4 17th at TPC Scottsdale
is the course’s strategic centerpiece,
a shining example of Tom Weiskopf’s design philosophy.
By GEOFF SHACKELFORD
Photographs by DarrEn Carroll
Ask just about anyone at the Waste Management
Phoenix Open how to get to the par-4 17th hole and they invariably
respond, “You mean 16?”
The upscale Thunderdome encircling TPC Scottsdale’s Animal
House-meets-Mad Max par 3 has become such an iconic scene that
fans understandably scoop up “16” caps at its exclusive merchandise
tent. Yet after 2009 PGA champion Y.E. Yang’s disastrous final-round
decision to try to drive the water-guarded 17th green, serious golf fans
were reminded that Phoenix Open history is most often made on Tom
Weiskopf and Jay Morrish’s do-or-die 332-yard gem.
Weiskopf first became an admirer of drivable par 4s after his inaugural British Open at St. Andrews in 1970. “Under the right conditions, I
was able to drive the ball on the ninth, 10th, 12th and 18th greens,” said
Weiskopf, “though never in the same round. I knew when I got a chance to
design that I would make the drivable par 4 part of my philosophy.”
Once he joined forces with former Jack Nicklaus Design associate Jay
Morrish in the mid-1980s, Weiskopf made short 4s a priority while most
other architects ignored them in the race to 7,000-yard layouts. He countered skeptical clients by suggesting that par 4s less than 330 yards were
no different in spirit than the more widely accepted “reachable” par 5.
GolfWorld.com March 8, 2010 33
By The Numbers
TPC Scottsdale
17th Hole
Yardage: 332 PAR: 4
Architects: Tom Weiskopf, Jay Morrish
Player Consultants: Howard Twitty, Jim Colbert
Opened For Play: December 1986
In Short: A slightly downhill, straightaway drivable par
4 with a well-bunkered layup area and a large, contoured
green guarded by water left and deep swales right.
There have been 3,283 total tee shots on the 17th hole at TPC
Scottsdale since 2003 when the PGA Tour’s ShotLink debuted; 68
percent of the tee shots have been attempts to go for the green (2,227)
Scoring avg. since 2003 going for green: 3.56 (853 under par)
Scoring avg. since 2003 laying up: 4.07 (65 over par)
Scoring average in 2010: 3.646 (183 under par)
Highest score in Phoenix Open play: 7 (13 times,
including Greg Owen in 2010)
Lowest score in Phoenix Open play: 1 (Andrew Magee, 2001)
Tee shots in water, 2010: 24
Total balls in water, 2010: 28
Snap Judgment Yang had a two-stroke lead coming to the 17th Sunday but rushed his drive and hooked it into the water en route to a bogey.
Weiskopf’s first short par 4 appeared nearby
at 1986’s Troon CC in Scottsdale. Sixty designs
later, Weiskopf has built 74 drivable par 4s, first
with TPC co-designer Morrish and now with collaborator Phil Smith. Fourteen Weiskopf designs
feature two short 4s (but never on the same nine).
Though he believes the terrain has to suit the concept, Sunday Punches
Final-round tee
Weiskopf prefers his reach- shots, recorded by
able two-shotters to play with ShotLink, yielded an
the tee slightly above the eagle (yellow), birdies (red), pars (blue)
green, as is the case at TPC and bogeys (black).
Scottsdale. And because of liability issues, he stays away from incorporating a blind
green element that could lead to injuries.
“The trick is to create a hole that is as much of a challenge
when you lay up and decide to not drive the green as it is for
the player hitting driver,” the 67-year-old said while stopping
through his Scottsdale office in between design projects in
China, Hawaii and Italy. “It’s almost like building two par 3s,
where the tee shot lay-up feels like you’re playing to a par 3.
But it’s hard to pull it off where you equalize both options.”
Prioritizing a balance of risk and reward for either line
of attack explains why Weiskopf seldom brings water into
the equation. Only three of his drivable 4s include a water hazard similar to the one guarding the left and rear of
TPC Scottsdale’s 17th. The real twist with Weiskopf short
4s comes at the green, where he bucks the tendency to
build a tiny target, à la Riviera’s 10th or Cypress Point’s
ninth, two of his favorites.
“If the green gets too small, why would I take the chance
of driving it?” Weiskopf said. “If there’s not enough target,
there’s not enough margin for error.”
Even then, Weiskopf believes a large green works only
if the various hole locations require different strategic
approaches calling upon precision for all tee-shot options. That’s a defining characteristic of TPC Scottsdale’s
6,500-square-foot penultimate putting surface, where he
envisioned four tournament hole locations in no particular
sequence: two on a canted back-left peninsula, one on a
back-right shelf and a front-right hole location protected
34 March 8, 2010 GolfWorld.com
by a greenside knob that rewards those laying up
near the bunker on the left side of the fairway.
Informed that PGA Tour official Jon Brendle had employed a seldom-used front-left hole location yielding five
eagles and a first-round scoring average of 3.431, Weiskopf
laughed. “Tell Jon Brendle he screwed up!” he said.
Brendle doesn’t regret the location, though he did lament
employing it Thursday after he used similar looking backcenter and back-right holes for rounds two and three, getting away from his goal of better “blending” hole locations.
Weiskopf originally envisioned one or two eagles a day
and a majority of players laying up, but the distance explosion of the last decade has dramatically shifted the 17th’s
architectural balance. On the eve of the hole’s debut in
1987, George Peper wrote in Golf Courses Of The PGA Tour
that No. 17 was intended as a drivable par 4, “but chances
are, few will try.” Yet since 2003 when the PGA Tour began
assembling its remarkable ShotLink database (see chart),
nearly 70 percent of players have gone for the green.
The shift means fans do not get to experience the tension-filled tee-shot dramatics Weiskopf had hoped for—
the player staring at his yardage book, engaging in a spirited conversation with his caddie, and then peeling off his
driver headcover as the gallery goes wild.
Remedying the imbalance would be simple, according
to Weiskopf, who would like to build a new tee extending
the hole a few yards and perhaps expand the prominent
centerline fairway bunker closer to the green. But he
is also cognizant of not destroying No. 17’s essence as a
swing hole capable of producing thrills or moments such
as Andrew Magee’s bizarre tee shot on Jan. 25, 2001, when
his tee ball ricocheted off Tom Byrum’s putter and into the
hole for the PGA Tour’s first and only par-4 double eagle.
“Why change history?” Weiskopf asks.
Scottsdale resident Geoff Ogilvy is one of the few players who considers the merits of nearly every conceivable
design detail and while he believes the 17th is “better than
most” holes the tour visits, he’s not sure it’s a model for architects to mimic. Told that the hole historically averages
at least a half-stroke tougher when players lay up, Ogilvy
suggests that is “because it’s a U.S. Open fairway width in
the lay-up area. The only guys who lay up now are the ones
who can’t fly the bunker.”
It wasn’t always that way.
Longtime Paradise Valley resident Howard Twitty was
one of two player consultants on the TPC Scottsdale. He
hit tee shots in the dirt with Weiskopf and a few years later
served as a player consultant to Bobby Weed at the TPC
River Highlands in Cromwell, Conn., where the drivable
par-4 15th has become that course’s pivotal hole.
Watching the 2010 Waste Management Phoenix Open
play from a spectator platform behind the 17th tee, Twitty
was asked how he played the hole competitively. “You’re going to laugh, but I could never decide what to hit,” he said.
Eventually, Twitty just aimed at the pesky centerline
bunker in hopes of not hitting a laser-beam tee shot. His
best appearance at TPC Scottsdale was in 1987 when he
opened with 68-65 and finished T-15. Twitty made eight of
13 cuts at the TPC, while Weiskopf was 0 for 4. So much
for designers holding all the cards.
Despite the change in No. 17’s shot values, 24 Phoenix Opens
later the hole has become the most sophisticated component
of TPC Scottsdale’s epic four-hole closing stretch. That’s in
spite of then-PGA Tour commissioner Deane Beman’s initial
concerns, something Weiskopf laughs about now.
“When we were chosen to do the golf course and Deane
came out during construction to see the hole roughed in,”
recalled Weiskopf, “he looked at the narrow lay-up area and
said, ‘Well this hole’s awful.’ And I said, ‘Deane, why’s that?’ ”
Beman believed the 17th would not be exciting for fans
because it only favored the long hitter.
“I told him, ‘Now wait a second Deane, if it’s downwind,
most of the field is going to take a crack at it.’”
The notoriously short-hitting Beman countered that he
would never take a driver out and go for the green.
“I said, ‘Deane, good God! Do you know how far up we’d
have to go with the tee to get you to drive the green? You
wouldn’t think of driving it unless you had a 50-mile-perhour wind at your back.”
Beman remained unconvinced and reiterated his demand that they redesign the 17th. Weiskopf refused, and
dragged the commissioner to nearby Troon CC for an in-
spection of the drivable fourth hole. After that trip proved
to Beman there would be a reward for the short, straight
hitter, he let the hole remain as the architects envisioned.
The 17th has not changed since, except for modifications
to stadium mounding left of the greenside lake to accommodate tents and tables in what has become the prime
view of Sunday’s traditional back-left hole location.
To understand how precarious the final-day pin placement appears, imagine most of the green as a fist with an
extended thumb surrounded by water (see diagram). No
wonder players trying to drive the green Sunday and facing a shorter second shot averaged 3.73, while those laying
farther back posted a whopping 4.44 scoring average.
Yang was still seven under on his round even after missing a 16th-hole birdie putt and jovially tossing his ball to
the Cameron Crazies of Scottsdale. He then walked under
the grandstand and onto the 17th tee, holding a two-stroke
lead and the honor. All week, groups typically waited until
the green cleared to tee off, even if they couldn’t reach the
putting surface with their drives. And with the group in
front still putting, Yang waited two minutes before inexplicably deciding to tee off.
Yang’s tee shot started at the hole and curved left. He
bent forward, willing the ball to stay dry, but it found the
water hazard’s small forward extension. The South Korean
dropped his club and grabbed his head in agony. A bogey 5
dropped him to 14 under and an eventual third-place finish
behind Hunter Mahan and runner-up Rickie Fowler.
Having birdied No. 17 two of the first three days by
driving it to the front fringe, Yang never entertained laying up. But after the round and before Mahan sealed his
second career victory with pars on the last two holes,
there was little doubt in Yang’s mind what cost him the
tournament.
“I think if I do lose … that would be the reason why I didn’t
win, on No. 17,” he said. Monday, on Twitter, Yang wrote,
“That tee shot at the 17th will haunt me for some time.”
His shocking mistake provided yet another reason why
TPC Scottsdale’s penultimate hole remains the course’s
true centerpiece—with all due respect to the Thunderdome. GW
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