[Mike_Cirba]

Ted;

Thanks for the clarification.  It is a beautiful view, agreed, but I also think we might agree that it's a routing weakness in terms of walkability and flow.  

I hope to get back there this year.

[Mike_Cirba]

Dave;

Fair enough.  If you think I'm full of it and biased against Tom Fazio, then that's your opinion.  

I'm basing my assessment on playing courses of his (including with his uncle) that stretch over four decades.  Some of his courses are great, others are good, and some are not so good.  

[Ted Kramer]

Dave;

Fair enough.  If you think I'm full of it and biased against Tom Fazio, then that's your opinion.  

I'm basing my assessment on playing courses of his (including with his uncle) that stretch over four decades.  Some of his courses are great, others are good, and some are not so good.  

So if your choices are
- great
- good
- not so good
What is your opinion of Pine Hill?

-Ted

[Mike_Cirba]

Ted;

"Great" is thrown around too much in marketing palance.  "Good" is too vague, and "not so good" covers a wide variety of failings.

I like the Doak Scale so I'd give it a 6 on that meter.  

His description from the "Confidential Guide to Golf Courses".

6 - A very good course, definitely worth a game if you're in town, but not necessarily worth a special trip to see.  It shouldn't disappoint you.

[Ted Kramer]

I haven't been lucky enough to get my hands on that book yet . . .

would you mind posting his ratings . . .his definitions of the specific #s?

If you don't feel like typing it out, I understand, I just haven't been lucky enough to get a copy of the book yet, and I'm very curious about his "scale".

Thanks,
Ted

[Mike_Cirba]

Ted;

I'll try to type them all later.  In the meantime, for comparison purposes, here's 5 and 7.

5) Well above the average golf course, but the middle of my (Doak's) scale.  A good course to choose if you're in the vicinity and looking for a game but don't spend another day away from home just to see it, unless your home is in Alaska.

7) An excellent course, worth checking out if you get anywhere within 100 miles.  You can expect to find soundly designed, interesting holes, good course conditioning, and a pretty setting, if not necessarily anythnig unique to the world of golf.

[THuckaby2]

Here's the concise version of the Doak scale, as sent to me once by somebody here when I asked... the numbers get thrown around so much it is good to keep this on hand... especially when haging out with GW raters, for whom everything is a "solid" this or "bulletproof" that...  


0= poisonous
1= very basic
2= not offensive but offers very little.
3= average golf course.
4= above average but nothing to distinguish itself
5= well above average, likely to have several distinctive holes.  But not worth a special trip.
6= very good course, would be one of the best courses in any area.  Play if reasonably closeby.
7= excellent and no obvious weaknesses, eventhough it might not offer anything unique.  Play within 100 miles.
8= a course of distinction, worth travelling substantial distances to.
9= a world great, may have one or two weaker holes, but a slew of world great holes too.
10= perfect, don't even miss one hole

[Matt_Ward]

Ted:

Before you can understand why Pine Hilsl is rated / evaluated the way it is -- you need to play a greater range of public courses in NJ to really comprehend what is being said by the people who have posted -- e.g. myself, Mike Cirba and others.

Pine Hill is a fine layout, but Tom Fazio has done far beyond in terms of overall design efforts IMHO. I base my conclusions on 50+ courses of his I have personally played spanning no less than 25 years in length. I chuckle when I read that Golf Magazine has the layout among the top 31 courses you can play in the USA because frankly it's just not that good IMHO.

If you play a full range of TF courses you can quickly see if the "details" are included with the design. Stop by and play Galloway National in Absecon and I believe you will see what and a few others have been saying.

Dave S:

There are people here on GCA who take a broader analytical perspective of TF beyond a simply "thumbs up" or "thumbs down." I consider myself someone who has beeen fair in terms of the wide range of layouts that have come forth under the TF design umbrella. No doubt there are people here on GCA who think anything that TF does is simply piss poor stuff.

[Ted Kramer]

Based on that scale, I think 6 is pretty fair. And I'd say if you were going to err on one side or the other, its a lot closer to a 7 than it is a 5. I'd call it a 6.5.

And here is how I would compare it to some other courses that you guys might have played, this is just a quick example off the top of my head, not a studied list:

Pebble - 9
Spyglass - 8
Pac Dunes - 9.5
Bandon - 8.5
Caledonia - 7.5
True Blue - 6.5
BP Black - 9
BP Red - 6.5
LI National - 6
Sagamore - 6.5
Ridgewood CC - 8
Montauk Downes - 6.5

Thanks for the consise version of "Doak Scale", seems like a pretty good/clear way to express feelings on a particular course.

-Ted

[mike_malone]

 What strikes me as valuable in the Doak scale is that theoretically all courses could be a nine or  a ten;they are not ranked. Secondly, he provides seven places for above average;that makes sense to me and it creates much space for distinction.

  As a result,Ted, I see no need for 1/2 point scalping.

[Mike_Cirba]

Based on that scale, I think 6 is pretty fair. And I'd say if you were going to err on one side or the other, its a lot closer to a 7 than it is a 5. I'd call it a 6.5.

And here is how I would compare it to some other courses that you guys might have played, this is just a quick example off the top of my head, not a studied list:

Pebble - 9
Spyglass - 8
Pac Dunes - 9.5
Bandon - 8.5
Caledonia - 7.5
True Blue - 6.5
BP Black - 9
BP Red - 6.5
LI National - 6
Sagamore - 6.5
Ridgewood CC - 8
Montauk Downes - 6.5

Thanks for the consise version of "Doak Scale", seems like a pretty good/clear way to express feelings on a particular course.

-Ted

Ted;

In giving Pine Hill a 6.5, you should know a couple of Doak scores for local courses.  For instance, Philly Country Club, Huntingdon Valley got 6’s or 7s, Rolling Green got a 7, I recall.  Philly Cricket was a 6, I believe.  Merion East a 10, Philmont North a 5, and so on.  I’d question whether Pine Hill ranks quite that high.

Of courses by Tom Fazio, I know that World Woods Pine Barrens received an 8, and deservedly so.  Given that it’s on flattish sandy land, and knowing that Pine Hill would be built on more preferable rolling, sandy land, I had hoped for a similar effort and result in New Jersey.  Given the visibility of the project with its vaunted next door neighbor, I was hoping for something really special.

Thus, even though Pine Hill is a very good course, a 6 or even 6.5 as you say, expectations of something wonderful and unique for public golf in the northeast lead me to say I was disappointed overall.    

[JakaB]

Mike,

Based on your criteria for course evaluation...how good is Sebonack going to have to be before you poo pooh it because of the excellent ground it sits upon and its outstanding neighbors....I think we already know it will be overpriced.....going to be tough to measure up to Shinnecock and National....So..if Pine Hill wasn't next to Pine Valley it would rate higher.   What percentage of people in the real world that play Pine Hill do you think play Pine Valley more than once a year.....

[Mike_Cirba]

No John;

It wouldn't rate higher if it wasn't next to Pine Valley.  It wouldn't rate higher if it was in Dubuque, Iowa.

But, it's on similar land to Pine Valley, and having played World Woods before then I was hopeful.

I just thought that Tom Fazio would give the project full weight and attention to ensure that it was among his best, given the proximity to his home club.  

[Dan Kelly]

It wouldn't rate higher if it wasn't next to Pine Valley.  It wouldn't rate higher if it was in Dubuque, Iowa.

First Harold Ross.

Now you.

I wonder why you Easterners have it in for little ol' Dubuque -- the Cleveland of heartland towns, in the New Jersey of the Midwest.

In the immortal words of E.B. White: "I say it's Sioux Falls, and I say the hell with it."

Smileys all around!

[A.G._Crockett]

No John;

It wouldn't rate higher if it wasn't next to Pine Valley.  It wouldn't rate higher if it was in Dubuque, Iowa.

But, it's on similar land to Pine Valley, and having played World Woods before then I was hopeful.

I just thought that Tom Fazio would give the project full weight and attention to ensure that it was among his best, given the proximity to his home club.  

Maybe he did...

[Mike_Cirba]

Tom Fazio is very talented, and he gets some BIG budgets.  

I don't sense that any expense was spared at Pine Hill, either.  

[Brian_Gracely]

Should conspiracy theorists be looking into Fazio's proximity of Pine Hill to Pine Valley, and Rees Jones' proximity of Atlantic GC and The Bridge to Maidstone and NGLA, and their corresponding work?  Is there too much conflict of interest, especially in keeping the value of the later clubs?  

[JakaB]

It wouldn't rate higher if it wasn't next to Pine Valley.  It wouldn't rate higher if it was in Dubuque, Iowa.

Mike,

You can't tell stories like that when all you have said above remains in plain sight...I don't think you would have been nearly so dissapointed with that site on those soils in Dubuque...My guess is that you would have given Pine Hills a solid 5.8 instead of the 5.2 you gave it if nothing else than the beauty of the site when compared to the rest of the Iowa countryside...........unless redanman told you different of course..

[Mike_Cirba]

Brian/John;

The course was marketed by owner Eric Bergstol's group as the public Pine Valley, prior to opening.  Since Eric will be at the Winter Meeting at Essex County, why don't you come along and ask him if about conspiracy theories and such?

John;

If the course had been surrounded by dead flat Iowa farmland, I'm quite sure Fazio would have built large, mature tree covered berms around the place to block out such unsightly views, ala Shadow Creek.  

[Jerry Kluger]

I know its not around the corner but Fazio was able to take much of what he did at World Woods and bring it north to Galloway.  I mean that in the sense of sandy soil and some rolling terrain.  Galloway turned out to be very special and two factors to me that are strong positives are the way the course fits within the terrain, even if the routing is a bit forced, and the green complexes, which are very interesting and challenging.  Perhaps one would need to speak with the developers/owners, to see how much they influenced the end product.  The owner of Galloway is a very enthusiastic golfer and takes pride in what he created and I don't believe that profit was his motive.  One day perhaps Fazio will be available for an extended interview where he can be asked how and why he designed a particular course and answer our questions.

[Mike_Cirba]

Jerry Kluger;

I agree completely.

Galloway (about 35 minutes from Pine Hill) is a blast and a full two points higher than Pine Hill, IMO, even though the land isn't as good.   I had hoped that Pine Hill would be an even better course, but perhaps they were just unrealistic expectations on my part.

[Ted Kramer]

Based on that scale, I think 6 is pretty fair. And I'd say if you were going to err on one side or the other, its a lot closer to a 7 than it is a 5. I'd call it a 6.5.

And here is how I would compare it to some other courses that you guys might have played, this is just a quick example off the top of my head, not a studied list:

Pebble - 9
Spyglass - 8
Pac Dunes - 9.5
Bandon - 8.5
Caledonia - 7.5
True Blue - 6.5
BP Black - 9
BP Red - 6.5
LI National - 6
Sagamore - 6.5
Ridgewood CC - 8
Montauk Downes - 6.5

Thanks for the consise version of "Doak Scale", seems like a pretty good/clear way to express feelings on a particular course.

-Ted

Ted;

In giving Pine Hill a 6.5, you should know a couple of Doak scores for local courses.  For instance, Philly Country Club, Huntingdon Valley got 6’s or 7s, Rolling Green got a 7, I recall.  Philly Cricket was a 6, I believe.  Merion East a 10, Philmont North a 5, and so on.  I’d question whether Pine Hill ranks quite that high.

Of courses by Tom Fazio, I know that World Woods Pine Barrens received an 8, and deservedly so.  Given that it’s on flattish sandy land, and knowing that Pine Hill would be built on more preferable rolling, sandy land, I had hoped for a similar effort and result in New Jersey.  Given the visibility of the project with its vaunted next door neighbor, I was hoping for something really special.

Thus, even though Pine Hill is a very good course, a 6 or even 6.5 as you say, expectations of something wonderful and unique for public golf in the northeast lead me to say I was disappointed overall.    

Thanks for those "Official Doak Ratings" . . .
I wasn't trying to guess what Mr. Doak or anyone else thought about the courses mentioned, I was only using the scale as a way to compare courses that I have played so I could put my feelings about Pine Hill into some sort of context . . .

-Ted

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