Opinion & Analysis

3 emerging golf architects discuss the future of course design

Published

9 years ago

May 5, 2015

The next leaders in golf course architecture, unfiltered. Sounding off on their work, the game, the state of the industry, the future of restoration and new constructions, what needs to change, and what inspires them.

Michael McCartin worked for Tom Doak’s Renaissance Design, assisting in the construction of Old Macdonald, Ballyneal, and Streamsong. He recently completed a unique nine-hole golf course in Sperryville, Virginia: Schoolhouse Nine.

I grew up playing on a public course…it was dead flat. If you don’t have a good eye for it, it seems devoid of architectural features. After playing there as my reference point and going out to other courses, it piqued my interest to see the differences once you start introducing different elements.

By 12 or 14, I’d read every book out there. I was obsessed with course design. I think I got [Tom Doak’s] Confidential Guide when I was 14 or so, and that really took it to another level.

I studied abroad in St. Andrews, which was the best decision ever. At the time I was there, the links card was 150 pounds for the year to play unlimited golf on all the town’s courses, including the Old Course.

When I was there, I started a correspondence with Tom Doak. I knew he had lived there, and he was nice enough to give me some recommendations. After I graduated, I applied for an internship with Tom. So, for the past 10 years or so, I’ve been working with Renaissance Golf Design.

Streamsong, a project McCarty worked on.

Streamsong, a project McCartin worked on.

When you look at Schoolhouse Nine, what we’re doing, it hits the buttons. Affordability: the course is going to cost $10. Juniors can get a pass for the summer at a reasonable rate. Pace of play: It’s 9 holes. And maintenance and affordability go hand in hand. We’re only irrigating the greens, so everything else changes according to the season.

There are opportunities where making the course more interesting is going to help on the revenue side. If you’re going to rebuild a bunker, it’s not that much more to build in cool architectural features. There’s no cost in building a new green 20 yards to the right versus rebuilding the same green.

Clients can offer a lot of design ideas as far as what they’re inspired by and you can use that as a starting off point. “How can I incorporate something like that into the design?” You end up with something you might not have come up with on your own. But because you had a nugget of a starting idea, it evolved into something, and you can then point back to the owner and say that it came from his idea.

You get a better product when you have someone who is involved with the design actually doing the building. Coore, Crenshaw, Tom, Gil Hanse, they all spend time on machines or have in the past, and they have a crew of people they work with all the time. I think you get the best results that way.

You’re still going to get owners who want to build Augusta National and some people who are more realistic about it. The projects that aren’t as high profile yield just as much opportunity for great golf architecture, where the course makes the best of the property.

Just because there’s one trend doesn’t mean people aren’t going to be building, like, Bluejack National down in Texas—high-end, charge a bunch of money. But I hope that the portion of the pie that’s allocated to more affordable stuff grows. There are a lot of opportunities to get away from the super exclusionary, super high-end place.

———

Tad King (L) and Rob Collins at Sweetens Cove.

Rob Collins (along with partner Tad King) is the man behind Sweetens Cove, the rebuild of Sequatchie Valley Golf & Country Club that Golf Digest named the best nine-hole course in Tennessee and course architecture fans are raving about.

Sweetens Cove: Hole 1

Right now, I’m looking at two Donald Ross restoration projects. Our phone is definitely starting to ring and we’re seeing a pick-up, but it would be unrealistic to think that in the next 10 to 15 years get back to where we were in the 90s.

We wanted to be able to design and build golf [courses]…in contrast to the typical model that’s used where you have the architect on one side and the contractor on the other. There’s going to be a bigger premium placed on efficiency, cost saving, the construction methods.

The traditional approach…leads to a lot of competition. It can lead to a lower level of quality. It can lead to higher costs. We looked at the guys who we thought were doing the best work in the world…Hanse, Doak, Coore and Crenshaw. They have a design-build mentality where they have control, and that’s how we do it, we design and build.

We like building strategic golf courses that make you think: Wide corridors…contour that creates interest in and around the green complex. We really stress recovery shots around the greens and the ground game.

We’re always trying to enhance the experience a little bit with things you may not notice the first 10 times you play, but you’ll notice it the 20th time. I want the golf course to always be revealing something new.

Sweetens Cove: Hole 3

As an architect, dealing with the contractor, there are little things you’re going to give in on. One or two or three little details aren’t going to make that big of a difference, but if you add up all the details you gave in on the course, if you start chipping away at details, eventually the project is going to be flat. That’s what so many golf courses suffer from: They’re just kind of monochromatic.

We started in 2011…had it [Sweetens Cove] grassed out in the summer of 2012. The family that owns it decided that golf is not part of their core business, so I partnered with Ari Techner of Scratch Golf to take over last May. It opened up last October.

It’s a really special place. As far as golf goes, there’s nothing at all like this anywhere. I said, I really want to do something different here. Nobody’s going to drive to rural Tennessee to play a golf course that looks like Chattanooga Golf and Country Club. We had to do something unique.

We did that with really wide fairways…fairways cut everywhere. Greens are very large…very undulating. We use a lot of contour to create interest and to create playability dilemmas and challenges. It’s very heavily influenced by Pinehurst No. 2…with Maxwell-Mackenzie-Raynor-type greens.

I don’t like 9-hole courses that masquerade as 18-hole courses. Let’s just be content with building nine great holes. Let’s build enough flexibility…that you can leave it up to the golfer. They can play the front tees one time or the back tees or do whatever they want. It’s a more democratic approach.

———

Kyle Franz (C) with Joe Buck (L), Greg Norman (RC)

Kyle Franz restored Donald Ross-designed Mid Pines to much acclaim. Golf magazine named it the best resort renovation of 2013. He also worked with Tom Doak at Pacific Dunes and the Pinehurst No. 2 restoration with Coore & Crenshaw.

I randomly met [Mid Pines’] owner at a cocktail party one night. Not knowing who he was, I was very candid on what I though the potential was for the golf course, if they ever chose to do the kind of things they were doing on No. 2. I did a bunch of Photoshops of what the golf course would look like. The same things needed to happen that happened at No. 2: Restoring the sandy areas. Restoring the areas around the bunkers to what they were originally like.

All the underbrush had been slowly eradicated over the decades. It was a bit of a mindtrip to put back together that feeling and concept. I added hazards to get the same kind of strategic feel—the blood-pumping shots—it was a very fun restoration: part archeology and part improvisation to get the holes to feel like they originally did.

A lot of things are in play over the next 10 or 15 years. The financial crisis turned even the biggest architects into restoration architects. That is really the direction the business needs to go. Obviously there are a few new courses beginning to be built these days.

There’s so many really good golf courses…classic golf courses…newer courses on really good pieces of ground. It takes a huge chunk out of the equation to deal with a place where you already own the property and turn it into a really good golf course. There’s a lot of those out there. I think that’s going to be big over the next 20 years or so: Taking the golf courses we have and making them a heck of a lot better.

I do think there’s maybe one more golf boom left in the United States. But we’re going to get to the point where we’ve kind of saturated our own market. A new golf course gets built here and there in the UK, but they eventually did that. Nothing new got built for a long, long time.

People like Tom Doak, myself, we’re very, very heavy proponents of walkable golf courses. 6,000- to 6,500-yard gof courses. Places that are comfortable to walk. Every one of those drivers that you buy that’s designed to send your balls 30 yards farther…that comes back to their checkbook…the amount of land required…irrigation…turf…maintenance…construction. Every contractor builds budgets on square footage. That comes back to the golfers at the other end of the line. It’s made it too expensive…and it’s hard to get young guys excited about golf because it takes too long to play.

With Pacific Dunes we all kind of hoped that’d be a line in the sand. One of the highest-rated courses built in the past 10 years, but it’s only 6,600 yards. Tom built the perfect course into that piece of land.

9-hole courses play into this. For some reason it’s a little bit harder to get people excited about them, but the opportunities are out there to kind of push the ball forward. What would be really cool is to find a section somewhere in the country where’s there’s like four different parcels for nine-hole golf courses within a 20 mile radius.

The holes that really do something for me are the ones that have proven absolutely timeless. Like No. 15 at Pinehurst No. 2. The green is so small and the area over the green is so severe that it’s foolish to attempt any aerial shot. So the percentage is to play short and hope you can trundle it up there. And the Road Hole…that hole will work for ground shots for as long as the game is played.

The philosophy Bill and Ben had 20 years ago was to make the ground game interesting…throw it out to the players and give them options. I look at it in terms of making it a sucker play to put it in the air. Example: No. 5 at Augusta. The aerial game is only…40 percent of the game.

Ever since I’ve known Tom Doak, he’s wanted to do reversible routing; Tom’s finally getting to do that at Forest Dunes. It’s something that I’ve always wanted to do…two for the price of one! Maybe this will be Tom Doak’s Sgt. Pepper’s moment…something completely different than what he’s done that has a huge impact on what everybody else is doing. It’s always been in the back of my mind…but it takes somebody as smart as Tom Doak…to make it work.

That winter I spent at St. Andrews, I joked that I probably walked it backwards as many times as I did forwards, because I was aware that the course had been reversible before. Some of the best holes in the world are on the Old Course going the other direction.

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Ben Alberstadt

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16 Comments

Katie Masheter

Jan 25, 2017 at 8:13 am

Some high-end dazzling eye-candy designs but a lot more emphasis on naturalistic, playable, uncluttered golf http://www.scottishdesignmasters.com/biggest-changes-future-trends-golf-course-architecture/

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Mark

May 8, 2015 at 2:11 pm

The modern breed of architecture is getting too “clever”…everyone tries to get as many features as possible into a course instead of designing something that suits the local terrain. Mr Doak does some good work but the ultra exclusive and heinously expensive Renaissance Club is a poor relation to other courses and that same coastline and is no more than a pastiche of what a true links is. Scottish Golf is for working men and women and affordable.
As for the rennovation of Pinehurst Number 2…..a school friend of mine lives 5 miles from the course and was almost reduced to tears. He describes the changes as vandalism…
And I’m in rarew agreement with IJP. Chambers Bay is the answer to a question nobody asked. Please go back to great parkland venues like Winged Foot, Baltusrol and Oak Hill….

Reply Report comment
- Eej
  
  May 9, 2015 at 12:20 pm
  
  “Scottish Golf is for working men and women and affordable.”
  
  You couldn’t be farther from the truth.
  http://www.standrews.com/Play/Green-Fees
  
  those are in pound sterling, mate. Telling me that’s affordable for the working men and women? Don’t be daft
  
  Reply Report comment
  - net
    
    May 10, 2015 at 5:56 pm
    
    Yeah, there’s about 500 courses outside of St. Andrews. The big name courses are expensive, but there’s certainly plenty of working men golf to go around. Some better than the big names.
    
    Reply Report comment
Greg V

May 8, 2015 at 10:19 am

One of the problems with golf course architects is that they are so close to the subject that they try to outdo each other, creating the next great masterpiece. In reality, the public golfer ends up with courses described above – long forced carries, an overuse of penal bunkers, water in way too many places.

Most of us need a minimum of challenge – hitting the ball straight is challenge enough. We want courses that are in decent shape; green speeds in the moderate range generally provide more fun and more satisfying rounds.

From the pictures that I saw in the article plus others that I saw when exploring on-line, the courses mentioned are over-designed. I would challenge these guys to provide an experience akin to North Berwick – a playable course that has evolved over time, rather than designed as someone’s masterpiece. Throw in one little quirky flair like a short wall in front of a green, and be done with it.

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Cysmic

May 7, 2015 at 1:28 pm

Franz: What would be really cool is to find a section somewhere in the country where’s there’s like four different parcels for nine-hole golf courses within a 20 mile radius.

Within a 20 mile radius of my hometown in northwest Iowa there’s 11 different 9 hole courses, not including an additional 9 hole Par 3 course. You want 9 hole courses, come to Iowa.

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ken

May 6, 2015 at 9:21 pm

I live in a metro area in NC. During the period 1990 to 1997 11 golf courses were built within a 45 minute drive of my home in the suburbs.
One has closed. Another has gone through several ownership changes. 5 others once owned by the same company are now under the ownership of a few different companies.
The one common denominator is they are all “upscale” semi private or daily fee.
All of these courses were built so they COULD NOT be walked. Why? Golf carts mean revenue.
Another issue….modern courses were designed each to be more difficult than the one three miles down the road. Too many forced carries. Deep fairway bunkers with soft sand and steep faces make it impossible for all but the single digit index players to advance the ball. Greens too large( $$) Dumb. We amateurs don’t want to get beaten up. We want to have fun.
BTW, the one factor as to why a round of golf takes too much time is caused by those who play tees inappropriate for their skill level.

Reply Report comment
- Chuck
  
  May 7, 2015 at 11:50 am
  
  You’ve made some excellent points.
  
  Some of what makes a routing require golf carts is the land itself. Less choices for golf course parcels; more land use regulations and wetlands protection; in some cases there are demands for residential/homesite plans.
  
  This was a real nice job by Ben and his subjects. For those of you who haven’t yet read it, Geoff Shackelford’s “The Future of Golf” is now in paperback and expands on many of these subjects. Geoff is a sometime-architect in his own right, with some similar (9-hole) projects and some very significant consulting work (LACC) to his credit.
  
  Reply Report comment
Sean

May 6, 2015 at 8:38 pm

Many of the modern courses seem to have been built with the better golfer in mind…forced carries, long, and the like. The vast majority of the golf public struggle on these kinds of venues. Allowing people to play the ball on the ground, reasonable yardages, and the like, may keep people from getting frustrated and leaving the game.

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Jordan

May 6, 2015 at 9:58 am

I wish there was more 9-hole golf available near me (Brooklyn, NY). I’d play a lot more if I could be done in 2-3 hours. It’s nearly impossible to get out for 18 with both my wife and I working full-time and a 4-month old at home. Right now, the only option is to get up at 4:30am and get one of the first tee times at one of the local munis as that is the only time they offer 9-hole rates.

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John

May 5, 2015 at 9:57 pm

I took to the game at the age of 10 playing a 9 hole public course, Caznovia Park, in Buffalo. It was affordable and I would play it two or three times a day. It sits on a beautiful piece of land and could be a gem if someone put some money into it. As I grew older, got married and had children, 9 hole golf became the norm for me three or four times a week because it took less than 2 hours. I believe there is a place for nine hole golf courses that are affordable, not frustrating but fun to play, and can be played quickly. The U.S. needs to get out of the “bigger is better” mentality in alot areas, including playing golf!

Reply Report comment
other paul

May 5, 2015 at 9:13 pm

The closest golf course to my house is a 9 hole course that I usually played a few times every summer. It was to easy, and to short, 2700yards. Last year there was rumors of it bring developed into something else. So it was barely maintained. Some bunkers are over grown with weeds and they barely seem to even cut the grass. I dont even want to know if they are opened this year because last year they were an embarrassment to golf course management everywhere. How ever, if someone built a nice course in its place I would go there all the time like I used to.

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duckjr78

May 5, 2015 at 4:57 pm

Please, more articles like this! Excellent job.

Reply Report comment
HoldTheLag

May 5, 2015 at 2:41 pm

Wow to play a course like that for $10 is a steal and a half…really wish we get more like that built around here.

Reply Report comment
Brody

May 5, 2015 at 1:33 pm

Nice job, Ben! Good read

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Daniel

May 5, 2015 at 1:08 pm

This is a great article that gets me excited about the future of golf. The two main complaints about golf are that it is too expensive and it takes too long to play. The really well designed 9 hole course would solve both problems. Right now most goers think that if you don’t play 18 it doesn’t count as a real round, but if there were more 9 hole courses around it would become more acceptable. Sweetens Cove looks amazing, I’d love to play that someday. If there was a course like that around me, I’d play a lot more golf.

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19th Hole

Vincenzi’s LIV Golf Singapore betting preview: Course specialist ready to thrive once again

Published

4 days ago

Apr 30, 2024

Matt Vincenzi

After another strong showing in Australia, LIV Golf will head to Sentosa Golf Club in Singapore looking to build off of what was undoubtedly their best event to date.

Sentosa Golf Club sits on the southern tip of Singapore and is one of the most beautiful courses in the world. The course is more than just incredible scenically; it was also rated 55th in Golf Digest’s top-100 courses in 2022-2023 and has been consistently regarded as one of the best courses in Asia. Prior to being part of the LIV rotation, the course hosted the Singapore Open every year since 2005.

Sentosa Golf Club is a par 71 measuring 7,406 yards. The course will require precise ball striking and some length off the tee. It’s possible to go low due to the pristine conditions, but there are also plenty of hazards and difficult spots on the course that can bring double bogey into play in a hurry. The Bermudagrass greens are perfectly manicured, and the course has spent millions on the sub-air system to keep the greens rolling fast. I spoke to Asian Tour player, Travis Smyth, who described the greens as “the best [he’s] ever played.”

Davis Love III, who competed in a Singapore Open in 2019, also gushed over the condition of the golf course.

“I love the greens. They are fabulous,” the 21-time PGA Tour winner said.

Love III also spoke about other aspects of the golf course.

“The greens are great; the fairways are perfect. It is a wonderful course, and it’s tricky off the tee.”

“It’s a long golf course, and you get some long iron shots. It takes somebody hitting it great to hit every green even though they are big.”

As Love III said, the course can be difficult off the tee due to the length of the course and the trouble looming around every corner. It will take a terrific ball striking week to win at Sentosa Golf Club.

In his pre-tournament press conference last season, Phil Mickelson echoed many of the same sentiments.

“To play Sentosa effectively, you’re going to have a lot of shots from 160 to 210, a lot of full 6-, 7-, 8-iron shots, and you need to hit those really well and you need to drive the ball well.”

Golfers who excel from tee to green and can dial in their longer irons will have a massive advantage this week.

Stat Leaders at LIV Golf Adelaide:

Fairways Hit

1.) Louis Oosthuizen

2.) Anirban Lahiri

3.) Jon Rahm

4.) Brendan Steele

5.) Cameron Tringale

Greens in Regulation

1.) Brooks Koepka

2.) Brendan Steele

3.) Dean Burmester

4.) Cameron Tringale

5.) Anirban Lahiri

Birdies Made

1.) Brendan Steele

2.) Dean Burmester

3.) Thomas Pieters

4.) Patrick Reed

5.) Carlos Ortiz

LIV Golf Individual Standings:

1.) Joaquin Niemann

2.) Jon Rahm

3.) Dean Burmester

4.) Louis Oosthuizen

5.) Abraham Ancer

LIV Golf Team Standings:

1.) Crushers

2.) Legion XIII

3.) Torque

4.) Stinger GC

5.) Ripper GC

LIV Golf Singapore Picks

Sergio Garcia +3000 (DraftKings)

Sergio Garcia is no stranger to Sentosa Golf Club. The Spaniard won the Singapore Open in 2018 by five strokes and lost in a playoff at LIV Singapore last year to scorching hot Talor Gooch. Looking at the course setup, it’s no surprise that a player like Sergio has played incredible golf here. He’s long off the tee and is one of the better long iron players in the world when he’s in form. Garcia is also statistically a much better putter on Bermudagrass than he is on other putting surfaces. He’s putt extremely well on Sentosa’s incredibly pure green complexes.

This season, Garcia has two runner-up finishes, both of them being playoff losses. Both El Camaleon and Doral are courses he’s had success at in his career. The Spaniard is a player who plays well at his tracks, and Sentosa is one of them. I believe Sergio will get himself in the mix this week. Hopefully the third time is a charm in Singapore.

Paul Casey +3300 (FanDuel)

Paul Casey is in the midst of one of his best seasons in the five years or so. The results recently have been up and down, but he’s shown that when he’s on a golf course that suits his game, he’s amongst the contenders.

This season, Casey has finishes of T5 (LIV Las Vegas), T2 (LIV Hong Kong), and a 6th at the Singapore Classic on the DP World Tour. At his best, the Englishman is one of the best long iron players in the world, which makes him a strong fit for Sentosa. Despite being in poor form last season, he was able to fire a Sunday 63, which shows he can low here at the course.

It’s been three years since Casey has won a tournament (Omega Dubai Desert Classic in 2021), but he’s been one of the top players on LIV this season and I think he can get it done at some point this season.

Mito Pereira +5000 (Bet365)

Since Mito Pereira’s unfortunate demise at the 2022 PGA Championship, he’s been extremely inconsistent. However, over the past few months, the Chilean has played well on the International Series as well as his most recent LIV start. Mito finished 8th at LIV Adelaide, which was his best LIV finish this season.

Last year, Pereira finished 5th at LIV Singapore, shooting fantastic rounds of 67-66-66. It makes sense why Mito would like Sentosa, as preeminent ball strikers tend to rise to the challenge of the golf course. He’s a great long iron player who is long and straight off the tee.

Mito has some experience playing in Asia and is one of the most talented players on LIV who’s yet to get in the winner’s circle. I have questions about whether or not he can come through once in contention, but if he gets there, I’m happy to roll the dice.

Andy Ogletree +15000 (DraftKings)

Andy Ogletree is a player I expected to have a strong 2024 but struggled early in his first full season on LIV. After failing to crack the top-25 in any LIV event this year, the former U.S. Amateur champion finally figured things out, finished in a tie for 3rd at LIV Adelaide.

Ogletree should be incredible comfortable playing in Singapore. He won the International Series Qatar last year and finished T3 at the International Series Singapore. The 26-year-old was arguably the best player on the Asian Tour in 2023 and has been fantastic in the continent over the past 18 months.

If Ogletree has indeed found form, he looks to be an amazing value at triple-digit odds.

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Opinion & Analysis

Ryan: Lessons from the worst golf instructor in America

Published

4 days ago

Apr 30, 2024

Brendan Ryan

In Tampa, there is a golf course that boasts carts that do not work, a water range, and a group of players none of which have any chance to break 80. The course is overseen by a staff of crusty men who have succeeded at nothing in life but ending up at the worst-run course in America. However, this place is no failure. With several other local courses going out of business — and boasting outstanding greens — the place is booked full.

While I came for the great greens, I stayed to watch our resident instructor; a poor-tempered, method teacher who caters to the hopeless. At first, it was simply hilarious. However, after months of listening and watching, something clicked. I realized I had a front-row seat to the worst golf instructor in America.

Here are some of my key takeaways.

Method Teacher

It is widely accepted that there are three types of golf instructors: system teachers, non-system teachers, and method teachers. Method teachers prescribe the same antidote for each student based on a preamble which teachers can learn in a couple day certification.

Method teaching allows anyone to be certified. This process caters to the lowest caliber instructor, creating the illusion of competency. This empowers these underqualified instructors with the moniker of “certified” to prey on the innocent and uninformed.

The Cult of Stack and Jilt

The Stack and Tilt website proudly boasts, “A golfer swings his hands inward in the backswing as opposed to straight back to 1) create power, similar to a field goal kicker moving his leg in an arc and 2) to promote a swing that is in-to-out, which produces a draw (and eliminates a slice).”

Now, let me tell you something, there is this law of the universe which says “energy can either be created or destroyed,” so either these guys are defying physics or they have no idea what they are taking about. Further, the idea that the first move of the backswing determines impact is conjecture with a splash of utter fantasy.

These are the pontifications of a method — a set of prescriptions applied to everyone with the hope of some success through the placebo effect. It is one thing for a naive student to believe, for a golf instructor to drink and then dispel this Kool-Aid is malpractice.

Fooled by Randomness

In flipping a coin, or even a March Madness bet, there is a 50-50 chance of success. In golf, especially for new players, results are asymmetric. Simply put: Anything can happen. The problem is that when bad instructors work with high handicappers, each and every shot gets its own diagnosis and prescription. Soon the student is overwhelmed.

Now here’s the sinister thing: The overwhelming information is by design. In this case, the coach is not trying to make you better, they are trying to make you reliant on them for information. A quasi Stockholm syndrome of codependency.

Practice

One of the most important scientists of the 20th century was Ivan Pavlov. As you might recall, he found that animals, including humans, could be conditioned into biological responses. In golf, the idea of practice has made millions of hackers salivate that they are one lesson or practice session from “the secret.”

Sunk Cost

The idea for the worst golf instructor is to create control and dependency so that clients ignore the sunk cost of not getting better. Instead, they are held hostage by the idea that they are one lesson or tip away from unlocking their potential.

Cliches

Cliches have the effect of terminating thoughts. However, they are the weapon of choice for this instructor. Add some hyperbole and students actually get no information. As a result, these players couldn’t play golf. When they did, they had no real scheme. With no idea what they are doing, they would descend into a spiral of no idea what to do, bad results, lower confidence, and running back to the lesson tee from more cliches.

The fact is that poor instruction is about conditioning players to become reliant members of your cult. To take away autonomy. To use practice as a form of control. To sell more golf lessons not by making people better but through the guise that without the teacher, the student can never reach their full potential. All under the umbrella of being “certified” (in a 2-day course!) and a melee of cliches.

This of course is not just happening at my muni but is a systemic problem around the country and around the world, the consequences of which are giving people a great reason to stop playing golf. But hey, at least it’s selling a lot of golf balls…

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19th Hole

Vincenzi’s 2024 Zurich Classic of New Orleans betting preview

Published

2 weeks ago

Apr 22, 2024

Matt Vincenzi

The PGA TOUR heads to New Orleans to play the 2023 Zurich Classic of New Orleans. In a welcome change from the usual stroke play, the Zurich Classic is a team event. On Thursday and Saturday, the teams play best ball, and on Friday and Sunday the teams play alternate shot.

TPC Louisiana is a par 72 that measures 7,425 yards. The course features some short par 4s and plenty of water and bunkers, which makes for a lot of exciting risk/reward scenarios for competitors. Pete Dye designed the course in 2004 specifically for the Zurich Classic, although the event didn’t make its debut until 2007 because of Hurricane Katrina.

Coming off of the Masters and a signature event in consecutive weeks, the field this week is a step down, and understandably so. Many of the world’s top players will be using this time to rest after a busy stretch.

However, there are some interesting teams this season with some stars making surprise appearances in the team event. Some notable teams include Patrick Cantlay and Xander Schauffele, Rory McIlroy and Shane Lowry, Collin Morikawa and Kurt Kitayama, Will Zalatoris and Sahith Theegala as well as a few Canadian teams, Nick Taylor and Adam Hadwin and Taylor Pendrith and Corey Conners.

Past Winners at TPC Louisiana

2023: Riley/Hardy (-30)
2022: Cantlay/Schauffele (-29)
2021: Leishman/Smith (-20)
2019: Palmer/Rahm (-26)
2018: Horschel/Piercy (-22)
2017: Blixt/Smith (-27)

2024 Zurich Classic of New Orleans Picks

Tom Hoge/Maverick McNealy +2500 (DraftKings)

Tom Hoge is coming off of a solid T18 finish at the RBC Heritage and finished T13 at last year’s Zurich Classic alongside Harris English.

This season, Hoge is having one of his best years on Tour in terms of Strokes Gained: Approach. In his last 24 rounds, the only player to top him on the category is Scottie Scheffler. Hoge has been solid on Pete Dye designs, ranking 28th in the field over his past 36 rounds.

McNealy is also having a solid season. He’s finished T6 at the Waste Management Phoenix Open and T9 at the PLAYERS Championship. He recently started working with world renowned swing coach, Butch Harmon, and its seemingly paid dividends in 2024.

Keith Mitchell/Joel Dahmen +4000 (DraftKings)

Keith Mitchell is having a fantastic season, finishing in the top-20 of five of his past seven starts on Tour. Most recently, Mitchell finished T14 at the Valero Texas Open and gained a whopping 6.0 strokes off the tee. He finished 6th at last year’s Zurich Classic.

Joel Dahmen is having a resurgent year and has been dialed in with his irons. He also has a T11 finish at the PLAYERS Championship at TPC Sawgrass which is another Pete Dye track. With Mitchell’s length and Dahmen’s ability to put it close with his short irons, the Mitchell/Dahmen combination will be dangerous this week.

Taylor Moore/Matt NeSmith +6500 (DraftKings)

Taylor Moore has quickly developed into one of the more consistent players on Tour. He’s finished in the top-20 in three of his past four starts, including a very impressive showing at The Masters, finishing T20. He’s also finished T4 at this event in consecutive seasons alongside Matt NeSmith.

NeSmith isn’t having a great 2024, but has seemed to elevate his game in this format. He finished T26 at Pete Dye’s TPC Sawgrass, which gives the 30-year-old something to build off of. NeSmith is also a great putter on Bermudagrass, which could help elevate Moore’s ball striking prowess.

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