Black is Beautiful

The Metropolitan Golf Writers Association held their second outing of the season yesterday at Bethpage

Unheeded Warning

Black, and your humble blogger went along for the ride.  I'd not played the Black since shortly after completion of the Rees Jones renovation in anticipation of the 2002 U.S. Open.  You know, the one where it rained every days and the guys played through a mud field...or wait, was that 2009?

There will be no shortage of opportunities to see the big boys play the Black in the nest decade, as it remains in the rotation for the Barclays (the event returns next in 2016), the first of the FedEx Cup season-ending series, and has been awarded the 1919 PGA Championship and 2024 Ryder Cup.  Those planning on attending that Ryder Cup have reportedly already started drinking, just to ensure that they're properly lubricated for the event.

The Black was very much as I remembered it, a long tough track with dramatic bunkering that severely punishes the player for every missed shot.  Here's How Ran Morrissett starts his review of the course at Golf Club Atlas:

If the owners told Tillinghast to give them a man sized course at Winged Foot, what must have been his marching orders when he was commissioned to build the Black Course at Bethpage State Park?!

The answer is the Long Island Park Commission wanted A. W. Tillinghast to build something that “might compare with Pine Valley as a great test.” That request is not as silly as it sounds, because at Bethpage, Tillinghast was given dramatic sandy property with which to work.

Yale teeing off on No. 14.

The unfortunate story, oft-repeated, is that the original wild sandy look of the course has been lost over time, replaced as usual by deep rough.  At inception, the comparison to Pine Valley was far more apt than we can possibly imagine at this point, though enough vestiges remain to give us a taste of it.  And if anyone in authority at the N.Y. State Office of Parks and Recreation wants to make a contribution to society, I'm pretty sure that Bill Coore would take that call.

The other surprising thing about the Black is the relative tameness of the greens, very much out of character for Tillinghast.  Morrissett attributes this to the fact that a gentleman named Joe Burbeck did the finishing work at the Black, which would have included the final shaping of the greens.  They are surprisingly flat, and there's a definite tendency to over-read and therefore over-borrow on putts.  

But this is Tilly's Master Class in driving, as each hole presents an interesting and different test off the tee.  The difficulty of that test is compounded by the length of the course, knowing one needs a solidly struck drive to reach the many long par-4's (in Tillyville there's no such thing as a reachable par-4).  And the bunkers are truly penal, deep and well positioned to receive the the slightly-misjudged shot.  For once I thing that Rees Jones did a wonderful restoration, as the bunkering looks entirely consistent and true to its roots.  As a contrast. at Baltusrol Lower the Tilly bunkers are utterly distinct from the Reestrocity (a term I first coined for his desecration of the 16th at Sleepy Hollow) bunkers, the latter being shallow saucers that look out of place and

are quite easy to escape.

In any event, a great day was had by all, especially as the forecast rain held off.  I played with old friend Yale Stogel, new friend Bill Braun (whom I met at Knickerbocker) and even newer friend Woody Lashen. who owns Pete's Golf, a custom club-fitter and builder in Mineola.  Woody also does some golf writing and a golf radio show, about which I'll try to get more details for anyone interested.

I don't bore you with too many details of my travails on the golf course, but this was a pretty good example of the yin and yang of golf.  We started on the 14th hole, a wonderful short par-3 that plays from high-point to high-point across a valley. that of course was our closest to the pin contest.  I put my tee ball 11 feet under the hole and made the putt, thank you very much.

The view from the fairway of the 15th green.

No. 15 may well be the hardest hole at the Black, on a course with no shortage of difficult golf holes.  It plays significantly uphill (far more uphill than the camera captures in the photo to the left)to a green that slopes significantly from back to front.  A no-good, awful second shot left me in the far-left section of the bunker that is front-left in the photo, fifty yards from a front pin with the ball some six inches below my feet.

A no-chance shot to be sure, though that sometimes frees us up to swing and not worry about the consequences.  Somehow I made perfect contact and could only listen as the crowd reaction went from "good shot" to "holy s**t" as the ball bit and spun back to 3-feet.  Wish I'd been there to see it (I could only see the top of the flag), but I jammed in the putt for a ho-hum 4-for-3.  Woody, my partner for the day, thought he'd hit the lottery, but the laws of nature had not been repealed and I quickly regressed to my recent mean.

The team, from l-r, Bill, Yale, My Ownself and Woody.

The dramatic Par-5 fourth, probably the best-known hole at the Black.

One last note on the Black, as relates to the upcoming professional events.  Its 18th hole has long been considered the weakest on the course, though this is more true at the professional level than for we hacks.  As you can see in the photo below, the fairway pinches at some 220-240 yards off the tee, right about where guys like us will land it.  By way of example, Yale carried the bunkers by inches, whereas yours truly ended up with a rake job.

The problem is that there's no way to move the tee back, as it's hard against the 17th green, and the green is perfectly situated for large grandstands and tents.  The big boys can easily fly the hazards, or when they opt to lay back from the bunkers it's an unmanly shot, witness the reactions to Lucas Glover hitting six-iron on his final hole in 2009.  The Parks Department officials told us that any consideration of using the Re 18th hole or other adjustments are moot at this point, but I can only say that this will prove to be an uninspiring hole on which to settle Ryder Cup matches, not to mention major championships.