When I first came here, this was all swamp. Everyone said I was daft to build a castle on a swamp, but I built it all the same, just to show them.” —Pete Dye
OK … now that quote isn’t actually from Pete Dye. It’s from “Monty Python and the Holy Grail”, but it easily could be from the architect extraordinaire referencing his hard work on the Stadium Course at TPC Sawgrass.
Built on 415 acres of northeastern Florida swampland 45 years ago, the home of the Players Championship is certainly distinctive, from its grassy “stands” to its always-in-the-way palm trees to its famed island green on No. 17 that has quickly become one of the game’s most recognizable holes.
With all that said, the Stadium Course has been picked apart over the years, and Dye even tweaked the course at various times to make the greens less dire and the bunkers more playable. If you’re looking to elevate your event to “fifth major” status, you’re going to need a track that stands up to the challenge. Thus, we polled the Golf Digest Illuminati to see where it stands on TPC Sawgrass: Is it a true championship test or does it lean more toward a tricked-up TPC course? And at a grassroots level, is it worth the $750 green fees? What’s it like playing there on a spring trip? Is No. 17 all it cracks up to be? Here’s what our team had to say:
Michael Johnson, Equipment Editor: I’ve been privileged to play more than a dozen TPC courses and while some have similarities, Sawgrass is singular as a championship test. Sturdy from start to close, a memorable finish and site of some of golf’s most iconic moments (“Be the right club, today!” and “Better than most!” come immediately to mind). You simply don’t get that at TPC Jasna Polana. Or any other TPC course for that matter.
Christopher Powers, Staff Writer: On a PGA Tour schedule where the courses seem to get easier and less tricked up every year, often asking the same question over and over, TPC Sawgrass is not only a championship test, it might be THE only championship test left outside of the majors (fine, Riviera, too). In fact, I am firmly in the camp that the Players at TPC Sawgrass is/should be a major. It’s OK to still penalize off-line shots and to ask players to shape shots both ways. It’s OK to make guys think about whether they really want to go after that tucked pin. It’s a course that cannot be overpowered like so many others these guys play. So what if it hurts their feelings every now and then when the wind is up. That’s what championship tests are supposed to do. Maybe it’s me drinking the kool-aid as I’ve now attended the last seven Players Championships, but I really can’t say enough good things about the course and the championship as a whole.
Stephen Hennessey, Managing Editor for Courses & Travel: Pete Dye created a genre with TPC Sawgrass—the ultimate spectator layout designed not just with fans in mind but to test the best players in the world on every shot. Anybody who likens TPC Sawgrass to any other TPC doesn’t know ball. TPC Sawgrass created angst among tour pros when it opened, but that’s a good thing. And in an era now where players are hitting it farther than ever imagined, Dye’s creation challenges by using sound strategy and demanding thoughtful execution.
Max Adler, Editorial Director: TPC Sawgrass has to be counted among the top courses ever built by Pete Dye, who is widely regarded as a genius and whose career as an architect spanned more than 50 years. You can't feel 100-percent comfortable standing over any shot there. A little voice is always suggesting you ought to do something more—a fade, a draw, some variation of spin and height where the penalty for not pulling it off is disaster. When you're done playing, you'll remember every hole distinctly and vividly. (Incidentally, it's the first course I played where I truly appreciated the chasm between scratch golfers and tour pros. My college team got to go there on a spring trip, took two paces off the back of each tee box like the idiots we were, and nobody broke 80.)
Peter Morrice, Executive Editor: I’m not a big fan of how manufactured the course looks. That said, I think a championship course is one that tests every facet and never lets up, and Sawgrass accomplishes that. Also, a great test should have an unforgettable finish, and this is the best three-hole gut check I’ve ever seen. You simply have to hit terrifying shots over the last three holes, or else bail out and make bogeys. Like Max, I played there with my college team. I was in the second group and didn’t think much of the shot on 17 until I saw our first group waiting to watch us hit. I was shaking. Can’t imagine with 20,000 fans and millions on TV. If you hit a good shot on 17 when it matters, I’m thoroughly impressed. I’ve played it three times since and could not curb my anticipation of 16-18. Maybe I’m an emotional infant, but I’m not alone.
Doug Pensinger
Joel Beall, Senior Writer: It’s hard for me to decouple the $750 green fee for a course where only a handful of holes truly captivate, so in that sense “championship” seems generous. Still, there's undeniable substance beneath the commercial veneer. The course demands versatility rather than favoring a single playing style, creating a test that has produced a diverse list of champions. Throw in the entrenched tradition and recognizable closing theater, Sawgrass might not be a top-tiered venue yet it is well above the standard TPC fare.
Kevin C. Cox
Dave Shedloski, Contributing Editor: Given the general theme of most responses here, I guess I'm about to commit heresy. The genius of Pete Dye, my longtime Ohio friend, is evident throughout TPC Sawgrass, and it needs no amount of tricking up to be a fine test of golf. It is inarguably great, and in the right conditions, it can be downright pernicious. And yes, it fulfills two prerequisites that make it a worthy venue for the PGA Tour's flagship event—players of varying skills have won there over the years, and it possesses a dramatic finish that presents opportunity or disaster, which lends itself to memorable outcomes. But I have never thought of TPC Sawgrass as a "championship" course. It's a fantastic course where a championship is played. But by comparison to others, such as Oakmont, site of this year's U.S. Open … that’s an authentic championship course. Riviera. Shinnecock. Augusta. A few others. There are actually not many in my mind that fit the bill. That's just me. I can pay homage to Pete Dye and his wonderful creation in the former swamp land of Ponte Vedra Beach, Fla., and appreciate it as an interesting, unique and even enthralling layout and still not convince myself to put it in the same category of the other aforementioned courses.
Greg Gottfried, Web Producer: Maybe this makes me a simpleton, but if you’re going to have a hole like No. 17 that causes maximum chaos and has the average viewer constantly thinking about how they’d play it, that’s a win for me. It all comes down to those final three holes and out of the last five years, all but one Players came down to a one-shot difference. That’s another victory. I’m fine with an old-fashioned golf course, and yet I’m never against changing it up, especially when there’s $25 million up for grabs. Throw everything into disarray! I love mess. It'd be cool to see the entire track in person one day … or even tee off there. It’s going to have to be on the company’s dime, though, because $750 is a little too rich for my blood. Maybe I can expense it?
Jared C. Tilton
Derek Duncan, Architecture Editor: Others can haggle whether the TPC is a “championship” course, whatever that means. (Hot take: it means nothing.) But if anything the design is tricked down. Over the decades the PGA Tour, often at the insistence of the clients (aka, the players), has softened Sawgrass, making roughs uniform, mellowing greens and creating turf as pristine and consistent as Augusta National. Pete Dye wanted to challenge the pros’ psychological mettle as much as their tactics and execution, and that meant dealing with adversity. But in taking away all the bad luck and bad lies he designed into it, the course has become predictable and comparatively toothless. Architecturally it remains a seminal and original touchstone, and I would argue Dye’s greatest expression given its purpose and meager beginnings. More importantly despite the neutering, it remains interesting, a far greater achievement for a PGA Tour course than whether it fits any criteria of a championship design.
Keely Levins, Contributing Writer: Island greens can feel gimmicky, but No. 17 works. It creates theater and drama on a level beyond what the average TPC course can accomplish. The finishing stretch has become iconic and has made the tournament a must-watch—all of which I’d say are qualifiers for a true championship course. My personal preference for classic green complexes and a design that relies less on mounds and dips can’t overshadow the long list of marquee winners this course has produced, nor the challenge it continues to present.
Jared C. Tilton
Tod Leonard, Senior Editor: This year will be my first to see TPC Sawgrass in person, but from watching the Players on television, “tricked up” has never come to mind. I enjoy the contrast of some of the interior holes surrounded by the trees before the course visually opens up down the stretch. Even casual golf fans can probably recite the last three holes and the water around them—reachable par 5, island par 3 and scary par 4. Also, any course that yields such a variety of winners—and most of them high-profile players—deserves to be counted among the most watchable and legitimate on tour.
Shane Ryan, Contributing Editor: I am far from an architecture expert, but I do love a good story, and the fact that Pete Dye raised this course from a swamp, pissed off all the players the first time they had a crack and even got thrown in the water by Jerry Pate after the tournament (Pate won) before they had to fix a few of his greens ... well, all that tells me this course is at least crazy enough to be infamous, and if it's crazy enough to be infamous, then it can be historical. From a place of relative architectural ignorance, I'm giving it my stamp of approval as a championship course. (However, they need to make 17 a true island green, and force the players and caddies to take small boats out and back.)
