COURSE: The Tournament Players Course at Sawgrass

LOCATION: Ponte Verde, Florida

Designed By: Pete Dye

JNSE DESIGN: By Ted Maiden


"PINE VALLEY WITH PALM TREES"


Host to the yearly Players Championship, The TPC as Sawgrass is distinctly
the "grandfather" of all TPC courses. The course and club are operated by
the PGA Tour and serve as the headquarters for the PGA Commissioner and his
staff.

When it first opened, Jack Nicklaus was asked if the controversial design
suited his game. "No," he said, "I've never been very good at stopping a
five iron on the hood of my car." Ben Crenshaw, normally the most diplomatic
of players, pronounced the course "Star Wars Golf, designed by Darth Vader".

After some heavy reworking of the greens and some traps, it has today become
the charmer. Crenshaw now says that "there are no weak holes." And it makes
the listing of the top 100 courses in the world. #18 is listed as one of the
toughest finishing holes in golf. And, the signature hole, #17, is world
famous and intimidates the most daring and bravest of players.

Sawgrass was the first STADIUM designed course. Large areas were raised and
terraced for the sole purpose of allowing spectators a good view of the play.
It's rated at 74.0 with a slope of 135 from the Championship tees, 71.9 with
a slope of 130 from the Pro tees, 68.7 and a slope of 126 from the Men's tees,
and 64.7 with a slope of 123 from the ladies tees.

Since 1977, this tournament has raised more than $5,000,000 for charity. It
was originally called THE TOURNAMENT PLAYERS CHAMPIONSHIP, or TPC. But when
a couple dozen other TPC courses were born, Deane Beman and the PGA changed
the name to The Players Championship and only the course retains the TPC
designation.


JNSE DESIGN CREDITS:

The reference material came from many different sources. Golf Courses of
the PGA Tour is a great book and was used for its color photographs on a
couple of holes.

Gordon Mobley sent me a package with a dandy overhead map that was part of
the handout stuff for the last round of the 1992 Players Championship. He
also sent a newspaper article that had different players commenting on each
hole. That's where the hole quotes come from.

I have to mention Mark Willet. You can actually find a couple of his objects
at in unmodified form. That, and he did not get to harass me extensively
while finishing this course, in the same manner that I have harassed him
during our joint effort on Cherry Hills.


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Then there is Tony Woodward. Tony happened to start a design on this course
at about the same time I did. He was neat enough to send me a yardage book
that he had. We laughed about the fact that there were many discrepancies in
the reference material. I tried to get Tony to release his design first, but
he has chosen not to. Tony, I tried. But, I found out during our interfaces
that Tony is the real "class act" and for that reason, dedicate this design
to Tony and the friendship I hope we can cultivate in the future.

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Finally, I had about 10 hours of video of the network broadcast of the 1992
tournament. The views of the course from the Met Life blimp became the judge
and jury as for accuracy of the design. I thought about putting the Blimp
in the background just like I did when I designed The Ocean Course at Kiawah
Island, but decided it would be redundant.

The background is my own abomination, but I think it goes well with the course
and looks very "FLORIDA" like. If there had been enough room, I would have
included the ever-present palmetto palms that you can't walk 2 inches without
finding here on the East Coast. I decided instead to make the course a bit
more colorful with a spring-like blooming azalea bush that should keep your
spirits in a spring-like mood - the time of year when the tourney is played.


If I missed someone on the credits, well, at least YOU know who you are.


I welcome feedback on the quality of my design efforts. I can be contacted
on Prodigy by message to NPNW54A. I also am the sysop of the Double Eagle BBS
in Melbourne, FL. The Double Eagle is the only BBS solely dedicated to the
Jack Nicklaus Golf Game. I carry in excess of 200 of the best and latest
courses and membership is free as of this writing.

The number is 407-259-9771 - 1200-9600 baud v.32, v.42bis, MNP5 - ANSI - 8N1.


ADDITION: If you are interested in obtaining more courses from other excellent
designers like Scott then call:

The 19th Hole BBS
(301) 869-2389
Gaithersburg, MD

Dedicated to Accolade and Jack Nicklaus Golf & Design.