In
the quarter-century since former commissioner Deane Beman unveiled his concept
of a PGA Tour-operated network of fan-friendly golf venues, the Tournament
Players Club “brand” has quietly morphed into a machine for selling homesites
and golf memberships.
While
certain facilities in the TPC portfolio—including the very first, the TPC at
Sawgrass—are praised for their architectural brilliance and tournament-hosting
capacity, the remainder have not lived up to the standards set by Pete Dye’s
1980 design in Ponte Vedra Beach, Fla. A typical TPC club today stands for
first-rate golf operations and upscale real estate ventures, but not necessarily
strategic and memorable golf well-suited to hosting the game’s top
players.
“They’re
too caught up with marketing, and not enough with the details of good design,”
says one current tour player, who insisted on anonymity to avoid being fined by
his association. “The bottom-line obsession would bother me less if we could
play some fresh and interesting holes instead of the same thing over and over
again.”
Of
41 official tournaments on the PGA Tour’s 2005 schedule (not including majors
and World Golf Championship events), 10 are staged on TPC courses. With more
TPCs on the drawing board, can the “stadium golf” concept be resuscitated, or
has it been permanently hijacked by the tour’s business
interests?
“The [to
ur’s] corporate structure has now somewhat diluted what was an ingenious idea
[on the part of] Deane Beman,” says architect Bobby Weed, who headed the tour’s
in-house design division for six years before starting his own successful
architecture firm. “Unless the tour can build more TPCs like Sawgrass, Scottsdale and River Highlands—creating a discernable motif—the
entire concept becomes further weakened. Shouldn’t the game of golf drive the
business side of TPCs?”
According
to players and architects questioned about the network’s 10 daily-fee and 15
private TPCs, the positives are undeniable. By providing rent-free venues for
certain tournaments, TPCs have boosted purses and increased charitable donations
by some $50 million. And they’ve always owned a reputation for impeccably
managed facilities with a focus on golf and environmental sensitivity.
