PEBBLE BEACH, Calif. — Jordan Spieth’s daring second shot over a cliff on the par-4 eighth gap in final 12 months’s Pebble Seashore Professional-Am will probably be tougher to copy this 12 months because of an adjustment by the resort partly because of friends making an attempt to recreate Spieth’s shot whereas enjoying the course.
Gary Younger, the PGA Tour’s chief referee for this week, advised ESPN on Wednesday that he met with Pebble Seashore representatives Tuesday evening who expressed that, throughout resort play, they’d been pressured to maneuver the crimson hazard line again and make sure the tough was thick sufficient to cease balls from working out to the place Spieth’s tee ball landed final 12 months, as friends had tried to emulate the shot.
“We painted the road the place we historically have it,” Younger stated of the setup for this week. “I do know that as a membership, they make a concerted effort to attempt to transfer that line additional away. Resort play, that is been their concern and so they simply need to make it possible for they’re doing every thing that they will to discourage individuals from making an attempt that shot.”
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Final 12 months, Spieth famously determined to go for the shot towards the needs of his caddie Michael Greller — who suggested taking a penalty shot. The three-time main winner proceeded to take a harmful off-balance swing that pressured him to step again from the bluff as he hit the ball. The shot labored out — Spieth saved par on the outlet — however regretted the choice afterward. On Wednesday, he was requested concerning the shot once more.
“I feel I saved a stroke,” Spieth stated. “Does the reward outweigh the danger? Not if you happen to suppose the danger was dying. However I additionally, I felt I may whack it over the water with a 7-iron and get it up close to the inexperienced. And I assumed up close to the inexperienced can be simpler than hitting a 7-iron from 10 yards again. And, yeah, I feel now figuring out my son quite a bit higher, he was actually younger on the time, I’ll not have hit that shot.”
Spieth stated this week that he observed the grass had “grown up by the sting” however would not imagine that solves the bigger difficulty.
“It stops the balls which will have gone by earlier than,” Spieth stated. “So there isn’t any win right here. I feel I actually messed issues up by hitting that as a result of I do not actually know the answer. Aside from shave all of it the way in which in order that, it doesn’t matter what, it goes proper in and it has much less of an opportunity of stopping quick. I do not actually know. As a result of you’ll be able to’t put a fence there as a result of your second shot will hit the fence.”
“That is downright terrifying proper now.”
This shot from Jordan Spieth was fairly the scenario. 😬 pic.twitter.com/sq04R96GXQ
— Golf on CBS ⛳ (@GolfonCBS) February 5, 2022
Younger stated the resort usually does have an indication that encourages friends to keep away from getting near the sting for any motive, however whereas the eighth will not have any signage dissuading gamers from taking the shot this week and the hazard line will stay in its regular place, the tough ought to do its job, based on Younger.
“The tough is a uniform two inches, but it surely’s a really thick tough,” Younger stated. “They fertilize the tough in that space fairly closely. They do every thing once more, to advertise a superb thick little bit of tough that is going to stop a golf ball from chasing alongside the bottom by the green into that space.”
And as Younger identified, most individuals — be it amateurs on this 12 months’s match or resort friends — will not hit it so far as Spieth does anyway.
