TPC Sawgrass (Stadium)

BACKGROUND

Back in the late 1970s, the then PGA Tour commissioner Dean Beman wanted to develop a permanent destination for the Players Championship – the only event owned by players on the professional tour – which was at that time hosted at Sawgrass Country Club.

After approaching the Arvida Corporation, the club’s owners, it was evident they didn’t want to part with their property so Beman turned to local Ponte Vedra Beach landowners Jerome and Paul Fletcher, who sold him 415 acres of swamp and wooded wetlands for a nominal $1.00.

Architect Pete Dye and his wife Alice Dye were engaged to design the new layout as a “stadium course” with spectators in mind, allowing golf fans improved views of play during the annual professional tournament at the club.

The course was not to favour a particular player or style of play so there had to be a range of short, medium and long holes, with both right and left doglegs, and the routing was set out so that no two consecutive holes would play in the same direction.

The location was a flat North Florida wetland area with less than two feet of elevation above the water table across the property so lakes were built for strategic purposes and to provide fill for creating movement in the fairways and mounding for spectator viewing.

Key locations were identified as the opening holes on both nines, along with the closing three holes on the inward half, where strategic viewing areas up to 30 feet high were built to allow thousands of spectators uninterrupted views of tournament play.

During construction, the infamous island green on the par three 17th became a reality, thanks mainly to Alice Dye. What began as a small pond beside the putting surface just got bigger as more sand was extracted until water entirely surrounded the green.

PLAYERS CHAMPIONSHIP

The Tournament Players Championship (as it was called until 1988) moved to TPC Sawgrass in 1982, having previously been staged at Atlanta CC Georgia in 1974, Colonial CC Texas in 1975, Inverary CC Florida in 1976 then Sawgrass CC between 1977 and 1981.

The course wasn’t universally acclaimed by the professionals as it was deemed too tough. Indeed, players like Jack Nicklaus, Arnold Palmer and Gary Player all missed the cut. Playing an orange golf ball, Jerry Pate shot a final round 67 to win by two strokes from the field.

This 9th edition of the event at its new home was marked by Pate throwing both commissioner Deane Beman and architect Pete Dye into the lake at the 18th, then diving into the water after them! Five years later, Dye and Pate teamed up with Bobby Weed to design the Dye’s Valley course at TPC Sawgrass.

Notable winners of the unofficial “fifth Major” at this venue include Sandy Lyle (the first non-American to triumph in 1987), along with multiple winners Fred Couples, Steve Elkington, Hal Sutton, Davis Love III and Tiger Woods.

TPC NETWORK

Nowadays, TPC Sawgrass is one of twenty-nine upmarket TPC facilities situated across the United States – from TPC Boston in the east to TPC Harding Park in the west – along with TPC Dorado Beach in Puerto Rico, TPC Danzante Bay in Mexico and TPC Toronto at Osprey Valley in Canada.

Owned, operated, and licensed by the men’s professional tour, the TPC Network comprises a mix of private and resort golf properties designed by the world’s leading architects, with each one capable of hosting elite golf tournaments.

Since TPC Sawgrass first opened in late 1980, TPCs have provided the PGA TOUR with rent-free venues for competitions, helping to boost championship golf purses and increase charitable donations to grassroots non-profit organizations.

At the same time, TPCs have provided ordinary golfers with the opportunity to test their skills on the same layouts where the professionals play. These venues are also known for their first-class conditioning and amenities, in addition to their commitment to environmental excellence.