The prep work is complete, now it is time for the PGA of America to execute its vision at the 2023 PGA Championship.
Oak Hill Country Club will play the role of host venue at this week’s big event, the second major championship of the season.
The event rotates courses every year but Oak Hill does have history at the event, hosting the 1980, 2003, and 2013 editions. There has been a major overhaul of the course since that 2013 edition.
Before we discuss those course changes, it’s important to point out the cutline rules for the week. The low 70 and ties will advance through the 36-hole cutline which is five more than the week-to-week TOUR grind.
The Course
The East Course at Oak Hill Country Club is hosting this week’s PGA Championship.
Glancing at the scorecard we see a par 70 that stretches to 7,394 yards from the tips. That is a 231-yard increase from the 2013 edition which was also hosted at Oak Hill.
The par 4s are beefy with seven of them playing 458 yards or longer. Combine that with cool May temperatures in New York and it becomes a very tough test from a length perspective. Remember that the last two PGA Championships at Oak Hill were played in August and they found their way back onto the rota before the event moved to May.
We saw Oak Hill at the 2013 PGA Championship where Jason Dufner clipped Jim Furyk by two shots, winning with a 10-under tally. Those are two names that lean heavily on driving accuracy. There was a 2019 course renovation so will accuracy still reign supreme at the East Course?
A big part of the renovation was the removal of hundreds of trees. That shifts the course more toward a Muirfield Village and less of a Harbour Town. It was previously pretty claustrophobic with overhanging trees. Back in 2013, Tiger Woods had said he was expecting to hit just two to five drivers per round. After the renovation, we should expect to see a lot more drivers pulled on the par 4s.
Originally a Donald Ross design, the 2019 renovation restored many of the aspects of the original design. That includes tiny greens which measure just 4,500 square feet on average.
Many of those greens are elevated and also surrounded by tricky, greenside bunkers. In addition to the tough bunkers, many of the holes now have runoffs areas to repel errant approach shots. Some of those runoff areas are extremely sloped, leading to some very awkward up-and-down attempts.
For turf, they’ll see traditional cool-season grasses with bent/poa on the fairways, kentucky bluegrass and rye rough, with bentgrass putting surfaces.
Looking at the overall scoring environment, we’ve seen the last two winners at Oak Hill be -10 and -4 winners. Looking at recent PGA setups, four of the last six winners have landed in the 5-to-8-under range for a winning score. Combine those two together and 7-under is probably a good target to aim for this week if you want to find yourself in contention down the stretch at Oak Hill.
Course Quotes
Sifting through some past quotes, let’s try to break down the course to see how it will play.
Tiger Woods in 2013: “It’s tough. It’s right in front of you. Really, no surprises out there. You just have to play well. This is one of those courses where you’ve just got to bring it ball‑striking‑wise. You’ve got to hit the ball well.”
Adam Scott in 2013: “The rough is long, and that’s the challenge here, will be to keep it in the short stuff to give yourself a chance to score. I think you’re going to have to be careful on the greens. There are some severe greens out there where it’s important to keep the ball under the hole, on or off the green.”
Hunter Mahan in 2013: “It’s a ball‑striker’s place, small greens, and you really have to control your irons into the greens. You can hit some really good shots, make some great swings, and hit it just a little bit long or just a little bit short and you are going to be penalized pretty heavily.
I pulled quotes from 10 years ago but what they said should still ring true. This is a course that will reward steady striking, and smart approach play. Bad shots will be heavily punished, as you would hope for in a major championship. Like Tiger mentioned in the quote above, the course is not tricked up, it’s right in front of you, forcing you to execute.
Correlated Courses
Using historical data we can look at overperformance and underperformance at this week’s host course and compare that to all of the courses played out on TOUR. Here are the ones that shared a lot of overlap:
Muirfield Village
TPC Potomac
Augusta National
You could also include any of the major championship venues from the Northeast but I would recommend lumping those together instead of using very small samples from each venue. otherwise we are looking for courses that reward smart approach play or have a big penatly for missing the fairway.
The Weather
Thursday: Cold morning with a high only reaching 64 degrees by midday. Winds at 4 to 9 MPH.
Friday: Sunny with a high of 80 degrees. Winds at 5 to 12 MPH.
Gamers playing single-round formats this week should make sure they monitor morning tee time temperatures. Unless we see delays, the earliest of tee times will be warming up and playing most of their round in very cold temps. That will make it harder to get the body ready to compete and also harder for the ball to fly.
