Participants in the 2023 Players Championship need to prepare themselves for a long walk — and at least three shots into the green — at the par-5 ninth hole of the Players Stadium Course at TPC Sawgrass.
How long?
Try 600 or more yards, if rules officials are feeling especially frisky.
There aren’t many changes coming to The Players or the Stadium Course this year but one of them involves the first significant modification to a hole since the par-4 12th was made drivable for the 2017 Players.
A new tee has been built for the ninth hole that can extend the scorecard yardage of 583 yards to the first 600-yard hole in tournament history.
That’s not to say it will happen — just that the tournament rules staff has the option. The weather forecast and the wind for the tournament rounds March 9-12 will play a large part in that determination.
But the longer tee will put some teeth into a hole that originally was designed by Pete Dye to be the most difficult par-5 hole on the course, and a three-shot hole for most players.
In recent years, the ninth hole has at times dipped below Nos. 2 and 11 in difficulty. Players also have tended to get a bit conservative on the hole, even on days when the rules officials move the tee up to entice them. In five of the last 10 years there have been no scores worse than a double-bogey at No. 9, and three triple-bogeys last year matched the entire total of the previous four years.
There have been three 600-yard holes in recent major championships, and one in the works. The par-5 14th hole at the Country Club in Brookline, Massachusetts, measured up to 625 yards for the 2022 U.S. Open; the par-5 fifth hole at Southern Hills in Tulsa, Oklahoma, was 656 yards for the 2022 PGA, and the par-5 13th measured at 632 yards; and Royal Liverpool is planning on 607 yards for its par-5 18th hole for the 2023 Open Championship.
New place to watch shots at No. 9
Players Championship officials have also created a new fan venue to the right of the new tee, giving spectators an up-close-and-personal view of players trying to muscle their tee shots down the right side to set up a rope-hook second shot into the small green, or take the safe play and lay up.
There will be two tents in the area, one housing Tito’s Stillhouse Lounge and the other ABBQ. The deck fronting the area was also built around a large oak tree, with three appearing to spring up out of the deck from a distance.
Fans also can look to the right and see players teeing off No. 18 and have an easy route across the ninth fairway to get to the 18th tee or the 16-17 amphitheater setting if they want to catch shots on the closing holes.
Off in the distance is the palatial TPC Sawgrass clubhouse and the huge lake separating the ninth and 18th fairways.
Tournament director Jared Rice thinks the combination of proximity to the new ninth tee and the overall panoramic sight of the two closing holes on each side will turn into one of the most popular spots on the course.
“It will be an awesome viewing experience,” Rice said on Monday at Players Championship Media Day, when print and electronic media got their first view of the build-out of hospitality structures and changes such as the ninth tee area. “The area behind the new tee and behind No. 8 green has been regrassed and the new tee will give the rules staff much more flexibility from a competitive perspective.”
The course looks as lush and green as ever, with the freezing weather earlier this winter apparently having no ill effects. And with the Tour’s West Coast Swing ending after the WM Phoenix Open this week and the Genesis Invitational in Los Angeles next week, the Honda Classic on Feb. 23-26 in Palm Beach Gardens will kick off the Florida Swing, with The Players third on the tee.
Officials yearn for a normal Players week
Rice said the tournament staff naturally hopes for a week without the weather issues that extended last year’s tournament to Monday. The finish was exciting enough, with Cameron Smith surviving a trip to the water at No. 18 to shoot 66 and win by one shot, but normalcy would be nice: since the tournament moved back to March in 2019, it’s experienced the cancellation in 2020 because of the COVID-19 pandemic, a greatly reduced capacity in 2021, with fans required to wear masks even outside, and last year’s torrential rain, followed by a chilly Saturday and Sunday and more rain during the first Monday finish since 2005.
“Anyone would say idyllic weather would be preferred,” Rice said. “But we’re ready for everything. As a team we’re always impressed with how patient and resilient our fans and volunteers are in those scenarios and when that kind of weather event happens, it challenges you to look even deeper about where we can improve.”
Rice said there have been minor changes made within parking lots, roadways, footpaths and fan gathering areas such as The Grove, Trucks on 10 and Tacos on 12 to improve drainage and safety, and the tournament committee has been working with the St. Johns County Sheriff’s Office and county officials to improve traffic patterns.
Rice said the best advice he can give to fans is to purchase parking passes early, especially for Friday and Saturday rounds — historically the busiest — and leave for the course early on those days.
Parking passes must be purchased separately from tickets and both can be purchased at theplayers.com.
PGA Tour app has been enhanced
Other enhancements or new features for the 2023 tournament:
∎ The PGA Tour app has been rebuilt, with three new features to help fans during The Players: an easier ticket interface that will make it easier to populate digital tickets to smartphone wallets; a wayfinding feature, which will give fans step-by-step and turn-by-turn directions to fan zones, dining areas, restrooms, first aid and the location of their favorite players; and an Augmented Reality feature for Nos. 16, 17 and 18 that will have enhanced statistics and shot trails.
∎ There will be a new free shuttle in the Nocatee area, along with two free shuttles from downtown Jacksonville.
∎ A new bicycle and golf cart parking lot will be available on the west side of Championship Way.
Hanging over the proceedings will be the continued battle raging within golf between the PGA Tour and LIV Golf. The top three finishers in last year’s Players, Smith, Anibarn Lahiri and Paul Casey, plus two more top-10 finishers in Dustin Johnson and Harold Varner III, have defected to LIV Golf and are under indefinite suspension by the Tour.
That still leaves a field that is likely to include 24 of the top-25 players on the current world rankings (sans Smith), which means No. 1 Rory McIlroy, No. 2 Scottie Scheffler and No. 3 Jon Rahm will be at the Stadium Course.
“Annually, about 95 to 98 percent of The Players field are fully-exempt players,” Rice said. “That means PGA Tour professionals who are out there, week in and week out, making up our field. It’s a little different from the other majors and that strength of field is what sets us apart.”
