TROON, Scotland -- When the likes of Tom Morris and James Braid and various other designers laid out their courses along the sea in places all over Great Britain and Ireland, there is no way they could foresee the game that exists today, one fraught with technological advances that allow players to hit a golf ball short-hop plane distances.
Of course, there were no airplanes back when they laid out these links, mostly by shaping the existing land with the help of horses, mules and other rudimentary tools. Morris, who won The Open four times using a gutta percha ball (he was a ball maker as well as champion golfer and course designer) would trip over his wooden-shafted clubs at the sight of a Dustin Johnson tee shot.