'Strategy Off The Tee Is Pretty Non-Existent' - Could Aronimink Be Overpowered At The PGA Championship This Week?

The PGA Championship could be one for the bombers this week, but could golf's big hitters overpower Aronimink?

Rory McIlroy is now chief scouter for the Majors and has taken a good look at Donald Ross design just north of Philadelphia, warning that it could be wide open off the tee.

Aronimink is hosting its first men's Major in 64 years but like a lot of traditional old courses even though it's been lengthened there's a fear the longer hitters in the field could take it apart.

McIlroy says the tricky, sloping greens will be "the big defense" for Aronimink this week, but the contenders for the Wanamaker Trophy won't have to work too hard to get there.

There's a lot of bunkers, around 180 of them in fact, but with another old Major course having trees removed, Aronimink could be left defenseless to golf's big hitters.

“I think in this day and age, I’m not sure if it’s going to test all aspects of your bag,” said McIlroy. “Strategy off the tee is pretty non-existent.

"It's basically, bash driver down there and then figure it out from there, which I think is a lot of these newly renovated - I think about Oak Hill in 2023 - when these traditional golf courses take a lot of trees out, it makes strategy not as much of a concern off the tee.

"It's a course where you can be super aggressive off the tee, and then there's a little more strategy and a little more thought going into the greens."

Why take out the trees at Aronimink?

Some extensive tree removal has again been carried out at Aronimink, as it was at Oakmont for last year's US Open - to mixed reviews.

The aim is to restore the course to it's former glory, and it can help with conditioning - but it does leave it more open to be attacked off the tee.

“I don’t know about it,” said Jon Rahm about trees being lost at Aronimink.

“I’ve been making this joke for the last few years where I see a lot of golf courses coming in saying, ‘Look, 100 years ago, this golf course was like this, there were no trees.’ I’m like, well, in the back of my mind, they planted those trees with the future vision of having those trees in play, and now you’re taking them all out?

“It does seem like it would let you be able to be more aggressive off the tees. There’s quite a few lengthy holes out there."

'Theres a lot of stuff you can get away with' - Scheffler

World number one Scottie Scheffler says that without the trees "there's a lot of stuff you can kind of get away with in terms of you can hit it pretty far offline" around Aronimink - and in fact the further offline you are the better in some cases.

"There's not many things to block you," added Scheffler. "And if you hit it really far offline when there's no trees, you can just get to the crowd and you have a cleaner lie than if you're a yard or two off the fairway."

Xander Schauffele, the 2024 PGA Championship winner, agrees and struggled to see the point of the continued tree removal for Major gold courses.

"When I hear certain designers saying, I'm going to restore this course to 1915, I'm like, well, it probably takes a good hundred years for a nice tree to grow, just to take it out, just to say it was where it was before," said Schauffele.

The PGA of America can make Aronimink as hard or as easy as it likes by making the sloping greens faster or slower - but it seems the field won't have too much trouble reaching the putting surfaces.

It looks like driving distance will be a major asset for players wanting to lift the Wanamaker Trophy on Sunday.