SCOTTSDALE, Ariz. — The Phoenix Open was being held at the Tournament Players Club of Scottsdale for the first time and course designer Tom Weiskopf wanted to know what players thought of the place.
Tom Byrum had to think for a moment before answering.
“I guess all I could come up with was I didn’t realize how far out here it was,” Byrum recalled.
That was 1987. This week, the Open will return to the TPC Scottsdale for the 36th time. No one is questioning the locale anymore. Instead, the decision to move the tournament to the TPC has turned out to be one of the most inspired decisions in Arizona sports history.
“To have that be almost a Super Bowl every year for the Phoenix area. … I don’t think anybody anticipated that,” said former PGA Tour commissioner Deane Beman.
How could they? At the time, all the Tour and the Phoenix Thunderbirds had in mind was finding a more spacious venue than Phoenix Country Club, which had hosted the tournament on a permanent basis since 1975. By the mid-1980s the galleries had overwhelmed the course; the Thunderbirds began selling disposable cardboard periscopes so fans in the back could see over the heads of those in front of them.
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After considering several options, including a makeover of Papago Golf Course, a decision was made build a new course inside the Phoenix Mountain Preserve, near the Pointe Hilton Tapatio Cliffs in north Phoenix. Beman and the Thunderbirds found a willing partner in a land developer but when they went to the Phoenix City Council for approval, Beman said, “We got our head handed to us. It was no way, Jose.”
That’s when Beman got a call from then-Scottsdale mayor Herb Drinkwater. Drinkwater said he had a piece of land he wanted Beman to see. Beman flew into Scottsdale Airpark and Drinkwater picked him up. On the drive Beman told Drinkwater that it would be difficult for the Thunderbirds to move the tournament outside of the city of Phoenix.
When they arrived at the property Drinkwater said, “Do you know where we are right now?”
“Yeah,” Beman said. “The city of Scottsdale.”
Drinkwater drove across the street.
“You know where we are now?” he said.
“No,” Beman replied.
“You’re in the city of Phoenix,” Drinkwater said. “You’re going to give this opportunity up because of a couple of feet?”
Beman was sold. He had seen how PGA Tournaments held “in the boonies” as he put it, facilitated growth and he was convinced the Phoenix Open would do the same for north Scottsdale.
“It didn’t bother me that the golf course was sort of pretty far from where the center of things were,” Beman said.
Others were. Pete Scardello was the chairman for the first tournament at TPC, in January of ’87. In the months leading up to the event he’d have lunch a couple of times per week at Phoenix Country Club, where he was a member. Invariably, his lunch would be served with a side of derision.
“Other members would say, ‘Hey, Pete, I like you but nobody is going to go to the tournament out there,’ ” Scardello recalled.
The fear of sparse galleries was the least of Scardello’s concerns. He thought fans would come to appreciate the easy sight lines and ability to move around without feeling like they were in a cramped bus station. But when it came to putting the first tournament on he and the rest of the Thunderbirds were in the dark – figuratively and literally.
“We didn’t know what we were doing because we hadn’t been there before,” Scardello said. “I was the crash dummy. We didn’t realize until we got out there that there was no electricity to the site. We had to bring in a power line from APS (Arizona Public Service) and pay for that.”
Roping off the fairways took three hours at Phoenix Country Club. It took the better part of two days at the TPC. On Thursday Scardello was told on his walkie-talkie that his wife needed to talk to him. He found a phone, called her and she said, “I’m out here on No. 15. You’ve got six (portable toilets) and 25 people in each line. I would suggest you get more.”
“I think we ended up with 20,” Scardello said. “There were just all kinds of different things, from busses to security, that we didn’t realize the scope of what we were undertaking. We had never done anything that big.”
Still, the initial tournament, won by Paul Azinger, was an immediate hit. Attendance for the week was 257,000, compared to 186,000 the year before. In the weeks following the event fans told Scardello they had stopped going to the tournament because it was too crowded at Phoenix Country Club.
“We got out here and it wasn’t crowded at all,” they said. “It’s really nice.”
It’s a bit more crowded these days, of course. The 2018 tournament hosted closed to 720,000 fans for the week. That was the last year tournament organizers announced attendance figures.
“It’s like the Super Bowl of golf tournaments,” said Champions Tour player Steve Jones, who played in the ’87 event and won it in ’97.
The stadium concept at the par-3 16th hole gets much of the credit for the tournament’s growth but Byrum believes the unique atmosphere, at least initially, had more to do with alcohol than aces.
“I don’t know what the attraction was other than there was beer being served for a long time,” Byrum said. “There was a beer stand on a hill that stayed open longer and it was perfect little amphitheater for people to gather around.”
Whatever the reason, the Open has come a long way since its dark beginning.
“I don’t think anybody could have anticipated what it’s become,” Beman said. “It evolved on its own. I’m very proud of it, honestly.”
Editor’s note: This story was originally published January 31, 2016, and written by Scott Bordow of the Arizona Republic, which is part of the USA TODAY Network, and updated to reflect 2022 is the 36th playing of the Phoenix Open.
