
CHARLOTTE, NORTH CAROLINA | What was then called the Wachovia Championship was in its second year of existence at Quail Hollow Club when the hosts of a Saturday morning golf radio show threw out a question to the audience, many of whom were listening on shuttle buses taking them to the tournament.
Given the hero-to-heartbreak nature of Quail Hollow’s three finishing holes, they asked, should the 16th, 17th and 18th holes have a nickname?
The phone lines lit up like never before. When a caller suggested the Green Mile – the title of a movie referring to the color of the tiles on the floor leading condemned prisoners to the electric chair in a Louisiana prison – a nickname was born.
Maybe it didn’t have the style and history of Amen Corner, but the Green Mile had its identity.
Say it and golf fans – and competitors – know what it is.
The par-4 16th hole, which measures 529 gently downhill yards, the 223-yard par-3 17th with water short, left and long, and the 494-yard, par-4 18th hole with a creek snaking along the left side, bring nerves and danger into play.
Since the PGA Tour returned to Quail Hollow in 2003, the three finishing holes have been the most difficult three-hole finish on the PGA Tour, averaging 0.9 strokes over par with a total of 1,803 balls in the water (through the 2024 Wells Fargo Championship).
Though the seemingly incessant showers that have saturated Quail Hollow Club this week will have a heavy hand in dictating the names likely to be on the PGA Championship leaderboard – short hitters will be at a greater disadvantage than before – the Green Mile will almost certainly have a direct impact on who hoists the Wanamaker Trophy Sunday evening.
“It is just a beast,” Jordan Spieth said.
Since the PGA Tour returned to Quail Hollow in 2003 and including the 2017 PGA Championship, the numbers for the Green Mile are striking.
A brief history lesson here.
When Quail Hollow opened in 1961 and through the decades that it hosted the PGA Tour’s Kemper Open and one of the original senior tour events, the three finishing holes were very different.
The 16th was a strong par-4 but its green sat atop a slope rather than near the lake that frames the closing stretch of holes. That redesign didn’t happen until the summer of 2013.
Under architect George Cobb’s original design, the green on the par-3 17th was situated up a hill and away from the water. Arnold Palmer, a Quail Hollow member, brought the green to the water’s edge in 1985, changing the hole completely.
It was Tom Fazio, the club’s resident architect now, who redesigned the finishing hole, adding the diabolical creek when he reworked the course in late 1997.
No. 16 (left), No. 17 and No. 18 at Quail Hollow. (Click on images to enlarge.)
Since the PGA Tour returned to Quail Hollow in 2003 and including the 2017 PGA Championship, the numbers for the Green Mile are striking.
Cumulatively, the first 15 holes at Quail Hollow have played 1,290-under par while the three finishing holes are a combined 7,683-over par.
Specifically in the 2017 PGA, the first 15 holes played 645-over par and the Green Mile clocked in a 488-over par.
“This golf course comes at you in waves. The first six holes you’ve had a good warm-up, buckle up, hang in there and then really from Nos. 7 through 15 is your opportunity to get going,” said CBS golf analyst Trevor Immelman, who finished second in the 2006 Wachovia Championship at Quail Hollow.
“You’ve got a couple drivable par-4s. You’ve got three par-5s. You really can make your score in the middle of the round. And then you get to 16 when the pressure is at its highest and things are most intense because you really need to hang on at 16, 17 and 18 with a major championship on the line.”
The Green Mile can be generous. There are 27 players who have a career score under par on the three holes but almost all were one-offs, such as David Lynn, whose 4-under par score is the best of the 777 players in tournament competition over the years. He was one and done at Quail Hollow as were the six players who are 2-under lifetime on the Green Mile.
Play it enough and it gets everyone.
The Green Mile asks direct and difficult questions of players.
Vijay Singh is 62-over par on the Green Mile, Lucas Glover is 55-over and Phil Mickelson is 52-over par on those holes. The par-3 17th has tormented Mickelson through the years; one year he played it in bogey and three double bogeys.
Even before the Green Mile had its nickname, David Toms gave it an element of distinction when he won the inaugural Wachovia Championship in 2003 despite making a quadruple bogey 8 on the 18th hole in the final round.
The Green Mile asks direct and difficult questions of players.
“I think the only shot you can really consider where you don’t have to be super focused on is the drive on 16. The fairway is pretty wide, and the hole is pretty long. You’re really trying to get it down there as far as you can into the fairway,” Scottie Scheffler said.
“But after that, the approach shot into 16 is really tough. The tee shot on 17 is really tough. Then you’ve got two really challenging shots on 18 with the water on the left side. There’s no real breathers in that stretch of holes.”
Survive the 17th and all that’s asked is to find a narrow fairway guarded by the creek along the left and trees and a bunker on the right side of the 18th.
Ask Rory McIlroy, who has won four times at Quail Hollow, the most intimidating shot on the closing stretch and he doesn’t hesitate.
“The tee shot on 17. That’s the consensus isn’t it?” said McIlroy, who has made more Green Mile birdies (20) than any player since 2010.
Unlike the annual PGA Tour event, which builds hospitality space over the back tee at 17, the PGA Championship will use the longest tee this week, adding more than 30 yards and changing the angle into a green that runs gently away from players in the back.
Survive the 17th and all that’s asked is to find a narrow fairway guarded by the creek along the left and trees and a bunker on the right side of the 18th. From there the creek hugs the left side of the green which has a substantial slope from back to front while leaning slightly toward the creek.
“(No.) 18 I think is the best of the three holes. You’ve got to hit a good drive to get it in the fairway. If you’re not in the fairway, you’re pretty much done for on that one,” said Sepp Straka, winner of last week’s Truist Championship.
“It’s going to take a lot of controlling the nerves and just executing good shots under a lot of pressure.”