Andy Staples leads renovation of historic Arizona golf club where Joel Dahmen once shot a 58

MESA, Ariz. — A U.S. Open champ, two prominent PGA Tour stars and an NFL Hall of Famer call it home. Now Mesa Country Club, a true gem in the greater Phoenix area, is getting ready for a major renovation.

Located in an older part of the third largest city in Arizona, the club sits across the street from a cemetery and just blocks away from Hohokam Park, home to the Oakland A’s spring training.

What makes the place, though, is topography that features sometimes astounding elevation changes for a course that’s almost smack dab in the middle of the generally flat greater Phoenix area.

“Built in 1948 by William P. Bell, the Golden Age architect,” said Andy Staples of Staples Golf Design, the Scottsale-based firm hired for the renovation. “We think it was one of the first courses William P. Bell and his son William F. Bell designed together.”

What’s also attractive to many of its members is its location. The Loop 202 is just a mile to the north. Phoenix Sky Harbor Airport is less than 15 minutes to the west. Scottsdale residents – including honorary members and PGA Tour stars Max Homa and Joel Dahmen – are about 35 minutes away.

Other members include PGA Tour Champions golfers Steve Jones, who won the 1996 U.S. Open, and Michael Allen. Don’t forget 2018 Pro Football Hall of Fame inductee and former Chicago Bears great Brian Urlacher.

“I first played here in 1982. Just old school. Love it,” Jones said. “You don’t get tired of this course. Small greens. You gotta have your irons under control. It’s a challenge. And the membership is just the frosting on the cake.”

Dahmen visits frequently, and in 2020 while playing with a few members of the Chicago Cubs he set the course record by shooting a 58.

The laid-back Mesa Country Club isn’t trying to keep its membership rolls a secret, nor does it have someone stationed at the front desk reminding everyone to take off their hats indoors. It is a private club with a relaxed atmosphere, none of the stuffy pretenses found elsewhere.

“Mesa Country Club is a special spot in the Valley, which has a lot of high-end private courses, but it’s a great country club but also has great people and has a blue-collar attitude,” Dahmen said. “You can show up in jeans, you can show up in a T-shirt. It’s just a really special spot for me. It’s like how I grew up playing golf. It’s a little more laid back, not as many rules.”

Old-school golf in the desert

As for the layout, it’s unlike most of the desert golf common in the Phoenix metropolitan area. That’s partly due to the age of the venue.

“We’re not really thought of as being an historic state for great old classic golf courses, which is one of the reasons I was hired because I have those tendencies,” Staples said.

MCC has a lot in common with Phoenix Country Club (host of the Charles Schwab Cup Championship on the PGA Tour Champions) and Arizona Country Club, also in Phoenix. All three layouts are old-school, parkland-style designs with rolling hills, huge trees and lots of grass.

Mesa Country Club has too much grass, in fact, and a reduction is a major part of the renovation. Staples said his redesign will take it from about 125 acres of sod to about 100. As you play the course, you can easily spot several areas where there will be no grass in the future –  these are areas that don’t need it, as they are for the most part out of play.

The course was built on a mesa, with several steep climbs most noticeable on:

• The par-5 fifth hole, with a dramatic downhill fairway that if managed properly could lead to getting home in two.
• The par-3 seventh, which has a canal rushing next to the tee box before meandering across the front of the green.
• The 10th hole, a par 4 on which the back tees are on a deck right off the clubhouse, requiring a tee shot over the road that leads cars to the parking lot.
• The par-3 16th, with an elevated tee box aimed at a small green that becomes narrow if there’s a back pin in play.
• The par-5 18th, which will see most golfers hitting a third shot up a steep hill to a green situated just off the clubhouse deck.

There’s a canal that slithers about the property, crossing several fairways and forcing some golfers to rethink their second shots on a couple of the par 5s. It comes into play on five holes. There also are a couple of lakes along the ninth hole, which features the trickiest green on the course.

The course was long overdue for a renovation, with the irrigation system in greatest need of an upgrade. Staples is big on conservation and responsible water consumption, calling it a “core value of sustainable golf design.”

He’s not just looking to renovate for next season but for decades down the road.

“What I try to do in all my golf courses is do it in such a manner that is looking 20, 30, 40 years down the line. Water efficiency, labor efficiency, those costs are only going up. So water is a huge aspect.”

A major re-do of all the greenside bunkers is planned. There won’t be any new bunkers, but the existing ones will be reshaped with added depth as needed and new sand added to all of them. Fairway bunkers, meanwhile, will be left as is, as there aren’t infinite resources available. The fairway bunkers will be reworked at a later date.

The greens, meanwhile, suffered from the common problem of shrinkage. They’ll be restored to their original sizes and brought up to modern standards.

Brian Reed, Mesa Country Club’s vice president of the board, confirmed the course will close on Feb. 18, 2024, with a goal to reopen on Nov. 1. He said the club is committing $10 million to the project.

Staples, who likes to tell a self-deprecating joke that he’s not the son of a famous golf course architect nor does he have a major championship or two on his playing resume, does have an impressive list of renovations and new builds in his portfolio. Most notable among his renovation work is Olympia Fields Country Club in Illinois. Of the seven courses he built, Sand Hollow Resort’s Links Course in Hurricane, Utah, and the Match Course at PGA National in Palm Beach Gardens, Florida, stand out.

As far as the future of Mesa Country Club, Staples says it’s probably not too far down the road before the golf club invests in TifTuf, a strain of Bermuda grass that can thrive year-round around Phoenix, even in the brutal summer heat. That will render the days of overseeding with rye grass for the winter a thing of the past, giving three weeks of playing time back to the membership.

The key to this renovation, though, is keeping the course grounded in its historical style, Staples said.

“I’d like to think that my tilt towards classic architecture tipped it in my favor.”