The first Elite Series stop on the West Coast swing.

May 20, 2022 by Charlie Eisenhood in Preview with comments

In an interview on The Upshot podcast, OTB Open co-TD Sean Jack said he wants the tournament to become the PGA Tour’s Waste Management Phoenix Open of disc golf.

The Phoenix Open is widely celebrated (and criticized) for being a fun, rowdy tournament, a real break from the stuffy atmosphere that can sometimes accompany golf. Just look at this scene from this year’s tournament after Sam Ryder hit a hole-in-one:

Sam Ryder Hole in One

The OTB Open has doubled down on their “party peninsula,” complete with a bar and grill and viewing platform, to give spectators a festive locale to watch some disc golf. There are also bleachers going up around hole 18 for fans looking to watch some final round drama. And it is fitting that this will be the first event to feature a post-round live music show, a part of the Disc Golf Pro Tour’s new concert series: The Main Squeeze will perform following an opening DJ set from Kevin Jones (yes, that Kevin Jones).

Oh, should we discuss the actual disc golf? When this tournament was at Gleneagles DGC in San Francisco, it was a grinder of an event, calling for a lot of full power shots and some big elevation changes. The move to Stockton and Swenson Park means less hills but even more distance. This is the longest course on tour so far this season, and it’s a few hundred feet longer than it was last year, when it was record-setting on tour.

Although the tournament is set on a golf course, the design mostly avoids the use of the golf fairways, instead cutting through the trees and in the margins to create a course that feels more disc golf-y than a typical golf…