An Anti Tiger Woods design: Painted Desert stands up as a reasonable Las Vegas course that emphasizes conditions

Sometimes finding a golf course in good shape for a reasonable price is enough.

Especially in a place like Las Vegas where golfers going in blind can find themseleves paying big dollars for very little value.

That’s what makes Painted Desert Golf Club such an unexpectedly important course. This often completely forgotten track is one of the most consistently green and well-conditioned courses in Vegas despite its Sin City-reasonable $109 high-season greens fee.

I wrote story about Painted Desert last spring and its greens whisperer superintendent. And it’s nice to see that more Vegas visitors (locals long knew the secret) are discovering it.

“As far as a good value play, Painted Desert is getting a lot more attention from golfers,” said Scott Bowles of Las Vegas Golf Travel, a course and hotel packaging company.

It’s an interesting little counterpoint in a week when Tiger Woods’ jump into the mad money world of celebrity golf architects is all anyone wants to talk about.

Painted Desert is one of those no-name designer, little marketing machinery golf courses that most people will never hear of. Yet, a number that do will enjoy playing it immensely because it remembers what a lot of golfers truly care about: a course in good shape for a decent price.

Imagine that truly crazy concept.