[Dan_Callahan]

While it's a world class course, and an awesome venue for the US Open, watching today was only slightly more exciting than watching paint dry. It's my hope, as with past Oakmont experiences, seeing it in person on Saturday, will be more exciting than the TV coverage. I mean, if Berman can't hype it up with "Major Tom's from ground control," it can't be hyped.

Two days of Chris Berman in the booth has been nothing short of unbearable. Someone needs to take him behind the clubhouse and tear out his larynx.

[Michael Christensen]

I really do not know what the problem is with trying to make professionals and the highest grade of amateurs hit the fairway.  That is the main test at a US Open.  If you hit the FW you have a chance to attack or play to a place on the green you want.  Don't hit the FW you should be penalized.  Sometimes it is a severe penalty, sometimes it is a minor penalty.

Casey and Ames shot a score today...it shows it can be done.  And I just saw Cabrera hit SW into #9....so if you are on with your drives, you CAN attack these greens.

[Jay Flemma]

Mike and Dan...I'm not saying I want -14...I want -4.

Afew birdies to give the fans SOMETHING TO CHEER ABOUT!  They pay green money for this event, but they wait for the lighning bolt that rarely if ever strikes.  I didn't hear a single roar today...I mean a real roar. And I was out there on the course for a good four hours.

156 of the greatest players in the world and NOBODY under par?  That's not balanced...that's all I'm saying.

[Eric_Terhorst]

I am watching loads of guys hack out to the fairway or or onto a green.  This is not proper golf so far as I am concerned

Sean, by this measure you must count Nicklaus' 10 out the Hell Bunker and David Duval's 8 out of the Road Hole bunker as among the most improper golf moments in golf history...

[Andy Troeger]

Hopefully we can have an entertaining meltdown such as at Carnoustie because thus far this event is a serious snoozefest.  I am really amazed that you lot go on like this.  You even complained about the Masters this spring when guys weren't allowed played aggressively.  Why such a free card for the US Open?

Ciao

The thing that amazes me is the comparison to the Masters. Augusta grows some rough and plants some trees and makes accuracy more important, sometimes allowing for recovery and often forcing pitch-outs, and everybody wails and moans about it. Oakmont grows tall rough and has deep bunkers, sometimes allowing for recovery and often forcing pitch-outs, and everybody seems to be much more favorable to the idea.

The end results are pretty similar thus far, yet the comments are not. That to be honest, I don't understand.

Its a US Open, this is pretty standard stuff.

[noonan]

There comes a point where a test becomes so difficult that it does not reward skill.

Example - trying to thread a needle at 7 feet.

[JohnV]

I don't know if we are watching the same event.  I am watching loads of guys hack out to the fairway or or onto a green.  This is not proper golf so far as I am concerned no matter if its a US Open or not.

Then tell them to hit more than 50% of the fairways.

I've spent two days walking with the players.  Of the 6 guys I walked with, 2 made the cut.  They were without a doubt the ones who hit the ball the best and made the least mental mistakes when they did make a mistake.

I saw some incredible recoveries from all the players and I saw some pretty stupid plays or less than marginal recovery attempts get severly punished.  I also saw some players make the smart play and then follow it up with another bad shot.  Yesterday on #5, Luke Donald hit a hybird onto a mound above a bunker on the left side.  He made the smart play and wedged it back to the fairway.  Then he made another bad play and knocked it over the green from where he couldn't get it up and down.  Two wrongs equaled a double bogey.

How does the US Open test players?  Physically and mentally.  Look at the mental errors that Tiger made on #2 today or Toms made on #14.  They both got greedy after terrible tee shots with irons and only a great up and down from the back bunker saved Tiger from double.  Nothing could save Toms.

As for the rough, I've seen that most players can reach the green from the first tier of rough and the most have to layup from the second tier.  The second tier starts 15 to 20 yards off the fairway, with the exception of some of the shorter par 4s where they bring it in closer the closer you get to the greens.  If you miss the edge of the fairway by 15 yards and the middle of the fairway by 25 to 30 yards, you deserve to be punished.

[Kalen Braley]

I gathered up the following stats off the USGA website and seems to make perfect sense, although it would be nice to compare it to a typical PGA tour event.

Most fairways hit - Only 6 players in the top 32 missed the cut
GIRs - only 3 players in the top 35 missed the cut.

So is it really about driving or is it about GIRs? Or were those GIRs so good for those players so good because they were playing from the fairway?  Perhaps a chicken/egg dilema here.

[Tim Bert]

I admit it.  I love to watch the pros blow-up at the US Open.  It's not because someone has told me that I should.  It's because after years of watching it, I enjoy the diversion from the typical event where birdies and eagles rule the day.  I wouldn't want to see over par when every week, but it is nice to be able to plan the calendar around the explosion at the Open.  I love watching the recovery shots and the remarkable par saves.  

I haven't seen one minute this week because I was traveling, but I'll be watching a little tomorrow, and you can count on my TV being on for the entire final pairing come Sunday.

I'll watch this year and the next and the next and so on.  And not because someone told me I should enjoy the difficulty and high scores, but because I know what entertains me - and this is one of those rare days when I can remain fixed in front of my TV for 4 consecutive hours.

[George Pazin]

Mike and Dan...I'm not saying I want -14...I want -4.

Afew birdies to give the fans SOMETHING TO CHEER ABOUT!  They pay green money for this event, but they wait for the lighning bolt that rarely if ever strikes.  I didn't hear a single roar today...I mean a real roar. And I was out there on the course for a good four hours.

156 of the greatest players in the world and NOBODY under par?  That's not balanced...that's all I'm saying.

Jay, two minor quibbles:

Oakmont's normal par is 71 - Cabrera is 2 under;

and

do you really believe it's possible to engineer a score that exactly?

The line between Shinnecock and a normal Tour stop is probably a lot finer than people think. I, for one, would much rather err on the side of too tough. I found today's play much more compelling than yesterday's. A little firmer and tougher hole locations made a gigantic difference.

My recollection of Carnoustie is that there were spots that fairways were narrowed to 10-18 yards. That is way less than just about anywhere I can think of at Oakmont. Carnoustie seemed like automatic wedge outs. I guess I did watch a different tourney than Sean, because I saw plenty of people at least try to go for greens, and not just wedge out. This caused problems in a lot of cases, as JohnV mentions.

Cabrera's birdie on 9 was just a dagger to so many guys.

Can't wait to see what the weekend has in store.

[Bill_McBride]

I gotta say I am very surprised by Tiger's game plan.  I thought he proved at Hoylake that he could hit irons and beat the field who were hitting drivers.

[Dan King]

Jay Flemma writes:
Mike and Dan...I'm not saying I want -14...I want -4.

You can do that. Since par is meaningless, don't let the USGA dictate to you what par is. You can determine the par you want to determine. If you decide par is 72 (nice, level fours) then you can. Now you have the leader at 4-under halfway through the tournament with seven players under par. You can even go crazy and call the course a par-80. Now you have the leader at 20-under, and the cut came at 10-under. Coool. Bob Hope would be thrilled. Viewers that really want to see the players struggle can call it a par-18, with 104-over currently leading.

Why let the USGA dictate how much you are going to enjoy the tournament?

Cheers,
Dan King

For the 1920 US Open, the future superstar, Bobby Jones, playing his first Open, was paired with the great Harry Vardon, then the
greatest player the game had ever seen. Early in the round, Jones thinned a simple short pitch right through the green. Red with embarrassment he turned to Vardon and said: "Mr. Vardon, have you ever seen a worse shot than that!"
"No," Vardon replied.
  --Michael Hobbs

[Phil McDade]

Bill:

Oakmont may be fast and firm, but it doesn't appear to have reached the ultra-fast, browned-out stage that Hoylake was in last summer. Oakmont has five sub-400 yard par 4s, but its other par 4s are quite long, and the par 5 12th virtually demands a driver as well. Tiger could get away with no driver at Hoylake; I think everyone, including him, has to use driver on at least some holes every round. And, some of Tiger's irons off the tee have been errant, i.e., his very first tee shot today.

[Jim Nugent]

I gotta say I am very surprised by Tiger's game plan.  I thought he proved at Hoylake that he could hit irons and beat the field who were hitting drivers.

From what I saw, it's not a matter of game plan.  It's execution.  At Hoylake, those irons ended up in the fairway: he hit 85% of the fairways, IIRC.  So far at Oakmont, lots of them are not.  He has only hit 54% of fairways.   And where he hit over 80% of greens at Hoylake, he's only hit 58% at Oakmont.  

[George Pazin]

Phil, several of the long par 4s at Oakmont are long on the scorecard only - they play significantly downhill.

Case in point:

Thursday Tiger hit driver off the 1st tee, missing the fairway by a good bit, and started the day off with a bogey. Friday he hit iron off the 1st tee (his 10th of the day). Result: split the fairway, parred the hole. Even the 10th, where you note he missed the fairway with an iron, he was only in the first cut, up against the next cut, and made par.

Similarly, if one accepts the 670 yard 12th, the greatest hole in golf, as a 3 shot hole, the big boys could easily play it with an iron off the tee.

Does anyone know if Tiger has hit the fairway with his driver yet?

[Jay Flemma]

yes...at least twice he said.

[wsmorrison]

"If you think its mindless...and if wayne doesn't like it...then I know I did something right."

Then in your mind, you must have done something exceptionally right because I don't agree with just about everything you wrote.  In your case ignorance must be bliss.

[JohnV]

I don't know if we are watching the same event.  I am watching loads of guys hack out to the fairway or or onto a green.  This is not proper golf so far as I am concerned no matter if its a US Open or not.

Then tell them to hit more than 50% of the fairways.

If you miss the edge of the fairway by 15 yards and the middle of the fairway by 25 to 30 yards, you deserve to be punished.

This is the type of comment I don't understand.  I don't care about what a player supposedly deserves (whatever this means).  If the game is gonna be on tv it should be entertaining.  I don't find the attitude of you get what you deserve entertaining.  Watching groups unable to make plays from the rough on nearly every hole is not entertaining.  Watching players standing around waiting for shots to be contemplated and then executed from nasty rough is not entertaining.  I guess I'm odd that way.

I spose my concept of golf is very different than most on this site.   I want to watch the sort of golf I enjoy playing.  The one exception was Carnoustie.  That was amazing drama I think mainly because the Frog was thinking like 15 capper rather than a pro on the cusp of winning the Open.  It was totally mesmerizing to watch such a breakdown of the thought process.  Probably the biggest difference between me and apparently most on this site is that I am not addicted to watching golf - I can take it or leave it because I know for the most part it is boring to watch.  I expect to be entertained if I am gonna watch.  From my perspective, the Masters and the Open provide much more entertainment on a yearly basis than the USGA - much of the reason are the setup difference in the courses.  

Ciao

Sean, I don't understand why you feel that your entertainment is the reason the US Open is being played as opposed to identifying a national champion.

As I understand it, the purpose of the championship is to identify the player who hits the best shots and therefore makes the lowest score and wins.  Someone who can't control his ball and keep it within a 40 yard wide dispersion should pay a price in that effort to win.  That is what I mean by deserves.  There are other ways to deal with it than long rough such as lots of trees, water or out of bounds, or in the best of worlds a terrible angle into a green, but at Oakmont, the rough or a deep bunker is the punishment usually dealt.  Given that the player can get the ball back to the fairway from there, he still has the opportunity to get the ball up and down for par and I've seen quite a few of them do that in person and on TV this week.  I've also seen quite a few of them try to be overly heroic and end up with a double bogey.

[Brent Hutto]

Again, why does Oakmont get a pass this year when Winged Foot and Carnoustie do not?.  What is substantially different other than perhaps one's opinion of the quality of the course?

Sean, as it happens my wife and I were discussing this very question over breakfast. My conclusion is that if that Carnoustie setup was a complete cluster--k, then this year's Oakmont setup can not be brilliant. And vice versa. If there had been 20mph winds on Thursday and Friday the bloodbath at Oakmont would have made Carnoustie look like the Hope Chrysler Classic.

I suppose I need to see Oakmont for myself one of these days. Because for some reason, everyone around here who's seen it grant it a special status where the things that this group spends 365 days/year hacking on about other courses are considered extra-special bonus features at Oakmont. It must indeed be a very special place.

[George Pazin]

Mike and Dan...I'm not saying I want -14...I want -4.

Afew birdies to give the fans SOMETHING TO CHEER ABOUT!  They pay green money for this event, but they wait for the lighning bolt that rarely if ever strikes.  I didn't hear a single roar today...I mean a real roar. And I was out there on the course for a good four hours.

156 of the greatest players in the world and NOBODY under par?  That's not balanced...that's all I'm saying.

My recollection of Carnoustie is that there were spots that fairways were narrowed to 10-18 yards. That is way less than just about anywhere I can think of at Oakmont. Carnoustie seemed like automatic wedge outs. I guess I did watch a different tourney than Sean, because I saw plenty of people at least try to go for greens, and not just wedge out. This caused problems in a lot of cases, as JohnV mentions.

George

Where did you get this info?  First the rumour was the sup fertilized the rough (couldn't have anything to do with a very wet spring - thats too easy surmise) and now there were 10 yard wide fairways.

I will grant that Carnoustie was diabolical, but I would hesitate to state that it was set this way on purpose.  Plus, this little shindig happening right now is looking very similar to Carnoustie, in fact even more harshl because of the very penal bunkering on nearly every hole.  

Again, why does Oakmont get a pass this year when Winged Foot and Carnoustie do not?.  What is substantially different other than perhaps one's opinion of the quality of the course?

Ciao    

Ciao

Sean, I didn't say all fairways, or even some fairways, I said some spots. One of the preview issues I just read earlier in the week, either Golf or Golf Digest, said there was one landing area that was 9 yards wide. I will try to find it for you next week, if you don't believe me.

I thought WF last year was fine as well.

I didn't see as much of the Carnoustie Open, only snippets of the first 3 days and a good bit of the final day; but there seemed to be much more wedging out. I could certainly be mistaken in that impression.

All the anecdotal stuff favors Oakmont as well. The first round leader at Carnoustie missing the cut, Garcia reduced to tears after shooting 89 or whatever.

The players, with a few notable exceptions, have generally said Oakmont is incredibly tough, but generally fair.

[TEPaul]

Let me ask you all something;

If a guy like Tiger Woods really is the best on the planet and the likes of Mickleson, Els, Goosen, Singh et al aren't far behind then what aren't they doing at Oakmont that some of these fellows on the top of the Oakmont US Open leaderboard are doing?

I think I like this idea more and more that the four majors really are significantly different from one another. It's varietal and it makes the best of the champions adjust if they want to be successful in all of them.

What's wrong with that?

I think we all know that Woods has been having trouble with the accuracy of his driver for a few years now. That doesn't seem to show much because of the way most pro tournaments are setup. It will surely be exposed at a US Open, though, and nobody could know that better than Woods.

I've never seen Woods miss many fairways with that interesting variety of 3 wood tee shots he has. Why isn't he using that more often?

[Tom Dunne]

I think one could certainly make the argument that of all the Open venues, this type of setup is most appropriate at Oakmont. It's not a Golden Age course; it predates it by half a generation, and the essential nature of the course is penal.

On the other hand, the fact that so many players are worried about the rough (and not just Phil, who's an easy target), does suggest to me that the setup has been overcooked once again. I question whether this kind of hyper-harvesting was really necessary in order to let Oakmont be Oakmont.

The thing I don't get is this "identifying champions" business. So many people complained that Ogilvy backed into the title last year, as if pars on Winged Foot's 18th were a dime a dozen. Ben Curtis is still considered a schmuck even though he's since won twice more on Tour. As long as they're all playing the same course, and there's no on-the-spot tinkering as at Shinnecock, I simply enjoy watching players (great and small) find different ways to contend or win.  

Why not just sit back and enjoy the weekend, and figure out what it all means afterward? Isn't that what Monday morning quarterbacking is all about? We've got the best players in the world taking on one of our finest courses--that's more than enough for me.  

[Rick Shefchik]

I know this much: If the U.S.G.A. did not choose America's most difficult golf courses for the Open, and set them up in a way that made par an exceptionally good score, some other organization would.

There would be a tremendous void in golf if the pros were not subjected to conditions like these at least once a year.

[Jay Flemma]

Be honest with me...did you and wayne even read the entire piece?

Or are you judging just the snippet.  The piece was well received by alot of other people.

I had a great time and thought it a great championship...but what was the point of lowering par?  +1 would have won and the fans would have had more excitement with more birdies.

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