[rboyce]

Shaping up to be an amazing finish.

Take a scroll thru the leaderboard and notice where the American flags are concentrated. Maybe just anecdotal, but seems to say a lot about where the best players are coming from.

http://www.uswomensopen.com/scoring/dyn/alllb.html

[wsmorrison]

Why hasn't anyone posted about this Open?  My friend, Charlotte Mayorkas was having a great tournament until the 3rd round seems to be getting her.  She and a bunch of her tour friends are playing golf with me on Thursday.  I gotta take the dogs out for their walk, but this course and this tournament deserve some discussions.  I hope many watch and discuss later.

[Mark Bourgeois]

I think the weather delays have made this tournament very difficult to follow.  That said, the course looks fantastic.

I've really enjoyed seeing the first hole. Not sure what the field average is, but it seems to be playing like a par 4.40; ie just a little easier than a par 4.5.

[Dan Herrmann]

Sunday morning - it's live on ESPN2 right now

Wayne - how'd you get with Charlotte Mayorkas?  UCLA grad, so that isn't it...  Looks like a player with a great future.

I used to know a bunch of the LPGA players thru Nike.  They were always very nice and "real".  And, boy, did they like the employee store!

--------------------------------

Back to the course - what do folks think about John Fought's work?  To me, it looks like he put the Ross back into the Ross.  Seems like Fought was pretty darn successful to me.

The golf course looks wonderful.  We've already made a decision to visit sometime.  

[wsmorrison]

Dan,

Yep, Charlotte was number 1 on her UCLA team.  She stayed at my mother-in-law's house when the Women's Amateur was at Philadelphia Country Club in 2003.  She visited us each year since, playing Rolling Green, Merion and Philadelphia Country Club on her brief visits.  She is very interested in classic era golf courses.  Growing up in LA, it is no wonder that she is very fond of Riviera, Bel Air and LACC.  I think Bel Air was a practice course for UCLA.

Next week is a week off for the ladies, so she's going to stop by on her way north and play, with a few of her tour friends.  She is a wonderful young lady with a bright future on tour.  I am fortunate to get to know her.  We'll see how they do from the orange markers at 6480 yards.  I hope it is firm and fast.  Maybe Matt will put in a few diabolical pins  

When are we getting together?

[Phil Benedict]

Pressel is a gritty competitor.  Pressure's on Lorena to win a major.  4th round should be terrific.

[Ken_Cotner]

Really enjoyed it.  Pine Needles was terrific, albeit maybe not as firm in the fairways and greens as they would have liked due to rain.

Spent most of Saturday out there.  Really fun watching shots around the greens.  Those girls/ladies/women are VERY good.  But most are SLOW (like the men, I guess).  Exceptions -- Laura Davies, Annika, Brittany Lincicome.  Brittany was fun to watch -- energetic and definitely trying to push the pace!  

I thought the last round on TV was compelling also.  Seemed that Johnny Miller and Roger Maltbie liked the course but didn't really know it well  -- read several putts incorrectly that break opposite from what your mind tells you.  Congratulations to Cristi(?) Kerr.

Ken

[michael j fay]

The field had 5 Parks (no Central), 6 Lees (no Robert E. or Gypsy Rose) and 6 Kims (last name not first). They should rename it the Women's Tournament with Seoul. More Koreans made the cut than Americans.

Big kudos to Both John Fought and Kristie Kerr.

Maybe Fought can be the new Open Doctor.

[Brent Hutto]

Slow doesn't begin to cover it. It was painful even watching the last nine holes after the fact with the DVR on fast-forward. I'm just about to join Shivas in advocating to outlaw the "cheater line" if I have to see one more person step up to the ball and then crouch back down to move the damned line a fraction of a millimeter.

I just got a mental image of David Ledbetter's academy sitting down there in Florida mass-producing these painfully slow Kabuki performances on the greens. Imagine ranks of young men and women as far as the eye can see with a conductor calling through a megaphone

"Plumb Bob!"
"Bend!"
"Mark!"
"Align!"
"Look!"
"Twiddle!"
"Stand!"
"Bend!"
"Re-Mark!"
"360 Walk!
"Doublecheck!"
"Pick up marker!"
"Step Up!"
"Step Away!"
"Re-Mark!"
"Twiddle!"

later, rinse, repeat...

If this junk was anything other than b.s., they'd never miss a putt inside eight feet with one of these routines.

[Dan Herrmann]

Don't blame the pros - blame the pablum they're fed since their childhood, "You must have a routine and never vary from the routine."

The AGJA was painful to watch on the greens - boys and girls.  So friggin' slow.

[Matt_Cohn]

The golf course looked fantastic. A nice combination of interesting holes without being so interesting that it distracted from the tournament itself.

I know Ochoa is the best lady player in the world, but she does have some areas of concern in her swing, doesn't she? Has any great player ever had so much head movement, either swinging or putting?

The rough was interesting as it seemed to provide a mix of deep ugly lies; pretty good lies; and lies that simply made the ball hard to control. It was also unusual to see many, many balls over the backs of the greens. Come to think of it, I'm not sure I've ever seen over-the-green in play to that extent in any other tournament I've seen.

Brent,

If they outlaw the line on the ball, will the manufacturers be ordered to start printing their name on the ball crookedly?  

[Garland Bayley]

Great win for Cristie. I became a fan when Annika was going to play the PGA tour. Golf Digest wanted to test an LPGA player on a PGA setup. All the players turned them down, as they didn't want to take a chance on losing face. Cristie simply said, sure where do I tee it up. She went to the Phoenix tour stop and played Sunday pins and tees on Monday. Shot a couple or three over par. Made it obvious that Las Vegas was way out of line saying Annika couldn't break 80. Wish I could say a made a bundle with that info, but I'm not exactly a betting man.

[Rick Shefchik]

I'm tired of watching them line up their cheater lines, too. They should stop doing it because there's no evidence that they putt better that way.

The Women's Open simply reinforced the post I made early on the first page of Shivas's 137,000-post "Cheater line" thread: If it doesn't work, it ain't cheating.

[Glenn Spencer]

College football is screwed up. I will readily admit that, but at least they have a coaches poll. The LPGA needs one.  Any ranking system that has Lorena Ochoa ranked 1st needs to be looked at. How can you be the best player in the world, even though you haven't won a big tournament? Yeah, she gets points for winning the little ones, but c'mon. How many shots did she half shank today? I bet Christie Kerr could name 5 players that she would have been more afraid of in the last group today. Hopefully, I am wrong, but after 18 at Cherry Hills and today, I am not buying her as the best in the world. Kerr's birdie on 14 was as good as it gets. It was something you would expect from a champion or the best in the world, no matter how it is determined.

[Glenn Spencer]

Also, I agree with the announcers and all about the job that Fought did on the course. I thought it played beautifully, but I could not figure out what they were saying about adding yardage. Was that for the tournament or for the course? Anybody know? If it was for the tournament, wouldn't they just move to the mens tees? I couldn't figure it out.

[Sean_A]

Also, I agree with the announcers and all about the job that Fought did on the course. I thought it played beautifully, but I could not figure out what they were saying about adding yardage. Was that for the tournament or for the course? Anybody know? If it was for the tournament, wouldn't they just move to the mens tees? I couldn't figure it out.

Glenn

Like many Ross courses, Pine Needles has many holes in which the player has the choice of staying on top of a hill (knob to knob drives essentially) for the approach or try to bang the ball over the hill to the flat for a much shorter approach, but usually uphill OR one could get stuck on the downslope.  I think some holes were lengthened to regain this sort of choice off the tee.  I would have thought the ladies were essentially playing the Ross tees at around 6400 yards - maybe 500 or so yards shorter than the back tees.  

Ciao

[TEPaul]

I say three cheers and a twenty gun salute for Dottie Pepper. She should announce at every tournament. The only problem is she's at her best when the camera shows her and I guess we can't expect they could have her on-screen all the time. Or can we?  

Her Newport Women's Open announcing was the best I ever saw.

The fact that Bill Vostinak absolutely adores her announcing is the proof of how good she is.

[Brad Klein]

Glen,

in response to your Reply #15, they moved the tees back for this year's U.S. Women's Open at Pine Needles by 200 yards, but there is also a new back set of tees available at 7,000 yards. All part of Fought's restoration of the playing character. The effect, for strong men and for strong women, is that now they are hitting into the upslopes of the hills as Ross intended, rather than hitting the ball up, over and way past the apex of the hills. The course plays far more than than 200 yards longer this way from those 6,600 yard tees than from the 6,400 yard tees.

[Brent Hutto]

Don't blame the pros - blame the pablum they're fed since their childhood, "You must have a routine and never vary from the routine."

I have a putting routine and I agree that it's absolutely important to never vary from it (at least if you're playing for something and keeping score). My routine is to read the putt while walking to the ball and while pulling the pin. Then I mark my ball, wipe it off and replace it. Then I take one practice stroke and immediately step up and hit the ball.

The problem is not repeating the same set of steps every time you hit the ball. The problem is when the thing you're repeating includes idiotic, superstitious, time-wasting diversions like the "cheater line" or Furyk's asinine repeated backing off and starting over. Once I've marked and cleaned the golf ball, it takes me less than five seconds to hit the putt. If I took as long as these pro golfers do to get ready to hit it I'd either forget where the hole was or fall asleep before I got around to putting.

The AGJA was painful to watch on the greens - boys and girls.  So friggin' slow.

I was playing golf a couple years ago with a young man who played on his high school team. We were waiting on every shot but it didn't seem to bother him. He told me that in the 18-hole championship matches at the end of their season (they play 9-holes for most of their matches) you know going in it's going to be well over six hours. The normal pace is somewhere about six and half. He said you either learn to deal with it or you can't be a good high-school player.

[EDIT] And by the way, these people doing the "cheater line" thing are violating the principle of repeating the same routine every time. If you step up to the ball, look down and realize you have to go back and twiddle the line and start over then that's not at all the same as you do it the times you get the right correct. So it's even stupid by its own definition.

[Andy Doyle]

I know Ochoa is the best lady player in the world, but she does have some areas of concern in her swing, doesn't she? Has any great player ever had so much head movement, either swinging or putting?

I think they need to figure out what's going on inside her head.  She's a great player, but has some real problems in the close ones down the stretch.

The Golf Channel did a neat rewind/fast forward segment dating back to before Cherry Hills showing her tendency to pull/hook the ball when things get tense.

[Mike Hendren]

I find the caddies lining up the players far more objectionable than the cheater lines.

That said, a young man caught up with me on 18 this weekend and I asked him to join me.  He spent forever lining up the cheater line for a 12 foot putt and left it 18 inches short.  Classic.

Mike

[Jerry Kluger]

I don't think lining up the cheater line is what takes so much time - the problem is that they don't walk around the putt, etc., until it is their turn to play.  That is the same problem with all of their shots - men and women - they're on the tee on a par 3 and they don't look at their yardage book or consider their club selection or talk to their caddie until it is their turn to play.  

Were they really hitting it as far as the announcers said they were - I believe it was 17 where Kerr flew it over the bunker at the corner of the dogleg and they said that she carried it more than 275 yards - I was at the match play championship last year and spent most of my time at the range - didn't see any players carrying it that far.  

What about Johnny Miller's comment that he didn't like bunkers on the corner of a dogleg.

[Mike Hendren]

What about Johnny Miller's comment that he didn't like bunkers on the corner of a dogleg.

I questioned whether that is what I heard him say.  Not his best line.

From the aerial it appeared that the tee markers at 17 were not way up, so that's no small carry, but no way its 275.  

The 14th and 17th are outstanding examples of dogleg holes well bunkered at the corner (how 'bout the 10th as well?).  The fact that they bend different ways is a real credit to the routing as well.  No coincidence that the final margin of victory was earned on those two holes.  

Mike

[Phil McDade]

I find the caddies lining up the players far more objectionable than the cheater lines.

That said, a young man caught up with me on 18 this weekend and I asked him to join me.  He spent forever lining up the cheater line for a 12 foot putt and left it 18 inches short.  Classic.

Mike

This is why, re. Shivas' argument, it should be banned. Slow play at tournaments due to excessive lining up of cheater lines can be enforced by back-boned officials. It's the pernicious use of cheater lines by the everyday golfer that slooowwwws the game down for the rest of us and merits its banning. And the everyday golfers take their cues from the televised use and promotion of it.

[Sean_A]

What about Johnny Miller's comment that he didn't like bunkers on the corner of a dogleg.

I questioned whether that is what I heard him say.  Not his best line.

From the aerial it appeared that the tee markers at 17 were not way up, so that's no small carry, but no way its 275.  

The 14th and 17th are outstanding examples of dogleg holes well bunkered at the corner (how 'bout the 10th as well?).  The fact that they bend different ways is a real credit to the routing as well.  No coincidence that the final margin of victory was earned on those two holes.  

Mike

Bogey

I despise bunkering on the inside corner of doglegs when there are trees already protecting the corner.  Pine Needle's #10 is a perfect example of this OTT bunkering - imo it isn't necessary and in the case of #10 really serves to stop balls rolling to a worse fate.

Ciao

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