Isn't this what we have been waiting for?!

[Brent Hutto]

Jud,

Unless the zombie corpse of Tiger Woods makes an appearance at Pinehurst over the weekend, the ratings are screwed no matter who does or doesn't have an eight-shot lead. Let's be real.

[Jud_T]

I agree.  Frankly the only reason I'm watching this thing is to see the course.  It may be wishful thinking, but it'd be nice if there was some suspense come Sunday and the course was in ideal condition.  Oh well, there's always hope for the Woman's Open.

[Brent Hutto]

Jud,

If the weekend's final pairing ends up being Na and Kaymer, we may be praying for the Russians to nuke North Carolina by this time tomorrow afternoon.

[RKoehn]

I agree with Greg.

You can't just blame these conditions on the rain.  The USGA watered the course on Wednesday night as well.  They were trying to soften it up.  This is not the same USGA of years past.  This crew is afraid of high scores, afraid of being called unfair, or afraid of losing the greens before the women's event.

The greens are definitely slower than normal US Open greens.  The fairways are undeniably wider, causing far more fairways to be hit.  The rough is nowhere near as penal as the vast majority suspected.  The ball is spinning, even from the "rough."

The course "looks" great, I agree.  It's great to say you like seeing a brown course (I do too), but these are not really U.S. Open conditions.

Hopefully the weekend will improve but with more rain and hot weather coming seems likely to be more of the same.

[Russ Arbuthnot]

I'm pretty sure these are U.S. Open conditions since that is what they are playing right now. There's more to it than the conditioning. There is a competition for a trophy, money, history. Credit to Kaymer. Why isn't anyone else doing what he's doing? Last I checked, they're all playing the same course. Kuch laid the sod over it. Casey hit 16 of 18 greens, but doubled 17 yesterday after missing the green, and could only muster even par. If everyone is having such an easy go of it, why are they so far behind the lead?

[Greg Clark]

While no one is doing what Kaymer is, the field is having a much easier time than most Opens for sure.  +4 would be the second lowest cut in Open history.  That being said, if the greens firm up for the weekend it should be really fun to watch.  They shouldn't have watered on Wednesday, particularly with the possibility of rain within 24 hours of doing so.  But still lots of golf to play, and time for things to firm up a bit more.

[Paul Gray]

I'm pretty disappointed in GolfWRX. Maybe the unwashed aren't as unwashed as we thought. The course is mostly getting rave reviews from what I've seen on that site.

On another site, a guy said the 90s version of Pinehurst was much "prettier" and the new version "looks like an abandoned sandlot." I got a kick out of that and was hoping for more golden quotes on WRX, but came away empty.

I was also disappointed.......initially.

Then I thought that if the average serious golfer,  and they're certainly that, can get to like this then we might not have such a fight on our hands after all.

[Patrick_Mucci]

I think many are forgetting that for the golf course the event won't be over on Sunday afternoon, it'll just be entering the second half, and as such, the USGA has to err on the side of caution.

Anyone who has seen what a U.S. Open Course looks and plays like on Sunday afternoon understands the unique challenge this year's Opens present.

[David_Tepper]

"The greens are definitely slower than normal US Open greens."

RKoehn -

Out of curiousity, what is your basis for making this statement?

DT

[Paul Gray]

I'm deeply worried. The idea that the guy playing better golf than any other human on the planet should be able to break par on a calm sunny day is an insult to golf. 

[Brett_Morrissy]

Am enjoying the US open a lot this year.
It still amazes me that guys that are the best in the world, cannot think there way thru a strategy, or evaluate the way they 'normally' play, and not seek to adjust to vastly different shot requirements, not have the capacity to think to land a ball short and let it run on, or bump and run from some of those slopes, and these thoughts are the same watching some of the shots on the Sandbelt the last couple of years. For me, this set up reminds me of the heathy/bracken 'scrub' and firm ground of the Sandbelt.

[Terry Lavin]

With the benefit of four days of evidence, I'd say this was a good week for gca. Coore Crenshaw and Ross sure got a lot of play. The native areas look good even if they provided little in the way of defense to these great players. The green runouts grew a little tiresome especially because they seemed excessively penal. Most of all, we again learned that a great course can host a boring Open and a boring course (Torrey) can host a great Open. One guy played great and only a few others played pretty well. In that way, it was eerily reminiscent of the Olympia Fields Open where three guys broke par and the final round was a snoozer.

[Patrick_Mucci]

Terry,

I didn't mind the grasses, but there seemed to be a lot of stemmed plants that I didn't like in the "native" areas

[Paul Gray]

Mucci,

Something amazing has happened at Pinehurst because we've been in agreement for four whole days! 

[Patrick_Mucci]

Paul,

Eventually everybody is entitled to my opinion.   


Mucci,

Something amazing has happened at Pinehurst because we've been in agreement for four whole days! 

[Jud_T]

I know we're in a tiny minority, but this is the first tournament I've watched wire to wire solely for the GCA. 

[BHoover]

I know we're in a tiny minority, but this is the first tournament I've watched wire to wire solely for the GCA.  

I agree and I wasn't really that interested in the Open until I started watching on Friday.  I'd like to see Pinehurst be the USGA's version of TOC and host the Open every 5 years, if for no other reason than to drive Trump and his minions nuts.

Now if we could just get this type of setup for the Ryder Cup...

[jeffwarne]

With the benefit of four days of evidence, I'd say this was a good week for gca. Coore Crenshaw and Ross sure got a lot of play. The native areas look good even if they provided little in the way of defense to these great players. The green runouts grew a little tiresome especially because they seemed excessively penal. Most of all, we again learned that a great course can host a boring Open and a boring course (Torrey) can host a great Open. One guy played great and only a few others played pretty well. In that way, it was eerily reminiscent of the Olympia Fields Open where three guys broke par and the final round was a snoozer.

What I thought was great about the semiplayable native areas was that they encouraged bold play, something not usually seen in a US Open.
Which of course led to more fairways missed and more bogies

[Bryan Icenhower]

I would answer that, yes, it was what WE were waiting for.  The better question is, does it matter what we were waiting for?  I hope so.

But based on what I've heard / read outside here, not sure what we want matters. For every stat saying missing the fairway matters statistically the same whteher its 4" rough or native there is a Johnny Miller talking about how the width makes it easier. Which one to you think JQP latches onto?

For every thought that goes through my head of "oh you missed that on the wrong side" there are scores of people saying the course is tricked up because the pro hits it out of the bunker and it ends up 20 yards off the green. Yet we know he had the slimmest of chances of staying on the green because short and long were both dead.from the angle he missed and that is STRATEGY.