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Cliff Hamm

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US Open vs Masters
« on: April 03, 2018, 04:25:56 PM »

 Growing up in the 60s I would’ve clearly said the US Open was more prestigious than the Masters. I had often heard that for Southerners the Masters was number one.


Watching Jordan Spieth being interviewed he referred to the Masters as the Super Bowl of golf for Americans. One of the media  prefaced a question, that it used to be the US Open but now he would say the Masters, had the most prestige


I now agree.   Looking back things began to change around 2000 if not a bit before, coinciding with the Tiger era. Has the Masters gained? Or has the US Open simply lost prestige? I tend to think the latter.


Why?
« Last Edit: April 03, 2018, 04:30:31 PM by Cliff Hamm »

Kalen Braley

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Re: US Open vs Masters
« Reply #1 on: April 03, 2018, 04:37:20 PM »
Cliff,


I would have to agree here, I think the Masters is the Super Bowl.  But it has several advantages like being the 1st major of the year with half the country jonesing to see top notch golf again, the course is preened and babied at considerable expense to peak during that 2-3 week period, and is hands down the least accessible course that the average joe knows about, amping up the mystique of it.


But its biggest asset, is also my biggest criticism...strength of field.  They deliberately limit the field size to the top 50 guys more or less, (almost all name players who have an actual chance to win), and stock the rest with amateurs and older guys just trying not to embarrass themselves.  (Dont get me wrong, I think its awesome they invite so many AMs and let the past champs play).


But this almost guarantees they are going to get a great-to-epic leaderboard come Saturday and Sunday... as opposed to other full field events where a few no name guys can have a great week and either win or fill up 3-4 top 10 spots on the board and push the cut line much lower.


It is what it is...


Cal Seifert

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Re: US Open vs Masters
« Reply #2 on: April 03, 2018, 04:38:21 PM »
I cant speak for every year but I doubt anyone would say that last years US Open seemed more prestigious than last years Masters.

BHoover

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Re: US Open vs Masters
« Reply #3 on: April 03, 2018, 04:45:59 PM »
I cant speak for every year but I doubt anyone would say that last years US Open seemed more prestigious than last years Masters.

Brooks Koepka would disagree with you.
« Last Edit: April 03, 2018, 04:50:00 PM by BHoover »

Kalen Braley

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Re: US Open vs Masters
« Reply #4 on: April 03, 2018, 04:52:05 PM »
I cant speak for every year but I doubt anyone would say that last years US Open seemed more prestigious than last years Masters.

Brooks Koepka would disagree with you.


And this guy as well!!  ;D



Cliff Hamm

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Re: US Open vs Masters
« Reply #5 on: April 03, 2018, 04:56:39 PM »
 Kalen...No disagreements but all that was true sixty years ago. I just see that the U.S. Open has diminished in stature overtime, including the announcers. Maybe that is a factor. I miss the opening music, Jim McKay, Dave Marr,  Jack Whitaker, etc

Eric LeFante

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Re: US Open vs Masters
« Reply #6 on: April 03, 2018, 05:45:38 PM »
If you could only watch one golf tournament a year, to Cliff's point, I think most people will pick the Masters. In most years I would pick the US Open, and I certainly would this year with Shinnecock, but I know I'm in the minority.


I think the Masters is singularly focused on creating one of the best sporting events in the world. Similar to Amazon, they will do anything to make their customers happy, even if it doesn't make financial sense right away. The amount of money they spend for a new shopping area or a media center to use for one week a year makes my head hurt. But year after year, the tournament's stature grows and people get more excited for the tournament.


This thinking is in the Masters DNA; the timing of the tournament was set so the sports writers could drive up from Florida after spring training for baseball. And the new media center is the greatest in the world, which makes the writers happy, which makes them excited to come and cover the tournament.


The Masters App is by far the best app for any sporting event that I've come across. It must cost a fortune, but all these things widen the "moat" the tournament has around itself compared to all the others.

Kalen Braley

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Re: US Open vs Masters
« Reply #7 on: April 03, 2018, 05:50:24 PM »
Kalen...No disagreements but all that was true sixty years ago. I just see that the U.S. Open has diminished in stature overtime, including the announcers. Maybe that is a factor. I miss the opening music, Jim McKay, Dave Marr,  Jack Whitaker, etc


Cliff,


I actually agree with you, I was just trying to insert a bit of humor with the Joe Buck photo.


But what I also miss about the US Open is highlights when it first came on air to this!!  Into the Night!


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X4OlypXALU0

Cliff Hamm

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Re: US Open vs Masters
« Reply #8 on: April 03, 2018, 06:19:34 PM »
 This is the one. Just like odors  Music floods the brain with memories. In this case romance and first love. Otherwise known as the U.S. Open back in the day.


https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=8YS7sWCG_ZE

V. Kmetz

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Re: US Open vs Masters
« Reply #9 on: April 03, 2018, 06:54:18 PM »
Ill engage, but I announce disdain for the word prestige (George Carlin rightfully identified it as one of the more bullshit words of marketing and puffery).


For me there is no question that the Masters has it, has always had it since near its beginning, before TV.  Some of the reasons are unfair sui generis advantages (1st...can't win the Slam without it...eagerly anticipated major golf after 8 months... same beautiful, ultra-exclusive site year after year...the property and cultural ephemera (Green jackets, Ike's tree, Magnolia lane ...I've been there and it is one of the few things which exceeds expectations).


And I love the course, while not played, it seems like that great character where every hole is a memorable and distinct test, but the course is well-picked in other threads.


But the connection with Jones and great champions and their deeds is a massive factor...In my un-empirical connotation, Jones (perhaps accidentally) "made" this course for the great champions such as himself... and though it has been washed thru modern televised celebrity sport industry hokum and the financial planner's dulcet tones of Mr. Nantz, to a great extent I feel Bobby Jones bridge of the game from the original Scottish roots to the modern American hegemony in everything he launched at this place and at this tournament...


Jones was mindful and respectful of his games origins and kept that conscience in Augusta National...he never forgot the players of his youth and his salad days as a competitor...it was he who conceived it as a fun gathering of the greats of that time (though the club's fortunes and fiscal realities almost immediately advanced it as a money maker)...it was there he had the PGA stage its first two Senior Championships in 1937-38 (a great trivia question)...it was he who had Jock Hutchison and Freddie McLeod tee off to start the Masters and it was he who insisted that past champions get a life time exemption - sadly, but effectively curtailed when the course had grown too big more than a decade ago... he had that sense of history and his place in that history and its alive there.


But to return to just the champions aesthetic, since Ouimet's legendary victory (when the face of the game started to turn to an American profile) tell me what list of champions is more signatory of American championship golf mettle and reputation than Jones, Hogan, Palmer Nicklaus and Woods...and these names are forever associated with this championship, this gathering... Arnie's Army started here, and his days yielded to the unbelievable exploits of Nicklaus here, and Woods inaugurated the last great era of championship excellence here (while he may seek to reclaim that status, much of this last decade has been spent figuring which contender...Scott, McIlroy, DJ, Day, Spieth would take such a long-lived hold )


... and only a hair or two beneath those five legendary champions... Nelson, Snead...Watson and popular cool cats like DeMaret, Couples, Fuzzy, Bubba, Phil and of course Gentle Ben.


Yet the second large factor for my assessment is to observe how well represented (given a small field event, which is often held as a critique) the international great is represented here (once international play was really transacted regularly)...Player, Ballesteros, Faldo...Olazabal, Langer, Singh...and the international cool cats, Lyle, Cabrera...


Sure there are one-off-golf-history-could-be-fully-written-without-them champion factors in both camps.... Brewer, Goalby, Coody, Aaron, Stadler... Immelman, Weir, [seemingly] Willet, {maybe] Garcia, but victories here have a way of making one re-assess a multi-major winner guy like Zack Johnson and Schwatrzel....


And then consider you know the losing, the failing stories almost as well as the winning ones...Billie Joe Patton or Sarazen's double eagle?...Curtis Strange, Ken Venturi or Mize's chip? Weiskopf and Spieth's meltdowns on 12 or Couples staying on the bank?  Bear Tracks or the Norman collapse...Seve in the drink or Nicklaus' near ace en route to Lazarus legend...Hoch's choke or Bubba's boomerang?   And there's dozens, maybe scores more that only need a tickle to be recalled vividly...


So for me it's here...yes it doesn't have the empirically complete Open nature of the old belt and the US one, but in a great many ways, that's been a screen for the cream... this is the true Elysian fields for Golf immortality...heaven...perhaps The Old Course is where the Saints congregate, but Augusta National is the Pearly Gates.


cheers   vk




"The tee shot must first be hit straight and long between a vast bunker on the left which whispers 'slice' in the player's ear, and a wilderness on the right which induces a hurried hook." -

Ryan Coles

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Re: US Open vs Masters
« Reply #10 on: April 03, 2018, 07:44:27 PM »
The Masters is clearly in 2nd place in the list of four, well ahead of the US Open.


Perhaps the switch to May will eventually see the PGA relegate it to 4th.

V. Kmetz

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Re: US Open vs Masters
« Reply #11 on: April 03, 2018, 07:53:51 PM »
The Masters is clearly in 2nd place in the list of four, well ahead of the US Open.


Perhaps the switch to May will eventually see the PGA relegate it to 4th.


RC...that's just a statement...why?...how about supporting the opinion, as others do on a discussion board.
"The tee shot must first be hit straight and long between a vast bunker on the left which whispers 'slice' in the player's ear, and a wilderness on the right which induces a hurried hook." -

Ryan Coles

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Re: US Open vs Masters
« Reply #12 on: April 03, 2018, 08:16:20 PM »
You like verbosity. I like concise. To each his own.


1. The Open


Why? The history, the courses, the spectators. The original and the best.


2. The Masters


Time of year, spring optimism. Returning to the same venue means comforting familiarity and more often than not the final round throws up great drama.


3. PGA potentially over taking the US Open


Why?


The May date will likely elevate it and enable it to pick up on any momentum from a good Masters.


Some interesting courses are selected and the PGA seem to do a better job of setting them up.

Cliff Hamm

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Re: US Open vs Masters
« Reply #13 on: April 03, 2018, 08:33:02 PM »
No one has yet addressed my initial question.  Has the US Open declined as far as image, prestige, status, prominence, stature, or whatever word satisfies your intellect, over the last 20 years?

BHoover

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Re: US Open vs Masters
« Reply #14 on: April 03, 2018, 09:08:30 PM »
No one has yet addressed my initial question.  Has the US Open declined as far as image, prestige, status, prominence, stature, or whatever word satisfies your intellect, over the last 20 years?

I say no, at least no more than any other major. In my opinion, each major is equally significant.

Tim Martin

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Re: US Open vs Masters
« Reply #15 on: April 03, 2018, 09:15:37 PM »
I think a majority of the U.S. players would rather win the U.S. Open and the same with the euros and rest of the world wanting to win the British Open. It does seem like the Masters has eclipsed both of those tournaments not only for prestige but for what the players are afforded by ANGC after they win. The USGA and R&A are not set up to bestow the same spoils as ANGC.

John Kavanaugh

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Re: US Open vs Masters
« Reply #16 on: April 03, 2018, 09:18:00 PM »
The Masters is the Daytona 500. It's a great way to start the year.

Tommy Williamsen

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Re: US Open vs Masters
« Reply #17 on: April 03, 2018, 09:25:15 PM »
Growing up in the late fifties and sixties, the Masters had the most prestige and mystique for me. After all Palmer, Player, and Nicklaus seemed to trade the title every year. And they show up every year. Since then the winners, except for a few, are some of the best who have ever played the game. And they It is hard to overcome the mystique that surrounds AGNC. Baltusrol, Olympic, or Olympia Fields do not stir the soul.
Where there is no love, put love; there you will find love.
St. John of the Cross

"Deep within your soul-space is a magnificent cathedral where you are sweet beyond telling." Rumi

Garland Bayley

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Re: US Open vs Masters
« Reply #18 on: April 03, 2018, 09:28:44 PM »
Yawn.

The Masters is a club invitational that has outgrown its britches. Set up a tournament so the chosen ones get anointed champion, add some feel good competitors, some flowers, and immaculate maintenance that can't be sustained, and you get a pageant that people salivate over. Only competition for such a pageant this year is the royal wedding.

The Open Championship is the truly interesting golf tournament.
"I enjoy a course where the challenges are contained WITHIN it, and recovery is part of the game  not a course where the challenge is to stay ON it." Jeff Warne

Garland Bayley

  • Karma: +0/-0
Re: US Open vs Masters
« Reply #19 on: April 03, 2018, 09:29:42 PM »
Growing up in the late fifties and sixties, the Masters had the most prestige and mystique for me. After all Palmer, Player, and Nicklaus seemed to trade the title every year. And they show up every year. Since then the winners, except for a few, are some of the best who have ever played the game. And they It is hard to overcome the mystique that surrounds AGNC. Baltusrol, Olympic, or Olympia Fields do not stir the soul.

What's AGNC? ;)
"I enjoy a course where the challenges are contained WITHIN it, and recovery is part of the game  not a course where the challenge is to stay ON it." Jeff Warne

BHoover

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Re: US Open vs Masters
« Reply #20 on: April 03, 2018, 09:33:49 PM »
Yawn.

The Masters is a club invitational that has outgrown its britches. Set up a tournament so the chosen ones get anointed champion, add some feel good competitors, some flowers, and immaculate maintenance that can't be sustained, and you get a pageant that people salivate over. Only competition for such a pageant this year is the royal wedding.

The Open Championship is the truly interesting golf tournament.
I have to admit that, with your self-proclaimed expertise on shotmaking and putting, I’m surprised you would not think more of the Masters.

Ryan Coles

  • Karma: +0/-0
Re: US Open vs Masters
« Reply #21 on: April 03, 2018, 09:38:23 PM »
No one has yet addressed my initial question.  Has the US Open declined as far as image, prestige, status, prominence, stature, or whatever word satisfies your intellect, over the last 20 years?


It wasn’t really much good 20 or 30 years ago, was it?


Do kids dream about being Scott Simpson and winning the Monday playoff?

Tommy Williamsen

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Re: US Open vs Masters
« Reply #22 on: April 03, 2018, 09:40:22 PM »
Growing up in the late fifties and sixties, the Masters had the most prestige and mystique for me. After all Palmer, Player, and Nicklaus seemed to trade the title every year. And they show up every year. Since then the winners, except for a few, are some of the best who have ever played the game. And they It is hard to overcome the mystique that surrounds AGNC or as some think ANGC. Baltusrol, Olympic, or Olympia Fields do not stir the soul.

What's AGNC? ;)
Where there is no love, put love; there you will find love.
St. John of the Cross

"Deep within your soul-space is a magnificent cathedral where you are sweet beyond telling." Rumi

Ryan Coles

  • Karma: +0/-0
Re: US Open vs Masters
« Reply #23 on: April 03, 2018, 09:42:54 PM »
No one has yet addressed my initial question.  Has the US Open declined as far as image, prestige, status, prominence, stature, or whatever word satisfies your intellect, over the last 20 years?

I say no, at least no more than any other major. In my opinion, each major is equally significant.


In the same way that John, Paul, Ringo and George were all equally significant. Perhaps not.....

Garland Bayley

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Re: US Open vs Masters
« Reply #24 on: April 03, 2018, 09:59:34 PM »
Yawn.

The Masters is a club invitational that has outgrown its britches. Set up a tournament so the chosen ones get anointed champion, add some feel good competitors, some flowers, and immaculate maintenance that can't be sustained, and you get a pageant that people salivate over. Only competition for such a pageant this year is the royal wedding.

The Open Championship is the truly interesting golf tournament.
I have to admit that, with your self-proclaimed expertise on shotmaking and putting, I’m surprised you would not think more of the Masters.

My commentary was on pageant and weak field, not course. Get it?
"I enjoy a course where the challenges are contained WITHIN it, and recovery is part of the game  not a course where the challenge is to stay ON it." Jeff Warne