Monday Musings

We're in a bit of a lull on the golf calendar, so your favorite golf blogger is going to pace himself before the inevitable flurry of activity as the golf gods give us a month of linksy goodness.  It all starts with the Scottish Open at Royal Aberdeen and The Open Championship at Hoylake, but also includes the ladies at Royal Birkdale, a first-class links, and the Seniors at Royal Porthcawl in Wales, which will be my first look at that well-regarded links,

But there's a few things to kick around, just to keep my blogging muscle-memory in sync:

Congressional Drudgery - Those curmudgeons who hated Pinehurst, think James Achenbach crying over the width of the fairways, must have thought they'd died and gone to heaven watching the preceedings from Congressional over the weekend.  Per John Strege:

It is called the Blue Course, presumably in a nod to the color of the language it evokes from a

Not  sure what Rose is doing here, unless it was his last golf ball?

vexed PGA Tour constituency. The word of the day there Sunday was “#amp;@?$%$!” 

Congressional Country Club in Bethesda, Md., occasionally hosts the U.S. Open, suggesting its tournament course is not likely to warrant a Miss Congeniality award. But that’s the U.S. Open. Why was it showcasing its ugly side in a tournament now known as the Quicken Loans National?

Please, John, feel free to call it the Quickie.   And what of the overnight leader, Mr. Top Five himself?  Barry Svrluga, good luck with spell-check on that one, fills us in:

The final group on the final day consisted of a pair of 23-year-olds: Patrick Reed, a three-time winner on tour, and Seung-yul Noh, who posted his first victory this season at New Orleans. But they combined to play the first two holes of the back side — the water-protected par-3 10th and the hardest-on-Tour par-4 11th — in 7 over. Reed shot 77 and finished tied for 11th. Noh shot 79 and finished tied for 28th.

Needless to say, Shackelford was not a fan of the set-up:

I know that Justin Rose was trying to be nice and make the (apparently insecure) members ofCongressional feel better, but his post-round remark is ultimately an unintended slap at Rory McIlroy's resounding U.S. Open victory at the Blue Course in 2011. And also a bit of outdated thinking that a great test is one that rewards the least accident-prone driver. Naturally, Thomas Boswell lapped it all up, even bringing out the "defenseless" word to describe the U.S. Open at Congressional.

Read the Boswell piece if you're so inclined, and of course this is a never-ending argument discussion.  But the logic for knee-deep rough seem limited to "That's how it's always been,"  the purpose of which seems to be to shut down the argument.  Pinehurst proved to be every bit as resistant to scoring as Congressional, without one square inch of rough.  And while the conditions of a Pinehust are not transferable to other locales, one of the arguments that the Boswells of the world ignore is that if you insist on holding the Open in mid-June in Washington, D.C., you're assuming the risk of the heavy rains and soft conditions we saw in 2011.

And, going way out on a limb, I'll wager that Freddie Jacobson agrees with Shack and me:

Home Game - Stacey Lewis considers the LPGA event on Northwest Arkansas to be a "home game," so good on her for this:

Stacy Lewis has worked tirelessly over her career to embrace the overwhelming support in her adopted state of Arkansas. 

The recovering introvert finally found a way to do so while overcoming her self-imposed pressure Sunday -- shooting a 6-under 65 and rallying for a much-sought after official win in the NW Arkansas Championship. 

Lewis earned an unofficial rain-shortened win at the tournament as an amateur in 2007, but she had struggled to match that effort since as her popularity -- and ranking -- soared.

Michelle Wie had held the lead at the start of the final round, but her much-discussed putting prowess deserted her and she posted a 73, finishing T8.  When will she ever deliver on her potential?  Oh, last week?  Never mind, then...

Yawn -  This week the seniors apparently played one of their majors...who knew?

The main stage at storied Fox Chapel Golf Club is its 17th green, a classic Seth Raynor

example of a Biarritz green. It’s big and long and wide and divided by a serious approach-shot-eating trench.

So there was no better place for the biggest stroke of the Constellation Energy Senior Players Championship. Bernhard Langer, known for conquering the yips more than once, rolled in a bender of a birdie putt from 35 feet at the 17th on Sunday.

It didn’t win him the tournament. All it did was lift Langer into a tie with Jeff Sluman going to the 72nd hole, but it was a stroke of genius and the shot of the week. Langer needed two playoff holes to defeat Sluman and score his third Champions Tour major championship -- holing a short birdie putt on the par-5 18th the second time he played it -- but it was that unlikely putt at the Biarritz green that made it possible.

Most surprising to me is that this is only Bernhard's third senior major.  Doesn't it seem like he wins 2-3 of those every year?  

Business is Business - I'm usually in sync with that combination adage and old Jewish joke, but this item will be something of a dissent.  I've long been troubled by Jim Furyk's sponsorship and promotion of 5 Hour Energy, which is at best innocuous and at worst...well, read this for the at worst.  I understand that Mr. Furyk's staff bag and hat are valuable real estate, but surely he has other endorsement opportunies, no?

Karen Crouse is quietly redeeming my opinion of the N.Y. Times with her golf column, and she had this in yesterday's edition:

Tiger Woods’s new golf bag, with the neon green MP on the front panel, a pocket and the base, is an attention grabber. The initials stand for MusclePharm, a Denver dietary supplement company that recently signed Woods to a multiyear endorsement deal. 

In the fields of nutrition and science, supplements fall on the hazard line, with officials divided on whether they are O.K. or out of bounds.

Now Tiger might be a harder sell to the sponsorship community, given that he's radioactive to 50% of the homo sapiens population.   But still....  Can't you just put another Swoosh on the nag and leave it at that?  Do we really have to be promoting such drek?

But this, from Tiger's lapdog mouthpiece, had me chuckling:

“Our goal is to take the stigma out of supplements,” said Woods’s agent, Mark Steinberg.

“Tiger Woods, maybe the most fit golfer that we’ve had, let’s show that it’s O.K. to align yourself with supplements. Just be safe when you do it. That’s the message we collectively want to spread.”

Silly me, I thought the goal was to, you know, win golf tournaments...  Business is too complicated for my tiny little brain.

This Game is Brutal, Vol. CCCXXXIII - I saw none of the big-boy play from Congressional yesterday, but I turned on Golf Channel and saw the conclusion to the Web.com event:

England's Greg Owen won the United Leasing Championship on Sunday for his first Web.com Tour title, overcoming a seven-stroke deficit with a 5-under 67 for a one-stroke victory.

The 43-year-old Owen, the winner of the European Tour's 2003 British Masters, had a 9-under 279 total at Victoria National and earned $108,000. 

''It's just a crazy game,'' Owen said. ''I'm delighted. This was unexpected. ... It's been a long time. I've had back surgery and changed continents. You always wonder where you are and how to compete these days. The game kicks you in the teeth so many times. If I could do anything else I wouldn't be playing this game. It's a tough sport but only one of 156 can do this each week so it feels very special to be holding this trophy.''

Happy to see a guy like Own, who has stuck with it through lots of thin and little thick, get himself a "W" and a check.   Unfortunately what sticks with you is then endless procession of youngsters, all looking for their first breakthrough win, throwing up all over their soft spikes.  The names include Matt Weibring (not sure if he's D.A.'s son), Mark Hubbard, Tony Finau and Andres Echavarria, and it was just ugly.  

There's nothing I can say to mask the extent to which they succumbed to the pressure, one can only hope that they learned from the experience.

Toledo Mudballs, Anyone - John Strege points us to an interesting David Briggs item in The Blade concerning the efforts of Inverness Club to position itself for a return to major-tournament golf.  

The Inverness Club spent its first century accumulating some of the biggest moments in golf

The 2nd and 11th holes during the renovation.

history. 

If a major series of changes have their intended effect, more could be on the way. 

Inverness reopened last month after a nine-month shutdown with a new course and a new philosophy — in large part to make its latest run at bringing one of golf’s crown jewel events back to Toledo for the first time since 1993.

Thankfully no mention of the Lon Hinckle tree... not one of the USGA's finer moments.  There's lots of good stuff on working with the golf organizations, though one hopes the club officials are not being hopelessly naive.  From my perspective, the USGA will be happy to let you host as many U.S. Amateurs and Women's Opens as you'd like, and if you're thinking those are test runs for a U.S. Open, well the USGA doesn't consider it incumbent upon them to disabuse you of your dreams.

But this was quite interesting:

Golfers will notice a longer, tougher, faster, and greener course. Beyond the redesign — which also rebuilt and moved back the conjoined Nos. 1 and 10 tees — the most significant change is the new playing surface. Inverness superintendent Steve Anderson put more than a dozen strains of grass for the fairways and greens through more than a year of testing in the nursery, then, along with top club officials, unanimously selected two Oregon-based varieties. The grasses so outperformed the others in the trials that Anderson told a reporter, “You would have picked them out.” 

The course is gaining particular attention for its greens. Inverness is just the second club to regrass with the seed known as Pure Distinction. Anderson described the greens as much finer, denser, and upright than the old ones.

I thought Pure Distinction was, how shall we put it, a Gentlemen's Club on the West Side Highway, but perhaps I'm misinformed.  In any event, it's a storied venue and I'm quite intrigued by the description of the new turf.  

Golf in the Middle Kingdom - The relationship of the Chinese government to the game of golf might be more convoluted than your humble blogger's relationship to the truth.  Because of a concern about resources, water in particular, golf course construction has been banned in the country...except, they're building them anyway.

Here's some background from a Reuters article:

Nevertheless, developers interviewed by Reuters expressed little concern, saying golf courses were in demand by local authorities who wanted the revenue from selling land while attracting well-heeled visitors to their regions. 

The ban was imposed to protect China's shrinking land and water resources in a country home to a fifth of the world's population but which has just 7 percent of its water. The only place exempt is the southern resort island of Hainan.

Developers had built 639 golf courses across China up to the end of last year, tripling the total since 2004, according to the website of Forward Management Group, a company based in the southern city of Shenzhen that offers a range of golf services in China.

This is in the news because of reports that three golf courses have been destroyed by the government:

From 6-irons to plow shares, now a corn field.

All that remains of the long fairways and manicured greens at the 18-hole golf course on the outskirts of Beijing are bits of rubble and mounds of mud. In March, Chinese authorities sent in workers to dig up the course and tear down the clubhouse. 

Two others across China were also demolished while another was turned into an eco-friendly park and a fifth converted into a tea plantation, suggesting the government could finally be cracking down on developers who have long ignored a 2004 ban on building new golf courses. 

The government, which announced the demolitions last month, said its actions served as a warning and an attempt to educate "would-be" violators. A few weeks later, the national auditor joined in, publicly shaming two big state-run enterprises for building golf courses.

Seems more than likely that the bribes were no longer being paid, as per this comment:

"It's a stepped-up campaign for sure," said one Chinese developer, whose company built a course after the ban and who spoke on the condition that neither his name, his firm nor the course be identified. 

Nevertheless, developers interviewed by Reuters expressed little concern, saying golf courses were in demand by local authorities who wanted the revenue from selling land while attracting well-heeled visitors to their regions.

It's not uncommon for golf to be caught in the class-warfare sniper fire, it's just always amusing to see how corrupt the People's Republic is. 

The Reviews Are In...

... and the consensus is that another few weeks of out-of town tryouts are indicated.  Unfortunately the show has a hard open on July 17th in Liverpool, and there's no opportunity for further rehearsals.

Karen Crouse, reviewing the two-act play in Pravda, gave it 1 1/2 stars:

Fore Left: Why the worry, his lines look perfect here.

Woods, playing in his first tournament in more than 100 days after having back surgery, followed his 74 with a 75 to miss the cut by four strokes. A double bogey on the front and four consecutive bogeys on the back sealed his fate. It was only the 10th 36-hole cut Woods has missed since turning professional in 1996.

But surely, given the quality of performers involved and their previous fourteen smash hits, there must be something you liked, Karen?

Fore Right:  He's even working it both ways.

In his two rounds, Woods carded 12 bogeys, seven birdies and the double bogey, which came at No. 5, a par 4, after his approach plugged in a greenside bunker and he needed two swipes at the ball to get it out. In a microcosm of his week, Woods missed the bogey putt. He was a yard or two off on his yardages and putted poorly (after 31 putts on Thursday, he needed 30 on Friday). 

Woods said he could take “a lot of positives” from the week. “The fact that I was able to even play; I came back four weeks earlier than we thought I could,” he said. “I had no setbacks. I got my feel for playing tournament golf.”

Hmmm....when the only positives come from the producer's press release, that's not very encouraging...

Steve DiMeglio can't see his way to more than one star, though he gave us this from the headliner:

"The thing I was worried about most was hitting driver, and I roasted most of them the last two days."

Roasted?  Is this now a golf term?  How about all the putts that didn't get halfway to the cup, were those blanched?

Jeff Rude dispenses some tough love, giving the production no stars:

Tiger Woods said he was encouraged. But he’s not ready. 

Not ready to contend any day soon, anyway. 

He may find something between now and the Open Championship July 17-20 at Hoylake, where he won in 2006. But that might be difficult to accomplish without more competitive rounds to chip off the rust that was apparent at the Quicken Loans National.

Both Rude and Shackelford argue that Tiger should play The Scottish Open at Royal Aberdeen the week before The Open Championship.  I'd add my voice to that if anyone was listening, but here' how Geoff put it:

The second round viewing from the Quicken Loans National was both fascinating and discouraging, as Tiger Woods made a miraculously fast recovering from back surgery only to look and sound like the same less-than-once-in-a-lifetime golfer he had become just before the surgery. 

Constantly mentioning he needs "reps," Woods made clear after his 74-75 MC that his priorities lie elsewhere these days by refusing to even consider adding more to his schedule. For those hoping he'd return refreshed with the desire of old and a desire to do anything possible to win, Woods made clear this is his only start before The Open Championship at Hoylake. As theAberdeen Asset Management Scottish Open lures a great field the week prior to the Open, the mystery remains, why does Woods insist on getting to the UK as late as possible when a great week at Royal Aberdeen is an option?

That's certainly how it looked to me, as no part of his game was sharp.  As an aside, Shack refers to missing the cut at "The Quickie," which has the benefit of being amusing on multiple levels.

John Paul Newport, in his weekly golf column for the Wall Street Journal, had this from swing guru Sean Foley:

Sean Foley, Wood's coach, made the analogy to a fighter pilot. "He can fly on the simulator for

weeks, but the first time he sees another plane in combat, chemically it's going to be different. The adrenaline is going to be different," Foley said in an interview. The key after layoffs for any player is to quit thinking so much. "You know what to do, but it's time to trust the training and free it up." 

Woods talked about the need to get "his numbers"—meaning, to get dialed in on the distance he's hitting his irons into the greens. But surprisingly his long game in both rounds looked sharper than his chipping and putting, which Woods said he had been able to practice since shortly after the surgery. He left three or four lag putts embarrassingly short, outright stubbed a chip on Thursday and took two shots to get out of a bunker on Friday.

This is what has Shack, Rude and me scratching our collective heads...every word that comes out of the collective Team Tiger mouth argues for another start before Hoylake, but it ain't gonna happen.  

No one begrudges Tiger his vacation with the kids, but doesn't he hear that clock ticking?   Does he truly believe in his preparation, or is there an element of concession deep in the recesses of his psyche?  

Loose Ends

We've fed the beast with two longer posts already today, but still I hear you screaming for more... I've created a monster...

That Awkward Team Room - On Tuesday we covered Rory's allegation that he was "On inferior commercial terms" to former good buddy Graeme McDowell, as part of a filing in the contentious lawsuit between the Freckled One and former agent Conor Ridge.  There's always another slight to be publicly aired, and Dearbhail McDonald (I've no idea what his friends call him) is on the beat for the Irish Independent:

Rory McIlroy has been accused of "orchestrating" the timing of a contentious lawsuit against his former agent to clash with the Bahamas wedding of fellow golfer Graeme McDowell.

The former good mates before the 2012 Ryder Cup.

The sensational claim has been made by Horizon Sports Management, the Dublin agency Mr McIlroy is suing in one of the most bitter commercial actions to come before our courts. 

Horizon, led by MD Conor Ridge, has claimed that Mr McIlroy issued legal proceedings against the agency in September 2013 to "inflict maximum reputational damage through the media" on Mr Ridge and Colin Morrissey, his trusted lieutenant.

And from later in the piece:

Mr. McIlroy's legal team was at pains this week to stress that their client had “no issue” with Mr McDowell, but it is feared the forthcoming litigation could place a strain on their friendship. 

Ya think?  From this I'd intuit that that horse is long out of the paddock:

Mr McIlroy was conspicuous by his absence at Mr McDowell’s sun-kissed nuptials in Baker’s Bay in the Bahamas.

Shack is envisioning a delightfully awkward team room at the Ryder Cup, though at this point McDowell is not guaranteed to be there.  

R & A Rehash - Sources withing the Royal and Ancient Golf Club of St. Andrews, never to be confused with the rules making and Open Championship sponsoring R & A, inform me that a vote will be taken of the membership in July as to whether or not to allow voting by mail (by post if your affecting Old World airs).  I'm unclear as to how this voting will take place, but it may be that a meeting is convened at Royal Liverpool during Open week.

It's something of a walkback, for Peter Dawson, but it's unclear if it represents concern about the result of said vote.  Amusingly enough, one correspondent expressed frustration that certain women-only clubs, namely St. Rules, St. Regulus and the Ladies Putting Club of St. Andrews are not under the same pressure as the R & A.  Let's ee whether the vote actually passes, shall we, before we complain about the injustice of it all...

While There, Pick Up Your Heart - Joe Passov gets credit for breaking the news that Harding Park will host the 2020 PGA Championship, and it later emerged that it will also host the 2025 Presidents Cup.  Here's Joe's pitch:

Situated in the heart of San Francisco, in sight of the vaunted Olympic Club, this venerable

1925 muni sports fairways hemmed in by frequent fog and cypress trees, lush rough and a wild closer (the 15th during the Presidents Cup), a 475-yard par-4 that opens with a bite-off-as-much-as-you-can-chew drive over a lake, followed by an uphill smash to a rollicking three-tier green. While some contend that too many holes look and play alike at TPC Harding Park and that facilities aren’t quite top-tier, there’s no denying that the handsome setting and mild weather would be welcome relief for players and fans, who usually swelter at many PGA Championship destinations. Couple that with new (April 2014) bent grass greens, new bunker sand and other changes, and perhaps TPC Harding Park will make a stellar major venue.

Eh, not so sure about that last bit.  It's a great looking venue, but in reality a poor-man's Olympic that's really quite boring.  

as usual with the two PGA organizations, there's lots of sordid history for this decision, which Shackelford helpfully details in a post at the Loop:

And while San Francisco’s climate is infamously unreliable due to nearby coastal fog, the announcement of Harding gives the PGA of America options for the playing date, most likely in late spring or possibly in early fall 2020 after the Olympics. A May date could also come into play if the Players is moved back to its March spot on the calendar.

Wednesday’s announcement will give the PGA of America back-to-back public-course venues (with Bethpage scheduled to host the 2019 PGA) after many years of avoiding municipal or state-owned courses. The last genuine public course to host a PGA was Tanglewood Park in North Carolina in 1974. Harding Park is co-managed by the PGA Tour and has been officially known as the TPC Harding Park since November 2010, making this the first major championship to visit a Tournament Players Club course.

After many years of poor maintenance, the course, which was previously used to park cars for the U.S. Opens played at nearby Olympic Club, was renovated in 2002. The PGA Tour Design Services renovation of Willie Watson and Sam Whiting’s 1925 design came in at a staggering $23 million -- $7 million over budget. Harding Park then hosted the 2005 WGC-American Express Championship, won by Tiger Woods over John Daly in a sudden-death playoff.

Yeah, the taxpayers got soaked pretty well on that one, and the city even managed to lose money hosting the American Express.

Now Shack is somewhat crest-fallen by this announcement, as he was checking fares to Melbourne for the 2020 PGA Championship at Royal Melbourne.  That's obviously a Olympic year, and assuming it survives the Rio yawn-fest, the typical August date is a non-starter.  But if Shack had returned my calls, he'd have been reminded that it's not called the PGA of America for nothing...

This Space Available -  Mike Stachura, who used to be either Bomb or Gouge (though that Golf Digest blog has gone fallow), has an item on a meaningful missed opportunity:

Players often finish majors upset about missed opportunities, but rarely is it the winner -- or more specifically, his sponsors -- doing the missing. From a marketing perspective, that's what happened with Martin Kaymer.

Despite having deals with TaylorMade, Hugo Boss, SAP and Rolex, Kaymer is the first U.S. Open champ in decades to carry a bag free of sponsors' logos (the sunflower was a tribute to his late mother, Rina, who died of cancer in 2008). Had one been on the bag, it could have paid off handsomely. Eric Wright, president/executive director of research at Joyce Julius & Associates, which studies sponsorship value, estimates Kaymer's in-broadcast exposure during the final round alone was worth "in the range of $600,000 to $1 million."

That's a bit rich for my blood, but now that Kaymer has missed the cut in this week's Euro event perhaps an Unplayable Lies logo would work on his bag?  Of course I'd need Employee No. 2 to get off her duff (correction, her very attractive duff) and whip us up a logo...

From Can To Can't - It's been a bit since I've sent you David Owen's way, but he's back with another account that makes me want to apply for membership in his Sunday Morning Group,  As always, it's better when I let David spin the yarn:

To celebrate the official arrival of summer, my friends and I played golf on Monday from can to can’t -- from when you can see until you can’t. Seven of us teed off at 5 a.m., when it was just light enough to follow a ball most of the way to the dogleg in the first fairway, and about 30 minutes later we were joined by Peter A., who had just discovered that he didn’t know how to set his alarm clock.

And later there's this:

After the first 18 holes, we drove to the coffee shop on the village green for breakfast. After the next 27, we made ourselves cheeseburgers and hot dogs on the grill in the parking lot next to the clubhouse. We also stopped occasionally to change socks, shoes, and shirts. I flipped my socks every time we passed the clubhouse, so that they would dry evenly:

It's a fun read, but you knew that.  He ends with this video of an elderly member on the putting green:

That reminds me of a story from my first year at Willow Ridge.  Theresa and I were hitting on the range when an extremely elderly man was helped up to one of the practice tees, think Wodehouse's Oldest Member if that reference is known to you.  A spectacularly beautiful woman, who we assumed to he his caregiver, would place a ball on the tee for him and he'd do his best to put a swing on it.  All I could think was that I hope she's still in the business when I'm in my dotage.   

Easy With That Car Trunk, Bog Guy - The TV is on in the background and out of the corner of my eye I'm watching Tiger finish his second round at Congressional.  He's not sniffing the cut, the victim of bad driving, bad iron play, bad wedge work and really bad putting.  I don't think it's the least bit surprising that he's not game-ready, though that 3-birdie binge yesterday doesn't seem to have had any legs.

The dilemma he faces is that he's got two weekends before Hoylake, does he really think that practice alone will get it done.  If not, he's got two logical choices...  He can elect to play at The Greenbrier next weekend, though today is the cut-off for him to declare for that event.  The other option would be the Scottish Open at Royal Aberdeen, though I'm guessing the former is more logical.

And Tiger, just to be safe, how about we let Joe LaCava slam the trunk lid.

Pinehurst Postscripts

The world may have moved on, but the golf blogging community is still bitterly clinging to its guns and religion pine scrub and wire grass plants.

In my conversations with friends and playing partners, I've been surprised by many of the comments I've heard.  To me the back-to-back Opens were a home run, a grand slam even, but many have expressed misgivings over the golf course.  I'll get to those below, but first let's see what those who are paid for their opinions thought.

Geoff Shackelford has been playing his usual role of Aggregator-in-Chief, so we'll let him play tour guide for this morning's spin through the nether reaches of the golf blogosphere.  First up, he links to Michael Bamberger's take on the fortnight from the current edition of SIG+D, but he's put off by the e-mag format:

I'm not sure this will work, but Michael Bamberger files a super postscript in the SI/golf.com

Digital thingy that's a pain to read (aren't they all...we must make it hard for readers to read and

experience ads!). Essentially, Bamberger touches on Kaymer and Wie's fascinating wins and the huge sucess of back-to-back Opens.

The link does work, but am I the only one that gets all wobbly in the knees when he throws around technical jargon (Geoff, you had me at "thingy")?  It is well worth a read for his take on both Kaymer and Wie, but we bloggers hate the digital format from which we can't plagiarize copy-and-paste extensive excerpts legal under the fair use doctrine.  And if you think THAT made Shack cranky, stick around until I finish the positive reviews.

Next up is Bill Field, a Pinehurst-native writing in Golf Digest.  This to me was the gist of Bill's piece, though since Shack highlighted a different graph you might be induced to click through and decide for yourself:

For those who believe that great courses produce great moments, Wie's bomb at the penultimate hole recalled Tom Watson's chip-in at Pebble Beach in 1982 or Nick Price's eagle at Turnberry in 1994. Indeed, Pinehurst No. 2 proved a wonderful stage, if seeming somewhat oversold during the U.S. Open when the gallery was so large it created several uncomfortably congested junctures. Even though the ropes were still much further from the fairways during the Women's Open than in Bermuda-rough tournaments, smaller crowds made it more pleasurable to spectate in Week Two than in Week One. 

As for the restored sand, wire grass and native-vegetation areas artfully put in by Bill Coore, Ben Crenshaw and their team several years ago -- a bold move that returned the mojo to Pinehurst No. 2 -- they not only look right but reintroduced randomness to recovery shots. It's true that most balls settled in very playable lies, the one for Kaymer's remarkable approach to the fifth hole in the third round being the best example. Yet some did end up in nasty places. Two such situations for Stacy Lewis on the 14th in the final round threatened to derail her exciting charge, but she took her medicine on the second one and saved a bogey.

I'll get back to waste areas again below.

Last up for Shack is his buddy Doug Ferguson, with whom he hands out at the 10th hole at Riviera:

Thanks to an amazing restoration project led by Bill Coore and Ben Crenshaw, and plenty of cooperation from Mother Nature, two weeks of U.S. Open golf at Pinehurst No. 2 could not have gone much better. It really was double the pleasure. 

The next step for the USGA is to avoid what Hollywood has never understood: Don't bother with a sequel. 

The USGA wanted to provide a similar test for the men and women over consecutive weeks. With few exceptions — the par-5 10th hole for the women, as an example — it got it just right. Perhaps the most telling statistic was the scoring average in the final round. 

For the men it was 72.40. For the women it was 72.39.

All three pieces are worth a read, as each has his own unique focus.  But the events came off without a hitch, the women were treated to increased attention and in both cases a worthy champion was crowned.  So, what could anyone logically complain about?

 That would be Golfweek's James Achenbach, sneaking in Stage Left:

There was one major flaw hanging over the U.S. Open and U.S. Women's Open at Pinehurst No. 2. 

The fairways were too wide. 

U.S. Opens historically have been a test of driving accuracy. More than all other golf tournaments, they carry a well-earned reputation for narrow fairways and diabolical rough.

In U.S. Opens past, players were rewarded for driving the ball in the fairway and penalized for driving it off the fairway. The formula was pretty simple: Accuracy off the tee was a major predictor of success in the championship.

Shack subjects him to an old-style circa-2001 Fisking in this post, one that provokes rose-tinted memories of a more genteel era.  And late in the piece Aschenbach adds this:

Pinehurst No. 2 had mammoth fairways. The rough was replaced by sand and wiregrass and

other native plants. Competitors encountered few obstacles off the tee. With driver or 3-wood in their hands, they must have felt like it was the Indianapolis 500 -- pedal to the metal for all four days.

This is quite obviously quite crazy, as of the 312 golfers that pegged it in the fortnight, exactly four completed their play under par.  And three of those four were at two or one under...

But I'm hearing similar things from folks I speak with about the Opens, so there's maybe a deeper point to be made.  I've previously mentioned my good friend Glenn, who was outraged (OK, maybe an overly-dramatic choice of words)  at how east play was from the waste areas.

Yesterday I played with an old work mate, who admitted that he didn't like the look of the course.  His biggest complaint seemed to be that Mike Davis had the course playing far too short for the ladies, citing the 237-yard Par-4 on No. 13.  When I reminded him that no woman under six feet tall broke par, that didn't seem to change his viewpoint, he just didn't like it.  He even suggested that my frequent trips to the U.K. and Ireland might make me more favorably disposed to brown, which is no doubt true.

The other factor I know is in play, is the appreciation of the severity of the greens.  Unless you've played No. 2, you really can't appreciate how extreme they are and how difficult the shots into and round the green complexes are.  Television, even in high-def, remains a two-dimensional medium that can't quite capture the experience of dealing with those greens.  

As I drill down on Aschenbach's thought process, it seems to be that since the U.S. Opens have always had narrow ribbons of fairway, that's how it should always be.  A little resistant to change, are we?  As for the correlation he craves between driving accuracy and scoring, have you watched any golf in the last decade, Jim?

But I think it's more than just punching bag Jim that's having trouble dealing with change.  It's not what people expect to see, and there's a visceral negative reaction to it that's immune to logic.  All I can say is that playing No. 2 is a magnificent experience, that it appears entirely natural (perhaps not the buried-elephant greens) and looks like it's been there forever.  

Oh, and by the way, Jim, if this wasn't your idea of a U.S. Open, you might want to give Chambers Bay a miss.

Return of the Prodigal Son

The appeal of the story of Tiger's earlier-than-expected return to tournament golf is that no one, Tiger included, knew what to expect from him.  Notwithstanding that, I'm left with the sense that it kinda sorta, you know, pretty much went according to the script.

Jim Moririty leads with the all-important scene on the first tee (OK, technically the tenth tee):

Give him this much, in his first competitive round since back surgery on March 31, Tiger

Woods could at least bend over and tie his shoes on the first tee. Going out in four-over-par 39 on Congressional C.C.’s back nine, his front, it looked for a while like it would take a belt sander to knock all the rust off Woods’ game. On the front, however, he birdied three of his final six holes to finish with a respectable three-over 74. In Woodsian jargon, for what it was, it was what it is.

No details on whether he double-knotted them for safety, so we'll have to await further details.   

The good news is that he was pain free, though he also took pains to point out he wasn’t headed for the practice range, he was headed for a cold soak and treatment. “The back’s great. I had no issues at all. No twinges. No nothing. It felt fantastic. That’s one of the reasons why I let go on those tee shots. I hit it pretty hard out there,” he said. “I think tonight I’ll just take it easy.”

Everything else takes back seat to the err....back, so let's hope he's leveling with us there. Of course during his hibernation Tiger was limited to chipping and putting, so those parts of his game were expected to be more battle-tested, no?  From Rex Hoggard:

Conventional wisdom suggested that because Woods had been limited to only chipping and putting for much of the time since his surgery his short game would not be as rusty as his tee-to-green play, but he struggled early and often around the greens. 

He bogeyed No. 15 after a poor chip to 12 feet, missed a 5-footer at the 16th hole for birdie and bogeyed the 17th and 18th holes after more poor chips. 

“I hit some bad pitches,” said Woods, who hit 10 of 18 greens in regulation, nine of 14 fairways and needed 31 putts. “Those are the ones I should get up and down and I didn't.”

Barry Svrluga, still searching in vain for a vowel, tries to capture the meaning of it all:

But there is little doubt that the uneven, 3-over-par 74 he shot in the first round of the Quicken Loans National meant something more to golf as a sport than the occasional chunked chip shot or wayward iron — both of which Woods hit Thursday. On a global sporting scale, the PGA Tour stop in Bethesda this week is cast against everything from the World Cup to Wimbledon. Without Woods, it drowns. With him, it at least competes. 

“It was cool,” said 20-year-old Jordan Spieth, who played in Woods’s group and struggled to a 74 himself. “It was great to see everyone behind Tiger welcoming him back and wishing him well.”

Tiger played in the early wave, and as such wasn't covered in the Golf Channel broadcast window.  From the highlights package, it appeared to be a Rorschach inkblot of a round, one from which the viewer can draw any and all conclusions.  For those inclined to be less charitable, it was a mess of a day in which Tiger showed little ability to get his ball into the hole.  For those awaiting the Messiah, with only two weeks of full swings behind him the man played the last six holes in three under.  The latter, of course, was the perspective of the Striped One in his post-round presser...

Helen Ross, writing at PGATour.com, captures some of the new, more cuddly Tiger:

Tiger Woods joked that he, Jason Day and Jordan Spieth were just trying to break 80 on

Thursday during the first round of the Quicken Loans National. 

"Unfortunately we didn't see a lot of each other on the (first) nine," Woods said of the trio, who rank Nos. 5, 6 and 9, respectively, in the world, but posted surprising 4-over 39s on their first nines. "... It was a bit of a fight today for all of us but we all hung in there."

She found the galleries surprisingly subdued, but how exuberant can they be when it's 120 degrees and the marque group throws three 39's on the board:

The gallery was somewhat subdued but supportive of Woods and his playing partners. Three fans wore orange t-shirts with the words "He's Back" across the chest. After his sixth bogey, a fan yelled out encouragement: "Keep trying, Tiger, keep trying." And the cheers racketed up considerably when he starting hitting it close on the back nine.

How the mighty have fallen, when the drunken screams turn from "You Da' Man" to "Keep Trying."  

Maybe the most interesting item out there this morning is this Matthew Rudy discussion with instructor Jason Birnbaum about Tiger's swing:

"There's no doubt he and Sean are working on things that you can't see with the naked eye, and I'm sure they have a plan for what they want to do," says Jason Birnbaum, a Golf Digest Best Young Teacher, "But his swing is obviously shorter. He used to have a full backswing, just short of parallel, with some softness in his left arm. Now, he's short and extremely wide." 

Less obvious that the shorter backswing with longer clubs is the amount Woods' hands now lead the clubhead into impact with the driver. "He's aways had a lot of that lag in his swing, but at Congressional, it's gotten extreme with the driver," says Birnbaum, who is based at Alpine Country Club in Demarest, NJ. "Based on what I've heard him say, I know it's something he and Sean are trying to do with his swing, but it's gotten out of hand. His body positions are almost identical, but his release point is completely different. You'd need to see TrackMan numbers to know exactly, but hitting down that much on the driver has to hurt his accuracy. It's probably hard for him to time."

There's video at the link for those interested.  I've pointed you to the item so obviously I find it interesting, but have to add that it may be jumping the gun.  The idea that a man coming off back surgery would initially display a shorter backswing is highly non-counter-intuitive....or, to use a more technical term, duh!

But out of the frying pan... as the man noted in his presser, he needs his reps to get back his feels... But he starts the day behind virtually the entire field, and unless he can post a pretty darn good number our Prodigal Son will have the Sabbath, errr make that both Sabbaths, off.

The Tiger Beat

For some reason, the Quicken Loans National Pro-Am has generated more coverage than typical for your run-of-the-mill Wednesday on Tour.  Must be the excitement of teeing it up with payday lending officers...

Barry Svrluga (Vanna, I'd like to buy a vowel) tees it up in the WaPo:

Tiger Woods’s first shot in public in more than three-and-a-half months came at 6:30 a.m.

Wednesday morning, and it was a dud – a 4-iron that drifted into a bank at Congressional Country Club’s 10th hole, then trickled into the pond below. 

But nearly five hours later, Woods – who will Thursday make the Quicken Loans National his first tournament since he underwent back surgery – was more upbeat. His game is not tight, but his back feels fine. 

“I hit some loose shots today,” Woods said after he completed 18 holes in a pre-tournament pro-am. “I also hit some really good ones. Back feels good, which is nice, which is a really good sign.”

I know Tiger likes to get out there early, but do they really start Pro-Ams at 6:30 a.m.?  However, you'll no doubt be glad to see that his on-course behavior remains intact:

He did, though, show frustration when shots went astray. After an errant tee shot at No. 8 – his 17th hole of the day – Woods grimaced and thumped his clubhead into the ground. But he said that even with Congressional’s thick rough, he didn't have a problem aggressively attacking shots that didn't find the fairway. 

“I went for it today, just to test it and make sure,” Woods said, “and made some pretty good ones, too.”

No mention of his vocabulary, though....Jaime Diaz, offers this note of caution for those awaiting the return of the Messiah:

Woods is 38, six years removed from his last major victory, and coming off back surgery to relieve a pinched nerve. Even if he were to again climb to No. 1, it wouldn't be with the breathtaking power that marked his prime but with a more professional precision. With much less margin for error, some skeptics -- who also wonder if his appearance at Congressional is really about being a tournament host needing to appease a new sponsor -- question whether Woods has the energy needed to assault the mountain yet again. 

All legitimate points. But another that is rarely mentioned -- and could negate them all -- is the state of Woods' most important asset: his mind. No doubt it was in a jumble post-scandal, and my own theory is that Tiger's refusal to depart from the worn-out litany of "reps," "feels" and other jargon when he deigns to discuss his game is designed to avoid addressing the real issue: what's going on between his ears. As a result, a bunch of baggage -- some of it very heavy -- has lingered.

 And for those who simply can't wait for the afternoon Golf Channel coverage, Tiger is now on the golf course, playing with Jason Day and Jordan Spieth, and Golf.com is providing a live blog of his play here, according to which our long national nightmare is over.

Modern Times

James Corrigan is one of the few remaining golf writers in the U.K. old enough to have hit a Tour Balata, and his perspective on Tiger's return is worthy of your time.

His lead should be taught in J-Schools everywhere:

Tiger Woods is the quantitative easing of professional golf. He is not the solution, he is the

mask. He only seems to make things right in the short-time.

So it is that euphoria will burst down those dollar-decked fairways of the PGA Tour this week as Woods returns, at breakneck - but we must pray not ‘break-back’ - speed, to rescue his sport from obscurity, or, as one American columnist said, "the soccer World Cup".

Two short graphs and he's slammed everyone from The Federal Reserve to xenophobic American sportswriters... well played, Sir! 

But Corrigan is making a serious point, and here's the gist of it:

Rory McIlroy was bang on earlier in the season when he declared it to be the responsibility of the elite players whose names were not Tiger to step up and fill the void. The young Ulsterman is wise enough to envisage the picture without the red-shirted one and he is horrified to see a mass of bland parity. No heroes, no zeroes, but so many multi-millionaires. That is the fate of modern professional golf. 

Why? The factors are numerous, some to do with the shameful inaction of the governing bodies, some to do with the nature of golf as sport and the nature of 21st Century fame. 

There’s the equipment, the ball, the course design. Technology, progress, call it what you will, has made it harder for the creatives to separate themselves. Golf has always been a sport where any of many can turn up and win on a given week.

I absolutely love his concept of "The Creatives," but what he's really saying is that modern technology has greatly compressed ball-striking skills, with which I wholeheartedly agree.   

In fact, it reminds me of a pro-shop conversation I had a few years ago with Bruce Berman, the best player at Willow Ridge.  Bruce, whose opinion always warrants serious consideration, was of the belief that Jack's 18 majors was the more substantive accomplishment because he had to beat gamers such as Arnie, Trevino, Watson, Miller and Weiskopf (though he never actually seemed to prevail over Trevino and Watson, did he?).  

By contrast, Bruce was dismissive of Tiger's challengers, including Phil, Ernie and the like, who wilted in his presence.  My rebuttal, which will seem more cogent than probably expressed off the cuff, was a variant of the "deeper-field" argument, simply that Tiger had to beat more players to win his majors than Jack did.  What I really wanted to say was that the modern equipment equalizes ball-striking to a great degree, making professional golf tournaments more putting contests than they used to be.

That last is undoubtedly somewhat an over-statement, the key word being somewhat.  For instance, we've discussed at length the work of Mark Broadie in compiling Tour stats and analyzing player performance.  In revisiting my original Moneyball post, we found that the best ball-strikers on Tour (Tiger, Justin Rose, Henrik Stenson, etc.) picked up some 2 strokes on the field every round.  I'm guessing that if Broadie had the requisite data form Jack's era, that differential would be far larger.  After all, a bad shot with a persimmon driver and Tour Balata golf ball is far worse than  abd shot with a 460 cc Titanium driver and ProV1, no?

While I agree with much of Corrigan's points as relates to the professional game, but I'm not completely with him on his conclusions:

Yet this applies now more than ever and it is happening at a time in sport in which celebrity is everything and, in which, only big names sell. Equality sucks. Hence the hysteria which will greet Tiger in Washington DC. 

Yet one day Woods will be history and then, if something has not been done to capitalise on the Tiger factor, to glean out of it more than greenback for the troops, golf will go back into its niche corner. 

That will mean even lower participation levels, less finance for the grass-roots, the game becoming yet more inaccessible. Yes, Woods is a once-in-a-lifetime, even a number of lifetimes probably. But his influence reveals the weaknesses of golf in its present guise, not its strengths. This week, more than any.

Golf has really never come out of its niche corner, though we could argue whether that's a good or bad thing.  The reality, irony alert, is that the technology has made the game far more enjoyable at the club or hack level, but has no doubt made the game poorer at the professional level.  

I'm not quite the pessimist that Corrigan seems to be, because there's value in puncturing the Tiger bubble.  Every sport has casual viewers, just check the TV ratings for the Belmont Stakes as an example.  The problem seems to be more that we built golf courses for these casual viewers, and that's not going to end well.

There's nothing inherently wrong with being a niche sport, especially one with an attractive demographic profile.  The industry simply needs to rationalize itself around a realistic participation rate, and not over-invest based upon inflated expectations.  Or, if you're TaylorMade, you can continue to assume that every person watching Tiger wants to replace their $500 driver every 90 days...

Gettin' It To The Clubhouse

I've been watching a bit of the PGA Professional National Championship from Myrtle Beach because our friend Big Break Anthony is playing.  Not that I need an excuse to turn on Golf Channel, but it's been very cute watching Theresa monitor and agonize over Anthony's hole-by-hole progress.

As a philosophical matter, it can be interesting watching guys that are really playing for something that matters to them.  For instance, I found the old Fall Finish on the PGA Tour more interesting before the advent of of the wrap-around schedule, because the guys were fighting for their professional lives.  That's pressure...

Same concept in watching the club pros try to earn a trip to Valhalla for the PGA Championship, and maybe even more so as these guys don't make their living playing the game.  Where are you going with this, I hear the reader screaming, so I perhaps should get to my point.

Corey Prugh is one of the club pros playing this week in Myrtle, about whom I knew nothing as of two hours

The unfortunate Corey Pugh.

ago.  Corey is on the professional staff at Manito Golf & Country Club in Spokane, WA, and he stepped to the 18th tee at The Dunes Golf and Beach Club at +3, safe to be booking a plane ticket to Louisville unless he did something stupid....  Well, to quote famous golf authority Forest Gump, stupid is as stupid does and Corey made a nine.  I didn't see the disaster, but there is water fronting the 18th green, but a nine would have required rinsing more than a single golf ball.

So, it got me thinking about other epic final hole collapses in golf history.  Some you'll of course know, but perhaps other swill be new to you.  I'm limiting myself to major 18th hole meltdowns, omitting short putts such as Doug Sanders or I.K. Kim.

1. Jean Van de Velde - Open Chamionship, Carnoustie, 1999

This is the golf standard for final hole meltdowns, and comes with great video and photographs, but I'll take a contrary position.  Van de Velde got one of the worst breaks I've ever seen in televised golf, and shouldn't have found himself in this Hall of Shame.  

With a 3-stroke lead, Van de Velde hit driver off the 18th tee, and that was pretty stupid as it brought the Barrie Burn into play.  But he got away with the drive he pushed to the right and had a reasonable lie in the rough.  

At that point, most people would have laid up short of the Barrie, which circles back across the fairway.  But the Frenchman marches to his own drummer, and he decided to play over the burn towards the grandstand, from which he would receive a free drop.  And the thing is he did it,his 2-iron  easily cleared the burn, but hit a railing on the grandstand and bounced back to the far side of the burn.  That might not have been fatal, except it was a wet year in Scotland and he drew a lie that he couldn't get a wedge through.

Thus begat the chain reaction that lead to his demise, though I give him props for gettng up-and-down from a bunker to actually get himself into the playoff won by Scotsman Paul Lawrie.

2.  Sam Snead - U.S. Open, Philadelphia Country Club, 1939

Knowledge is king, and the Slammer didn't have that which he needed.  He came to the 18th hole, a Par-5,

needing only a par to win the U.S. Open.  Thing is, he didn't know that, as this was long before leaderboards or before the leaders went out at the end of the pairings.

For reasons obscured by the passage of time, Snead thought he needed to make birdie, and accordingly went for the green in two.   From there he made an eight, costing him his best chance at an Open.  

Since he never won an Open, the one major title that eluded him, that had to be the one he felt got away.  Though his other close miss, while not exactly on point, deserves a retelling.

Measuring Snead's downfall.

At the 1947 Open at St. Louis Country Club, Snead sank an 18-foot snake on the 18th hole to force an 18-hole playoff with Lew Worsham.  The next day, Snead and Worsham were tied and both had three-footers for par on No. 18.  Snead was over his putt ready to take it back when Worsham called for a measurement to determine whether Sam was, in fact, away.  He was, but when he resumed his stance he missed.

Was it gamesmanship or a genuine concern for order of play, you make the call.

3.  Phil Mickelson, U.S. Open, Winged Foot, 2006

Like the Slammer, a sure thing Hall-of-Famer for whom the Open is the missing title, Phil has famously finished second six times in the event.  But while some of those were near-misses, this is the one he had his hands on.

Has anyone seen Phil in a yellow shirt since then?

On the 18th tee with a one-shot lead, he almost caused a heart-attack in Johnny Miller when he pulled driver.  The most amazing thing about that Open was that he had a lead, having sprayed his ball all over the township of Mamaroneck all week.  He proceeded to block his driver left-of-left, bouncing it off a hospitality tent.  But driver wasn't close to his stupidest decision on the hole...

In such a situation one obviously chips out, especially when you're Phil Mickelson, the greatest wedge player on the planet.  And even should you fail to get it up-and-in, you have to like your chances in an 18-hole playoff against the relatively unknown Geoff Ogilvey, right?

But not our Phil, who tries to hit the hero shot, makes solid contact with several trees, and makes double-bogey.  Honorable mention to Colin Montgomerie, who suddenly found himself with a chance to win the Open, but gagged on a seven-iron on No. 18 as well.

4.  Arnold Palmer, The Masters, 1961:

Palmer had won the Masters in 1958 and 1960, and it looked like he was going to be the first player to go

back-to-back in '61 (Nicklaus and Faldo later did so).  He hit a good drive on No. 18, and while walking to his ball spotted a good friend, towards whom he walked.  His friend congratulated him on winning his third Masters and, well, you really don't want to be doing that.  

Palmer put his second shot into a greenside bunker, bladed his bunker shot across the green under a television tower and made double-bogey.  I hope he's still on Gary Player's Christmas card list if only for that gift.

5. Lorena Ochoa - U.S. Women's Open, Cherry Hills, 2005

Lorena Ochoa was not yet a household name when she came to the 18th hole at Cherry Hills in 2005.  The course was playing brutally hard for the ladies, but playing more than an hour ahead of the leaders Lorena was 3-under on her day and a par would have likely been sufficient.  Heck, a bogey might well have gotten it done.

The 18th at Cherry Hills plays over water from the tee, then uphill to the green.  It's a difficult hole, the kind of stout finishing 4-par that the USGA has always loved, but the water should not really be in play for a professional golfer.  

I can't possibly remember whether there was a leaderboard in sight, but the only possible conclusion is that the young lady became suddenly aware that the Open was hers to win.  She put possibly the worst swing I've ever seen a professional make on the ball, and hit a low, ugly snapper that never had a chance to clear the water.  Having nowhere to drop, she re-teed and did the exact same thing, ending her championship with a snowman.

For what it's worth, the only swing by a professional that I've seen that may have been worse than Lorena's was by Mark Calcavechia on the 17th hole at the Ocean Course at the 1991 Ryder Cup.  That was Calc mid-epic-choke, letting Colin Montgomerie earn a halve after having him 4-down with 4 to play.  

If readers (Maggot?  Mark W.) can think of any I've missed, please e-mail me or post them in the comments and I'll be happy to add an update.