Thursday Threads

We've got a lot to cover, so without further ado...

Sectionals, The Dark Side - This is simultaneously affirming and heartbreaking:

Won Jun Lee, a 17-year-old from South Korea and a junior at the Saddlebrook Academy near Tampa, learned a hard lesson Tuesday during a U.S. Open sectional qualifier at Timuquana Country Club. 

Lee, seventh in the World Junior Rankings, received a two-stroke penalty on the 11th hole during the second round after using a club to tamp down a pitch mark that his ball left when landing behind the green. 

According to golf rule 13-2, players are not allowed to repair such marks off the green. Playing partner Tim Wilkinson informed officials of the infraction after the round.

I can't find anything that confirms one way or the other whether the pitch mark was in his line of play, but Wilkinson had warned Lee during a weather delay that he was close to incurring a penalty.

Here's more:

It’s part of golf’s culture that if players don’t call penalties on themselves, their partners are obligated to do so to “protect the field.” Lee’s two-stroke penalty gave him a double-bogey six at No. 11 instead of a par, and a 68 instead of a 66. His two-round total of 5-under 139 left him one shot out of a five-way playoff for the final two spots at Oakmont. 

Without the penalty, Lee would have tied Wilkinson for second at 7 under and secured a berth in the U.S. Open, while the five players tied at 6-under would have played off for one spot. 

“I had to say something ... It’s unfortunate because he’s a very, very good player,” said Wilkinson. “I wanted him to realize that you’ve got to respect the game. And it’s about the rest of the field, too.”

It's really easy to feel bad for the young man, but he's:

1.  Seventeen years old: and
2. Shooting 66's in U.S. Open Sectional Qualifying at an age when he should still be taking naps with his blankie.

I suspect we'll be hearing a bit more from that young man in the future.  Hopefully this serves as an important lesson learned...

Forward Press - Shack uses his weekly feature to highlight the absurdity of our golf schedule, though in a post-modern moment this excerpt is from the blog in which he links to his own feature (C'mon Geoff, get over yourself):

When the LPGA and PGA Tour Champions have ten majors between them--I think that's it--there are only so many weeks on the calendar they can go. They each have one this week as we gear up for Oakmont and I'm not sure it's a swell idea, but this is the healthy state of pro golf.

I disagree with Geoff in that this is the perfect time for the ladies and round-bellies to hold their biggest event.  I'll no doubt watch the fairer sex in prime time because, well, Memphis.... Need I say more?

But yes, when you have five majors it goes without saying that they're not all, what's the word....major.  So, first the ladies:

The LPGA’s second major of the season heads west for the KPMG Women’s PGA

Championship at Sahalee Country Club. Just a year removed from the sports-crazy Seattle market hosting a major, we’ll find out just how devoted they are as major championship golf returns to the Ted Robinson-designed course where Vijay Singh won the 1998 PGA Championship.

They have 18 of the world top 20, including Lydia Ko, Inbee Park and Lexi Thompson and all-in, prime time coverage from the Golf Channel as well as NBC. That’s right, the LPGA in prime time on network TV.

This is the event first held last year at Westchester Country Club, and offers yet another chance to remind the viewer that the organization that fired Ted Bishop in righteous indignation for his sexist comments couldn't be bothered holding an event for the women until 2015.  

There's also this weird subplot involved:

I didn't know that Inbee was Vulcan.

SAMMAMISH, Wash. -- When Inbee Park finishes the first round of the KPMG Women’s PGA Championship on Thursday she’ll officially complete 10 years on tour and qualify for the LPGA Hall of Fame.

What we don’t know is how much longer we are going to see the remarkable 27-year-old from South Korea—with seven major championships among her 17 LPGA wins—play competitive golf.

The fact Park is plagued by a sore left thumb and is thinking about starting a family with her coach Gi Hyub Nam, whom she married in October 2014, has sparked rumors on tour that she is thinking of retiring, rumors she tried, somewhat unsuccessfully, to shoot down Wednesday at Sahalee Country Club.

This highlights the inherent contradictions in the LPGA's rigid HOF qualification system.  The positive is that it protects against the inevitable dilution of standards, witness the men's Hall in golf and other sports as well.  The flip side, though, is that it inevitably leaves certain deserving players on the outside looking in, Exhibits A and B being Laura Davies and Lorena Ochoa, in any order you prefer.  And this is particularly impactful in the women's game, where the decision to start a family is time sensitive.

As for the old guys, I'm with Kenny Perry.....when he whined that nobody cares about anything that happens on that tour, he might have been understating the case.  But Shack informs that there is a reason to watch them this particular week:

Philly Cricket In The Spotlight!
The twelfth third senior major of 2016 is at a must-see venue, A.W. Tillinghast’s restored Philadelphia Cricket Club (Wissahickon Course), Flourtown, Pa. Keith Foster did the meticulous work and the geezers should love playing this venerable layout.
You’ll be shocked to find out that Bernhard Langer defends a title he won by six.

Shack helpfully provides this aerial video of the course:

It's a great year for senior venues, as their U.S. Open will be at Scioto and their Open Championship will be at Carnoustie.

Oakmont Observations - We'll get back to our fly-overs in a second, but first let's see what may be up with our good friends at Fox:

Picture this: You’re watching the U.S. Open on Fox, and you see a gorgeous flyover shot

of the golf course. It’s in high definition and presents a bird’s-eye view of all the action — a visual that most people couldn’t get on their own. 

It used to be that these shots were captured by cameramen or cameras stationed on blimps or helicopters. With the advent of aerial drones, coupled with the Federal Aviation Administration greenlighting their commercial use, expect more of these birds in the sky during sporting events — especially if it’s being broadcast by Fox Sports.

We saw them use drones at Chambers Bay, though they were limited to those holes fronting Puget Sound.   But this is the twenty-first century, so this is where they're headed:

Fox Sports has more plans for aerial drones in the future. For instance, it’s trying to marry drone footage with augmented reality, which Fox Sports has previously used to create features such as the glowing puck in hockey and the yellow line for football. With drones, it wants to develop features such as “visualized wind” for golf. 

It all falls under the Fox Sports Lab label, which is the umbrella term for all of the different experiments Fox Sports is doing with emerging technology. Its work with NextVR to develop virtual reality experiences falls under this banner. So does its golf range finder, which required five different technology companies working together to create.

I'm a Luddite and therefore incapable of visualizing "visualized wind", so you're on your won.

Next up is our Phil Mickelson-Joe Passov cage match..... Not really, though Phil had these comments about Oakmont:

After two days scouting the Pittsburgh-area layout Mickelson echoed a common theme from those who have played the course, stressing its difficulty from tee to green with little let-up. 

“I really think it is the hardest golf course we've ever played,” Mickelson said on Wednesday at the FedEx St. Jude Classic. “A lot of golf courses, when it challenges you tee to green the way Oakmont does, it usually has a little bit of a reprieve on the greens, and you really don't at Oakmont.” 

Mickelson has competed in two U.S. Opens at Oakmont, missing the cut in 2007 and finishing tied 47th in 1994.

And while we've heard this from others, I think we chalk it up to Phil's relentless though often questionable optimism:

“The reason why I'm optimistic about Oakmont is that it doesn't require me to hit a lot of drivers,” said Mickelson, who spent Monday and Tuesday playing Oakmont to prepare for next week’s championship. “It requires me to get the ball in play off the tee, but when I'm not hitting drivers, if I'm hitting 3-woods, hybrids, I feel confident I'm able to do that a fairly high percentage of the time.” 

Mickelson did concede that when you start missing fairways at a course like Oakmont – “Which isn't exactly uncommon in my game,” – things can get difficult quickly.

I'm old enough to remember Phil playing the 2008 Open at Torrey Pines without a driver, and needing GPS to find the fairway.  The problem is that Phil is crooked with every stick in the bag, including the alignment rod.

Joe Passov ranks the U.S. Open venues in terms of difficulty, and when this famous blood-letting can't crack the top five, you'll intuit that it's a very competitive category:

6. Winged Foot Golf Club (West), Mamaroneck, N.Y. (1974)
Scoring average: 76.99; par 70, +6.99 

Some guy named Jack hacks out of the rough at the '74 Open.

Jack Nicklaus was once asked to rate several famous courses on a scale of difficulty from 1 to 10. He rated Augusta National, St. Andrews, Oak Hill and Seminole all 8s and Pebble Beach and Baltusrol each got a 10. How about Winged Foot? "11," said Nicklaus. "Maybe 12." So hard did Winged Foot play in 1974 that Hale Irwin won with seven-over-par 287, and Dick Schaap titled his tournament book, "Massacre at Winged Foot." Extremely firm, undulating, pear-shaped greens were the primary culprit.

The reader will hear much about Johnny Miller's famed 63 at Oakmont next week, and this was the USGA in "Empire Strikes Back" mode.

It's a fun piece, but given the prevalence of Opens from the '50's, it speaks to many things beyond the  relative difficulty of the venues.  This year's venue barely squeaks into the Top Twenty, so expect the boys to go low.... Or not.

Next, Mike Bamberger, more a Philly guy, pens this love letter to the club:

Throughout golf, people are talking about making the game kinder and gentler. Everywhere, that is, except Oakmont. Here's the Oakmont view of the world: First there was Calvinism, then there was golf. 

The club's founder and guiding light, Henry Fownes, believed in hard as a traditional golfing value, and his spirit has pervaded the course ever since its 1903 opening—as a par-80. Hard in every sense: firm (weather permitting) and, more significantly, resistant to scoring. That's why Johnny Miller's Sunday 63 in the 1973 U.S. Open is widely regarded as the greatest round ever played. Arnold Palmer, who lived 35 miles down the road in Latrobe, was tied for the lead through three rounds. Miller posted early and watched Palmer play in on TV. Writing about his win years later, Miller said, "When Arnie missed that [four-foot] birdie putt on number 11, it was clear: He couldn't catch me. He couldn't shoot one under to tie me or two under to beat me—not at Oakmont under U.S. Open pressure." Not at Oakmont.

Do read the whole thing, as it captures one of the great clubs that helped the game take root in this country.  I'd like to excerpt the entire thing, but here's one selected almost at random:

Alex's sister, Emilie, graduated from South Carolina last month. Alex tells a story, with unmistakable glee, about being on the range with Emilie and their grandfather. Emilie was 14, and she and her grandfather were playing closest-to-the-pin to five flagsticks on a mown green surrounded by a firm, fast runoff. The shots were maybe 30 to 70 yards long. Emilie was hitting open-faced wedges, à la Paula Creamer, winner of the 2010 U.S. Women's Open at Oakmont. Gramps was hitting hooded bump-and-runs, à la Sam Parks. (Birmingham logged many, many rounds with the winner of the '35 Open at Oakmont.) One bounce and here come the brakes. As Alex tells the story, Grandpa hit it inside Emilie nine of 10 times and said, "'I'll beat you nine out of 10 every time if you keep playing shots like that.' And my sister started crying. Grandpa made her cry!"

They don't do participation ribbons at Oakmont..... though how hard can this place really be when the last U.S. Open was won by a girl wearing pink?

Lastly, another post-modern moment from our Shack:

It's a little scary to Google Bobby Jones' article on the unfairness of furrowed bunkers and find a ten-year-old post from this very site as the second result. 

But in searching for one of my favorite Jones articles that's what happened, and while he wasn't quite as cranky as I remembered, Jones' take on Oakmont's penal bunker furrowing rakes remains a fun read. Especially if you're into the evolution of the place, and in particular, their bunkers.

I'll throw myself on the mercy of the court for my excessive linking to the man, but who else writing about golf today knows that Bobby Jones wrote such an article on furrowed bunkers?

Shack's original post is here and the Jones article can be found here, his argument being that the highly-skilled player has no greater chance of pulling off the shot than the amateur hack.  Amusingly for those of that love such things, he introduces the stymie to support his argument.

But I also loved this quote attributed to the sainted Charles Blair Macdonald from the comments:

“If I had my way there would be a troupe of cavalry horses running through every trap and bunker on the course.”

I'm going to take that as pro-furrow.

 Back to our flyovers....

Hole No. 5 - This may be what passes for a reprieve at Oakmont, and is no doubt one of the holes Phil spoke of where driver is not needed.  But if you're in the long stuff, God help you to put your approach somewhere manageable, even with a short iron:

Hole No. 6 - The first Par-3 features a green restored to its original contours:

Hole No. 7 - This begins the "hold-onto-your-hat" section of the golf score, as pars are precious.  The flyovers should really include yardages, but I believe this hole is to play at a scorecard yardage of 479 in the Open.  I assume they'll have to mostly hit drivers, and God help thos that miss the fairway....

Hole No. 8 - This hole plays far shorter than its yardage, but if it didn't we wouldn't finish by Sunday.  It's a beat regardless, and note that GIR statistic for the nest players on the planet:

Shack had this telling comment:

I'm not sure releasing a paper outlining the lack of distance gains and then lengthening the longest par-3 in U.S. Open history twelve or so yards does much to make your argument stronger. Especially when the hole saw only 27% of the field hit the green in regulation last time the U.S. Open was played here. 

Nonetheless, the least interesting looking and playing hole at Oakmont is still interesting, a credit to its design.

A good way to express it.... when your worst hole is still pretty interesting, you've got something going there.