Open Thursday

It's gonna be grand, though I don't actually have all that much for you this morning.... And more LIV/governance content than actual Open stuff perhaps, though we'll start with the Open.

The Weather - Good and improving, as per local boy Shack

A little hard to read, but mostly what the doctor ordered.  As you'll hear repeatedly, the lack of institutional knowledge of the venue requires greater preparation, but there's a huge benefit buried in that chart, to wit, the wind will apparently come out of the SSW for all four days.  Fortunately the weather industrial complex always gets it right....

Geoff adds this further update:

Temps managed to get into the middle 50s during the middle of the night when we had clear skies, but like a movie franchise that has had way too many sequels, the marine layer cloud cover is back again and has warmed us up to the upper 50s to begin our day. Overcast skies will have some holes in them at times this morning, with mostly cloudy conditions transitioning to partly sunny skies as we get closer and closer to lunchtime. The forecast for this afternoon calls for mostly sunny skies a good portion of the time and before the wind picks up is when we’ll have our best chance at climbing past 70 degrees. Then as southwest winds gust well into the teens early to mid afternoon, temps will back down a few degrees. Look for low clouds with patchy fog/mist to be possible tonight into Wednesday morning and the outlook for Wednesday into Thursday is pretty much the same. Morning clouds give way to some afternoon sunshine each afternoon with it looking like overall a little less sun than we’ll have today. Temps will try to get higher in the 70s for Friday and most likely will do so on Saturday before falling back towards average on Sunday.

It matters for a couple of reasons.  First, the USGA takes delightfully retro approach to their event, maintaining a full field of 156 players.  We know how the cool kids detest having to suck it up and actually compete against the riff-raff, so we should enjoy this pleasure while we still have it.

My snark aside, the bigger issue is it allows the USGA to allow the course to gradually firm up day-by-day:

A very nice gallery turned out on a cloudy day where only rays of light were seen over two hours of the evening. But any bit more was welcomed on a course deceptively firm. The course may look green but it’s much drier than it looks. That said, one top player coach told me it would have been “gettable” today and with a similar forecast Thursday, expect excellent first round scoring.

Amusing in that we don't really know what "excellent scoring" means at this venue.  That's why we'll need to watch....

Who Ya Got? - This is always the leats interesting aspect of pre-event coverage, for the simple reason that I'm so humiliatingly bad at it it's an impossible task.  Golf.com has their writers picks of winners and longshots up, so should we see if there's any fun to be had there?

Ryan Barath

To-win: Brooks Koepka, +1,100. Ever since his return to good health, Brooks has been a force at majors, capped off by his win at the PGA Championship. With more rest leading up to the U.S.

Open and already a two-time winner of the event, he comes away with his sixth major and cements himself as the best major golfer of his generation.

Sleeper pick: Rickie Fowler, +6,600. Rickie has been having a great season, and although he had a tough Sunday at Memorial, his play during the rest of the event demonstrated that he can handle tough courses. LACC is going to be playing firm and fast, and I think this could be the perfect place for him to not only snag his first win in a while but also his first major.

These are not exactly bold picks, though my strongest argument against Brooksie is simply the fact that he won the prior one.  I agree that Rickie is playing a bit better, though I'm still a tad skeptical.

I'll lump these two together for obvious reasons:

Josh Berhow

To-win: Brooks Koepka, +1,100. It’s hard to bet against him at this point! The guy loves tough, U.S. Open-like courses, and this is, after all, a U.S. Open. You know he has that swagger back now, too, and a confident (and healthy) Brooks Koepka during the middle of a major season is bad news for everyone else.

Sleeper pick: Phil Mickelson, +15,000: Did I really want to pick Phil as a sleeper? No, not really. But did I think his odds would make him this much of a long shot? No way. Hey, the guy showed us at the Masters that he’s still got plenty of game left, and you know how much completing the career grand slam means to him. Plus, there’s also all that golf news you might have heard about in the last week, and it’s safe to assume that’s taken a little bit of weight off Mickelson’s shoulders. The guy’s gotta be entering LACC riding high.

Zephyr Melton

To-win: Scottie Scheffler, +750. I’m not exactly going out on a limb picking the betting favorite, but it’s hard to bet against Scottie these days. He’s hitting the ball better than anyone in the world and it keeps him in contention week in and week out. If he can even figure out the putter a little bit, he’s gonna run away with the title.

Sleeper pick: Phil Mickelson, +15,000. I’ll go with my heart here. There’s no single tournament any golfer wants more than Phil wants the U.S. Open, and it sure would be cool to see him do it. SoCal guy competing close to home should give him some extra motivation, too. Let’s see a career grand slam.

I won't deny that I hate the guy with a white-hot passion, but I'm still not buying it.  I feel no needs to diminish what he did at Augusta, but I also think that venue lends itself to it (see, Langer, Couples, Jack, etc.).  I think Phil's days as a U.S. Open contender are long behind him, but if you're looking for something that would ruing my weekend, look no further.

Isn't Scottie an interesting case, though?  All he has to do is fix that putting, and all he needs to do is get it into the middle-of-the-pack, given his elite tee-to-green game.  That said, he's been clueless on the greens all year...

Josh Sens

To-win: Viktor Hovland, +1,800. It’s far too late to call Hovland a breakout star, but he has taken his game to another level this season. I’m looking for him to follow a pattern we’ve seen from other big-time talents in the run-up to their first major win — some close calls, a bit more seasoning, a prestigious win (in Hovland’s case, the Memorial). The timing seems right for his biggest victory yet.

Sleeper pick: Gary Woodland, +12,500. Despite a missed cut at Oak Hill, Woodland has been showing promising signs. A top 15 at Augusta. A top 10 at Riviera, just down the road (and by the same architect, if you are inclined to think that sort of thing matters). The chalk these days in golf is so dominant that it’s hard to imagine anyone but Scheffler, Rahm or Koepka winning. But at 125-1? That’s a reasonable play.

The 2019 champion as sleeper pick?  I'm gonna need a ruling.....

Dylan Dethier

To-win: Xander Schauffele, +2,000. I don’t think I’ve quite picked Xander to win a major 20 times yet, which means this week, I’ll finally turn a lifetime profit. Also, this dude has to win a U.S. Open at some point. Since his debut in 2017 his results are T5-T6-T2-5-T7-T14. It’s time.

Sleeper pick: Adam Scott, +8,000. What’s tan and tan and tan all over? Adam Scott in a sweater and slacks in the Southern California sunshine. The Aussie is showing sneaky form; after starting 2023 with eight consecutive finishes outside the top 20, he’s logged three top 10s in four starts. This man at this price seems like a worthwhile option.

Adam Scott becomes he rocks an argyle sweater?  You can see why I'm so bad at this game as I focus on all the wrong things....

Before exiting we need to enjoy this worst pick evah:

James Colgan

To-win: Rory McIlroy, +1,100. I can see it now: Rory McIlroy wins the U.S. Open by three strokes, and in his post-tournament presser, he summarily (and literally) flips the bird at the Tour establishment for the past 18 months. “Hey Jay, thanks for the motivation,” he says with a snide smirk as he lifts the trophy. (Is this likely to happen? Almost certainly not. But a man can dream.)

Sleeper pick: Gary Woodland, +12,500. I can also see it now: Gary Woodland wins the U.S. Open by three strokes. Rather than the tasteful end to a turbulent two weeks in the sport we’re all expecting, the golf world instead comes to terms with the least narratively fulfilling victory in the entire field. As Woodland walks away with his second major in five years, his win serves as a reminder that nothing really matters anyway.

I'm not a betting guy and barely understand the pricing cited, but isn't that a rather large disparity between Rory and Scottie?  I actually think it makes sense, though, because I don't like this venue for Rory at all (nor do I think his mind is in a good place).  Off the tee LACC will work for him, but Rory has always struggled in firm-and-fast conditions.  But this venue features perhaps the widest disparity in difficulty, with the hard holes being really long, but also featuring many scoring holes, into which the guys will be hitting wedges.  Given that the weakest part of Rory's game has always been his wedges, one anticipates him flying greens with them all week.

Of course, Colgan is most likely picking him because he'd like to see that bird flipped, failing to understand that Rory has already conformed himself to the new zeitgeist, fully prepared to welcome hs new Wahabi masters.

That USGA Presser -  Geoff with the coverage:

Fred Perpall, Mike Whan and John Bodenhamer presided over a nearly hour-long session

covering a wide range of topics, including state of the game issues, L.A. North, community outreach and what to expect this week.

President Perpall opened by acknowledging pride in “the impact that we will have this week beyond the golf course,” discussing various USGA initiatives and setting the table for CEO Mike Whan whose most newsworthy line may have been a declaration that any course reversal on distance is “highly unlikely.”

After opening with a shout out to PGA Tour Commissioner Jay Monahan, Whan explained how the week here is making history, with the largest “build out” in USGA History and highest purse ever ($20 million). Here are some highlights from the session.

On specifics:

Bodenhamer on the pace of play concerns. “We know we've done the study with our colleagues

in the equipment standards department, the scientists and the engineers in the USGA, those really smart folks that figure out things like where pinch points are on golf courses that host the U.S. Open. We know it's going to be around 6 and 7 and 11. But what we've done, we've done over 520 simulations. We know where those pinch points are. We know what we need to mitigate, and we've got the best referees in the world to do that. We're on top of it, proactively addressing it.”

That 6th hole just screams "Bottleneck", but at least it's an interesting bottleneck....  As one player noted, given that every day is a five round on tour, what are we talking about here?

A few bits on the ball rollback:

Whan on the bifurcation element to distance regulation tightening. “A model local rule approach, to be perfectly honest, allowed us to be a little bit more aggressive because you could be more aggressive with distance at the highest level of distance and therefore not have an impact.”

Whan on the difficulty of making a new “MLR” ball for elite players. “We've received product against a model local rule proposal already asking us to equipment test it, so we've received balls from multiple manufacturers, so I know they can make product. It may not be their finished version, but in months they were presenting us versions that they wanted to test.”

Whan on the notion of pausing implementation of a Model Local Rule on distance because of the LIV/PGA TOUR saga. “We started this in 2018. It's 2023 and we're talking about implementing something not earlier than 2026. I was talking to a friend the other day who's like, why are you rushing this through? I'm like, how slow do we have to go? Started in '18, talking about a '26 implementation. He said to me, can't you just slow this down? I'm like, slower than an eight-year process?”

Whan on charges the governing bodies have rushed the distance study. “If anybody feels like this is in a hurry I don't think they're really paying attention. We're talking about we've been back and forth in a listening process and we are now again, and we've told everybody recently that no earlier than 2026. We're not talking about this season. We're not talking about next season. We're not talking about the season after that. I think if people feel rushed by this, I worry for them because this is a pretty slow process.”

Let me interject this Model Local Tour Confidential Q&A:

The 123rd U.S. Open finally starts on Thursday at Los Angeles Country Club. We’ve covered a lot so far, yet have hardly scratched the surface. What’s the U.S. Open storyline NO ONE is talking about?

Jack Hirsh: I would say the USGA’s proposed ball rollback has gone under the radar, but people are still talking about it, just not as much as we expected. What truly no one has talked about is how Tommy Fleetwood nearly got his first PGA Tour win last week. Yes, Tommy Fleetwood still does not have a PGA Tour win. I think this week might be as good as any because the best ball-strikers are going to thrive at LACC. A close loss can often motivate a breakthrough win.

I agree it's gotten less attentional than it might have otherwise, though it comes with an irony alert.  If anything, the governing bodies have made matters worse by not addressing this issue earlier, so it's quite amusing, as Whan notes, to se eit characterized as being rushed.

That said, I think what's bene ignored is how the PGA-PIF lovefest may change the dynamics of this process.  We understand that each and every tour professional will instinctively rebel against any change, it's simply how they're wired.  I though I could see a path forward whereby the competition between the Tour and LIV would allow for acceptance of the MLR.  But with peace in our time it seems logical that this becomes a harder sell, the more so as you consider that thinly-veiled threat from Rory just before the deal announcement.

This isn't today's issue, but may well be one of the more interesting stories to follow looking forward.

Here are the other answers to that TC panel query about under-covered stroylines:

Jessica Marksbury: I’m thinking it’s Phil. As our colleague Sean Zak wrote on Wednesday, Phil has been uncharacteristically quiet this week. If you follow Phil on Twitter, you know he has plenty to say, so maybe the fact that he’s made himself scarce is an indicator of just how seriously he’s taking this championship. As we all know, Mickelson is one major shy of the career grand slam. The fact that this one is sort of on home turf would make it all the sweeter. Of course, the idea of him winning another major — especially a U.S. Open! — in his 50s seems preposterous, but look at what he did at the Masters! He has to be thinking it’s possible to turn back the clock one more time, even if no one is paying that prospect much attention at the moment.

James Colgan: Scottie Scheffler, who is playing the best tee-to-green golf of anyone alive right now, and who I think is primed to blow away the field in his second major win this week. The dude had the second-best ball-striking performance of anyone in the last 20 years (!) at the Memorial, and he’s flying totally under the radar this week.

Sean Zak: I believe Jordan Spieth is healthy. And when he’s been healthy this year, he’s been good-bordering-on-great. Two weeks ago at a firm, difficult golf course with thick rough, he finished T5. There’s so much room for optimism around Jordo, and we don’t seem to be paying him much attention!

Dylan Dethier: Patrick Reed. Perhaps it’s because today was Flag Day, but it finally occurred to me that Reed is going to be a legitimate contender to win this week’s national championship. And nobody is talking about it!

OK, Dylan, the question wasn't what could ruing my week.....

That's it for now kids, balls will be in the air within an hour or two.  I think this golf course will test the players in ways we don't see often, at least on this side of the Atlantic, but I expect that they will respond with interesting strategies and great shot-making.  I haven't looked forward to a major venue this much since, checking notes, Royal Portrush.  And that one turned out pretty well...

Enjoy!