Weekend Wrap - Summer of Our Discontent Edition

Wow, I suppose we should just console ourselves with Rory's Masters win, because absolutely nobody had the Aaron Rai-Wyndham Clark parlay.  With only one major remaining, we're left to debate whether that's a good thing or the other kind.

It's hard to fault anyone.  The USGA picked the most classic of venues (the only founding club of the USGA still able to handle elite play), set the course up appropriately for the anticipate winds, yet delivered a lifeless week of golf.  It's not that the leaderboard didn't feature interesting names, but rather that the play seemed, well, I'm gonna go with lifeless again.

Combined with the aggressive boorishness of the crowds, quite the shock on Long Island, and it all just feels dispiriting.... 

Where to start?  Anywhere but there, so how about Geoff's characteristic numerical summary:

• -4: Winning score to par by Wyndham Clark (64-69-70-73-276)
• 66: Low final round score by Joaquin Niemann, Ludvig Aberg
  
• 67: Final round score of runner-up Sam Burns
• 17: Final round scores in the 60s
• 71.389: Final round scoring average (Par 70)
• 3rd: Lowest final round in U.S. Open history behind 2019 at Pebble Beach (71.190) and 2015 at Chambers Bay (71.293).
• 22: U.S. Open rounds at Shinnecock Hills
• 1st: Sunday’s scoring was the lowest on average in the history of the U.S. Opens played at Shinnecock Hills
• 70-70-70-70: Keith Mitchell’s four rounds (T4), first in U.S. Open history to post four even par rounds
• 3: Players finished under par after 72 holes (3 over five previous
• T23: Position of low amateur Ryder Cowan (68-72-72-73) and Jackson Koivun (72-71-74-68)
• 11: Stimpmeter speeds (Greens single cut)
• 7,419: Final round yardages
• 73: High temperature under mostly sunny skies, dry winds S/SW occasionally gusting into 10-15 m.p.h.

No clue what Geoff means by that 22 rounds at Shinny?  Five modern Opens total twenty rounds.... did they play only two rounds in 1896?  

Now, about those crowds.  Here's one take:

Wyndham Clark had the world against him. He won the U.S. Open anyway

But even Clark wasn’t prepared for Sunday at the U.S. Open and the one-sided nature of it. When

Clark and Scheffler arrived to the first tee at 2:24 p.m., they received a nice ovation; it even seemed nonpartisan. But that did not last.

Fans sang “Happy Birthday” to Scheffler and waited patiently for this final group to put balls in the air. Scheffler hit first, then Clark. Then someone yelled before Clark’s ball had even reached its apex.

“Crash and burn, Wyndham!”

On Clark’s approach from the 1st hole, someone in the Founder’s Club, the luxe balcony hospitality tent left of the 1st fairway, yelled for the leader’s ball to get in the fescue. On the par-3 2nd, Clark missed well left and then had his chip roll slightly over the green. Some fans urged it to keep rolling.

“It’s brutal,” said one volunteer, looking behind him at the grandstands in disgust. “Cheering like that for a bad shot?”

It didn’t stop.

Before Clark teed off on 4, a fan yelled, “Don’t choke, Wyndham!” and was promptly removed by security. A couple more fans were reportedly sent home during the day as well. When Clark hit his approach, he seemed to receive a nice applause. It was such a rarity up until that moment that this reporter — who did not see where the ball landed — made note of it, only to find out the ball had landed 20 yards right of the green. That’s what they cheered for.

Don't know about that.  Seems like he was sufficiently prepared to, yanno, get it done.

Here's an alternative take:

What the U.S. Open crowd got wrong about Wyndham Clark

I do not claim to know much about Clark. I have seen what was reported about his behavior at the U.S. Open last year at Oakmont, when he destroyed a sacred locker room after a lousy round of

golf and later seemed disinterested in expressing remorse. I have seen his bad swings result in temper tantrums, including once accidentally narrowly avoiding striking a volunteer (those expressions of remorse were more sincere). And I have certainly seen the rehabilitation efforts he has undergone in recent months to shed the stigma that he is a hothead, or worse, a Bad Guy.

But after watching him on Sunday at Shinnecock, I do know this: Wyndham Clark has some serious backbone.

In case you weren’t already aware, it is very hard to win a major championship. It might be said that it is hardest to win a U.S. Open. A national championship victory is an experience tantamount to waterboarding — except here the drowning is not simulated. You do not win an Open. You endure through one, flailing wildly through a vast ocean of failure and disaster to eventually emerge with a score lower than your competitors. Very often, it takes every last ounce of you.

This is because the U.S. Open is the ultimate test of yourself. It reveals things that you wouldn’t dare say out loud. It presses you where you are weakest. It shows you who you really are.

To win a major championship the way that Clark did on Sunday at Shinnecock — in which he was competing not only against himself but against all of Shinnecock — was a reflection of Clark’s innermost self that not even he could paper over.

So how’d he do it?

He did it laughing.

Yeah, he was a laugh riot out there.  But the point is to deflect it, and obviously they found a way of doing that....

From Geoff:

Hubert Green played the final four holes of the 1977 U.S. Open under a death threat. Clark played the final 18 holes against Scottie Scheffler, Sam Burns, and a pitiful fan base refusing, en masse, to acknowledge a two-time U.S. Open champion’s clutch play.

To the credit of USGA security, efforts were made early in the round to crack down on fans crying out zingers like “Don’t choke” and other nonsense. Clark opened in three-over-par 38.

“Man, they definitely didn’t want me to win,” Clark said. “It’s pretty rare in an Open Championship or a major to have fans kind of boo against your shots or cheer for bad shots.

Looked like the USGA was far more proactive than the PGA of America, though that's quite the low bar.  Not least because the PGA of America wanted the chaos, given the vastly different nature of the events.

So, care for a review of Clark's "issues"?

2025 PGA Championship at Quail Hollow

One month prior to his incident at Oakmont, Clark received backlash for dangerously throwing his driver after a subpar tee shot. The driver hit a T-Mobile sponsor sign (the same sponsor Clark's hat represented) and was just a few feet away from a wind flag attendant. Here is a video of the outburst on hole 16 at Quail Hollow.

And, of course, this one cited all week:

2025 U.S. Open at Oakmont

During last year's U.S. Open at Oakmont Country Club in Plum, Pennsylvania, Clark made headlines due to a post-round outburst. In Oakmont's historic locker room, which strives to maintain its original 1903 design, photos surfaced of a locker door bashed in.

Clark took his anger out on a locker door after he missed the U.S. Open cut, shooting eight over the first two days. Here is a photo of the aftermath from Clark's outburst at the storied Oakmont locker room.

There's pictures and video at the link.  That PGA club toss will get your attention, as it really could have taken out a volunteer.  Also, amusingly, he took out a TMobile sign, amusing because he currently sports a TMobile logo on his cap.

I'm ignoring a stupid comment from the Masters Par-3 contest, but I do want to add this one:

Bay Hill, March 2024, third round, 18th hole, cameras all over him. Clark is in the third-to-last group, playing with Scottie Scheffler. He hits his tee shot in the juicy right rough, yards from the lake there. His ball settles deep in it. He has, and this is a term of the art, nothing. One play: hack it out.

But Clark went in there with the heavy flange of a wedge, shoving it behind the ball four or more times. (The rule book says you can touch that grass “lightly” — the rules want to make sure you are not improving your lie.) While doing so, the ball — to Brandel Chamblee, to me, likely others — seemed to move. Your ball can’t move when you’re addressing it. If it does, it’s a shot and the ball goes back to where it was. That’s why Jack Nicklaus hovered — hovering is not addressing. Tour rules officials conferred and decided not to give Clark a penalty. I was not the only person flabbergasted by that.

“The ball clearly moved,” Chamblee said in the Golf Channel broadcast that day. “He clearly didn’t ground his club lightly. You begin to wonder: What does a Tour player have to do to get a penalty?”

Amen, Brandel.

Have you seen that clip of Patrick Reed at the Barclays?

So, is he any worse than Sergio, who still seems welcome in polite society?  PReed is about to be welcomed back on Tour, so can we at least be consistent?  He also didn't go to LIV with all the other a******es, so that should be a mark in his favor.

I know what this game can do to us, not that any of the above can be excused.  I actually remember liking his apology after the PGA incident, because he spoke of having to earn our trust back.  The Oakmont incident came far too soon after that, and his reaction to it was off-putting.  The apology came too late, but (operating from memory) I seem to remember it included some sense that the club should have kept the incident quiet.  Kinda like Bryson berating a Golf Channel cameraman for hurting his brand......   All those years of the Tour not disclosing disciplinary actions has created a generation of spoiled brats, eh?  Who coulda seen that one coming?

Shall we see what the Tour Confidential panel wants to talk about?  Again, you don't seem to be on board with this rhetorical thing:

Wyndham Clark won the 126th U.S. Open, taking a commanding six-stroke lead into the final round and ultimately besting Sam Burns by one stroke at Shinnecock Hills. How did Wyndham run away from the field so easily the first three days and then hang on, even when it looked grim, on Sunday?

Josh Sens: Clark’s putting was deadly all week. But in those opening rounds, he himself said that

the driver was key, that when the big stick is going well, he’s tough to beat. It probably helped that Shinnecock, like Los Angeles CC before it, was set up with wide fairways. Clark found a lot of short grass in those opening rounds. And then, when his tee-to-green game got sloppy in the closing rounds, his putter remained en fuego.

Zephyr Melton: He had a red-hot putter, got some fortunate breaks when he hit it astray, and hit some seriously impressive shots when things got tight. Winning wire-to-wire is always impressive, but to do it in U.S. Open conditions at Shinnecock is on another level.

Josh Schrock: He took advantage of the good end of the wind draw on Thursday, and did the same late Saturday when it died down. He built his lead that way and then leaned on a ridiculously clutch putter to bail him out when needed. To win a U.S. Open, especially wire-to-wire at Shinnecock, you’re going to need everything working in your favor; that includes making a number of par and bogey saves. Wyndham did just enough to keep the train on the tracks on Sunday and get it in the house.

I didn't see Saturday's round, in which he might have won it by building that lead.  I do think they're selling short how well he played the back nine on Sunday, pulling himself together in the nick of time.

Due to some past unsavory headlines — a rules controversy, club-throwing incident and damaging an Oakmont locker — Clark has had to work to reshape his image. Although some argue lots of golfers have tempers. Do you think the criticism of Clark is fair? And will this help turn it around?

Sens: It’s one thing to have a temper. It’s another to trash someone else’s property. Clark earned his reputation. He acted like a toddler on more than one occasion. But this week, he said and did all the right things, and he was gritty as all get out when it mattered. Sports fans like that, and I’m sure Clark earned some admirers along the way. Whether he’s actually changed, who knows? But since when has the American public ever demanded that its celebrities/athletes actually be the people they present themselves to be?

Melton: The criticisms after locker-gate are definitely fair, especially considering his lack of accountability and passive apologies. But in the world of sports, winning cures everything, and adding another trophy to his resume won’t hurt.

Schrock: How do we define fair? Sports and sports fans, by and large, are not rational or fair. Golf has lacked villains since most of them left for LIV, and if Clark can somewhat fill that void, then that’s good for the sport. It wasn’t just about him smashing a locker or almost hitting a volunteer with a driver at the PGA or mashing the grass down behind the ball at the API. It’s all of it. The fans went a little overboard cheering against him Sunday. But fans don’t like runaway winners, for the most part. They either want drama or a massive win from a superstar. Add in Clark’s transgressions, and you get a guy who isn’t exactly a fan favorite and a New York crowd that will try and will a train wreck into existence. Will a wire-to-wire win at Shinnecock help change that? Does it really matter? Probably not.

Fair?  I don't even know what the question is going for, as how could either of those anger issues be ignored?

To me, the locker incident is that far more troubling, because it wasn't in the moment.  You finish a round and sign your scorecard and, a half-hour later, you're destroying property?  That said, his career body of work doesn't hold a candle to Sergio's.  Wake me up when Wyndham spits into a cup or damages greens that others still have to play...

Scottie Scheffler, who turned 30 on Sunday, came up short in his first attempt at the career Grand Slam. What gives you optimism he won’t have to wait long to complete the slam, and what gives you pause?

Sens: The only thing that gives me pause is that it’s very hard to win majors. Beyond that, nothing. He’s the best player in the world. He’s healthy. And unlike some other generational talents, he does not seem prone to sabotaging himself on or off the course. If it’s not next year, it will be soon enough.

Melton: He’s got the highest floor of any player in the game, and even when he’s got his C+ game (like he did this week), he keeps himself in contention. It’s only a matter of time before he knocks one off.

Schrock: He’s just always around the top of the leaderboard. He hasn’t had his A game all year and is always in the mix on Sunday. As long as he continues to have the highest floor in golf, he’ll have more chances to get this done. But while we can all sit here and say that Scheffler should have many more chances to win the career Grand Slam, sometimes things aren’t that neat. We don’t know what the future holds, where his game will be at each time this tournament comes around, whether or not he’ll get the bad side of a draw here or an unlucky bounce there. These opportunities actually don’t happen all the time. It felt like Sunday was a big missed opportunity.

The whole week was a huge missed opportunity.  I don't know what's going on with the guy, who seems exceedingly cranky.  The ball-striking still seems elite, he just looks clueless with the putter.

Joaquin Niemann received a two-shot penalty for throwing a golf club during his first round at Shinnecock Hills. No video has surfaced, although The Athletic reported Niemann was angry he didn’t get free relief from fire ants after hitting two balls out of bounds, kicked a flag used to mark his ball and some nearby sand before throwing his club approximately 50 yards. The penalty falls under a new code of conduct policy to police such things. But without any video, do you think the penalty was too severe? Why not just a warning?

Sens: Let’s not fall into the Instagram-era trap of thinking that if it wasn’t captured on video, it didn’t happen. Clearly, there were witnesses, and Niemann didn’t deny what he did. If anything, he should be happy the rules didn’t call for him to be booted from the tournament.

Melton: The act must have been particularly egregious to warrant a penalty without prior warnings. Unfortunately, without any video evidence, we’ll never know exactly what happened.

Schrock: I don’t have a problem with the penalty as much as I do with the arbitrary nature in which it’s given out. Niemann didn’t deny any of the reported parts of the incident. On Sunday, he joked it was a pretty good throw while also saying he felt the USGA was being intentionally harsh on him. Frustration happens, but there has to be a line. The problem is that we don’t have a clear idea of where that line is and what constitutes crossing it. Jon Rahm drop-kicked his driver down the fairway without penalty. Niemann threw his club away from people and got dinged two strokes. I think the way punishments are given out and the lack of transparency about why they are or aren’t given is a bigger issue than Niemann’s individual incident.

I have no clue what happened, but it's amusing to hear Joaquin Niemann thinking he's important enough to be singled out by the USGA.  Who does he think he is, Talor Gooch?

What was your most memorable takeaway from the 126th U.S. Open?

Sens: That as tough as Shinnecock is to play, it might be even tougher to set up. A lot of agony and effort went into getting this one right, both in maintenance practices and in public communications about the conditions. No one wanted the course to become the story. But to some extent, it became anyway. To the point where I heard a superintendent say that if it takes so much sweat and stress to get the course right, it might not be a suitable modern U.S. Open venue.

Melton: That even when Shinnecock is “easy,” it’s still damn hard. With all the complaining we saw on social media, you’d think the winning score was 30 under! Despite being gettable, only three players finished the week in the red. What a test that place presents.

Schrock: Going to go off the wall here. With Wyndham putting the tournament in a chokehold from basically Thursday evening on, my biggest takeaway is what a bad time it was for LIV to have a dud of a week. As the league pitches outside investors to get money to exist in 2027, its two biggest stars completely no-showed from the good side of the draw. The 78 Jon Rahm shot on Friday was shocking and Bryson DeChambeau quickly exited the proceedings on Friday morning. Bad time to have a bad week.

Shinny is one of the truly great places in golf,  but I'll admit to qualms about it as an Open venue.  Seeing the USGA over-correct in the face of those Thursday wind forecasts, and knowing the unique agronomic issues, is it worth it?  It still challenged the guys, but wasn't it a tad, yanno, boring?

This is a good one to go out on:

Who won the week without winning the week?

Sens: Tom Kim. He qualified his way in, then guaranteed himself a spot in next year’s U.S. Open. Not bad for a guy who’d all but vanished from the radar.

Melton: Keith Mitchell. He opened the tournament with a 41 on his opening nine, bounced back with a 29 coming home, and then turned in three more rounds of level-par play. Pretty solid week, I’d say.

Schrock: Jackson Koivun and Miles Russell. The future of U.S. golf both made the cut and played the weekend together for both rounds. Koivun, who will now turn pro, tied for low amateur, and Russell, who is 17 (!), acquitted himself much better than a number of golf’s big names. The future is bright. Put them out first at Adare Manor, Furyk.

Those first two are worthy.  Mitchell's 41-29 might have been my single favorite moment from the week.

Surprised no one mentioned Sam Burns, who finished stronger than I've seen him do previously.  

Hope you enjoyed.  I need to get a move on, so have a great week.