18 observations, thoughts and predictions for the week in golf…
- It’s an understandable inclination for the PGA Tour to share any positive news regarding the discussions with the Public Investment Fund of Saudi Arabia. The continuing agitation and frustration expressed by fans has likely made the tour anxious to share any positive movement. However, the ambiguity of press releases is likely to make most fans just say, “Enough with the labor pains, just show me the baby.” Here’s hoping U.S. Open is light on questions and comments because any question is going to be met with a detail free response. We will all be here when there is real information to share.
- The WD of Jon Rahm from the LIV golf event in the second round with a left foot infection is ominous. While it may be precautionary, the lack of competitive rounds since his missed cut at the PGA would appear to make the 3-round event in Houston an important precursor to the U.S. Open, an event Rahm won in 2021. With a T45 at the Masters and the aforementioned MC at the PGA casts the U.S. Open in an even more amplified light for Rahm since his departure from the PGA Tour to LIV. Injuries are inevitable but it would be a shame if Pinehurst is without one of the game’s best players. Rahm is scheduled to meet the media Tuesday at the U.S. Open.
- The Scandinavian Mixed event is good optics and it’s a worthwhile competition pitting the men against the women. For the second time in three years Linn Grant won the event. Grant punctuated a final round 65 with a chip in on the final hole and watched as Sebastian Soderberg, who is having a wonderful season, made a double bogey to finish and post 77. Grant was 11 shots behind Soderberg to start the day. Extra special for Grant is that the event was conducted in her hometown of Helsingborg, Sweden.
- The 11-shot comeback reminds me of a weird and hard to believe footnote about the man returning to Pinehurst this week as the last winner there in 2014, Martin Kaymer. Kaymer also won the Players in 2014 and he began 2015 in the middle east where he had so much success and appeared poised to win in Abu Dhabi in January for the 4th time at age 30. Kaymer blew a 10-shot lead to little known Gary Stal and not only did he not win that week, but he has also not won anywhere in the world since. He was the 12th ranked player in the world at the time and it appeared as a weird blip. He returns to Pinehurst this week, now a member of LIV golf. Monday the 2024 Hall of Fame class will be enshrined and eventually Kaymer will be a member of that body. Two majors, a Players Championship, former world #1 and a winning putt in a Ryder Cup is a wonderful body of work but it will be a circuitous route to the Hall nonetheless.
- Jack Nicklaus is 84 and yet this past week his contributions on the broadcast for both Golf Channel and CBS may have you believe he is 44 and he’s doing what he did for ABC back in the 80’s while still competing in majors. Jack would jump into the main tower with Dave Marr and Jim McKay and offer up the most insightful analysis of the golf course he had just played and what the players face coming down the stretch of the U.S. Open, PGA and Open Championship. Nicklaus being a contributor for ABC was one of the genius moves by a network and his thoughts this past week only amplify what I’ve always thought about him with a microphone. He’s the most righteous and interesting dude talking golf we’ve ever had. Makes you wonder if Tiger will ever dip his toes in the water for two or three events a year?
- It appears we can add Ludvig Aberg to the list of players playing through injury, like Jordan Spieth. Aberg was evasive when pressed about the severity of his knee injury by not confirming it nor refuting it either. Aberg’s chances at Pinehurst appear exponentially better than Spieth’s who comes to Pinehurst in a true funk. All of it exacerbated by the torn tendon sheath in his left wrist but his tie for 10th on April 7 in San Antonio is his lone top 10 in four months. Pinehurst favors his strengths, but his compromised physical state makes his chances at contending in the major he won in 2015 to be remote at best.
- The defending and reigning U.S. Open champion Wyndham Clark comes to Pinehurst dealing with increased expectations especially off the early results of the year coupled with missed cuts at the first two majors. Clark’s iron play has dipped this season over last and his efficiency around the greens is not nearly as sharp. Not a good combination on a second shot golf course in No. 2 and the requirement to be tidy around the devilish greens all the players will have to navigate. He has gone from a Masters favorite at the first major to a mild question mark returning to the championship he won a year ago in Los Angeles.
- Played Old Town Club this past weekend after experiencing it the first three times during the dormant winter months. I already knew the Perry Maxwell routing was truly among the best in the country but a walk around on a warm early summer day has me smitten with the Winston Salem, North Carolina course. Coore/Crenshaw have applied their TLC over the past decade and a recent greens conversion has made Old Town one of the sneaky great courses in America. The roll and tilt of the land coupled with the bunkering and green settings are so good.
- Tiger Woods will receive the Bob Jones award this week from the United States Golf Association, the highest honor they bestow upon an individual. Tiger comes to Pinehurst 25 years after he finished third in the first U.S. Open played at course No. 2. Tiger would win the U.S. Open the following year which marked his 7th USGA championship. He added two additional U.S. Open titles to his USGA resume and he is among a handful of players to win three different USGA championships. His playing career is in twilight, which doesn’t mean he will not wake up the echoes somewhere of the next five years, but the first special exemption into the U.S. Open made the timing to receive the Jones award practical. Tiger’s approach to his acceptance speech will be particularly interesting because his relationship with the governing body of golf in America goes back to his early teens and the U.S. junior. Expect real reflection and recall of things few have ever likely heard about his journey with an organization that conducted championships that Tiger won on nine different occasions.
- NBC’s decision to put Dan Hicks and Mike Tirico together in the 18th tower for the U.S. Open will work. Superior technical broadcasters who have low egos will allow them to mesh the co-analysts’ thoughts of Brad Faxon and Brandel Chamblee through the telecast effortlessly. Beyond that, the four men are friends and chemistry is the most essential ingredient when you share as much time on air as they will. Faxon is a cerebral golf nerd, in the best way, and Chamblee is a lethal weapon of eloquence and historical context, but Brad is not a wall flower and I’m certain this arrangement will work.
- Some names to consider on your U.S. Open wagering card for potential top 5’s, top 10’s and top 20’s. David Puig, Thomas Detry, and Aaron Rai. Puig is going to be known very soon as he begins to emerge on LIV and starts to get major starts. Detry is having a very good year, played very well at Valhalla and is currently among a handful of players I consider the best who have yet to win on the PGA Tour. Rai is very good through his bag which is generally rewarded in U.S. Opens and he fits the profile of a player to pop up in an Open and not go away. Add a Tom Hoge, he is a fantastic ball striker, a new age Jeff Maggert.
- For those attending the U.S. Open in Pinehurst and may be looking for the flavor of the village let me recommend a few spots for varying interests. For the ones looking for a true local watering hole the Drum and Quill is the spot. I highly recommend everyone walking through the Given Memorial Library which also is the home of the Tufts archives. The most golf-centric library you’ll ever see. For the ones looking for memorabilia and keepsakes walk into the Old Sport & Gallery. The owner Tom Stewart is a golf professional who was the head pro at the Adios Club in Florida. His shop is chock full of books and photos and the conversation with the owner is worth the trip in alone. Finally, if you need to find something to wear, the Gentleman’s Corner is a great American men’s clothing store owned by the golfy Chris Dalrymple who is a haberdasher right out of central casting.
- Collin Morikawa is plowing along, and he is a solid putting week away from winning. His T3 at the Masters and T4 at the PGA are a very good precursor for what to expect at Pinehurst. Add his results at Colonial and Muirfield Village and he is a short list guy. It’s very realistic that he could go to the Masters next April looking to complete the career grand slam. Collin feels slighted and winning solves attention issues, but his putter must be just warm not hot for him to win his third different major.
- Rory McIlroy and Pinehurst No. 2 does not appear to be an ideal fit. In 2014, before he won the Open Championship and the PGA, he finished T23 in the U.S. Open. Rory, however, is on a nice run of results in the U.S. Open with five straight top 10’s and he’s improved his result each year, including the 2nd place last year at Los Angeles Country Club. There is appreciable width to No. 2 and there are six par fours at least 480 yards long, with three par fours over 500 yards so his length CAN be a huge advantage on the brawny par 70 with 8 and 18 converted to par 4’s. Will he feel freedom to hit driver with liberty? Can his putter behave, and will his wedge play be tightened up? Rory has been very good inside 50 yards this year including the short shots he hit around the turn on Sunday at Quail Hollow to flip it on Xander Schauffele. He’s too good to not be hanging around and he says he’s embracing firm and fast now and should expect No. 2 to be very spicy starting Thursday if the forecast holds.
- LIV golf is a work in progress and it’s not going anywhere so questioning the schedule seems reasonable and appropriate as they try to gain more traction. Not having an event from May 5th which was the final round in Singapore until June 7th, the first round in Houston doesn’t seem right at all. As the entire United States is waking up to a new golf season in full you are dark for the month of May. The PGA doesn’t count, it’s not yours. Off Bryson DeChambeau’s electric performance in Louisville you had to wait three weeks to see him play again. Gaps of four weeks in the heart of the golf season is simply not how you build momentum.
- When I was a young assistant professional at the Governors Club in Chapel Hill, NC in 1991/92 Payne Stewart made several trips there to spend time with his sports psychologist, Dr. Richard Coop. One late November day, Payne, dressed in blue jeans, a ballcap and a beard gave me a chipping lesson. He was a star and in 1999 he would add his 3rd major to his resume at Pinehurst’s first U.S. Open. Less than four months later he was gone. 42 and so much life appearing in front of him. Here are the certainties about what was ahead for Payne in the 25 years since his win at Pinehurst. The captaincy of the Ryder Cup team, most certainly in Ireland in 2006 where he was beloved. A lead analyst position of the TV network of your choice. When Payne died, Golf Channel was four years old, and it was down the street from his home in Orlando. He had the gift of gab, the ease to give his opinion and the charisma to remain very relevant to this very day. 25 years, it moves so fast yet so much transpires and at the end the most irrefutable truth is that it’s all so damn precious. This week will be a lot about Payne, rightfully so.
- Congratulations to the hall of fame class of 2024. A wonderful return for the hall of fame to Pinehurst, where it never should have left. As we look ahead to 2026, I will refrain from getting into the weeds on potential player candidates, I will just re-state what I’ve said for several years now. There is absolutely no reason to abstain from enshrining people who are contributors who are still making massive contributions to the game. Mike Keiser is a trailblazer and MUST be put in for his vision to create havens for thousands and thousands of golfers to find joy in the game. Butch Harmon is the greatest instructor to the elite player, the sport has ever known, his enshrinement is a priority in 2026. Finally, he will have been gone 100 years the next time the hall of fame inducts a class and Seth Raynor absolutely needs to be a member of it. There are others who deserve the honor, but I’ll start there.
- The premise of Tiger or the field was a real thing and not a crazy thing for a period of years. The idea of Scottie or the field is a little impractical and maybe premature since he’s only won one of the four majors so far in his career but Scottie or the field is not residing in a galaxy far, far away. With that, give me Scheffler to win the 124th U.S. Open.