Tiger's First Round Comments

He has issues with the greens being too slow.

TIGER WOODS: I know the greens will be a little bit quicker. The guys were saying that it's -- we're not used to it in the U.S. Open. We just need to make the adjustment. We have plenty of time to on the putting green.

Q. Mike Davis a couple days ago said that you asked him, "When are you going to make these greens faster." Would you like to see them faster?

TIGER WOODS: You're used to playing U.S. Opens with fast greens; these aren't. With the pitch on these greens, you have to keep it on the slower side; we're just not used to being in the U.S. Open with greens this slow. If anything, the greens should have been slower last year. You have to make the adjustment. We're all playing the same golf course. You just have to understand that they're just a little bit slower than we're used to.

Q. (Inaudible) low score that could be had out there tomorrow?

TIGER WOODS: The greens are soft on some holes. Some holes are spongy and stringy. You can throw the ball in there and have it stop virtually where it landed. But in the wind hole, after three, I wasn't very happy.

Poor Mike Davis

According to a trusted eyewitnesses, USGA course setup man Mike Davis was seen several times in his cart today at Winged Foot accompanied NOT by the sitting Championship Committee Chair Jim Hyler (as is custom), but by USGA President and Citation jet man Walter Driver.

Poor Mike couldn't even enjoy his first day at the Open in charge.

USA Today: Lost Art of Shotmaking?

Thanks to reader Sean for the heads up on this great unbylined story in the USA Today (by Tom Spousta?) on the lost art of shotmaking. Some of the juiciest quotes, starting with Lee Trevino:

"You could punch little shots in there, punch little shots in here. Low drivers down the left side. Fly the ball to a spot and let it roll. Punch shots into greens as hard as bricks. ... You had to place every shot in the right position," Trevino says. "I was carving drivers left to right. I'd even hit some irons right to left. Jack was doing the same thing. People think all Jack did was hit it 5 miles and up in the air. He could hit it low, fade it, hook it; he could do whatever the heck he wanted with it.

"They called me more of a shot-maker than Jack," Trevino continues, "because I didn't have the high ball. I had to hit more weird shots than he did. Heck, they think Tiger Woods can hit a ball high? Shoot, Jack could hit a 1-iron so high and it would come down so soft you could catch it in your mouth."

And:

"It's non-existent. The kids out here are just hitting it as hard as they can and taking short clubs and whacking it out of the rough," says Kenny Perry, who has noticed fewer players in recent years working on shaping shots at the practice range.

"It's a dying art. There's just not many people that even want to try to hit those shots," says Corey Pavin, the 1995 U.S. Open champion who sealed his victory with a 4-wood approach shot he shaped right-to-left at the 72nd hole.

You can add Trevino to the anti-America, technophobic agenda setters:

"There's no such animal as shot-making anymore," Trevino says. "And it's not the fault of the player. It's the equipment."

Vijay has a simple take on the matter, and our friends in Fairhaven will probably sending the USA Today a love note for the second graph:

"The ball flies so much straighter now that it's almost useless to even try it," Singh says. "If you want to hit a fade, you really have to move it left to right to get something out of it. If you can hit it straight and long, why try to shape it?"

Pavin, Furyk, Perry and other players agree things began to spin toward less shot-making in the mid-1990s, when Titleist came out with the Tour 90 and Tour 100 model balls. Players liked the ball but noticed that a different dimple pattern made it more difficult to fade or draw shots as far as they did.

"It's almost impossible to hit those shots anymore," Pavin says.

The story also looks at modern course design as part of the problem:

Modern architecture, with its forced carries over hazards and elevated greens, also conspired with technology such as cavity-backed irons to force players into an aerial game.

"A lot of courses these days are built for high, hard shots," says Furyk, the 2003 U.S. Open champion. "The guys have the talent. ... It's just not called for as much."

Still, Furyk says fewer players using less imagination means shot-making "is slowly going to diminish over time."

Nicklaus agrees that if players don't face such adversity, they won't develop those skills. To that end, he used thick-pronged rakes that left wide rows in sand traps at his Memorial Tournament two weeks ago. Bunkers truly became hazards rather than a safe haven from thick rough.

"They're quite capable of playing the shots. But they've never grown up having to play shots," Nicklaus says.

12 x 4 = First Round Hole Locations

Reader Taylor noted that 12 of the first round hole locations are 4 (or less) paces from the green edge.

Marucci On Merion

The former Walker Cupper is the only one to have wondered about the state of the game circa 2013 as it relates to Merion's relevance:

"There's a universal feeling that this is part of our legacy. It's taken a lot of time [to get the Open back], but it's just thrilling. I don't know what's going to happen in the next 7 years, with the ball and clubs, but from a shot-maker's standpoint there's not a better course. It requires skills at all levels."

Phil's First Round Comments

Not much in Mickelson's press conference, but he did have this to say about the tiered rough:

Q. How much did you end up in the graduated first cut rather than the deep stuff?

PHIL MICKELSON: I remember being in the deepest stuff twice, on 15 and 1. I may have been in it more than that, but I remember those two for sure. That stuff is thick and tough to get it out of. I hit a couple chop shots to get it up and out of that grass and I was okay and I was able to scramble for pars, but it's very, very tough.

The graduated rough, the first cut, you can advance it up by the green. It's hard to hit the green. I don't know if I have actually got one on the surface there. But on the 8th hole I was able to hit it just short of the green and not have too difficult of an up and down, and a couple holes you can get it up by the green, but still, I don't think I ever got one on the green.

Monty Badges

After his stellar opening 69: 

Q. A couple years ago one of the magazines on this side of the ocean embarked on a be nice to Monty campaign.

COLIN MONTGOMERIE: Yes, it was super, after Bethpage Black.

Q. Are people being nice to Monty?

COLIN MONTGOMERIE: Yes, it was fine. I had a lot of support. We had a nice group, as well, John Cook and David Duval. We had a good group today, and there was no troubles or problems or whatever the case may be. I didn't need my Golf Digest badge, thank goodness. They made 25,000 of them. I don't know why they made so many (laughter). I think they gave me all the spares, and I think there's only two short (laughter).

Furyk's First Round Comments

Jim Furyk after his opening round 70 was asked about the tiered rough:

JIM FURYK: Yeah, it seems fine. The biggest difference to me is it seems like the gallery ropes are much wider than usual, which is kind of nice in the sense that it used to be if you missed a fairway by one or two yards, you had a terrible lie, and if you missed a fairway by 15 yards you could be out there where the gallery trampled it and it would be pretty good, and that doesn't seem to be the case this week. So far I like the graduated. It seems like you get you kind of get what you deserve.

And you have to give him credit for being honest about his recent injury:

JIM FURYK: Monday I was in Philadelphia for the Exelon Invitational, it's a tournament that I host. Exelon is my sponsor. We had Adam Scott, John Daly and Sean O'Hair in for a skins game.

I was hunched over a sink after brushing my teeth. I went to take basically Aleve in the morning, and I was kind of in bad posture, kind of hunched over the sink and I kind of tossed my head back in a quick motion, and it seems that I probably pinched a disk or pinched something in my lower neck, upper back area, and when I had done that I kind of felt all the muscles on the left side of my upper back just tense up and tighten it, and it made it real difficult for me to turn head to the left.

And how about this question...

Q. The USGA mentioned that these are poa annua greens. How common is that surface on Tour? Is there anything different or special about how you read these or putt on them? Undulations aside, just the grass itself?

Johnny Wants To See The Fairways Softer...

...so courses will play longer because he hasn't liked seeing the ball roll "50, 60 yards" and rendering courses too short. Yes, that's what he just told Jim Hyler during his Thursday appearance in the booth.

Hey Johnny, thinking out loud here, so hear me out.

How about rolling back the ball? Then you could have the best of both worlds: fast and firm and even better, you don't have to trick things up with silly fairway widths and tucked hole locations.

Just a thought. 

Annika Troubled By LPGA Resignations

Thanks to reader Patrik for this semi-translation/interpretation of a piece appearing in Swedish Golf:

Annika tells swedish golf.se that she is troubled about what type of decision that is made on the LPGA the last couple of weeks and is worried. She thinks they have done a great job to lift LPGA to a new level and she wonders if this is going to threaten that, etc

Give Us...

...a break.

90 minutes into the teleast and we've already gotten three "man-sized" course references.

What time does NBC take over?

Update on 2006-06-15 20:03 by Geoff

Seth Davis is blogging at SI.com and is already sick of Berman too.

U.S. Open Reads: Late Thursday Edition

Thanks to reader Chris for this story on the U.S. Open final round telecast on Nine Network getting the ax in Australia due to low ratings. Another story explains the move to Fox cable.

Josh Thomson looks at the two local caddies working this week.

Erin Bruehl reports that Tiger isn't getting complete Privacy.

Alex Myers writes about Mike Davis and his hole location philosophy.

The Biggest Lingering Question...

Watching TGC's mostly excellent pre-game coverage (highlighted by Dave Pelz and aerial comparisons between 1997 and 2006), the talk about the super high rough right off of Nos. 5, 6 and 11 fairways reminded me of the most obvious question not asked of USGA officials Wednesday: how come you are not offering tiered rough on these three holes?

You tell us in your press conference how you are working dilligently to make sure conditions are consistent from day to day.

We learn from Brad Klein that you are working hard to make green speeds consistent.

Yet the tiering is mysteriously inconsistent for the three most birdieable holes?

Oakmont Wants To Furrow Bunkers

(click to enlarge)Oh the floodgates have opened.

Gerry Dulac reports that Oakmont wants to furrow the bunkers at next year's U.S. Open.

"We're pushing for it," said Oakmont pro Bob Ford, among the contingent of club officials who are attending the 106th U.S. Open that starts today at Winged Foot Golf Club.

Paul "Mickey" Pohl, Oakmont's chairman for the 2007 U.S. Open, met yesterday morning with Pete Bevacqua, the USGA's managing director of U.S. Open Championships, and discussed the possibility of bringing back furrowed bunkers in the greenside sand traps only.

But USGA president Walter Driver said yesterday, "We have not talked about doing that at our championships."

If You Enjoyed...

...Brett Avery's excellent hole-by-hole live blogging of Michelle Wie's attempt to qualify for the U.S. Open, good news, PGATour.com has announced via email that he's going to be doing it again Thursday and Friday. This time he'll be filing reports on Tiger Woods.

I'll post a link as soon as they have one up and running.

But it should be fun to get an inside-the-ropes perspective on the hoopla surrounding Tiger.

Update on 2006-06-15 13:40 by Geoff

Here's the link to follow Avery's coverage.