U.S. Open could learn something from Travelers

Johnson. Rahm. Thomas. McIlroy. Predicting who will raise the trophy at the 120th U.S. Open at Winged Foot is easy. Winged Foot will win. It always does. "It was really hard," Justin Thomas, coming off a three-win PGA TOUR season, said after an early scouting trip before THE NORTHERN TRUST last month. He then went on to rave about how much he loved it. That's not an atypical response to this Tillinghast gem that dates to 1923, which has been lengthened 213 yards and will play as a 7,477-yard par 70. Hard but still great. Padraig Harrington, who needed three pars to win the 2006 U.S. Open at Winged Foot but made three bogeys, calls it, "A great, classic golf course." See? No hard feelings. "You have to hit all the golf shots," Harrington says. "It does ask a lot of questions." Not everyone has the answers, but the U.S. Open grades on a curve. Hale Irwin won the so-called Massacre at Winged Foot in 1974 at 7 over par. An aberration? Nope. Geoff Ogilvy won the 2006 U.S. Open at 5 over (71-70-72-72) after late gaffes by Harrington, Colin Montgomerie, Jim Furyk and, most famously, or infamously, Phil Mickelson. [Desk: please link to Sean's story about the players who had the trophy in their grasp only to drop it.] "The word in the locker room was, ‘How hard is this thing going to play?'" Irwin says of the '74 U.S. Open. "It was not an optimistic locker room, let's put it that way. Forget birdies. My plan was to accept par at face value and be very happy with it. Also, don't make double-bogeys, because there were just no real obvious opportunities to get those back with birdies." Jim Colbert was so wrung out by '74, when he tied for fifth, that he later told ESPN he considered Winged Foot, "Probably the hardest golf course of all time." Narrow fairways. Thick rough. Long par 3s. And steeply pitched greens that slope and move like Augusta National's and are so nuanced that the Golf Channel's Arron Oberholser (T16 in '06) predicts they will be very hard to learn in a matter of days, or even over the course of the week. Then there's the finishing stretch of 16, 17 and 18 - three exceedingly difficult par 4s. "Of the three U.S. Opens that I played before I hurt myself," Oberholser says, "there was no finish like it, nothing that difficult. If you get it done at Winged Foot, you are earning it." The thing about Winged Foot, say Oberholser and others who know it, is that it can be very hard to stop making bogeys once you start. (Harrington can attest to that.) "It was your typical old-school U.S. Open," Furyk says of '06, when he missed a 5-foot par putt on 18 that would have forced a playoff. "Tight fairways, heavy rough, have to get the ball in play. It puts stress on you over and over and over again. It's going to withstand the test of time." Thomas calls Winged Foot really hard but also fair and "not tricked up" and "right in front of you." Webb Simpson, who lost in the first round of match play at the 2004 U.S. Amateur at Winged Foot, sang a similar refrain when asked about the course. "I love it," Simpson said. "I feel like it’s just a brutally hard golf course, but they do it the right way. We come to a lot of these courses and they’ve got bunkers, you carry it at 295 or 300. Winged Foot, it’s like Harding Park, it’s right in front of you. It’s long, it’s hard, there’s really not a whole lot of birdie holes, so I think that’s a perfect venue for a U.S. Open golf course." Of the five U.S. Opens at Winged Foot, '74 was probably the hardest (especially with old equipment), but '06 was hardest to watch. Other than the 1999 Open Championship (Jean Van de Velde) it might be the most "lost" major ever, a sort of golfing five-car pileup from which only one man walked away. Not for nothing was it dubbed the Massacre at Winged Foot II. Few remember the misadventures of Harrington, Furyk and Montgomerie. They just remember Mickelson making double-bogey on the last hole of the tournament after hitting his tee shot off a hospitality tent, then trying a crazy second shot that turned out more die than do. "I am still in shock that I did that," he said. "I just can't believe that I did that. I'm such an idiot." Now 50, he has been U.S. Open runner-up a dispiriting six times. Winged Foot is just 30 minutes north of New York City, about which Frank Sinatra crooned, "If I can make it there, I'll make it anywhere." A Winged Foot U.S. Open is the golfing equivalent of that - take crazy weather out of the equation and there's just no tougher test. "I hit a lot of fairways and consequently hit a lot of greens," says Irwin, who would win two more U.S. Opens among his 20 TOUR wins. "So those kinds of courses were less problematic for me than they were for other people, and my career showed that. "But that kind of a win can propel you on," he added when prompted by the Sinatra line about New York. "Once you've come through a Winged Foot situation, other than coming up against terrible weather, you're not going to encounter much that's more difficult than that."

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Golf’s oldest championship ventures outside Scotland and England for just the second time in its 160-year history, returning to Royal Portrush in Northern Ireland as Francesco Molinari defends the Claret Jug he captured in masterful fashion last year at Carnoustie. Rory McIlroy, the 2014 champion at Hoylake and twice a winner this year (THE PLAYERS Championship, RBC Canadian Open), realizes a dream of playing on native soil along with countrymen Graeme McDowell and 2011 champion Darren Clarke. Meantime, Brooks Koepka seeks a second 2019 major to add to his victory at the PGA Championship after finishing second at the Masters and U.S. Open. FIELD NOTES: Newly crowned U.S. Open champion Gary Woodland and Masters winner Tiger Woods also headline the field for what’s now the final major of the year under the revamped golf calendar. … FedExCup points leader Matt Kuchar heads a list featuring 47 of the top 50 in the latest points standings. … In the world rankings, only No. 34 Kevin Na (neck) is missing among the top 85. … Slots remain for the John Deere Classic’s highest top-5 finisher yet to qualify, plus the Scottish Open’s three highest top-10 finishers still without berths. … John Daly, the 1995 Open winner at St. Andrews, will sit out this year after being denied a cart for his arthritic knee. He’ll tee it up in Kentucky instead at the Barbasol Championship. … Among the 12 survivors of local qualifying is amateur Brandon Wu, who helped Stanford to the NCAA team title last month. FEDEXCUP: Winner receives 600 points. STORYLINES: The spotlight shines on Royal Portrush, a striking layout which hosted the 1951 Open but waited 68 years for another chance. Built on heaving linksland overlooking the Irish Sea, the course is widely ranked among the world’s top dozen layouts. … Koepka looks to extend his run of excellence in majors, where he hasn’t been outside the top two since last year’s Open at Carnoustie. He also has a valuable asset in caddie Ricky Elliott, who grew up a half-mile from Royal Portrush and learned the game there. … Though McIlroy has THE PLAYERS Championship and RBC Canadian Open trophies on his shelf this year, neither would compare to winning the Claret Jug in his native Northern Ireland. He already holds the course record with a 61 – posted at age 16. … It’s even more of a home game for Clarke, who grew up an hour away and is a Royal Portrush member, and Portrush native McDowell. … Woods arrives without hitting a competitive shot since the U.S. Open. It’s the second time this year he’s gone from one major to the next without a tuneup stop in between – he missed the PGA Championship cut at Bethpage Black … Molinari’s victory last year made it nine of the Open’s past 12 champions to be crowned at age 35 or older. COURSE: Royal Portrush Golf Club (Dunluce), 7,317 yards, par 72. The only Open venue outside Scotland and England gets its second bite of the apple, albeit with a slightly altered configuration to accommodate a modern major. Two holes from the club’s adjacent Valley course have been melded into the front nine, with the original 17th and 18th holes taken out to house corporate chalets. The rest of the layout is largely untouched from Harry Colt’s brilliant 1932 design that takes full advantage of dramatic elevation changes. The famed “Calamity Corner� – an uphill par-3 measuring 230 yards – will play as No. 16 for the Open. Royal Portrush dates back to 1888, with Old Tom Morris being credited with the original layout. 72-HOLE RECORD: 264, Henrik Stenson (2016 at Royal Troon). 18-HOLE RECORD: 62, Branden Grace (3rd round, 2017 at Royal Birkdale). LAST YEAR: Molinari rose from a crowded pack – including the revitalized Woods – to give Italy its first major champion, navigating the dastardly Carnoustie without a bogey on the final day to triumph by two. Seven players held at least a share of the lead during the final round, and six were tied for the top spot at one point on the back nine. That included Woods, who surged to the front until a double bogey at No.11. That opened the door for the chase pack – including the patient Molinari, who opened with 13 pars until a birdie at No. 14. Three more pars ensued until a bold play at No. 18, when his drive flirted with a pot bunker but set up a wedge to 5 feet for the clinching birdie and a 2-under-par 69. He was the only man in the final four groups to break par. McIlroy (70), Justin Rose (69), Xander Schauffele (74) and Kevin Kisner (74) shared second, with Schauffele’s bogey at No. 17 effectively ending the final threat. Woods (71) tied for sixth. HOW TO FOLLOW TELEVISION: Thursday-Friday, 1:30 a.m.-4 p.m. ET (Golf Channel). Saturday, 4:30-7 a.m. (GC); 7 a.m.-2:30 p.m. (NBC). Sunday, 4:30-7 a.m. (GC); 7 a.m.-2 p.m. (NBC). PGA TOUR LIVE: None. RADIO: Thursday-Friday, 2 a.m.-4 p.m. ET; Saturday-Sunday, 4 a.m.-2:30 p.m. (SiriusXM).

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The holiday season is about togetherness – the more, the merrier – so it only makes sense that the last two tournaments of the calendar year hosted by the PGA TOUR are team formats. Next week’s PNC Championship associated with the PGA TOUR Champions connects generations. It’s fitting that it’s the last stop before everyone celebrates the holidays in earnest. There won’t be a Power Rankings for it, but the entire field of 12 two-person teams at this week’s QBE Shootout is slotted below. As it has since taking over as host of the three-day competition in 2001, Tiburón Golf Club’s Gold Course in Naples, Florida, is the stage. Details of it, the format, and more can be found below. POWER RANKINGS: QBE SHOOTOUT For two of the competitors in the field – Nelly Korda and Lexi Thompson – the Gold Course at Tiburón is exceptionally familiar, for it’s also the annual host of the LPGA’s CME Group Tour Championship. It was contested just three weeks ago. Save nine holes borrowed from the Black Course in 2014, only the Gold has hosted the QBE Shootout throughout the Tiburón’s tenure. The Gold is a stock par 72 that can tip at 7,382 yards, but it’s all about the format in an event like this. Length off the tee will matter only in retrospect if it’s paid off, for there is a reason why this is dubbed a Shootout with a capital S. Nothing has changed concerning the sequence of the scoring for every round. Friday’s opener is a traditional scramble. There will be 18-hole totals in the mid-to-high 50s. Last year’s highest R1 score was 62. The second round will played as modified alternate shot. Everyone hits a tee ball on every hole, but only one ball is used to complete each hole. There was one 62 and one 71 in this format last year, but all of the others ranged from 64 to 69. Sunday’s conclusion is better ball for which the lower of the scores among teammates goes on the card. There was one 68 in this format last year, but all of the others ranged from 60 to 65. The tournament record is 37-under 179. That was authored by the dynastic duo of Harris English and Matt Kuchar in 2020. Their margin of victory of nine strokes that week also is the largest in tournament history. They make up one of just two teams in this week’s field that has partnered together before. This week’s winning combo will share $950,000 of a record purse of $3.8 million. Spectacular weather is forecast. Daytime temps probably will creep into the low 80s and mostly blue skies will be accompanied by light winds. NOTE: PGA TOUR Fantasy Golf will resume with the Sentry Tournament of Champions on Jan. 5-8.

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