I love jazz – this is a strange opening to a golf column, but stick with me – and appreciate that for many it’s an acquired taste they’ve no interest in acquiring.
I have to agree on certain strands of the music, specifically the free jazz movement. I have a black hole in my sizeable record collection from the years 1964-1972, when most of jazz even to me sounds like an ill-arranged mess of parps and honks.
I feel exactly the same way about the US Open. I love the game of golf, but I have never understood the mess of parps and honks that the USGA seem to think constitutes a modern golf major championship.
Like Ornette Coleman is a tough listen, this week at Oakmont is going to be tough to watch. As I struggle to see how anyone can get enjoyment out of Pharaoh Sanders, I don’t see how anyone can enjoy the US Open’s brutal set-up in which missing the fairway by a half-yard probably means a hack back of barely a yard just to get the ball on to playable grass.
It doesn’t make any sense to me. I don’t believe – as the USGA’s Sandy Tatum famously said – that this identifies the best golfer of the day.
Every major has it’s share of oddities as winners but the US Open seems to attract more than most and that’s surely down to the destructive set-up.
Oakmont, of course, is the Daddy of all US Opens venues in terms of brutality. Like the very different Carnoustie on this side of the Atlantic, the super-private Pittsburgh club wears the difficulty of its course proudly.
Length, like Carnoustie, is a weapon. At Oakmont the other is the green speed, which could very well get out of hand this week after weeks without rain and strong winds forecast. It wouldn’t be the first time the USGA have lost their greens in a US Open; in fact it seems to be a fairly regular occurrence these days.
Still, advance reports suggest despite these unfavourable weather conditions the USGA have gone full speed ahead with their intended set-up, which has veered back towards the traditional after last year’s brief dalliance with links-style at Chambers Bay; ankle-high, thick manicured rough at all parts right up to the green edges.
Oakmont also, of course, represents a particularly tough bunker challenge. The sand is grooved by way of a special rake, making it quite unlike any other venue on the circuit.
In one respect, however, I’m glad they’re at Oakmont. The USGA’s attempt to broaden their scope worked at Pinehurst two years ago and then misfired last year. I think a return to their usual values was due.
And while I don’t much like it, one can appreciate this week for what it is; a one-off, an examination of some crucial elements of a golfer’s armoury – patience, primarily – just not the very creative ones.
So long as it’s once a year, I can stand it, like the John Coltrane free jazz record that occasionally pops up on my iPod.
Anyway now we’re done with tired analogies, who wins this week? You look for someone who blends length, straightness, and an ability to hole out from everywhere.
Rory McIlroy is the longest and straightest, but I wouldn’t put a sou on his putting stroke right now. Jordan Spieth is in swing struggles and may have trouble keeping the ball in play.
Jason Day is surely your reliable each-way bet from the leading trio of the moment.
Elsewhere, stick a pin in a sheet. I like Zach Johnson, Brandt Snedeker and I would have a penny or two on Russell Knox, and not wholly out of national sentiment.
Outsider? Try Bryson DeChambeau who you won’t get worse than 125-1. The guy has all the elements required to win this one day, why not now?
Elaine’s gut instincts prove correct
Scot Elaine Farquharson-Black piloted Great Britain and Ireland to a fabulous victory over the USA in the Curtis Cup in Dun Laoghaire at the weekend, breaking a cardinal rule of golf team captaincy on the way.
Elaine, who played on two Cup winning teams herself, made the tough decision to leave out Rochelle Morris for the first four rounds of play, starting her only in Sunday’s singles.
This is doing “A Mark James”, as the 1999 Europe skipper did at Brookline, and his tactic is generally accepted to have backfired disastrously.
Except James left out THREE players for the first two days. Elaine was never going to be as drastic as that. Instead she let Bronte Law – only the second player to go 5-0 in a series – carry the team, her Irish trio inspire the crowd and produce GB&I’s second home win in a row.
Long day on the links
I’ve often mentioned the 72 Club at Littlestone GC in Kent in T2G, where members play four rounds in a single day in an annual antidote to slow play.
St Andrews has it’s own version this Saturday. A quartet from the Links staff is playing a team from Callaway in a 72-hole, one-day challenge on the Old, New, Eden and Jubilee courses, for Macmillan Cancer Support.
You can support them at www.justgiving.com.