Ryan Palmer On Chambers Bay Green Complexes: "Put a quarter in the machine and go for a ride."

Steve DiMeglio of USA Today talks to Ryan Palmer about his scouting trip to Chambers Bay and he's got some issues with the green complex designs.

In particular, Palmer sees issues with the contours and some of the potential hole locations.

But … "We played it soft. The greens were rolling 9s (on the Stimpmeter). If they get it rolling 10 and 12, it will be interesting," Palmer said of the massive green complexes on the course. The greens feature large mounds, plenty of bumps and are largely unpredictable and will bring luck and plenty of it into play. "Put a quarter in the machine and go for a ride.

" … The green complexes are something else. With some of the pin placements, you will see some guys play it 30 yards left, 30 yards right or 30 yards long, and next thing you know you'll have a 2 footer. Or you'll be 75 feet from the pin. … You have to spend so much time on the greens, practice rounds are going to take eight hours. Every green has like five or six greens on it."

Palmer also provided the first review of the USGA's possible use of less-than-flat areas on tee boxes.

"(Davis') idea of tee boxes on down hills, up hills and side hills is ridiculous. That's not golf. I don't care what anybody says," Palmer said. "It will get a lot of bad press from the players. It is a joke. I don't understand it. I just don't know why they would do it."

USGA's Davis: You Will Not Win U.S. Open Just Showing Up

A bold pronouncement from USGA Executive Director Mike Davis in suggesting two practice rounds won't be enough to win at Chambers Bay. Especially since defending champion Martin Kaymer told the Fox Sports U.S. Open Media Day show he was more than likely copying his formula from 2014 of not playing the course until U.S. Open Monday.

From an AP story by Tim Booth on Monday's U.S. Open Media Day launch:

"I would contend that there is no way a player will have success here at Chambers Bay unless he really studies the golf course and learns it," Davis said Monday during media day for the U.S. Open. "The idea of coming in and playing two practice rounds and just walking it and using your yardage book, that person is done. Will not win the U.S. Open."

This would seem to suggest that qualifiers and others unable to get to the course before Open week will be at a disadvantage, but that could also be said for other venues packed with local knowledge elements.

Davis also had this to say about the playing style required:

"This is a one-of-a-kind site for us at a U.S. Open," Davis said. "There is going to be some players that just love this ground game and love the imagination and embrace it. And then there are other players who just want predictability. They want something right in front of them. They don't want to have to guess what is going to happen after the ball lands. It's just a different mindset."

Update on Tuesday, April 28, 2015 at 09:00 AM by Geoff

**Luke Kerr-Dineen with a nice roundup of comments in reaction to another revelation by Mike Davis: that some tees may be placed on unlevel surfaces.

Here are Davis’s comments from media day:

The routing itself is very interesting on this property.  If you really study it, on the front nine, twice you climb the hill and you come back down and then on the back nine you traverse your way up the hill and come back down one time.  And it really does make for interesting ebb and flow to the test of golf and certainly it adds to the endurance in terms of walking the golf course too.

But there are some neat things.  I mean, for instance, one of the things that's unique to this is the architects put in what they refer to it as ribbon tees, these tees that just kind of meander.  And it allows us to put tee markers where we want.  And in some cases we may end up putting tee markers on slight slopes as opposed to you think, well, you're always going to have teeing markers on very flat areas.  But there may be some where we give the players a little downhill slope, a little uphill slope, a side slope.  So that's interesting.

Phil: "There's no fire in the golf course right now"

Phil Mickelson, coming off a strong finish to get him to -6 and eight back of Jordan Spieth, summed up the odd state of affairs at Augusta National right now: no fire.

In no way taking away from Spieth's record setting 36-hole pace, Mickelson touched upon why it'll be tough for the pack to catch Spieth: the lush golf course.

From Alex Myers' GolfDigest.com report:

"Certainly, the firm conditions make angles important, past knowledge important, but there's no fire in the golf course right now," Mickelson said.

Jim Furyk made similar comments in his round, as I explained in a Golf World item.

While you'll hear over and over how the club will just turn on the Sub-Air units beneath the greens, they won't work. Besides being overrated in their ability to dry out the greens, there's a bigger issue in getting Augusta National to play with a little more "fire." 

It's too green.

Whether because the club is in love with deep green turf or simply the perfect rye grass growing conditions, the grass is just too healthy, too well fed and growing too fast between the 7 am mowing by the time afternoon play is going strong. Throw in the longish fairway cut designed to slow down the ball and mix it with the robust second cut, and the course looks downright fuzzy by the early evening.

Expect more of the same good scoring no matter what you hear. And considering that the best player has been identified so far, that's not all bad.

Update on Saturday, April 11, 2015 at 06:30 AM by Geoff

**Tiger's remarks include a new verb for something that is more myth than reality...SubAiring. From Karen Crouse's game story, courtesy of reader Tim.

“If they want to make this golf course a little drier, I was telling the guys earlier, it’s quiet out there, there’s no SubAirs going,” Woods said, referring to the system’s name. “If they turn the SubAirs on, they can suck the moisture out of this thing and get them firm, or they can live with it like it is and we can go out there and make a bunch of birdies.”

Asked if he was lobbying for firmer greens, Woods said: “It is what it is. You have to make the adjustments. You’ve got to go get it or you’ve got to play a little more passive.”

Achenbach: Pinehurst No. 2's Width A “Bad Dream”

Sigh.

It's been a while since we've read a column hoping for the good ole days of narrow, rough-lined fairways, but Jim Achenbach's lamenting of the dreadful "too wide" fairways and lack of accuracy needed to win at Pinehurst could be a prize winner! Especially since a total of four players finished under par over two weeks hitting to "mammoth" fairways.

Pinehurst No. 2 had mammoth fairways. The rough was replaced by sand and wiregrass and other native plants. Competitors encountered few obstacles off the tee. With driver or 3-wood in their hands, they must have felt like it was the Indianapolis 500 -- pedal to the metal for all four days.

I didn't see much pedal to the metal golf, did you?

There was no relationship between fairways hit and success in the Women's Open. Neither Michelle Wie, who won, nor Lexi Thompson, who tied for seventh, finished among the top 45 in driving accuracy.

Please, wake us up from this bad dream.

Of course Jim makes the mistake of confusing hitting the ball down an imaginary center line with “thoughtful strategy.”

Both played brilliant golf and deserved to win, but we should be worried that future U.S. Opens at Pinehurst can be dominated by power at the expense of driving accuracy and thoughtful strategy.

So the two winners, arguably the best in the game right now, played "brilliant golf and deserved to win," yet this is a bad dream? I'm so confused!

The Pinehurst Takeaways After Week One: Mostly Great!

The real stunner after week one of the U.S. Open(s) is how good the putting surfaces look heading into week two. The health after a week of preparations is astounding, and a huge credit to the Pinehurst maintenance gurus.  As I said on Morning Drive, the only blemishes are poorly replaced ballmarks by the men who don't know how to repair one.

I saw little of the divoting issue that was anticipated, in part because of shrewd course setup variance of landing areas, firm conditions and respect for Pinehurst No. 2 shown by players in practice rounds. Yes, it's going to be brown and dry with high heat this week, and no I don't think the course will be kind to the women, but for now let's look at the big picture coverage.

The takeaways are as I hoped and feared: gradual widespread embrace of brown and the sandy scrub, with expected dissenters, and fairly widespread desire to see some of Pinehurst's turtleback greens deflated. The issue is not so much that any of the prime candidates is unable to function at a rational speed, but instead the totality of the course. There's a relentlessness to the crowned greens that just takes a little away from the beauty of Donald Ross's design. (By no means do I know this course like many others, but after walking it for four days the first, second, sixth, ninth, and fifteenth greens could see the tire pressure reduced and Pinehurst No. 2 would be better for it.)

Anyway, Alex Miceli talked to Johnny Miller for a YouTube video after walking down from the NBC tower following his final US Open and he mentions that “money talks” when it comes to tournament rights. More interesting is that he says he “was getting a little mad” at the Pinehurst greens because they were “too much of a story.” He said he tried to treat this as if they had ten more U.S. Opens and didn’t cry, though he did get choked up in a classy final segment with Dan Hicks.

I wrote about the Cost of Rough at Pinehurst ending up almost as difficult as the previous U.S. Opens here.

According to the USGA’s “cost of rough” stat measuring the gap in scoring between players who hit fairways and those who miss, the final number was .286 strokes. In 1999 the cost of rough was .303, and .368 in 2005.

And by the way, how about we call the rough at Pinehurst what it was: rough. This was real rough. The old rough in golf--long dense, overwatered and fertilized turf--gets a new Delta Tau Chi name of "manufactured and manicured penalty zones."

Okay, too wordy, let's work on that.

John Hawkins took issue with the greens as well, despite joining the list of those awed by the look and character of Pinehurst No. 2.

Hit it thin? You deserve what you get. Common sense must prevail, however, and the fact of the matter is, original designer Donald Ross never woke up one morning to find his precious babies rolling at 15 on the Stimp, or even 11. Crenshaw and Coore were reluctant to mess with Ross’ fabled greens, a decision that proved long on respect and short on logic.

Bradley Klein offered this short assessment and defends the green complexes:

Sure, these greens are severe. Too severe. That’s their point. They are a little more pronounced than Ross designed them in 1935 when he converted these putting surfaces from sand to turfgrass.

There’s now a certain charm – and a mixture of sado-masochism – in watching world-class players struggle with surfaces that drive us normal golfers crazy. I am curious to watch the ladies (and girls, including an 11-year-old) try their hand, starting Monday morning during practice sessions for the U.S. Women’s Open. My bet is they will struggle mightily and curse the place.

The SI/golf.com Confidential team held a good discussion about the week, including this:

LYNCH: Can we really expect courses or golfers to embrace firm, brown conditions when Augusta National is continually held up as the pinnacle of American golf courses? Or when the PGA Tour presents the same monotonous, lush, setup every week that demands only execution, not strategic decision-making? Conserving resources (natural and financial) is appealing to courses, but it's a tougher sell to golfers because they are conditioned to expect what is celebrated on TV. So let’s not pretend that their reluctance to embrace firmer conditions is simply a lack of sophistication. Trump treats TV as reality, which is why the only things running fast on his courses are waterfalls.

SHIPNUCK: They better -- water is going to usurp oil as this century's most valuable resource. Lush, green, overly fertilized courses are going to become increasingly rare, which is fine by me.

GODICH: They should, but many won't. I loved the look.

PASSOV: Admittedly, if you haven't been exposed to lots of British Isles golf, "brown" is an acquired taste. My dad, my mother-in-law and my brother-in-law's dad all agree with Donald Trump. Give it some time. Some courses and regions are better suited to brown than others. Brown sends a wonderful message for our game and for the future of our game. Let it spread quickly and widely, but where appropriate.

SENS: Are we really going to place weight on the aesthetic input of a grown man who wears his hair like that?

Rex Hoggard on the USGA's Mike Davis addressing any fears of a permanent lunar eclipse caused by a -9 winning score.

“The score for me is not a metric on whether it was a good set up for the week. I look at it as how the golf course played,” Davis said.

“I can remember we got some criticism in 2000 because Tiger (Woods) shot 12 under at Pebble Beach. I kind of scratched my head thinking, OK, the best score for the other 155 players was 3 over. So to me we should celebrate what Martin Kaymer did this week. He executed beautifully.”

Shockingly, a man who has spent millions on waterfalls did not care for Pinehurst. G.C. Digital reports that Trump ripped Pinehurst and was engaged by Golf Channel's Matt Ginella and USA Today's Steve DiMeglio regarding his comments. All via Twitter of course.

Course Setup: “The USGA listened, unfortunately.”

That was Martin Kaymer's assessment of the course setup Saturday at Pinehurst where players felt the hole locations were pretty consistently as difficult as they could possibly be.

Ryan Lavner reports for GolfChannel.com.

But on Saturday, “I think they used the hardest pins they could possibly use on almost every hole,” Jordan Spieth (72) said. 

Said Matt Kuchar (71): “In practice rounds you guess where you think the pins will be and you kind of say, ‘Well, that’s too severe; they won’t put them there.’ And sure enough, that’s where the pin is. It seems to be year after year, and you should know better by now.”

Jim Achenbach has more extensive comments from Kuchar, who many times said he felt the course was teetering on the edge of going over the top.

Kuchar on Sunday's final round: "It (the course) teeters on unplayable … They've got it at the edge, and I'm sure they'll push the edge. I'm hoping a few pin placements are a little kinder tomorrow after they saw what went on today, but I'm not sure I'll get my wish."

Miami Meltdown: The Blue Monster Is Back!

I'm not one to enjoy players struggling with really tough conditions all too often, but the television viewing today from Trump National Doral was wildly entertaining (a Golf Channel replay starts at 9 ET).

Yes, the banks on the lakes should stop balls just barely moving from trickling toward water, and that will come with the turf maturing. But it appeared the players resisted adjusting to the firmness of the greens or the severity of the winds way too often, leading to some pretty wild and wet shots. I was surprised how many times a player flew their ball to the hole or tried to use the high winds to sweep a ball into greens not holding such shots. But as the wind died down, we saw some excellent shots in the afternoon, so the course is bearable under less windy conditions.

Doug Ferguson led by saying the "the new Doral in raging wind looked a lot like an old U.S. Open on Friday." Of the numbers, he notes that "only three players broke par in the second round. No one shot in the 60s. The average score was a fraction under 76."

Dave Shedloski with a nice roundup of player quotes at GolfDigest.com, includes this from players who surprisingly did not groan about the revamped design, but that the high winds interfered with their ability to show off the design's potential.

While a few players thought the setup was too penal for a golf course that Donald Trump purposely wanted made more difficult, the gusting winds were the real issue.
 
"Hey, look, with no wind any golf course and any setup are fine," Webb Simpson said. "When you have conditions like this, there's so much luck that comes into play."
 
"It stinks that the first year they're getting extreme conditions," Bill Haas added. "A new course, it's playing as firm as it can be. And with this wind, it just exposes every little area and every bad swing."

Brian Wacker's report at PGATour.com included this:

"That was a tough golf course today," Woods said. "I don't think that we expected the golf course to be that hard that fast, but it kept getting quicker and quicker.

"It was right on the teetering point. Some of these pin locations were just ‑‑ with the wind directions, it was just impossible to get the ball close."

Update on Friday, March 7, 2014 at 06:26 PM by Geoff

**Sportscenter's highlights from the day, with a nice bit of intro writing:

Update on Friday, March 7, 2014 at 06:29 PM by Geoff

**GolfCentral's look at the water balls.

And The Donald is projecting an 8-under-par winning score, writes Rex Hoggard in assessing the day and Tiger's views on the course setup:

As Woods marched down the seventh fairway, however, Donald Trump watched the day’s happenings with neither a hint of surprise nor remorse.

“They haven’t even set it up hard,” said Trump, who estimated the winning score would be around 8 under, less than half of what it took to win the World Golf Championship last year.

Update on Saturday, March 8, 2014 at 10:24 AM by Geoff

**Webb Simpson blamed the course setup, writes Gene Wojciechowski.

"I played terrible -- I want to get that out there," Simpson said. "But so much luck comes into play. You're not seeing a true golf performance."

We did see lots of plump numbers on the par-72 Blue Monster, which was given a major combover by owner Donald Trump. The Donald paid big money for the course redesign but got Friday's 30 mph gusts of wind for free.

Those winds, plus greens that were as hard as Trump's nearby helipad, plus a course setup that earned harsh post-round reviews, plus more water than Biscayne Bay, all combined to make shooting par here a near fantasy. Only 14 guys were under par after the first round, only four after the second round.

"We don't want this to happen again," Simpson said of the PGA Tour-produced setup. "It felt like a million years out there."

Interesting Dynamic: Dubai Offers $2.5 Million For Par 4 Ace

Tournaments have gotten great mileage out of hole-in-one offerings over the years but never have I heard of one that could alter the dynamics of a tournament as they may in Dubai this week.

It seems the Omega Dubai Desert Classic folks will pay $2.5 million for an ace on the par-4 17th Saturday and Sunday. And Rory McIlroy says he's already planning to give it a go, assuming the 359-yard hole is played up.

John Strege explains.

"There are not many chances you have to win $2.5 million in one shot, so I'll give it a go," Rory McIlroy said according to this Reuters report. McIlroy is playing in the Omega Dubai Desert Classic at Emirates Golf Club beginning on Thursday.

Tournament organizers, for the last two rounds only, are offering the sum, which equals the total tournament purse and far exceeds the $414,383 offered the tournament winner, though not necessarily the appearance fees a few players, including McIlroy and Tiger Woods, no doubt received.

Wedge-Out Rough? Say Goodbye To Tiger At Torrey!

Because if they keep this nonsense up with silly-thick rough around the greens, Mr. Woods and other top players will no longer begin their year at this otherwise wonderful event in one of the best sports towns around.

Photo By J.D. CubanThat's the gist of my Local Knowledge rant about issues with the rough, plugging lies in bunkers and overall nonsense that has taken the fun out of having firm, fast greens (for a change). The Killjoy Classic is not what this event needs.

Check out these stats through round three from the gurus at ShotLink. Though the comparison is far from perfect, remember that the South Course has been widened by the tour rules staff in some spots where the fairways had inched-in since the 2008 U.S. Open.

• Just 5 players managed to shoot rounds in the 60’s on the South Course at Torrey Pines today where the field averaged 73.73 (+1.73 over par). For the week, the South Course is playing to a stroke average of 74.235.

• In the first 3 rounds of the 2008 U.S. Open the South Course played to a stroke average of 75.08. This week the South Course is playing at a stroke average of 74.25 through 54 holes.

• The rough is up this week on the South Course where the field is averaging over 51 feet to the pin. In 2008 & 2009 the South course was the toughest course on TOUR when hitting approach shots from the rough. When in the rough, the field is going on to make birdie just 8.15% of the time this week through 54-holes.

Gary Woodland leads Jordan Spieth and Marc Leishman by one stroke heading into the final round.

Injury Rough Is Back And It's Lamer Than Ever!

I read through the lines after Sergio Garcia's post-round (76) comments about rough in Abu Dhabi, and wrote about it for GolfDigest.com. I think you'll be surprised to find Sergio was right to call out the course setup tactics.

Because just when you thought the days of injury-inducing rough had ended...

Update on Thursday, January 16, 2014 at 12:51 PM by Geoff

**A SkySports.com report quotes broadcaster Ewan Murray praising the rough, even though it might induce injury.

Murray described the course set-up as "marvellous", and said: "You are talking about setting up the golf course to test some of the finest players in the game today. In my opinion, that examination needs to be a stern one.

"Straight driving is very much part of the game and those who hit most fairways should have the advantage over those who don't. You will not beat these players will length alone, but you will identify the best of them by putting the premium on accuracy.

"The Tour should shorten the course on perhaps two of the four days and combine that with tucking the pins away. Give them different tests rather than the same all four rounds.

"The courses in the States are too easy. There is little or no rough and that plays into the hands of the long hitters. Their setting up of courses creates one dimensional players.

Who'd a thunk we'd come to the point that the U.S. was home to low rough and it was Europe trying to give us the dreadful high-rough, yawnfest golf?

"We copy America too often. The European Tour should take the lead, add variety and ask the players some different questions. When you do that the best will come up with the answers."

Asking players to walk a fine thin center line is not asking a different question. It's asking the same one-dimensional question over and over again.

Elk, Slugger Clean Up At The Annual Huggy Awards

John Huggan's annual Huggy's spotlight some of the more dubious on and off-course acts from 2013, including the R&A's peculiar softening of Muirfield's greens (it all worked out ok though...), Steve Elkington's Twittering and PGA Tour VP Slugger's White's views on the World Cup setup of Royal Melbourne.

Regarding the last mention, Huggan writes about Slugger's take on arguably the purest golf on the planet at Royal Melbourne:

Mr White was apparently not impressed by what he saw there, however. The best, most interesting and most strategically challenging course in the southern hemisphere just wasn’t up to scratch, especially around the greens.

As far as ol’ Slugger was concerned, not enough long grass circled the putting surfaces. He wanted to eliminate any need for imagination, flair and feel and replace it all with a succession of hacks/gouges, the only option left to players when rough encroaches close to the fringes. In other words, White wanted every player reduced to the same one-choice level.

Truly, this was a revealing statement, one that goes a long way to explaining why so many events on the so-often one-dimensional PGA Tour look so (un)remarkably similar. Whatever, Slugger is a worthy recipient of his first Huggy.

World Cup: Royal Melbourne On Edge!

The unprecedented pairing of the Australian Masters and World Cup in back-to-back weeks at Royal Melbourne posed only one possible issue: two weeks of tournament conditions on one course which happens to have some pretty wild green contours.

While officials are downplaying the griping, the scores and player comments suggest Royal Melbourne is on edge heading into Saturday's third round of the World Cup. Matt Murnane reports.

One of the tournament's headliners, Ireland star Graeme McDowell, admitted the course was ''driving him insane'', however insisted he was loving the challenge of lightning putts and sometimes impossible-to-judge approach shots - comparing it to the type of test you only got at golf's majors. That appraisal was backed up by Denmark's Thomas Bjorn, who leads the individual section of tournament at eight under par, and his closest rival American Kevin Streelman (-7), who added that the pace of the greens seemed as quick as Augusta, the home of the US Masters.

But it was comments from Australian star Jason Day, third at four under, that set off concerns that controlling the pace of putts and the bounce of approach shots could prove impossible as the course continues to deal with the toll of hosting two tournaments in two weeks.

Asked whether he felt the course was verging on being unplayable, Day's response forced Australian PGA tournament director Andrew Langford-Jones to face the media and squash concerns that the organisers could be facing a potential problem over the weekend.

''You look at the ninth hole. G-Mac [McDowell] landed his [approach shot] just on the green and it bounced and rolled 30 paces,'' Day said.

If memory serves, a very nice approach area short of the green is provided to land the ball short and run it up. Just a thought!

Martin Blake said officials downplayed rumors of epic Stimpmeter readings.

Two players said they had heard the greens were running at 15 on the stimpmeter, an astonishing figure. But the PGA Tour of Australasia's tournaments director Andrew Langford-Jones said the stimpmeter reading this morning was 13.8, adding he had not heard any complaints from players in the locker room.

Thomas Bjorn leads. You can follow the scores here. In the USA, Golf Channel coverage starts at 8 pm ET.