Kuchar could smile his way to U.S. Open title

Kuchar could smile his way to U.S. Open title












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Matt Kuchar finds himself in the conversation on the best players who haven't won a major.(Getty Images)

PGA.COM June 12, 2013 7:31 PM


By Tim Dahlberg, Associated Press

ARDMORE, Pa. - He was the smiling kid with his dad on the bag in his first U.S. Open, eager to be himself and not the guy he was following.

Matt Kuchar never expected to be the next Tiger Woods, mostly because even then he knew it wasn't possible. Winning the U.S. Amateur a year after Woods recorded his third straight amateur title got him into the 1998 Open, but it would be a long time before the two were in the same conversation again.

"I was never thinking because I won the amateur the year after Tiger that I was the next Tiger Woods,"Kuchar said. "That was never something that I thought about or thought I was going to follow the same path as Tiger. I knew I had a different path that was for me."

That path was rocky at times, but Kuchar never lost faith in his talent. He rebuilt his swing, found his way back on the PGA Tour after a brief hiccup, and started contending in tournaments.

Now he's in another conversation this week at Merion Golf Club. He's joined a select few as perhaps the best player who hasn't won a major championship.

"I don't know that I'm quite in that talk yet," Kuchar said Wednesday. "I know that a lot of people have been yelling out that they have got me in their pools and they're picking me this week. But we hear a lot of that talk every week."

Perhaps Kuchar should start listening more. Coming off a win two weeks ago at the Memorial - where his young son got a high five from host Jack Nicklaus when Kuchar won - he's high on a lot of lists as a possible winner at this Open.

That he's not shying away from the talk says something about how confident he is about his game.

"I feel like I'm playing some good golf," Kuchar said. "I'm looking to continue to play good golf. Certainly a major championship, a U.S. Open, is one I'm geared up for. I'm looking forward to competing and trying to put my name on this trophy."


Kuchar was still an amateur when he played his first U.S. Open at Olympic Club in San Francisco in 1998. His father - who drew some criticism for his exuberance - was carrying his bag and on Sunday it was both Father's Day and the golfer's 20th birthday

Fans sang Happy Birthday to him and yelled "Happy Father's Day" to his father as they walked to tees, but the real highlight was a 14th place finish. It paid no money but showed Kuchar that he could compete with players a level above him.

Three years later he was a regular on the PGA Tour, making $500,000 in his rookie year. The next year he won the Honda Classic, giving him a two-year exemption on tour and marking him as one of the rising stars of the game.

Then it all started to fall apart. Kuchar began missing cuts with regularity, finally ending up in golf's minor leagues - what was then the Nationwide Tour - while he retooled his game and tried to find a swing that worked as well as the swings of players who were on the big circuit.

"I think that out here there was a definite learning curve on the PGA Tour of just being comfortable standing on the range, hitting balls next to Ernie Els or Tiger Woods or Phil Mickelson and not just being in awe," `Kuchar said. "And trying to say, `Well, I can't hit it like that, what do I need to do to hit it like that?'''

He was a tennis player who took up golf when his mother upgraded their membership at a country club as a Christmas present. Playing better was never an issue since he quickly became one of the top - and finally THE top - amateur in the country.

Coming back on tour in 2007 he played well enough to keep his card, though barely. The next year he won $1.5 million, and the next year cracked the top 25.

Kuchar has already won twice this year, at the WGC-Accenture Match Play Championship and the Memorial, his sixth career win. He's moved to No. 4 in the world golf rankings, and hasn't missed a cut all year while averaging 69.84 strokes a round.

He's a ball striker who rarely makes mistakes, and a putter who excels on fast greens, a combination that has oddsmakers and fans lining the fairways at Merion thinking he has a good shot to win his first major this week.

"I think (the) great thing about the game of golf is there's no clear-cut favorites," Kuchar said.

From Hogan to Daly, five great 1-iron shots

From Hogan to Daly, five great 1-iron shots











PGA.COM June 12, 2013 7:35 PM

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The Ben Hogan plaque in the 18th fairway at Merionhas been a must-see destination for the players at …


By Doug Ferguson, Associated Press

ARDMORE, Pa. - On a quiet day and on a relatively empty course for practice rounds, just about every player at Merion stops at the plaque in the 18th fairway that commemorates Ben Hogan hitting 1-iron into the 18th green in the 1950 U.S. Open.

To see such a landmark in golf history, players are inspired to try to duplicate the shot. But this is no longer an option.

Good luck finding a player who even carries a 1-iron. And the shot Hogan hit, which the USGA estimates to be 213 yards, is no longer a 1-iron. Graeme McDowell hit a 3-hybrid, conceding that Hogan would probably roll in his grave.

There was a time when several players carried the club known as the ''butter knife.'' Finding memorable shots in the U.S. Open is not that easy.

Here are five shots with the 1-iron that stand out:

5. JOHN DALY REACHES THE UNREACHABLE PAR 5

The legend of the 17th hole at Baltusrol was that no one could reach the 630-yard hole in two shots. Baltusrol had not seen the likes of John Daly in the 1993 U.S. Open.

Fans and volunteers kept telling Daly they wanted to see him reach the green in two, though that could only happen if Daly hit his tee shot in the fairway. He finally managed in the second round on Friday.

Daly blasted his tee shot, leaving him about 287 yards up the hill. He smashed his 1-iron - Daly didn't carry a 3-wood back then - and the ball landed in the thick rough between a pair of bunkers, bounced a couple of times and rolled across the green.

''I swung as hard as I could,'' Daly said.

He shot 68 that day, though he would not be a factor the rest of the week. No matter. Daly desperately wanted to prove he could reach the 17th in two, and he said he told his caddie, ''We may not play good, but at least we'll make history.''

4. JACK NICKLAUS AT BALTUSROL

Jack Nicklaus was leading Arnold Palmer going to the par-5 18th at Baltusrol in the 1967 U.S. Open, but more was at stake than beating Palmer again in the U.S. Open. Nicklaus needed a birdie on the last hole to break Ben Hogan's U.S. Open scoring record of 276 in 1948.

It didn't start out very well.

Nicklaus pulled his tee shot into thick rough and had to pitch back out to the fairway. That left him 238 yards away from a thin lie in the fairway, up the hill to the green. He chose a 1-iron, and the shot was so true that Nicklaus took a couple of steps toward the hole when he hit it.

The crowd told him the rest. The ball settled just over 20 feet from the hole, and Nicklaus made the putt for a closing 65 and a four-shot win over Palmer.

3. JACK NICKLAUS AT PEBBLE BEACH


If not for the famous photo of Ben Hogan at Merion, what Jack Nicklaus did in 1972 at Pebble Beach might be the most memorable 1-iron struck in U.S. Open history.

Because it struck the flag.

Nicklaus was never out of the lead after every round that week at Pebble, and in the tough wind off the Monterey Peninsula, his 72 in the third round gave him the outright lead. He was comfortably ahead going to the par-3 17th, though it was no picnic. The wind was ripping hard into his face. Nicklaus pulled out his 1-iron and would have been content to be in the front bunker.

Here's where the shot is even more amazing - Nicklaus had to make an adjustment in the middle of his swing because he felt the club slight off line.

It struck the flag, and Nicklaus went on to a 74 for a three-shot win and his third U.S. Open title.

''The shot I performed, I don't think I could ever do again,'' he said later.

2. BEN HOGAN AT MERION

Sixteen months after the car accident that nearly killed him, Ben Hogan was on the cusp of an amazing comeback. He was in control of the final round in the 1950 U.S. Open at Merion. He was two shots ahead when he three-putted the 15th for a bogey, and then found a bunker off the tee on the par-3 17th and failed to save par.

Suddenly, he was tied for the lead with Lloyd Mangrum and George Fazio, who already had finished the final round. He would need a par on the tough 18th just to join them. The final day was 36 holes, and Hogan hit such a good drive in the morning third round that he needed only a 6-iron. But with his legs battered and swollen on his 36th hole of the day, his tee shot couldn't catch the slope of the hill, leaving him about 213 yards.

He was between a 4-wood and a 1-iron, and he went with the 1-iron.

Hogan reached the green, about 40 feet away, and two-putted for par to get into the playoff. He won the next day.

What makes the shot so famous was Hy Peskin, a photographer for Life magazine, who positioned himself behind Hogan and captured the iconic pose.

''I knew as I shot it, I had something really terrific,'' Peskin later told Golf Digest.

1. IRON BYRON WINS HIS ONLY U.S. OPEN

The record shows Byron Nelson winning his only U.S. Open in 1939 at Philadelphia Country Club after two 18-hole playoffs. Denny Shute was eliminated after the first 18, and Nelson shot 70 in the second playoff to beat Craig Wood by three shots.

There are no photos of the most significant shot. The occasion wasn't as heroic as when Hogan won across town at Merion 11 years later.

But there is no denying the quality of Lord Byron's shot.

He took the lead in the second playoff with a birdie on the third hole. On the par-4 fourth, Nelson had 215 yards and hit a 1-iron that went into the cup for an eagle. Just like that, he had a big lead and was on his way to victory.

Five Questions Heading into the U.S. Open at Merion

Five Questions Heading into the U.S. Open at Merion











Travis Mewhirter June 12, 2013 8:22 PM




COMMENTARY | It's finally here: the U.S. Open, the second major, golf's supposedly toughest test of the year, and it's back at Merion, the place where Ben Hogan hit the most famous 1-iron of all time and where Lee Trevino once outdueled Jack.

There's nostalgia, the ubiquitous "will Tiger ever catch Jack?" storylines, a hot Matt Kuchar, a struggling Rory McIlroy, and a pretty little -- still currently underwater -- course less than 7,000 yards long about to challenge one of the most elite fields in golf, and, of course, plenty of questions coming in. My top five:
1. Happy anniversary Tiger?

When it comes to majors, Tiger will always be the first question until he surpasses Nicklaus. Exactly five years ago, Woods was playing Torrey Pines on one leg while the other was quietly suffering an ACL tear. And he won, beating a short-hitting chatterbox named Rocco Mediate in an 18-hole playoff. What a poetic narrative this would be for Woods to end his half-decade major drought, once thought to be a preposterous stretch for the world's No. 1 pre-fire hydrant.

Merion doesn't set up quite as well for Tiger as Torrey or Pebble Beach, where he won in 2000 by 15 strokes, did. It's quirky, with monster par threes and a glut of short par fours -- a ball striker's heaven. Woods is better when he can uncork driver and float high-irons into the green while most of the field is left hitting middle irons. At Merion, the headcover may come unsheathed maybe two or three times per round, his low irons doing the majority of the work off the tee.

But, Woods has also won four times this season -- double that of anybody on Tour -- as many times he has ever won entering a U.S. Open. A fifth would be a happy anniversary indeed.
2. Merion or the field?

As mentioned above, this antique, wicker basket toting track just outside Philadelphia is quirky. It's playing 6,996 yards, the shortest since Shinnecock Hills in 2004 and Southern Hills in Tulsa three years before that. The optimal survival strategy for a course that short short is to play firm and fast, chasing balls into its shin-high rough and sending approaches bouncing off greens. That's exactly how Merion had been playing -- until this week. Five inches worth of rain has morphed it from Open-ready, firm and rigid like the USGA wanted, to a spongy, vulnerable, birdie-prone golf course, not much unlike any other tournament.

What the rain does provide, however, is even shaggier rough and the elimination of any roll off the tee, making the holes seem somewhat longer than what they actually are. Most expect a bird-a-thon, but Merion may be underestimated.

3. Can Adam Scott go two in a row?

It seems like forever ago when the Aussie used that long, sweeping, stroke of the belly putter to bury Angel Cabrera in a sudden-death playoff at Augusta for the Masters. It was Scott's first ever major and the fourth by a belly-putter wielder.

In a group made for TV, the No. 3 player in the world is paired in the opening two rounds with Woods, No. 1 in the world, and McIlroy, No. 2 in the world.

Two U.S. Open champs and Scott, who has never seriously contended at an Open. Maybe the Masters will be the impetus he needed.
4. Is it Kooch's time?

As I wrote last week, Matt Kuchar is the hottest name in golf right now -- but he's never won a major. Aside from Tiger, the smiling assassin is the only other player on Tour to have more than one win. Merion's short setup plays well for Kuchar, notorious for playing small ball off the tee, relying instead on steady ball striking to lead him to his Tour-leading 35 Top 10s since 2010.

Many count him out, saying he doesn't have Tiger's killer instinct or Rory's ethereal ability, but if there's one U.S. Open course where Kuchar can win, Merion is it.
5. Will we see 2011 Congressional dominating Rory, or 2013 struggling Nike Rory?

The Irishman's struggles have been well-documented this season. We haven't seen many shades reminiscent of the kid who blew past Congressional in 2011 for an Open-record 16 under or the one who would later win the 2012 PGA Championship by eight strokes, the same margin which he won his inaugural major.

As noted above, he's playing with Woods and Scott, good company to be in if a boost in concentration or motivation or whatever it is that he needs. McIlroy is traditionally solid in majors, aside from his meltdown at Augusta in 2011. Since 2009, the 24-year-old McIlroy has finished in the Top 10 six times, but was cut from last year's Open at Olympic.


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Travis Mewhirter has been working in the golf industry since 2007, when he was a bag room manager at Piney Branch Golf Club in Carroll County, Maryland, and has been involved, as a player, since 2004. Since then, he has worked at Hayfields Country Club, where the Constellation Energy Classic was formerly held, and has covered golf at the high school, college, and professional levels.