Dunno,was wondering myself.
When playing split tees on weekend rounds, the worst scores will tee off last on hole 10.
The middle of pack players will tee off first off both tees.
And their are a couple of notable players that missed the cut: Padraig Harrington who has won 3 of the last 8 majors is currently playing horribly and shot 76-76. Paul Casey, who is currently ranked #3 in the World and has been playing well with three wins worldwide in 2009 also missed the cut.
I like my boy Weir’s chances. He’s in good position, he’s been playing pretty well this year, and he’s got a great mental game, and generally does well in tournaments with lots of rain delays and other distractions. He’s also probably the best, most experienced golfer in the current top 12, two shots out of the lead, and the next player below him is 3 shots back. His confidence has to be sky-high.
He shot a 64 while lipping the cup twice and scoring a double on one hole. He could easily have shot 60. Of course, he did benefit from the excellent afternoon conditions. But that also means he got a day of rest and practice today.
On the bad side, his play this year has been a little more inconsistent than usual, so we’ll have to see if he can hold it together.
Do I detect a little nationalistic bias there?
Oh, probably. I’m definitely a homey. But objectively what I said is pretty much true. There are two people ahead of Weir: Ricky Barnes’ best finish to date was 47th at the St. Jude Classic. Lucas Glover has a 2nd and 3rd finish this year, so he’s playing very well. But he hadn’t had one top 10 finish in the three years before that, and he’s only won one tournament, in 2005. Only eight top-10 finishes in his entire career. Weir clearly has an advantage in experience over either of these guys. And he’s playing well this year, having already finished 2nd and 3rd in 2009, plus another top 10 finish. He’s won a major, in conditions similar to this.
But hey, there’s still two rounds of golf to play. Anything can happen.
I wonder how important the draw will be today. Tiger will be unlikely to tee off close to the time the leaders do. His conditions may be better ,may be worse, but different. His side of the draw is a long way back.
Tiger is playing his 4th while Barnes in on 1. It should not be too big a problem if the rain comes in.
The greens are apparently slower than most expected. they can not get to the hole.
I wish they wouldn’t move the tees up. What are these guys, a bunch of pussies or something?
It can play over 7400 yards. With the wetness ,the big hitters would pull away.
I just can’t get excited about a Nationwide tour guy winning the U.S. Open. I switched over to soccer, and am watching a freaking miracle occur.
What’s wrong with that? It would give Tiger a chance to get back in it.
The US Open is supposed to designed to prevent some ham and egger from getting lucky, but I think the defenseless course on friday kind of screwed everything up.
I think it did to but it still takes a lot to hang in there and complete 3 more good to great rounds.
It would kill Weir.
So what? I have nothing against Weir, but this is supposed to be a sports event, is it not? Power is part of it. I don’t see why power should be handcapped. To me, that seems the same as lowering the baskets to eliminate height advantages in basketball. Anyone not strong enough to drive long fairways shouldn’t be playing in the US Open.
Why was Barnes just allowed to pick his ball up out of a buried lie in the rough, dust it off and reset the lie? What kind of bullshit was that? I though you weren’t allowed to clean the balls in this event.
You want to offend left hand Canadian fans?
With a Rules official at his side, Barnes was checking his ball to see if it was embedded. It was not.
Since the ball was not embedded, he did not get to “dust it off” or clean it in any fashion.
My big issue, how would anyone like to hit a shot from 175 yds, to within 20 ft of your intended target and not be able to find your ball? Ricky Barnes just did that on the 18th hole. Lucky that there were 5000 forecaddies in the grandstand to direct him to his ball.
I think it was on 11. Barnes was in the deep rough. he took about 50 practice swings cutting down weeds on every swing. perhaps it was camera angle, but he looked like he was hacking at weeds that would inhibit his follow through. That is illegal.
Hang on… by that logic, how about making all the greens domed with insane breaks? Why do you want to handicap the great putters? Weir is 6th this season for putts per round - Tiger is 17th.
How about making the fairways twenty yards wide, and make the rough three feet thick so you can’t get out of it? Why do you want to penalize the super-accurate hitters? Tiger is currently rated around 90th for driving accuracy. Tightening up the fairways would benefit a lot of other players. Why not do that?
The courses are set up to balance all of these factors. In no way is Tiger being handicapped because the course isn’t set up to benefit his particular strengths.
Anyway, as of right now, Weir is doing a fine job of handicapping himself.