Alex B

Statement from Tiger's website: Kinda what you'd expect, I guess.

80 (+9). Played at my friend's club that I play all the time in the summer, so I know the course well. We played the white tees because it was wet and cold, and he hadn't played in a month. I started off lousy (+5 through 5), had a string of six straight pars, then finished kinda ehh. Made par on the tough 18th, though -- second straight year I've closed out my season with a par on this hole; second straight year my friend nonetheless beat me by a shot. Still a good ending, though. There was some foul-smeeling fertilizer on the greens whose odor accompanied me home after the round. Gross. Also made the greens run at about a 5. 7/18 GIR (including 4/5 on par 3s), 11/13 fairways, 32 putts. Missed greens short; missed putts short.

Wow... that was deep. (jk) On a more serious note, what kind of miss does too-shallow hands usually cause? What do the hands do from the top of the back swing -- cast the club over the top, drop down to get back on plane, or something else?

Yeah, of course, the next day Leonard sank the famous putt that won the Cup for the US, so...

Usually carry it a weak 145-150; ball rolls out around 5 yards, depending on the conditions. I gained about 10 yards this summer but have lost it all from the colder weather, not playing as much, and reverting back to a weak cut (instead of my summer draw). Use the Callaway X-20 uniflex shafts.

Wow, great work. Very impressive.

Congrats on the win, dude. What did for finished in the overall rankings for the summer and for the full season?

Haha, nice! So, under that logic, here's a (semi-) legitimate question: who has won the most times with Phil in the field? Phil has 37 wins with himself in the field; I'd assume that more than 37 of Tiger's wins have come with Phil in the field, though I'm not positive.

Wait ... I'm confused. Who has more victories than Phil with Tiger in the field?

Yup, "better than most" is annoying as hell ... that's why I love using it to irritate friends. So I guess I like the line not for itself but for its effect.

The Good: A friend of mine came up with "legit sticks" for a good shot. At first I hated it, but it's grown on me a lot. I really enjoy overusing Gary Koch's infamous "better than most" on a chip or long putt that looks like it has a chance to drop. I also like phrases with "sauce" in them -- "weak sauce" for something that comes up short, "garb sauce" for a terrible shot. The old saws about a massive pull (i.e., a "dead yank") being a "Thurman Munson" and a poor shot that has a fortunate result (i.e., one that "got away with murder") being an "O.J. Simpson" are also pretty good. Finally, my friends and I have named a short putt that barely gets to the hole a "Vijay." (Remember his three-foot birdie putt on 18 during the third round of this year's PGA Championship?) ------------ The Bad: In my first ever post on this forum (in this thread no less ... glad to see it resuscitated after its two-year coma), I complained about "not a lot of green to work with." Well, it still sucks.

Vijay nearly did it a few years back, but birdied 18 (a par 5). The commentators suggested that it would be tough mentally to want to make his 5-footer for birdie on the last ... quite possibly one of the dumbest things I've ever heard from the TV guys. I parred through my back nine one evening this summer -- needing to play 3 holes on the front for a full 18 (rain had interrupted me earlier), I parred those, too. Twelve pars -- not bad for one night's work.

I had this issue in state summer junior tournaments this year -- here were the six I played in: 1. 35 (E) - 37 (+3) = 72 (+3) 2. 36 (E) - 38 (+3) = 74 (+3) 3. 35 (E) - 40 (+5) = 75 (+5) 4. 37 (+1) - 42 (+6) = 79 (+7) 5. 40 (+4) - 39 (+3) = 79 (+7) 6. 38 (+2) - 40 (+4) = 78 (+6) The first tournament was played on the hottest day of the summer. Idiotically, I forgot to pack a water bottle -- without any on-course fountains around the turn, I went +3 from holes 10-13. Then, after getting a drink on the 14th tee, I was even the rest of the way in. In the second tournament I made double on 18 because I was playing for the win. It hurt (I lost by two), but I wouldn't have played the hole any differently. The third tournament was played on a course (my former high school team's home course) where the back is nine much longer and harder than the front. A mental mistake leading to double on 17 made things worse. In the fourth tourney, I was playing terrible golf. The 37 on the front was sheer luck (half-topped irons leading to birdies, etc.). On the back, I got way too aggressive and went double-triple on 12 and 13. A mental blowup -- tried to force a game that wasn't there at all. The fifth tourney I did better on the back than on the front. The sixth tourney I got distracted near the beginning of the back nine, lost all confidence in my putting stroke, and made three dumb bogeys from 13-15. Somehow pulled myself together mentally and parred the last three holes. So there are a lot of reasons it can happen, but most boil down to getting mentally distracted. On the front nine, you feel you can save a mistake because there's a lot of holes left to play. On the back, you get too caught up in your score, and start forcing the issue, trying to make heroic shots to make up for a bogey or whatever, and end up compounding the errors. You just gotta play every hole as if it's the first hole of the day. Just like multiple flips of the coin aren't related, the eighteen holes are all individual -- you start fresh from the tee on each one. It's when you treat the entire course as one massive interconnected hole that you run into trouble. I'm trying to get myself to think that each hole is the first and only hole of a one-hole course.

My worst scores came mostly in spring, during high school golf matches (I've graduated now ). 9 Holes: 46 (+12) on the front 9 at Yale (yup ... par 34) 47 (+12) on the back nine at Wintonbury Hills 18 Holes: 90 (+19) at Watertown Golf Club ... made an 11 by pumping 3 straight drives OB left. Just a dumb decision not to switch clubs. I think the first day I played at my home course (Quinnatisset Country Club), I shot around a 92 ... but I wasn't playing a strict round. Worst score this summer has been a 47 (+11) on the back nine at Hartford Golf Club. Worst 18 has been a recent 85 at my home course.

Wow, next time I go out to play a round, I'm telling my buddies I'm playing a "one-man scramble." Everybody on my team hits his shot, we (I) pick the best one (of one), and go from there. Seriously, though, what do you mean? One guy plays a scramble with two different golf balls? Three? Can he be a switch-hitter?

Nice! Glad to see you started off your high school golf career well. My first match ever, playing #6 (the last spot) on the JV squad, I drop-kicked my first drive down the middle -- the club hit 8 inches behind the ball and bounced into it. Shot 48, which was 2nd best for the team. Now my self-indulgent, unnecessary "glory days" rant: I had a similar experience last year. At the end of a terrible senior-year campaign, I shot 36 (E) in our final match before the year-end tournaments (in which I again sucked). Like yours, this match was at my home course ... which also was our opponent's home course (so it was an away match for us). The greens were aerated -- but I putted really well (12 putts) to compensate for a bad ball-striking day. Actually was -1 through 8, but my driver had snapped in half on the eighth tee, so using a 4-wood off the tee on the long par-4 ninth didn't work out so well. Nonetheless, I was still medalist for the only time in my high school varsity golf career ... so I should shut up because I was about 1/30, whereas the OP is (I assume) 1/1. Keep it up! I love high-school golf stories ... tell us more if you have any good ones.

Yeah, we've had ten years of it ... but after watching Sergio's major-championship performance over that span, I suggest we call him El Noño . Or El Floppo, or El Yipo ... until he finally wins one (which he will).

Tell us your secrets. I'm currently mired in 10th overall for the group, 8th for the summer ... near the bottom of those who haven't stopped playing at some point. Weak showing this year (as always).

Hunter Mahan. Why? History in Hartford: Win two years ago, T2 last year. Dude obviously knows what he'd doing in Cromwell. Recent play: Mahan contended late into the final round of the US Open until the 16th hole, where he dialed in an iron to get back into the thick of it -- his ball hit the pin and rolled off the green, resulting in a bogey and ultimately (having suffered another dropped shot at 17) a tie for sixth. He's peaking, too: his last five starts have gone MC, T45, T27, T14, T6. Expect a "1" appended to that list's end by Sunday afternoon (as I applaud his closing birdie on the 18th green ... a rare benefit to living near Hartford).

Best 18: 75 Best 9: 34 Strangely, my two lowest rounds ever came on back-to-back days. In preparing for a little club tournament, I shot 76 (34-42); then in the tourney I threw up a 75 (35-40).

For the second consecutive year, Rocco Mediate has gone off in the penultimate group for the final round of the US Open. Only for the 2009 edition, he's in the second-to-last group going off the back nine -- which means that he's in 3rd or 4th place if you turn the leaderboard upside down. In all seriousness, we may see a funny situation tomorrow. Since the USGA sent players off 1 and 10 at the same times, the wave going off 1 could finish first and leave us with a few stragglers to finish off the championship. This scenario is unlikely, of course, because the front-nine wave has a lot more at stake (and thus will likely play slower) than the back-nine wave. But don't be surprised if Andres Romero and Jeff Brehaut conclude this year's US Open on the 9th green, waging a wild battle for a share of 58th.

276 (-4) will do it. For the heck of it, I'll call a three-way tie between Mickelson, Glover, and Tiger Woods (who honestly could've shot 65 the last two days had his putting been worth a damn). Then Glover wins the playoff.

I disagree or take issue with every point made here. It is difficult to overcome a Tiger Woods in a sudden death playoff and impossible in 18 holes the next day. History doesn't support this statement: 1. If you look at last year, Tiger only managed a tie in the 18-hole portion of the playoff. Then, he won the sudden death portion of the event very easily. 2. Ben Hogan was dominating the then-unknown Jack Fleck after a few holes of their 1955 playoff. Then, Fleck came back to win. 3. Jack Nicklaus lost (gasp!) a 1971 playoff to Lee Trevino. 4. Francis Ouimet beat Vardon and Ray in the 1913 playoff. I'd say it's basically impossible to overcome a Tiger-like player in sudden death (I think he's about 12-1, losing once early in his career); it's tough but doable in an extended playoff. The lesser player has time to make up for a shaky start (remember, Rocco missed a 4-footer for par on the first hole last year) and settle down, so the better player can't win by merely intimidation. Plus momentum would play a bigger part and the golfer with the hot swing would win. Of course these statements about a sudden-death playoff are correct, but are they good for a US Open? As I said earlier, the US Open is a test of endurance, both mental and physical, and of earning the title through smart thinking and good execution. Neither momentum near the final holes of regulation nor a hot swing to produce a quick birdie seem fitting to determine a national champion. Only an 18-hole playoff matches the gravity of that task.

First, I'll direct you to this thread , which discusses playoff systems in majors. As for my opinion on the 18-hole playoff: I think it's necessary. The US Open serves to determine a national champion, not to please the fans, the sponsors, the media, or the PGA Tour (and its next stop -- go Hartford!). That's why the USGA doesn't use lift, clean, and place; that's why the USGA doesn't shorten the championship to 54 holes; that's why the USGA uses an 18-hole playoff. Even if not a single person watches the Monday playoff, it will still produce a champion in the fairest possible way. All else is surrogate to doing so. (Now having said all this, the USGA is primarily a money-making machine just like every other organization. I'm surprised it hasn't bailed on tradition and equitability for the quick, easy, and likely more money-friendly solution of a sudden-death or 3- or 4-hole aggregate playoff. So, well done, USGA, and keep it this way.) One more note: In the case of a tied playoff, I maintain the rare and (I'm sure) almost universally opposed position of wanting another 18 holes to be played. Sure, it looks ridiculous, and most everyone would tune out, and golf as a whole would be ridiculed -- but we'd have a deserving national champion. The US Open is about endurance and earning the title: if you'd suffered through 72 holes and battled on for 18 more, winning or losing the tournament on the result of only one extra hole seems ... flaky.

The USGA, I think, wants to preserve the traditional "flip-flopping" of the two waves between the first two rounds. Usually, the morning wave on Thursday becomes the afternoon wave on Friday, and vice versa. Not sure I agree with the USGA's decision here. Anyone else notice how similarly Johan Edfors and Ryan Moore are dressed?