Charlotte's Wagner hoping for big finish

Johnson Wagner spent the past two weeks hanging around home in Charlotte, playing some golf, relaxing and getting ready for what he hopes will be a big finish to his 2008 PGA Tour season.

Wagner, who won the Shell Houston Open in April, opened the World Golf Championship-Brdgestone Invitational Thursday in Akron, Ohio, with a solid even-par 70, putting himself in position to be a factor at Firestone when the weekend arrives.

The victory in Houston in April not only got Wagner into the Masters at the last minute, it affirmed his belief that he belonged on the tour. His record since Houston, however, has been spotty.

He made four straight cuts in one stretch but his best finish has been a tie for 27th in the EDS Byron Nelson Championship.

Wagner ranks 45th in FedEx Cup points and went to Firestone intent on improving his standing as the four-tournament playoff stretch approaches in three weeks.

"I'm starting to play better on tougher courses and in bigger events and I feel like I can play well in this stretch," Wagner said. "I want to make the top 30 in the FedEx standings so I can play in the Tour Championship and winning another tournament would certainly take care of that."

After the Bridgestone this week, Wagner will play the PGA Championship next week, bypass the Wyndham Championship in Greensboro then being the FedEx Cup playoffs at the Barclays in mid-August. Ideally, he would play his way into a spot at the Tour Championship Sept. 25-28 at East Lake in Atlanta.

As for his breakthrough victory at Houston, Wagner said he needs to focus on what's next rather than on what he's already done.

"I need to quit thinking about (the win)," Wagner said. "I need to focus on the good things I did to get in that position and start doing them again."

Again, Wie elects to be sideshow at men's event

The Women's British Open, pardon me, the Ricoh Women's British Open, is being played this week at Sunningdale in England and Michelle Wie is playing instead in the PGA Tour's Legends Reno-Tahoe Open.

Need I ask, what's wrong with this picture?

The question I've always had about Michelle Wie is whether she's more interested in being a great golfer or a great star.

The fact she's in Nevada rather than England this week raises that question again.

Sure, she would have had to qualify to play in the British Open, but if you're serious about being great you try to play in the biggest events. Unless you're Kenny Perry - but he's 47 and deep enough in his career to skip the British Open even if it's a decision he will likely regret down the road.

Wie was a star. Now she's a curiosity, which means she's moved in the wrong direction.

Playing in another men's event - a second-tier PGA Tour event that includes none of the top 50 players in the world - seems the wrong thing for her to do right now. Maybe she will make the cut - she's shown signs of getting her game back - but what would that prove?

I would love to see Michelle Wie become everything we've projected her to be. She could further transform women's professional golf if she could become a regular winner.

She makes you watch.

If it can all come together for her, Wie could have an enormous impact on the game.

But bypassing a major to be a sideshow in Reno-Tahoe isn't the best way to do it.

Play golf, live longer

What if I told you that playing golf can add five years to your life?

I know, there are times when you think your head will explode after you've chunked another wedge into a bunker or hit a slice deep enough into the woods that the CIA couldn't find it. You think the game will kill you, not keep you alive.

But if the findings of the Karolinska Instituted in Sweden are accurate -- and its reputation apparently makes it the Pro V1 of its field -- then playing golf may be better for you than a glass of red wine a day or passing on the Thickburger.

According to the study, which was published in the Scandinavian Journal of Medicine & Science, golfers are 40 percent less likely to die at a given age than people who don't play golf. Don't ask me to explain the formula but that means the game adds about five years to your life, unless you go about it the way John Daly does.

The study evaluated 300,000 golfers and took a variety of factors into consideration. The study looked at blue-collar and white-collar golfers to negate the idea that wealthier people tend to play golf, and consequently, might have access to better health care.

I'm just guessing here but playing football probably doesn't add five years to your life. Bowling probably doesn't either.

But golf apparently keeps you alive longer, which is a good thing unless you have the shanks.

Namesake was golf giant

Many of the best young players in the Charlotte area are at Cedarwood Country Club this week playing in the Dick Tiddy Metro Junior championship.

Chances are the winners won’t be familiar with the man for whom the tournament is named but he was one of the giants of golf in this area.

Tiddy was a Charlotte native, who played college golf at Wake Forest with a fellow named Arnold Palmer, beginning a friendship that started in the 1940s and lasted until Tiddy passed away four years ago at age 74.

Tiddy was good enough to play the PGA Tour for a couple of years but he was a Hall of Famer as a teaching pro and all-around golf man. He knew how to make club members happy, cure swing flaws and brighten the days of everyone who came in contact with him.

He was the head pro at Charlotte Country Club before taking the same position at Cedarwood when it opened in the mid-1960s. But when Palmer called and asked Tiddy to run his beloved Bay Hill Club in Orlando in 1971, Tiddy moved south but kept his Charlotte connections alive.

For more than three decades, Tiddy taught golf at Bay Hill despite a series of health problems that gradually took away his ability to walk. Friends from Charlotte would routinely visit Bay Hill and Tiddy would return home where members of his family remain.

There was nothing he liked better than helping someone with their golf swing, whether it was a kid just learning the game or one of the many touring pros he put his trained eyes on. He made the game seem easy and I can remember him watching me hit high soft draws during a lesson and happily calling them ‘Carolina cut shots.’

Dick Tiddy was a big man, standing about 6-5 and weighing more than 250 pounds but he was larger than that in the ways that matter most.

He touched thousands of golf games and just as many lives, improving both.

Filling Tiger's void? Harrington, but not Phil

In the aftermath of the Open Championship, the question isn't whether Padraig Harrington is the game's second-best player regardless of what the official world rankings say -- he is -- nor is it whether this major championship Sunday performance is like so many others in Greg Norman's star-crossed career -- no, this was different.

The question is, what happened to all the guys who were supposed to pounce on major championships while Tiger Woods is on the mend?

This was going to be Sergio's moment, but he shot 44 coming in on Sunday and was never a serious factor.

Ernie Els?

His first-round 80 said more than his three good rounds from there.

Phil Mickelson?

Paralysis by analysis. Just play golf. Enough with the five wedges and rocket-science approach to trajectory and all that overthinking. Just go play golf, especially over there where feel is the most important thing.

Vijay?

He's getting old.

Adam Scott?

Where'd he go?

At least 23-year old Anthony Kim played like a guy capable of winning, at least until he put a putter in his hands. Then the hole started playing hide and seek.

Harrington, meanwhile, enhanced his place in the game with his gritty play. He's as tough as they come and his back nine Sunday was a thing of beauty. Looking for a winner at the PGA next month? I'll start with Harrington.

As for Norman, he didn't win but he had a chance with nine holes remaining and, in the process, he reminded us again of how captivating a personality he can be.

Norman was the game's dominant personality for a decade and having him back out front again reminded us of how flamboyant he was.

Had he somehow kept it together and won at Birkdale, it would have been one of the great stories ever, on a level with Jack Nicklaus' win in the 1986 Masters.

It didn't happen, unfortunately, but it's different when you're a 53-year old businessman who plays golf when the mood hits. This wasn't Norman in his prime with all the arrows in his heart. This was an aging giant back for one more moment and he played with much of the world pulling for him.

Norman didn't play as well on Sunday as he had in the three previous rounds and there was some criticism of him hitting his driver as often as he did. But Norman is considered by many to be the best driver -- combining length and accuracy -- ever. To play away from his strength on Sunday would have been counterintuitive.

Maybe he would have won if he'd hit more 3-woods and hybrids off the tee. Maybe not.

The way Harrington played at the end, it was his tournament to win.

The question is where everyone else went.

Will it be British Open champion*?

Will it ultimately matter on Sunday when someone is handed the Claret Jug that Tiger Woods was not at Royal Birkdale this week?

Of course, it will.

How can it not?

It's a major championship, of which Tiger has won 14 of the past 46, and in the prime of his career, he's not there. Having proved last month that he can, in fact, beat the rest of the world on one good leg, Woods' absence changes the structure of professional golf.

Players have made the point this week that the Open Championship is bigger than one player and they're right. They've been chasing golf balls around the hay over there since 1860 and having your name etched on the trophy is an extraordinary achievement.

But when you hear Ernie Els talking about how ominous Tiger's presence is when he's in the field and you remember Sergio thanking Tiger for missing The Players Championship he won in May -- was Sergio joking? -- it's obvious who and what are missing.

Evidently the game itself spooks Els these days, based on his body language while shooting an 80 Thursday.

This is a moment -- as the PGA Championship next month will be -- when the Adam Scotts and Sergios need to take advantage of the opportunity. Tiger will be back next year and the status quo will return with him.

Someone will be proclaimed champion golfer of the year Sunday afternoon at Birkdale and read his name on the Claret Jug.

It won't have an asterik beside it.

At least not one that's visible.

18 holes with Clemson's Bowden

In another two weeks, Clemson football coach Tommy Bowden will be immersed in the start of preseason practice, dealing with all the things a head coach of a likely top-10 team has to deal with.

On Tuesday, however, Bowden spent the day playing golf at The Reserve at Lake Keowee, hosting an annual outing for media and athletic staff members before the crush of the season arrives.

I was paired with Bowden, sharing a cart with him, and though our golf didn't exactly sparkle, spending four hours with him away from football was a treat.

He recently returned from the annual family vacation with his father and brothers and kids and grandkids to Panama City, Fla., where the focus may be more on golf than football.

"My dad plays 36 holes a day every day and he plays in the heat of the day," Tommy said. "If you're just going to play 18 holes, you'd better take your own car because he's not leaving."

Bowden is a solid -- and quick -- golfer who hit several good shots during the day, but he doesn't play as regularly as some coaches. By his own admission, he's no Steve Spurrier on the golf course, but he has fun.

At The Reserve, a beautiful Jack Nicklaus-designed course nestled among the hills alongside Lake Keowee, Bowden would stop the cart on bridges to look into creeks for snakes -- we saw one black snake sunning itself -- and he looked longingly at the lake when the course bumped against it.

He lives on Lake Hartwell near Clemson and, like the rest of us, stared at how far down the water is, leaving boats stranded on the shore in places. Bowden also talked about how much he enjoys taking his boat on the water when he has a few hours.

As for the golf, Bowden joked that he needed to stack his team with good players one year so he could win the tournament he hosts.

He didn't do it this year. Maybe next year.


-- Photo (above right) taken of Clemson football coach Tommy Bowden before participating in his annual media golf outing in Sunset, S.C., on Tuesday, July 15. (Anderson Independent-Mail, Mark Crammer)

Ballantyne facelift moving along

The golf course at Ballantyne Resort may be closed for the summer but there’s a lot going on anyway.

The layout, among the busiest and most popular in the Charlotte area, is getting a significant makeover that began June 16.

The practice range area will be dramatically different when the course reopens – Sept. 1 is the target date. The range has been reshaped and a new pavilion has been built nearby, creating a place for golfers in outings to gather.

The pavilion will sit where the practice green was and will have new putting greens on each side.

The staging area is also getting a facelift to help with the many outings the course hosts each year.

The most significant change to the course will be seen at the par-4 second hole. What used to be a short, quirky dogleg right with a tiny green has been transformed into a straighter par-4, essentially a new hole that will be a nice improvement.

The long, severe green at the par-4 eighth hole is also being reshaped to make it more player-friendly.

Additionally, the bunkers are being dredged and will have premium sand installed. Creek work and landscaping is also under way.

“It’s getting a really good facelift,” said Dana Rader, who operates her golf school at the resort. “The whole concept is geared toward a wow factor.”

Speaking of Rader, she’s also been down for a time this summer after having knee replacement surgery last month. She hopes to be back at home on a limited basis next week.

Kim develops attitude to match game

When Anthony Kim won the Wachovia Championship here in May, it was deemed to be the first of many victories for the 23-year old.

No. 2 came Sunday at Tiger Woods' AT&T National at Congressional in Washington, adding to the growing sense that Kim may be the game's next big star.

Kim has an exceptional swing that appears sturdy enough to hold up under pressure. It's efficient and powerful, an ideal combination.

The difference, as Kim admitted at Quail Hollow in May, is in his attitude. He's still a hot-shot young player, but he has begun to grow into his talent. He has begun to understand how to play and, consequently, how to win.

That isn't limited to hitting good shots and holing putts. Kim has offered several anecdotes about the growing pains he's experienced in his short time on the PGA Tour and offered a telling story in the media room after his win in Washington on Sunday.

He was playing in the BMW Championship last fall during the FedEx Cup playoffs. Kim had been out late the night before and showed up 15 minutes before his tee time, just long enough to grab a breakfast burrito and slap a couple of putts before going to the first tee. While he was preparing to change into his golf shoes, Kim saw Woods, whose tee time was much later but who had already had an extended pre-round practice session. Woods won the tournament while Kim finished tied for 52nd.

"That was quite a low point for my career," Kim said Sunday. "I wasn't doing myself justice to act that way and prepare that way."

The change has been dramatic.

And we're just seeing the start of it.

Big stars skipping Tiger's event, but why?

Tiger Woods isn’t the only star missing from the AT&T National this weekend at Congressional Country Club in Washington.

There’s no Phil Mickelson. No Adam Scott. No Vijay Singh. No Sergio Garcia. No Ernie Els.

Shall I continue?

In an event hosted by Tiger – who won’t be on the property at Congressional because flying causes his newly repaired left knee to swell – and is played on a superior course that will host the U.S. Open in three years, only five of the top 20 players in the current world rankings have bothered to show up.

It should remind us again how fortunate the Wachovia Championship has been to draw the star-stacked fields it has each year.

Tiger offered a modest defense of the field during a conference call this week when he said players make their own schedules based on many things and he understands they can’t play all the time. Tiger is the ultimate example of picking your spots, but he operates in a different universe.

What does the paucity of big names at Congressional mean?

I don’t think it’s guys dissing Tiger. If he asked a favor, I’m guessing most players would say sure.

The U.S. Open was three weeks ago, guys have had time to rest and the British Open is still two weeks away. This seems the perfect week to play. They can’t complain about the course and it’s the Fourth of July in Washington. Sure, it’s hot but it’s hot almost everywhere in July.

In fairness, some guys are ailing. Scott, for example, is still dealing with the hand he caught in a car door last month.

The edge has been dulled on this season now that Tiger is on the shelf, and it doesn’t help when what seems to be a big event winds up as a week off on too many stars’ schedules.

It is, unfortunately, the way of the world on the PGA Tour.

The question this week: Did Steve Stricker bring the fireworks?

Tiger talks about knee

During a conference call on Monday, Tiger Woods filled in some of the details about his knee problems that put a premature end to his 2008 season.

Woods said he still doesn’t know when he will return to competitive golf and won’t until he gets into his rehabilitation later this year. He said doctors have told him it could take between six and 12 months for him to fully recover.

Tiger said he’s had knee soreness the past 10 years because of the stress he puts on his knee in his swing. He said he’s worked to reduce the torque on the joint but the knee problems have been ongoing.

Woods said doctors told him when they removed a cyst from his knee in 2002 that his anterior cruciate ligament was more vulnerable to rupturing. To better support his knee, he worked hard on strengthening the muscles in his leg.

While running on a golf course last August, Woods said he took a slightly awkward step and felt his ACL rupture. “It didn’t take much,” he said. “Everyone was surprised it lasted as long as it did.”

He opted not to have reconstructive surgery at the time and focused on training to support his knee.

Woods said his knee “held up great” early in the year but became more unstable as the season went on. The natural rotation from his swing caused cartilage damage and his surgery after the Masters was intended to allow him to complete the 2008 season, then have reconstructive surgery.

He developed stress fractures, which caused him to miss The Memorial Tournament two weeks before the U.S. Open and the injury essentially shut down his practice time.

“It got to the point where I couldn’t walk to a cart. That’s not good when the cart is 10 feet away,” Woods said.

He couldn’t play more than nine holes in preparation for the Open and decided before the tournament that he would shut it down for the year after the championship, regardless of how he played. Of course, he won, proving that he can beat everyone else with just one good leg.

“It will be nice to finally have a healthy leg,” Woods said.

5 players to watch while Tiger's away

With Tiger Woods’ participation in the PGA Tour reduced to commercial breaks for the remainder of this season, the question becomes what happens now?

What, the Travelers Championship doesn’t float your boat?

The PGA Tour will survive without Tiger for the next four months (remember, it essentially surrenders football season) though television ratings will probably be somewhere in the range of ‘JAG’ reruns.

Still, it’s an opportunity for someone else to take the stage, especially in the run-up to the Ryder Cup, which is great theater with or without Tiger.

Here are five players who can help themselves and the PGA Tour in Tiger’s absence:

PHIL MICKELSON
It’s his stage now. He flamed out at the U.S. Open at Torrey Pines, but he’s still the brightest star in the universe while Tiger’s on the mend.

Lefty can carry the game if he plays well the rest of the summer. Don’t look for him to win the British Open, but perhaps the PGA and he’ll be a central character in the Ryder Cup.

SERGIO GARCIA
It’s time for him to win a major and maybe fate pays him back at the British Open at Birkdale. His win at The Players was enormous for him, and he hung in there at the U.S. Open after a terrible start.

BOO WEEKLEY
He has become a solid player who will probably be on the Ryder Cup team, just for him media center visits if nothing else. He’s likeable and he’s different enough that if he can win again, fans will notice.

BRANDT SNEDEKER
I have the sense he’s the real deal. He idolizes Tom Watson and, while it’s way too soon to say he’s this generation’s Watson, he has similar characteristics. There’s an energy about Snedeker that gives off good vibes and people got to know him a little with his Masters experience.

TREVOR IMMELMAN
He proved with his victory at the Masters that he’s an elite player. Now he has the chance to make himself a bigger star. He’s a sharp guy with a ton of talent and enough appeal to make people care. Another big win this summer would be huge for Immelman.

Rocco won fans, hearts at U.S. Open

Rocco Mediate didn’t win the U.S. Open trophy, but he won the hearts.

Until his disappointing end on the 91st hole of a championship that was so close to being his, Mediate found out that there’s still plenty of game left in his 45-year-old body and he learned how it feels to play golf on a cloud.

Tiger Woods is a marvel. We figured that out years ago.

Mediate is just a Pittsburgh guy, who has a balky back and likes to talk.

Everywhere he went over the weekend and on Monday, cheers of “Rocco, Rocco, Rocco” could be heard around Torrey Pines. He had the time of his life.

He could have melted when he was three strokes behind Tiger with eight holes remaining in the playoff, but he didn’t. Instead, Rocco made three straight birdies, flipped the advantage to himself and went to the 18th hole on Monday with a one-stroke lead.

It was the same position he was in on Sunday when Woods had to make a birdie to keep playing. Both times Mediate made a par on a hole that was generous about surrendering birdies.

When he absolutely had to make a birdie, he couldn’t and it cost him. As Rocco kept saying, he forced Woods to do something – and, naturally, Tiger did.

Mediate’s career may be defined by this Open because it reminded us again of how good a guy he is and how capable a player he is when his back isn’t forcing him to do television work or play professional poker.

The trophy went to Tiger.

But Rocco Mediate left with a smile on his face, too.

Winners, losers after Open's first round

WINNERS

-The working man: How else do you explain the presence of Kevin Streelman and Justin Hicks atop the leader board after 18 holes? Would you know either one of them if they pulled up a chair beside you?

The Open, of course, is sprinkled with guys who have been one-day wonders and they may fall into that category by Friday evening. But Thursday, they were better than everyone else.

-Ernie Els: He’s not a guy I figured had much of a shot in this Open, given the way his form has been. He’s traded mental coaches again, has changed his schedule back and forth a couple of times and seems unsettled.

But the Big Easy shot 70 in the first round and has a chance to build on that in the morning wave Friday. He knows how to win the U.S. Open, but it’ll take three more rounds.

-The course set-up: As promised, USGA officials played with the tee positions, shaving nearly 200 yards off Torrey Pines’ maximum distance. They’re likely to do the same thing today, though the adjustments might come on different holes.

Amazingly, no one has yet said this course set-up is too difficult.



LOSERS

-Defending champion Angel Cabrera: Maybe he should take up smoking again. Cabrera shot 43 on the front nine Thursday to shoot himself out of the tournament with an opening 79.

-Steve Stricker: He’s been mired in an ugly slump, missing four straight cuts and losing the edge that catapulted him to third in the world rankings late last year. He was leading for a time Thursday morning, shooting 4-under par on his first nine holes, but he followed that by shooting 41 on his second nine to wind up with a disappointing 73.

-Driver companies: Will Phil Mickelson start a trend by playing without a driver? Doubtful, unless the average Joe starts hitting 3-woods 280 yards.

Early surprises at the U.S. Open

There were two immediate surprises Thursday morning when Phil Mickelson, Tiger Woods and Adam Scott met on the first tee at Torrey Pines to begin play in the U.S. Open.

The first was that Woods would double-bogey the relatively benign opening hole, hardly the way he imagined starting. He yanked his tee shot into thick rough left of the fairway, hacked it back to the short grass, hit a short wedge shot over the green into more thick stuff then missed an 8-foot bogey putt.

Easy six.

It is not Woods’ worst start in a major. He triple-bogeyed the opening hole in the 2003 British Open at Royal St. Georges.

Woods, however, quickly righted himself and made the turn at 1-under par, looking increasingly like the guy to beat again.

The second surprise was the fact that Mickelson chose to play the first round without a driver in his bag.

He had a fairway wood and a hybrid but no big stick on the longest course in major championship history.

Perhaps he was just trying to level things out after playing the Masters in 2006 with two drivers.

The absence of a driver became noticeable on the 515-yard par-4 sixth hole where Lefty was 50 yards behind his playing partners off the tee. He made a bogey five there, the first of three straight bogeys.

For all the questions about whether Tiger would be sharp, it was Mickelson who – at least through the first nine holes – looked off his game.

There's hang gliding, sunbathing in nude

No one keeps official records on this, but it’s a fair assumption that this is the first U.S. Open played beside a nude beach.

For sure, it’s the first Open at a course with a hanging gliding port located near one of the tees.

Then again, we are in southern California.

Hang gliding will be discouraged this week while the Open is being played at Torrey Pines’ South Course. The USGA tends to frown on birdies and fliers buzzing Phil Mickelson when he’s putting.

As for sunbathing in the buff, well, the weather so far this week has discouraged that. It’s been cloudy and cool, which isn’t good for working on your all-over tan but the so-called marine layer is expected to subside this weekend, which means there could be some interesting blimp shots on the telecast.

A more intrepid reporter would have ventured down to Black’s Beach – it has its own website which features a photo of sun-tanned posteriors – but it’s a long trek and, well, I’m comfortable in my khakis, which would probably look out of place down among the, uh, free spirits.

I’ll take the word of a friend that it’s an interesting sight. Maybe if I sneak in behind the fourth green – it’s the one along the cliffs you’ve probably seen photos of – I’ll peek over at the beach.

And if you catch a shot of Tiger looking over the cliff there, you’ll know why.

I found a cool place at Torrey Pines

Here's a quick first impression of Torrey Pines from a man fresh off the plane from broiling Charlotte to the southern California coast:

It's cool.

Literally.

Walking around Torrey Pines at mid-afternoon Monday, a windshirt would have come in handy. I know that's not what anyone in the 100-degree heat wants to hear, but that's the way it feels on the northern edge of San Diego.

They claim this city has the best weather in the country, and I suppose they're right - if you like it sunny and 70 almost every day. The only bad months are May and June when the 'marine layer' intrudes. That means low clouds and a touch of fog shroud everyone within a few miles of the ocean, at least until lunch time. Then it goes back to being sunny and 70 again.

On Monday afternoon, though, it was still cool and gray with just enough breeze to make your eyes water if you stood on the edge of a cliff overlooking the Pacific for a few minutes. Sorry, that sounds like bragging. And maybe it should.

There are worse places to be than on the 488-yard par-4 fourth hole, which is the one that looks like it's about to fall into the Pacific. You wouldn't want to hit a tee shot there if you have a tendency to let it drift left because the only thing it can hit would be a trawler out in the ocean.

But as far as pretty goes, it wins, especially with a cool breeze coming off the water. The worst that can be said about the fourth hole is there's a sign behind the green warning of rattlesnakes in the brush, in case anyone's thinking of chasing their Titleist down there.

USGA officials are hoping the wind blows a little this week to make things more interesting when play commences on Thursday.

A nice, cool breeze.

U.S. Open history started in Charlotte

Sectional qualifying for the U.S. Open – the last way to get in at Torrey Pines next week if you’re not already in – is being held at 14 sites today.

It’s a cutthroat game where too many players are chasing too few spots and one bad hole can leave you home on your couch watching.

And sometimes history begins unfolding during sectional qualifying.

That’s what happened 72 years ago at Charlotte Country Club.

Don Bryant, now 85, was there in 1936 when Open qualifying was held at Charlotte, and he remembers watching how it ended that day.

Tony Manero, who was the pro at Sedgefield Country Club in Greensboro, came to the 18th hole needing a birdie to get into a playoff.

The 18th was a sharper dogleg right in those days and Manero’s hopes looked lost when he hit his tee shot into the edge of what members still call the soup bowl off the right side of the fairway at the bottom of the hill.

“From there, he hit a low shot under some trees and it ran up to the edge of the green,” Bryant recalled. “He was just off the green by a little bit but he made the long putt to get in the playoff.”

At the first hole, Manero hit a poor tee shot that left him a longer approach shot than other players into the green. But Manero scraped together a par and had earned his ticket to the 1936 U.S. Open at Balustrol.

“And, by George,” Bryant remembered, “he won that U.S. Open.”

Going too far to protect par

Last weekend, Jay Haas won the Senior PGA Championship by shooting 7-over par at Oak Hill in Rochester, N.Y.

This week, the NCAA men’s golf championship is being played at the Kampen Course at Purdue University where the scores have tended to look like something from a couples-event at the local muni.

And, two weeks from now, we’ll see the best players in the world chopping their way around the cliffs at Torrey Pines in the U.S. Open, no doubt begging for mercy from a course set up to punish the occasionally off-line shot.

All in the name of protecting par, I suppose.

What’s wrong with seeing good players making birdies?

There’s a reason people have been talking about Phil Mickelson’s spectacular 18th hole birdie to win at Colonial on Sunday. It was bold, creative and dramatic. And it was a birdie.

That’s the way golf tournaments should be won.

For years, the Masters was beloved because of how dramatic it was. The weekend was filled with birdies and eagles and heroes. Recently, though, there’s been consternation about the lack of drama and hints that maybe the set-up will be softened slightly.

The U.S. Open has made its reputation on being difficult and it tends to produce quality champions. You know what you’re getting at the Open. A four-day grind that’s as hard mentally as it is physically.

It would be more entertaining if the winner shot, say, 5-under par rather than 5-over par, and the integrity of the event wouldn’t be compromised. It would probably be enhanced.

On the flip side, seeing someone shoot 27-under to win a tournament goes too far the other way.

Finding the balance between difficult and severe is the trick.

What’s the fun in watching everyone make bogeys?

We see enough of that when we play.

Some people say they like to see the pros suffer like the rest of us.

Why?

It’s OK if the U.S. Open is unforgiving. That’s one week a year.

That’s enough.

Woods ready, but not pain-free

Checking out the golf scene:

• Tiger Woods said Tuesday that he expects to be ready for the U.S. Open at Torrey Pines in two weeks. Woods said his rehab from knee surgery is progressing well and he’s playing golf again. He considered playing the Memorial this week but decided against it because he felt his game was too rusty. During a press conference to promote the PGA Tour event he hosts in Washington in July, Woods said he’s still not pain-free from the surgery but stiffness is the biggest issue he faces. Woods said he decided to have the surgery “two or three weeks before” the Masters and would have had the procedure done even if he’d won at Augusta.
  

• With Phil Mickelson’s victory last weekend at the Colonial – and he could win at the Memorial this weekend – the run-up to the Open will be dominated by the game’s two most captivating characters. Between them, Woods and Mickelson have won nine times at Torrey Pines (Woods has six wins there) but they’re coming at this Open from different directions. Mickelson looks as if he’ll be primed to win his first Open while Woods will not have played since the Masters, a two-month break. For most guys, the two-month break would be reason to downgrade their chances. In Woods’ case, however, it seems less a concern.
  

• In case you haven’t heard, this U.S. Open will go prime-time on the weekend, at least on the East Coast. The USGA has scheduled Saturday’s third round to conclude at 10 p.m. with the final round set to end Sunday at 9 p.m. Obviously, close attention will be paid to NBC’s ratings over those two days, which means the suits would love to see Tiger and Phil in contention. A prime-time finish doesn’t work when the Open is on the East Coast but if the numbers are good this year, expect a similar scenario in 2010 when the Open returns to Pebble Beach.