Max Homa made a great run at the Masters in April — tying for third — but has struggled in the two major championships since, finishing T-35 at the PGA Championship and missing the cut at the 2024 U.S. Open this week. (He wasn’t the only big name to trunk slam on Friday.)
He opened with a 1-over 71 on Thursday, but signed for a disappointing 5-over 75 Friday and missed out on the weekend by one shot.
Homa will be watching the tournament from home this weekend and he’ll be rooting for the golf course to provide some carnage.
The moment I wake up on a Saturday after missing the cut I root for the course to become impossible so I can laugh at all the stupid players who whooped my ass. I shot 6 over and will shamelessly be this gif all weekend: pic.twitter.com/dc85vkLwKG
Homa is in the field for next week’s Travelers Championship, the final signature event of the season. He missed the cut at TPC River Highlands last year.
But not everyone shares the love for the course, which is hosting this week’s 2024 U.S. Open. In fact, one major champion, Mark Calcavecchia, took to social media to insist that he thinks the course is overrated.
Calcavecchia, who won 13 times on the PGA Tour and four more times on the Champions Tour, won his only major title in the 1989 Open Championship at Royal Troon. He was supposed to have had his swan song at The Open in 2020 at Royal St. George’s but it was canceled due to the global pandemic. In 2021, he had back surgery and was unable to play. So, he wrote the Open committee a letter asking them to give him one final start at the 150th Open at age 62.
I’m ready for some abuse. Just gonna spit it out!! Pinehurst is such a cool area with great courses. #2 ain’t one of them. Most overrated course in the world!! Lemme have it!! But it’s true
After 36 holes of the 2024 U.S. Open at Pinehurst No. 2 in North Carolina, tournament debutant Ludvig Aberg holds the outright lead at 5 under thanks to rounds of 66-69. The Swedish star missed the cut at the PGA Championship last month.
Bryson DeChambeau (67-69), Thomas Detry (69-67) and Patrick Cantlay (65-71) are tied for second at 4 under while Rory McIlroy (65-72), Tony Finau (68-69) and Matthieu Pavon (67-70) sit at 3 under, T-5.
The purse for the 2024 U.S. Open is $21.5 million with $4.3 million going to the winner. It’s the largest major championship purse.
Woods had plenty of opportunities down the stretch.
Tiger Woods posted an opening-round 4-over 74 Thursday thanks to an ice-cold putter during the middle of his day and average-at-best iron play. So, he needed something around even par Friday to make it to the weekend of the 2024 U.S. Open at Pinehurst No. 2 in North Carolina.
After opening with three pars, Woods hit a wonderful iron shot from 230 yards into the par-4 fourth and cashed in the 16-foot putt for a birdie. However, he immediately gave it back on the par-5 fifth and added another square to the card at the ninth, making the turn with a 1-over 36.
Woods made a couple pars on Nos. 10 and 11 but struggled on the 12th and tapped in for bogey. At that point, the cut looked like it was going to be 5 over. Woods, through 12 holes, was 6 over for the week.
After missing a short birdie putt at the 13th after a great wedge shot, Woods lipped out another birdie putt at the 15th that he began to walk in. The fans surrounding the par 3 were heartbroken.
On the 16th, Woods’ second shot landed in the middle of the green but bounce over the back, and his third from off the green nearly came back to his feet. He missed the lengthy par effort, and that was about it.
He got up and down for par from the sand at the par-3 17th and made par at the 18th to sign for a 3-over 73. Another missed cut for Woods.
PGA Tour players think all they need to do in order to get paid is play golf, and that is about to change.
PINEHURST, N.C. — The difference between obligations and responsibilities isn’t mere semantics about what one must do versus what one should do, and even less so for the investors about to place a heavy hand on the PGA Tour’s tiller. Free marketeers often view obligations as being for employees while responsibilities are for the executive and shareholder classes.
Brooks Koepka is none of the above as it relates to the PGA Tour, since he’s employed by LIV Golf and wasn’t part of the equity grants that made players nominal owners in PGA Tour Enterprises. But Koepka’s actions at the U.S. Open do illustrate a perplexing question that looms over his former circuit, one of many that will need to be addressed in the coming realignment.
At Pinehurst, Koepka declined to do a pre-tournament press conference or a post-round gaggle on Thursday. Players regularly skip media, though not frequently, and for a variety of reasons (though Koepka is alone — but not inaccurate — in saying it’s because the questions posed lack creativity). Sometimes they want to practice before dinner, they’re steamed about their play, they’re avoiding addressing a particular topic, they’re pouting over prior coverage, or they’re rushing to catch a Biden crime family exposé on OAN.
Brooks Koepka hits on the 12th hole during the second round of the U.S. Open golf tournament at Pinehurst No. 2. Mandatory Credit: Katie Goodale-USA TODAY Sports
There’s a generational difference too. Guys who’ve grown up with a direct line to fans via social media are inclined to see traditional media engagement as less important. Veterans who relied on such coverage to boost their profiles, and those of the Tour and their sponsors, are generally more indulgent of the process.
The PGA Tour has no regulations governing how members handle media. Players are trusted to make reasonable accommodations and if an issue arises the Tour will work with all parties to sort it out. So, no obligation. But is there a responsibility? It’s an intriguing question as the Tour morphs from a de facto union into a for-profit business. Koepka’s standoffishness at Pinehurst is easily dismissed as being on-brand for a player who enjoys cultivating a slightly combative, maverick image, but it points to a broader dilemma: PGA Tour players are accustomed to thinking that all they need to do in order to get paid is play golf, and that is about to change.
The investors pumping money into the Tour — not just SSG, but likely the Saudi Public Investment Fund, too — are not doing so to preserve the status quo, in any respect. They will expect players to shoulder more responsibility for the product, to be givers and not just takers. Private equity took over F1 in 2017 and the asks made of drivers grew noticeably greater. Not just media interviews, but marketing content creation, fan interactions, walk-throughs with rooms full of corporate sponsors. Golfers sometimes do things like that, but not often, and usually more in service of their own commercial interests than the Tour’s. That practice is incompatible with the impending expectations of folks who will want a more engaging, fan- and sponsor-friendly product that shows significant growth.
We’re about to find out how much players really believe themselves to be equity stakeholders with a shared interest in growing the Tour’s business, or if they still consider themselves independent contractors beholden to no one but wives and swing svengalis.
The scope of player obligations is only one of a number of difficult reckonings that promise to make the next few years considerably more compelling than the rancor of the last few. How many players will be fully exempt? How many tournaments can they access? How many events will be on the schedule? Where will they take place? What becomes of the men and events deemed surplus to new requirements? If the stars only show for $25 million purses, can $8 million prize funds still be expected in weeks overstocked with journeymen? If the post-playoff months are a testing ground for globalizing the product and for team golf, what happens to the stops currently occupying that window?
And that’s before you even get to the thorny issues around how LIV players might be reintegrated into the PGA Tour.
If the Tour’s locker room is a tinder box — and you don’t have to search far for occupants who insist that it is — then the match lies somewhere in that list.
Regardless of whether the Tour’s future lies in a ménage à deux with SSG or a ménage à trois alongside the PIF, change is coming. Among all the things it has botched, LIV got one thing right — it contracted the talent to certain obligations. The PGA Tour will need to figure out how to do the same with guys who are grooved to setting their own schedules, being their own bosses and promoting their own brands, sometimes with only accidental benefit to the Tour. That gap will need to be closed, and the process of doing so could prove every bit as rancorous as the schism that brought things to this overdue juncture.
“That was probably the moment I decided to go to SMU, when I saw that mural on the wall.”
PINEHURST, N.C. – Boo Weekley, the Yoda of the Florida Panhandle, once dropped some knowledge on Bryson DeChambeau that he’s taking to heart this week at the 124th U.S. Open: the center of the green never moves.
That philosophy has been paying dividends for the 30-year-old LIV golfer at Pinehurst No. 2, where the key stat on Donald Ross’s turtleback putting surfaces is greens visited. As one of the local caddies once said, never clap for a shot until the ball has stopped and been marked.
“I’m still trying to play to the center of the green most of the times. I’m sure you guys see I’m not really going at flags for the most part, trying to hit it to 20 feet, make a 20-footer. My long putting game has to be good this week, and that’s going to be the goal,” DeChambeau said. “Boo Weekley, center of the greens and call it a day.”
DeChambeau, the 2020 U.S. Open champion, followed up his opening-round 67 with a 1-under 69 on Friday, the first time he’s shot back-to-back under-par rounds at the U.S. Open since the second and third rounds in 2021. In doing so, he shared the clubhouse lead with Thomas Detry during the second round with a 36-hole total of 4-under 136. He’s now sat inside the top 10 after nine of the last 10 rounds at a major – the exception being the first round of the PGA Championship, where he eventually finished second. It didn’t hurt that DeChambeau holed several clutch putts, totaling nearly 130 feet on Friday.
“He’s solved the riddle on these greens,” said NBC’s Brandel Chamblee. “He’s had a wizard’s day.”
His performance through two rounds is shades of Payne Stewart, who won the U.S. Open here in 1999. DeChambeau, 30, was only five years old when Stewart, one of his boyhood idols, sank a 15-foot par putt on the 72nd hole to edge Phil Mickelson and DeChambeau would like to do nothing more than follow in his footsteps. It wouldn’t be the first time his career has mimicked Stewart, who died in a plane crash the same year as his Open victory. DeChambeau used to wear the same cap as Stewart and attended the same college, Southern Methodist University, where DeChambeau won an NCAA men’s individual title.
“He’s the reason I went to SMU, first off,” DeChambeau said. “I’ll never forget walking into the SMU athletic department — funny enough, I actually didn’t know he went there and I wore the hat as a bit of a tribute to Payne and Ben Hogan. Growing up, big Ben Hogan fanatic. Knowing what Payne meant to the game of golf, also, Payne Stewart fan. When I went to SMU, in the athletic department on the wall I saw a mural of him, and I’m like, Oh, my gosh, he went to SMU? They’re like, ‘Yeah, didn’t you know?’ I was like, ‘No, I didn’t know he went here.’
“That was probably the moment I decided to go to SMU, when I saw that mural on the wall.”
DeChambeau also made the John Deere Classic the site of his first PGA Tour victory, the same as Stewart. As a tribute to Stewart’s victory 25 years ago, DeChambeau has a white cap like Stewart used to wear hanging on the side of his bag.
25 years after Payne Stewart's win at Pinehurst, Bryson DeChambeau reflects on what Payne's legacy means to him. pic.twitter.com/UG8vXMCVxy
“From top dressing to Stimpmeter. … I mean top to bottom, we learn everything.”
PINEHURST, N.C. – During four tours of duty in Iraq as an operations officer for a logistics battalion, John Hurtado saw things he’ll never be able to unsee. He had days that weren’t easy and plenty of obstacles to overcome.
As the U.S. Open rolled into Pinehurst No. 2, Hurtado sat in the back of the media center — a large tent with massive scoreboards and screens — and marveled at how far he’s come.
“The last time I was in a tent like this, it was a map up there and I was in Iraq. It had secret stuff,” Hurtado said. “Really secret. UAVs (unmanned aerial vehicles) and all this stuff, all these computers. Each one was a different battlefield operating system. You had the Air Force, you had the Navy, you had media, you had well … you name it. It looks just like this in a divisional operation. Just like this.”
His new workplace is also part of a strategic maneuver, one that often leaves participants ranting and raving. But now, Hurtado, who moved to this golf haven in 2020, offers a little perspective to those who have let a simple sand hazard ruin a pristine backdrop.
Hurtado’s first job at Pinehurst Resort was working at the Cradle, a nine-hole test of par-3 skills located near the main clubhouse, and he instantly took to the position.
“I’d be raking a bunker, smoothing it nice and perfect, and some guy would come up and he’d be irritated,” he explained. “He just put one in the bunker and he’s angry because he doesn’t want to be there. And I look over with a rake in my hand and say, ‘Hey good morning, how are you?’ I’ve got a big smile on my face and I say, ‘How do you like my office?’
“They get the biggest charge out of it. This is where it’s at, you know?”
A member of the Greenskeeper Apprentice Program puts water down on the golf course ahead of the 2024 U.S. Open at Pinehurst No. 2 in the Village of Pinehurst, North Carolina. (Photo: Kathryn Riley/USGA)
Indeed, Hurtado’s new gig is a sweet one, complete with all the fresh air one can breathe and gorgeous views one can soak in, but life as a greenskeeper isn’t easy as the hourly job has forced plenty of willing laborers into other lines of work.
With that in mind, the USGA created the Greenskeeper Apprentice Program (GAP), which provides tuition-free education to those who qualify for the program, all with the intent of promoting hourly employees into more lucrative careers. This year marks the second class of the program, which according to the USGA, “pairs each student with an on-course mentor, intended to advance their professional development. As part of their classwork, apprentices learn valuable technical skills, while also gaining insight into why agronomic decisions are made.”
When participants finish the program, which is based at nearby Sandhills Community College, they get some college credentials, a bump in pay and a Journeyworker card through the United States Department of Labor. During the first year of the program, 18 of the graduates saw an increase in leadership responsibilities, not to mention a chance to help work with Pinehurst’s agronomy staff in preparing No. 2 for the 2024 U.S. Open.
The participants range in age, but Hurtado, who spent 35 years in the Army, said getting the opportunity to move into a second career as rewarding as working on a golf course has been the chance of a lifetime.
It hasn’t been without plenty of hard work, including classwork time and on-the-job training, but Hurtado said he wouldn’t have it any other way.
“I think we have 200 hours of in-classroom time and then I want to say two thousand hours of actual apprenticeship stuff,” he said. “From identifying problems with grass disease or drought or whatever. From top dressing to Stimpmeter. I just learned how to do that the other day. I mean top to bottom, we learn everything.”
Carson Letot instructs members of the Greenkeeper Apprentice Program ahead of the 2024 U.S. Open at Pinehurst Resort & C.C. (Course No. 2) in Village of Pinehurst, N.C. on Sunday, June 2, 2024. (Photo: Sean Dodge/USGA)
Carson Letot is the man responsible for putting the program in motion. A former high school science teacher who was looking to expand his horizons, Letot moved from Michigan to Pinehurst last Augusta to oversee and teach the GAP program.
“I think this is truly the nexus of recruitment and retention in the industry,” he said. “We’re at a position where golf is booming but the maintenance industry has been having a really hard time keeping up with that demand for a long period of time. There have been some issues. I don’t necessarily want to be negative about it, but oftentimes a lot of these individuals are working long, hard hours and not necessarily being compensated, right? And so, when we look at recruitment and retention intervention, we say, okay, well, how can we draw people in the industry and then how can we keep them? One of those ways is to provide some education and opportunity.”
Letot knows he’s working with students from various backgrounds in the GAP, so his teaching style has to be a little more hands-on than it was when he was dealing with teens. But the reward is a class that knows good things can come to those who stick it out.
“So let’s say I’m working this job. I rake bunkers every day. Maybe if somebody actually supports me and teaches me the science behind all this, I might take a little more ownership over it and then, from there, I might take on a leadership position,” Letot said. “So our goal is to have every one of our graduates who leave the program not only becoming a lifelong learner in the industry but at the same time seeking what we hope is going to be the development of a career. Not just a job to pay the bills here and there, but a sustainable career.”
The program is expanding, adding another class in Myrtle Beach this year and the hope is that it will continue to add career employees to the golf workforce.
For those like Hurtado, who continue to learn and grow in the process, the chance was one he’ll always be appreciative of.
“Look, this just kind of happened for me. I moved here from Colorado and was going to work as a handyman when someone said they had the perfect job for me because I love the outdoors, I love golf and I love learning new things,” Hurtado said. “It’s been just perfect for me.”
PINEHURST, N.C. – Tyrrell Hatton is always mad. Well, almost always.
After posting a second-round 1-over 71 on Friday at Pinehurst Resort & Country Club’s No. 2 Course, he conceded that he was “fairly happy” to be in red figures at 1-under 139 through 36 holes and within striking distance of the lead heading into the weekend at the 124th U.S. Open.
Asked to name when he’s been happiest this week, he paused and considered. Desserts ranging from chocolate mousse with shortbread on Wednesday and peanut butter brownies on Thursday made by the chef at the house he’s sharing with Matthew Fitzpatrick have been “off-the-charts good,” he said. “I’m in my happy place.”
That’s a far cry from his attitude on the golf course when things don’t go his way — his many club tosses, kicks and F-bombs have become legendary. But just how much have those unsportsmanlike moments cost him in fines?
“I think you’d actually be shocked because you’re thinking it’s ridiculous amounts,” he said. “Now, don’t get me wrong; it’s still a lot of money, but it is nowhere near – give me your best guess.”
A reporter threw out $100,000.
“Mate, you are not even close,” Hatton said, his smile growing wider.
Higher, he was asked.
“I think even with the DP World Tour, I reckon I haven’t reached double digits,” he said. It’s still quite a bit of money, but it’s nowhere near where you were saying.”
Clearly, the fines haven’t kept up with the purse inflation but that’s a story for another time. Hatton had some moments where he could’ve lost his mind and no one would’ve been surprised on Friday. None more so than at the 13th when his second shot struck just behind the hole, bounced and hit the flagstick and proceeded to roll off the green and into a bunker.
“That wasn’t a nice break,” he said. “I hit four good shots there and walked off with 5. Not ideal.” But he said he’s done better than most weeks in keeping a calm body.
“I’m trying not to sort of blow up too much because I’m trying to give myself a little bit of grace on occasions,” he said.
Asked to describe what’s going on in his mind while he’s playing, Hatton said, “Sort of internally screaming for the most part. Yeah, there’s just no, like, rest. There’s no easy shots. It’s quite a stressful five and a half hours, to be honest.”
“Some guys can bottle it up,” he added. “I’m not afraid to just get it out of my system.”
The U.S. Open has a way of getting under the skin of most every player and so Hatton mused that it is actually a bit more of a fair fight given that everyone is on the verge of going mental.
“With it being harder a lot of guys sort of losing their head, it sort of brings them to my level because I just lose my head every week,” he said with a smile. “They can kind of experience what it’s like in my head for a week.”
There is one more reason why Hatton should be happy with his position heading into the weekend in the North Carolina sandhills: “I literally didn’t think I was going to break 80,” he said after playing his first practice round earlier this week.
A short par putt on his final hole proved to be just enough.
Golf is fickle, as Scottie Scheffler proved through the first two rounds of the 2024 U.S. Open.
The World No. 1 and pre-tournament betting favorite walked off the course around 1 p.m. ET on Friday after shooting a second-round 74, putting him at 5 over at Pinehurst No. 2 and in danger to miss the cut. Tied for 87th at the time, he was in a precarious position. Only the top 60 plus ties from the 156 who started the tournament advanced to the weekend in Pinehurst, North Carolina.
After his round, he didn’t sound too confident he’d be sticking around.
“I don’t think 5 over is going to get me into the weekend,” he said. “But I’m proud of how I fought today. I gave myself a good chance. Really, yesterday, I felt like I did a great job. Today I just couldn’t get the putts to fall. This golf course can be unpredictable at times, and maybe it got the better of me the last couple days. I’ll sit down and think about where we’re going the last few days and figure it out.”
Six hours later, the cut came in at 5 under and Scheffler made the weekend on the number, his 39th consecutive made cut.
It was an unusual spot for Scheffler, who has won five times this season, including the Masters. He won a week ago at the Memorial for his 11th overall PGA Tour win but had a birdie-free round Friday, the first time he failed to post a birdie in a major in his career. He had two bogeys and a double on the par-5 fifth hole, which terrorized many golfers Friday.
“I think that’s part of the mystery of the kind of sandy areas. You get down there and it’s kind of luck of the draw whether or not you have a shot,” he said of his fifth-hole adventures. “Preferably I would have loved to have hit like a little runner out of there, but I had a bush in my way to where I couldn’t play the runner that I would have hoped to. Really all you’re trying to do from there is get it up on to the green somewhere, and I felt like I took the best route I could think of at first, and just because it’s so unpredictable.”
Scheffler’s last missed cut was the 2022 FedEx St. Jude Championship, a span of 672 days ago.
Pinehurst No. 2 in North Carolina is hosting the U.S. Open for a fourth time and the action is underway at the third men’s major on the 2024 calendar.
Rory McIlroy and Patrick Cantlay were the co-leaders after 18 holes. On the other end of the leaderboard, it’s not looking good for a good number of notable golfers.
