U.S. Open Parting Thoughts: Give Wyndham Clark His Respect, Blind Confidence In Rory McIlroy, The USGA's Lack Of Awareness, And LACC Being Over Hyped
If there is one word to describe the 2023 U.S. Open, it's strange, oh so strange.
It was strange before the first tee shot was even hit on Thursday. Los Angeles Country Club was portrayed as this mysterious place where most folks who shared a fence with the property weren't even allowed to step foot on it. The golf course didn't live up to the hype, but then again, the hype was too high in the first place.
Then, after 72 holes, Wyndham Clark was the player who found the winner's circle. While Clark won an elevated event a month ago, the entire golf world wrote him off before Sunday's final round with the likes of Rickie Fowler, Rory McIlroy, and Scottie Scheffler right there to take the championship away from him.
But the hiccup from Clark never came. Among the last few pairings, he was the best player on the golf course and was awarded the U.S. Open trophy and $3.6 million.
While it may have been a strange four-day stretch on a strange golf course with a strange winner, strange is par for the course in the world of professional golf these days. Days leading into the tournament the PGA Tour announced a merger with Saudi Arabia and LIV Golf, and the weird vibes simply continued into the U.S. Open.
It's Time To Stop Ignoring Wyndham Clark
Us golf fans like to romanticize things and the idea of Rickie Fowler winning his first major after the pit of despair he found himself in just a year ago or Rory McIlroy finally snapping his nine-year major drought was incredibly easy to imagine and even root for.
It was also easy to imagine Wyndham Clark carding a big number on Sunday and falling down the leaderboard, but some of us forgot that he is both a battle-tested player and person.
Clark lost his mother to breast cancer back in 2013 when he was in college. He managed to make it through that devastating spell of adversity and fight his way onto the PGA Tour.
Clark officially found his footing on Tour during the 2017-18 season with three Top 10s that year, and you fast-forward to this current season and he's been one of the more consistent players in the world.
While his win at the Wells Fargo Championship in May stands out, he had another five Top 10 finishes to his name leading into that event. He had been in the thick of plenty of leaderboards prior to the U.S. Open and proved to himself that he can compete with the best in the world with a win in an elevated event.
Clark's second shot into the Par 5 14th on Sunday may not just be the shot of the U.S. Open, it could be the shot of the year.
An elevated event in the Wells Fargo is not the same thing as a U.S. Open, but it certainly didn't hurt his headspace knowing that he has the ability to get the job done, and that's exactly what transpired on Sunday.
In just a five-week stretch Clark has gone from a player that very much flew under the radar to a two-time winner, major champion, and a potential shoe-in to make the U.S. Ryder Cup team as they head to Rome later this year.
You're Either With Rory McIlroy, Or You're Not
This isn't some new stance. For nearly a decade now you've either believed Rory McIlroy was going to win his fifth major or he was simply cursed to ever win a major championship ever again.
Even though he wasn't able to get the job done (again) this time around, I firmly find myself in the camp that McIlroy will win at least one more major before it's all said and done.
Sunday's final round at Los Angeles Country Club was a re-run of what we saw out of McIlroy at St. Andrews a year ago. Cam Smith was unconscious during last year's final round to win The Open, but it was the same sad story for McIlroy as his ball striking was there, but the putter did not show up.
That simply can not be the case forever.
McIlroy is maybe the greatest driver of the golf ball to ever live and gives himself way too many looks on the green not to win more. That's an incredibly simple take, but it's also 100% accurate.
Something will shift for McIlroy sooner rather than later. I'm not predicting that he rattles off a handful of major wins before he decides to hang it up, but another major title is in his future. Whether that involves winning a green jacket and completing the career grand slam, well, that's an entirely different story.
Los Angeles Country Club Wasn't It
Each and every year the U.S. Open rolls around every single one of us falls for the hype and predicts that this year's championship is going to be the most difficult test these players have ever seen. It was incredibly easy to do so this time around given that the last professional tournament held at LACC was in 1940.
It turns out that Los Angeles Country Club was nothing but hype.
Nobody with a brain can say that LACC is a bad golf course, but I can get on board with the argument that LACC is a bad U.S. Open golf course.
We somehow forgot that the best players in the world are extremely long and straight off the tee and giving them rock-hard fairways the width of a Wal-Mart is going to make things too easy. The place wasn't able to get as baked out as the USGA wanted it to due to the marine layer hanging around for the first two rounds, but if we're blaming things on the marine layer, we may have been at the wrong golf course to host a U.S. Open to begin with.
If the U.S. Open is supposed to portray to the rest of the golf world the style and greatness of American golf, LACC was a horrendous choice to begin with. We're talking about one of the most private, pretentious country clubs on the planet located in Beverly Hills of all places.
Not only does the entire idea of LACC not even compute for practically all Americans, it doesn't resonate with the overwhelming majority of people who have ever picked up a golf club around the world.
The USGA Deserves Plenty Of Blame
The vibes at this year's U.S. Open weren't just bad, they barely even existed, and the finger needs to be pointed at the USGA.
Given its location, around 23,000 was the capacity for fans this week in LA, if you can even call them 'fans.'
Of the roughly 23,000 available daily tickets, 14,000 of those were held for suites and hospitality tents, which are incredibly expensive. This left 9,000 tickets for general admission, but according to Joel Beall of Golf Digest, LACC members bought up around 4,500 of those 9,000 tickets. It's been widely rumored that members attempted to buy every general admission ticket available, but the USGA put their foot down.
How brave of them.
LACC members, just like anyone else in the LA area, have the right to buy whatever amount of tickets as they want, but that doesn't mean the USGA should be let off the hook here.
The USGA knew exactly what kind of country club and clientele it was getting involved with when they announced LACC as the host nearly 10 years ago. The golf course didn't magically shrink in that time frame either, the USGA knew how many fans the property could hold, but clearly couldn't pass up on the chance to host 'the people's championship in Beverly Hills.
LACC members buying up tickets and, in turn, keeping middle-class sports fans off the property and not fully embracing what it takes to host a professional tournament was incredibly predictable.
It goes without saying that LA isn't exactly ripe with sports fans to begin with, especially ones who want to sit in traffic to go to Beverly Hills on a weekend to watch golf. The lack of awareness from a common sense and logistical viewpoint is baffling from the USGA.
The U.S. Open is supposed to be held at LACC again in 2039, but if the USGA is smart they axe that deal, and they probably won't have to beg the membership to do so.
Follow Mark Harris on Twitter @ItIsMarkHarris