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Golf: The Majors and the minors too


Fragile Bird

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Yeah i agree on the amateur and speith making history would be great but i think i would still prefer scott day leishman and bowditch as winners. That may just be the aussie coming to the surface a bit though!
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Tiger's main issue is injuries of which he's had more than his fair share. He had back surgery last year and still hasn't recovered. He's had surgery on his knee so many times he's practically reconstructed the thing. And all of those have forced him to change his swing out of necessity to something more comfortable. He had an absolutely brilliant 2013 season when he won about 5 tournaments on the pga including the Players. He'll never dominate again like he used to but it won't be long before he's at least competing properly again and picking up the occasional win.

 

 

Anyway as for the Open. I'd really love to see Spieth take it down and go for the grand slam. But if I was betting it i'd probably go for Oosthuizen and Day, they've been playing the best stuff. But you never know, absolutely nobody could've predicted Dustin Johnson dreadful round today.

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The thing about Jordan Spieth winning the Open is that he is 21 years old. 21 effin' years old. Ben Hogan was 40 years old when he won the Masters, the US Open and the Open, but back in 1953 the Masters didn't yet have the status it does today, it was too new. He might have been able to win the fourth because he was having such a good year, but back then the PGA was held almost at the same time and he couldn't get back in time. Tiger Woods at the age of 24 won the 4 majors consecutively, but over two years. Bobby Jones is the only player who has ever won the 4 majors in the same year, 1930, but different majors because the Masters hadn't even started yet, Jones and Clifford Roberts starting it in 1934. Jones won the Open, the US Open, the US Amateur and the British Amateur and when that happened they borrowed the term from bridge and called it the Grand Slam.

Jack Nicklaus didn't win three in a row either, finishing 2nd in the Open in the year he won the Masters and the US Open.

In fact only 5 people have ever even won a career modern Grand Slam, Gene Sarazen, Ben Hogan, Gary Player, Jack Nicklaus and Tiger Woods. There are great players known for the fact they didn't: Sam Snead and Phil Mickelson (to date) have never won the US Open, Arnold Palmer and Tom Watson never won the PGA, Lee Trevino never won the Masters, and Byron Nelson and Ray Floyd never won the Open. Rory Mcilroy should be able to win a Masters sooner or later, one hopes.

If Spieth wins tomorrow the fact that he could then win the PGA opens up and we would have the first consecutive modern Grand Slam ever, and the only the 2nd since the term was created.

And Spieth is an incredibly focused young man. When Tiger Woods came on the scene you just couldn't imagine anyone with his talent making an appearance for decades and decades. But Spieth may very well be the person who could knock Tiger off the record books.


On the other hand....for Paul Dunne to win as an amateur would be amazing too. And the 1,150,000 pound first prize gets re-distributed to the other players, which would cheer them up for sure. :D

For Oosthuizen the task is to win the Open at St. Andrews consecutively, which Tiger did in 2000 and 2005.
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Put me down as one who wants Spieth to win it so he can keep his hopes of a Grand Slam alive. It would be a phenomenal achievement to say the least, and I absolutely believe he can do it. The combination of skill and maturity he shows at this stage in his career is remarkable.

 

Yesterday's round was a lot of fun with so many players ending up near the lead. Grumbling a bit that I'll have to miss seeing the final round live today thanks to the delays.  :( 

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Man that was a crazy final round.

 

[spoiler]

Disappointed for the countrymen that fell by the wayside, but that has to be one of the closest finishes in majors history.  At one stage last night there were about a dozen blokes that had a legitimate chance of winning it.

[/spoiler]

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I'm watching the post-round interview with Jordan Spieth and he did something I believe I have noticed before: he talks about himself (at first) in the 1st person plural. "We needed to do this", "we were prepared for that", "how can we work our butt off on 14 to get a putt in".

"We've played hard par 4s all year". "we didn't get it in".


I know Tiger Woods would do that. Subtle insecurity, or the game is a team effort with the coach?
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I'm watching the post-round interview with Jordan Spieth and he did something I believe I have noticed before: he talks about himself (at first) in the 1st person plural. "We needed to do this", "we were prepared for that", "how can we work our butt off on 14 to get a putt in".

"We've played hard par 4s all year". "we didn't get it in".


I know Tiger Woods would do that. Subtle insecurity, or the game is a team effort with the coach?

 

And the caddie.  Never forget that poor bastard. :)

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Oh God, yes of course!

 

Yeah I think he's including his caddie when he says that.

 

I agree with you on the outcome...if not Spieth then I'd rather have seen Day win his first major, but he came up just short once again. Johnson and Leishman benefited greatly from an earlier tee time which afforded them the luxury of avoiding the worst weather later in the day. Plus, Johnson holed that long putt on 18, which is the sort of thing major winners almost always have to do to come out on top.

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  • 8 months later...
1 minute ago, Tywin et al. said:

@Fragile Bird

You might want to change the thread title to make it about golf in general.

That said, holy hell yesterday was amazing. Spieth's collapse was one for the ages.

Good idea! :)

I meant to go searching for this thread a couple of days ago, but golf doesn't seem to have a big following here, so I didn't bother,

But holy hell!  He had problems after the turn on Saturday and dropped all the way to 1 stroke ahead, so I was wondering if he would have issues on the back nine again, but what a horrible hour.

I think he handled himself very well afterwards.  I saw an interview where someone said something like, "we watched from the outside, how did it feel from the inside?" and Jordan said "probably the way it looked from the outside."  And "I stood there and smiled and did everything I was supposed to do...the problem is it happens so soon after the end..."

Also interesting, on the post-game show on the Golf Channel, someone made a comment about Tiger Woods writing a book after his early success, in which he talked about his competitive instincts.  Apparently Jordan said afterwards when he made the turn after the front 9, he said to himself  "I have a 5 stroke lead, I need to be conservative", and maybe he will learn his lesson - Tiger Woods would have said "I have a 5 stroke lead, let's make it 10."

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I think the most brutal part was Spieth having to put the jacket on the winner. He looked devastated. 

Also, Willett's brother was super drunk and live tweeting the final 9. some of them are just amazing:

http://deadspin.com/danny-willetts-brother-sent-some-very-good-tweets-durin-1770256921

Quote

I once punched that kid in the head for hurting my pet rat.

Quote

If the boy does what he should, I will be able to say 'I've shared a bath with a Masters winners

And there are many more gems.

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27 minutes ago, Fragile Bird said:

Also interesting, on the post-game show on the Golf Channel, someone made a comment about Tiger Woods writing a book after his early success, in which he talked about his competitive instincts.  Apparently Jordan said afterwards when he made the turn after the front 9, he said to himself  "I have a 5 stroke lead, I need to be conservative", and maybe he will learn his lesson - Tiger Woods would have said "I have a 5 stroke lead, let's make it 10."

That is really interesting. I think one of the few universal truths in sports is if you play not to lose, you will probably lose.

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7 minutes ago, Fragile Bird said:

Lol, what a twit.  First rule - no drunken tweeting!

Aww, where's the fun in that? :P

Epic collapse by Jordan on 12, certainly one for the ages. But unlike Norman and other historic collapses before him, he made up ground on the next few holes and actually still had a chance to get back in it. I think that ability to bounce back is what sets him apart and why this will just be one misstep in his career rather than the sort of thing that defines him.

Also, to his credit, he comported himself well considering he had to put the jacket on Willet. You know he had to be devastated.

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I just heard an interview Willett did with my favorite sports radio show. It was amazing, and this guy has a star personality. The best part was when they asked him what the first thing he did with the jacket when he was alone and his answer was, "I wore it, only it, and it was glorious."

 

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Willett owes his wife, big time.  :D

She had the baby 12 days early.  He was likely going to miss the Masters because the baby was due during the Masters.  Now, I know it was always possible she might have said, "go, dear, don't worry about it", but still...

 

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1 hour ago, Tywin et al. said:

I just heard an interview Willett did with my favorite sports radio show. It was amazing, and this guy has a star personality. The best part was when they asked him what the first thing he did with the jacket when he was alone and his answer was, "I wore it, only it, and it was glorious."

 

Classic! :lol:

 

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1 hour ago, Fragile Bird said:

Willett owes his wife, big time.  :D

She had the baby 12 days early.  He was likely going to miss the Masters because the baby was due during the Masters.  Now, I know it was always possible she might have said, "go, dear, don't worry about it", but still...

 

Well he did pocket some serious cash, so I'm sure she will be well taken care of.

And it's funny, a lot of old-timers are saying there's an old adage that the most dangerous person in sports is a new father.

6 minutes ago, Ferrum Aeternum said:

Classic! :lol:

 

It was pretty great. Apparently Spieth's jacket has a lot of beer stains on it because he and his buddies got a little too wild with it last year. 

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