On the eve of the US Open…
I have been frustrated lately with my golf game! I don’t play enough (usually because of time), and I don’t practice! That says it all, don’t you think! I often laugh inside when I watch golfers and their expectations towards their game. They’ll hit their customary bucket of balls, putt a few balls at the putting green, and go to the first tee expecting to shoot par! They’ll curse and swear, bang their clubs, and even drink a few beverages to soothe their nerves. I’ve played with them too often to understand that they have never received a paycheck from the PGA!
So, on the eve of the US Open, you expect the best golfers in the world to be the best! One by one, in each interview, they all declare that the possibility of winning the tourney is theirs for the taking. But deep inside my spirit, there is only one golfer in the bunch that really believes that. In his last tournament, playing in the final group, trailing by four strokes, he came from behind and birdied three of the last four holes to win the Memorial by two strokes over Jim Furyk. OK, you know da man…he is Tiger Woods!
Everyone has a right to be frustrated, even the best golfers in the world will shank the ball (for non-golfers, that is a shot that is hit off the club that goes nowhere…), miss a three footer for a par, and hit the ball in the water! The weekend golf fanatics understand the irony of the game! We love it every time we see the best golfers do exactly what we do! It makes the immortal mortal once again! Hey, we’ve even seen them throw a club or two! But at the cusp of America’s most important golf tournament, our own Open, I am rooting for one guy! Go Tiger!
Can he be the first American, since Curtis Strange, to win back to back US Opens! Remember last year, Tiger’s epic victory at one of my favorite public links, Torrey Pines. With a stress fracture and torn cartilage in his knee, he bested Rocco Mediate on the 19th hole playoff to amaze all of us watching the greatest US Open since we saw our own Tom Watson chip it in on the 17th at Pebble Beach. It was great drama for golf enthusiast! Some were cheering Rocco, but I was rooting for my man, Tiger!
So on the eve of the 109th US Open at Bethpage Black Course, just like he did it in 2002, Tiger Woods, in his Sunday red shirt, will win his second consecutive US Open title and his fifteen major championship! Go Tiger!
