History Says Open Title Closed to Outsiders

The U.S. Open and Pebble Beach. Perfect! Dempsey vs. Firpo. Notre Dame vs. USC. The 1927 Yankees vs. the 1963 Dodgers. The world’s best golfers vs. the world’s best course. A course that can fight back.

Don’t bet on any players who don’t have the trouble shots, the all-around game or who can’t shrug off a double bogey or two. This will not be a-drive-and-an-eight-iron. This will be war. Pebble Beach takes no prisoners. The winner will be bloody. And, maybe, bowed.

There are a few things to look for. After all, this is the Open:

1--There will be a playoff. Three out of the last four years there has been a playoff and four out of the last eight. Three of those four regulation victories were by one shot. Twenty-nine of 91 Opens have ended in playoffs.

2--Forget the opening-round score. Ben Hogan opened with a 76 the year he won at Oakland Hills, Jack Fleck led off with a 76 the year he won at the Olympic Club, and Raymond Floyd and Larry Nelson started with 75s the years they won.

3--Forget the low, low scores. Lee Mackey Jr. shot an opening-round 64 in 1950. The next day he shot 81 and barely made the cut. Rives McBee shot a record-tying 64 in ’66 but sandwiched it around a 76 and 78 for nowhere. Tommy Jacobs’ 64 in 1964 was not good enough to let him catch Ken Venturi’s winning 278. The previous record, 65, was set by the Philadelphia amateur, James McHale, who slipped to 23rd, in 1947.

4--Unless they’re run up by legends of the game. Johnny Miller closed with a 63 in 1973 to win and Jack Nicklaus opened with a 63 in 1980 and won. (On the other hand, Tom Weiskopf also carded an opening-round 63 that year but then slipped all the way to 37th.)

5--Be prepared for heartbreak and blowups. Sam Snead needed only a par on the final hole at Philadelphia in 1939 to win the championship. It was a par five that was a piece of candy for the long-hitting Snead in those days. He made eight. He went from bunker to bunker, hit top shots, came apart, and sat with his head in his hands in the clubhouse as Byron Nelson won the Open.

In 1966, Arnold Palmer had a seven-shot lead with nine holes to play. He proceeded to give them away to Billy Casper, hole by hole, and needed a couple of coronary putts just to make a playoff--which Casper won by three the next day. Heartbreak? I was urged to title my column, “How I Lost the Open.”

6--Watch for the miracle shots. Tom Watson was not only in jail, he was on Death Row in the 1982 Open at Pebble Beach when he put his tee shot on the par-three 17th into lion country and, in the considered opinion of everyone who ever hit there, would be lucky to make four. He made two. He chipped it in. If it doesn’t hit the pin and drop, it might still be in the Pacific Ocean. It hits the pin. It wins the Open for Watson.

7--Watch for the bride-of-Frankenstein shot. In 1985, T.C. (for Tze Chung) Chen, a former sailor in the Chinese navy, had the tournament in hand when he came to the fifth hole in the final round. A wild four-iron shot put him in coarse rough. When he tried to wedge out, his club hit the ball twice on the same shot. A penalty. He took an eight on the par four. He lost the tournament by only one shot, and was thenceforth known in the press rooms as “Two-Chip” Chen.

8--Watch out for the officials. In that same 1985 tournament at Oakland Hills, the Zimbabwean golfer, Denis Watson, had a 10-foot putt for par on the eighth hole of the first round. His putt hovered on the edge of the hole. Golfer Watson waited. It finally toppled in. Great par, right?

But, wait a minute! Out of the crowd came roaring a USGA type. He ruled that Watson “waited too long” for the putt to drop. He penalized Denis two strokes. Golfer Watson waited all of 40 seconds. Don January once waited seven minutes before the rule was put in.

Denis Watson lost the Open (to Andy North) by one stroke. If he hurried after his putt and tapped it in for a five, he would have tied. So, never mind Fred Couples and Nick Faldo, keep your eye out for a guy in a striped tie, button-down collar and pipe.

9--Look for the headline “Unknown Leads Open.” Happens almost every year, Lee Mackey in 1950, T.C. Chen in 1985. Such other household names as Harry Todd, Les Kennedy, Mike Sipula and Alvin Krueger led after the first round. Occasionally, the unknown led the Open after the last round--Sam Parks Jr. in 1935, Tony Manero, the next year, Jack Fleck in 1955.

10--Don’t look for the TV “tap-in.” There’s no such thing in an Open. In 1947, Snead lost the playoff to Lew Worsham when he missed an 18-inch putt on the last hole.

11--Forget the amateurs. The last time an amateur won was 1933. The best an amateur has finished in almost 60 years was second in 1960--young fellow by the name of Jack Nicklaus.

12--If you have to bet, or get in the office pool, go with Andy North, Hale Irwin or Scott Simpson. Hale Irwin always wins U.S. Opens. If he doesn’t, North does. Irwin has won 19 tournaments and three of them were U.S. Opens. North has won three tournaments--and two of them were U.S. Opens. Simpson has won five tournaments. One of them was the U.S. Open and he was in a playoff last year. He’s always fifth or better in an Open.

13--Because it’s Pebble and the Open, look for par to be a pretty good score. And look for the headline, “Well-Known Wins Open.”