U.S. OPEN : So, <i> Now </i> They Have Norman Right Where They Want Him

They can’t predict earthquakes. Tornadoes come out of nowhere. So do tidal waves, forest fires and volcanic eruptions.

But, along about 5 o’clock this afternoon, expect a force of nature as predictable as a sunrise.

Gregory John Norman will no doubt explode all over the place, go up in smoke. Pieces of his golf game will be found all over the premises.

The Titanic of Golf is right on schedule. Leading or tied for the lead in a major tournament after three rounds--and steaming toward the iceberg.

Greg is always in that position after three rounds of a major. A lot of the times, he’s leading right up to the final hole. Been there, done that.

Take the 1986 PGA at Inverness. Greg had the tournament all but in the locker. He was standing on the 18th green with his ball sitting there. His closest competitor was in the sand trap. Unknown named Bob Tway.

The next thing you knew, the ball was flying out of the trap and into the hole. Shaken, Norman missed the putt. Tway won the PGA.

Take the 1987 Masters. Greg was on the 11th green, the second hole of a playoff for the title. He and journeyman Larry Mize had just disposed of Seve Ballesteros on the 10th hole. Norman was standing on the green over a makeable putt. Mize was well off the green to the right.

Mize chipped in. Shaken, Norman missed the putt. Mize won the Masters.

Somebody up there in that great clubhouse in the sky has it in for Gregory J. Norman.

Take 1986, the last time the U.S. Open was at Shinnecock. Of course, Norman led after three rounds. He was leading all the way to the 13th hole of the final round when suddenly he began slapping the ball around like a tennis ball. He shot 75. Raymond Floyd shot 66 to win. Norman finished 12th.

In 1984 at Winged Foot, Norman tied Fuzzy Zoeller for the Open championship. In the playoff, he shot 75. Zoeller shot 67.

In 1993 at Inverness, he lost the PGA in a playoff to Paul Azinger.

Some 14 times in the past decade, Greg Norman has lost a tournament on the 72nd hole. That’s not a career, it’s a sentence.

Aristotle said that great men are bedeviled by “undeserved misfortune.” In that respect, Greg Norman is a genius.

How much is due to misfortune and how much to bad judgment? Tough call. In the British Open in 1989, our resident Joan of Arc, our martyr, was locked in a playoff with Mark Calcavecchia and Wayne Grady. Norman came to the final hole. The fairway at Troon was wide. A sand trap loomed out there 300 yards from the tee. Jack Nicklaus, no less, said on television that trap “won’t come into play.” Hah! Our Greg hit it right in there.

If he had to tee it up with a six-iron, he shouldn’t have hit it there.

Gregory’s misfortune is sometimes deserved.

It’s too bad. If you had a charter from God to build yourself the perfect golfer, you might well start with Greg Norman. Broad-shouldered, slim-hipped, flashing teeth, daring eyes, he might have run a pirate ship in another place and time. He slashes at a golf ball with the abandon of a guy flogging deserters. In a sport where too often the contestants resemble letter-carriers or restaurant waiters, Norman looks like a heavyweight fighter.

His nickname is not “Porky” or “Broadway.” It could be “the Hunk.” But his blond hair and love for shark hunting have given him the nickname “the Great White Shark.”

One thing it isn’t is “Lucky.”

Like the rest of the field, Norman was less like a killer of the deep and more like a trout ducking a hook in Saturday’s horror-filled round. It was hardly golf’s finest hour.

If it was a fight, they would have stopped it. The world’s finest golfers were staggering around the course like a bunch of drunks at a driving range. It looked more like a truck drivers’ flight at a Sheboygan municipal. Balls were flying over greens, into hayfield rough and all over Long Island as the winds came up and turned this treacherous golf course into an armed terrorist.

When Tom Kite, who won a U.S. Open only three years ago, shoots an 82, you get some idea of the carnage at Shinnecock on Saturday. Nick Faldo, winner of three British Opens and two Masters, shot 79. Only three players in the field of 73 broke par and one of them (Gary Hallberg) needed a hole in one to do it.

Ben Crenshaw, the reigning Masters champion, not only had a 79 but on one hole hit two consecutive chip shots only to have the ball come rolling back to where he had struck it.

It wasn’t golf, it was manslaughter. Norman shot a 74. Now, ordinarily, when you shoot 74, you go home and cut your wrists. Norman acted as if they should give him a ticker-tape parade.

“Shooting 74 is sometimes the equivalent of shooting 62,” he said, adding, “I actually enjoyed it. . . . I learned something about myself today.”

He was not ready to run up the white flag. “I honestly hope the weather conditions stay the same tomorrow,” he insisted.

Shinnecock is the clear winner in this slaughter. It is not so much a golf course as a gas chamber. Not that it really needs it, but its misanthropic geography is actually aided by a 20-m.p.h. ocean wind.

“I can’t remember ever seeing such great players humbled,” Norman said. “I hit a lot of good shots but ended up looking like I was a 15 handicap. To finish tied for the lead under these conditions is something I’m proud of.”

It was a day for real 15-handicappers to gloat. These guys on the tour finally found out what it’s like to play the game the way we play it. The ball doesn’t have to go on a green, fellows, it goes where you sometimes can’t find it.

Norman ended Round 3 tied for the lead. Execution position, as usual. The only suspense left is which hole the cap will come off the volcano or who will chip in to beat him. The gods of golf have him right where they want him. Call 911. Send lifeboats. We’ve seen this movie before. It has a sad ending.