It’s a Setup--Approach With Caution

It’s the 99th U.S. Open, so welcome to Pineland. Here at Pinehurst No. 2, we’ve got your pine sand, we’ve got your pine trees, your pine needles, your pine greens and a total pine layout that’s virtually guaranteed to make many of the 156 players wonder why they find themselves in such a pine, pine mess.

There has never been a U.S. Open at Pinehurst, but all that changes beginning today when the National Open begins at Donald Ross’ historic track in rural southeastern North Carolina, or more precisely, where Highway 1 takes you after you turn left at the first water tower.

Maybe it’s not exactly a metropolis, but for the rest of the week, it’s the golf capital of the world, where the winner of the year’s second major championship reveals himself.

Right now, who that player might be is a secret. That’s not to say there aren’t a few hints, though. Here is a short list of the logical candidates:

* Tiger Woods--Some (but not many) hit it farther, but no one is playing better right now.

* David Duval--Everybody is waiting for him to win his first major, and this just might be the place since he has won almost everything else this year.

* Jose Maria Olazabal--The Masters champion has the patience and the short game to do very well in the long run.

* Colin Montgomerie--If it weren’t for Woods, he would be the hottest player in the world.

* Davis Love III--His back is no longer sore and the native North Carolinian knows the place like the back of his hand.

There are many more players with a chance, such as defending champion Lee Janzen, Ernie Els, Payne Stewart, Scott Hoch, Lee Westwood, Darren Clarke and Greg Norman, to name a few. And they’re all going to have to contend with a setup that is quite different from your typical U.S. Open.

This may be the first U.S. Open since they invented lawn mowers where the rough isn’t so tall you could lose a golf cart in it. The rough measured 4 1/2 inches early in the week, but the USGA ordered it trimmed to three inches because . . . of the greens. The greens at Pinehurst look like a water bed immediately after somebody did a cannonball on it. They’re all large and elevated and seem as though there is a very large turtle shell buried beneath the grass.

Not only that, the length of the grass around the greens is so short, it’s not going to keep many balls from rolling off the putting surface into so-called collection areas.

There are many who believe the best approach to the greens will be to run the ball, generally avoiding attempts to fly the ball to the pin and getting it to stop up there.

The shorter rough is an interesting concept by the USGA and may encourage players to go for the green from the rough instead of simply hacking the ball back out onto the fairway.

If that happens?

“You could see some interesting stuff,” Love said. “You could see some big, big numbers.”

Olazabal acknowledged that his short game is good, but said there are plenty of other players whose short games are in the same category. The trick is beating the course, however you do it. And Olazabal said that’s not going to be easy. He chipped with 10 different clubs during his practice round Tuesday.

“The course is very tough,” he said. “The greens and the surroundings of the greens are very treacherous. They’re very, very tough with a lot of slopes. And that’s going to make scoring very, very tough.”

Pinehurst? In short, very, very tough, indeed.

There has been a renewed interest in the chances of Montgomerie, who said the U.S. Open is no place to try to find your game. You’d better have it already, he said.

The last European to win the U.S. Open was Tony Jacklin in 1970, so Montgomerie is bucking the odds.

“I think it’s a motivation for every British golfer and also every European golfer,” Montgomerie said. “It’s been too long.”

Of course, it’s been never for Duval, who may be the dominant player of the year with four victories and nearly $3 million in prize money already, but he is still looking for his first major championship title.

Woods expects to be inventive around the greens and has worked on chipping with a three-wood.

“This golf course from tee to green is very simple,” he said. “It’s around the green where it becomes complicated.”

The complications begin today, at 6:30 a.m. Eastern time. That’s when the first threesome tees off--Jumbo Ozaki, David Toms and Brandel Chamblee. It promises to be a very long day with the last threesome on the tee at 3 p.m. Everyone starts from the first tee instead of dividing the field and starting half at the No. 10 tee to speed up play.

With rain in the forecast every day the rest of the week, finishing play on schedule may turn out to be as big a challenge as keeping golf balls on the green. But finding a winner? It may be like finding a pine needle in a haystack.