U.S. Open Always Includes These Guarantees

So nobody can figure out what’s going to happen at the U.S. Open this week? The thing is, if you consider it carefully, you have to admit that’s sort of hard to believe.

You would think that, after 101 years of it, someone would have left behind a clue here and there.

But unpredictability, that’s the U.S. Open style and we probably should be thankful for that.

And it’s not some slick production, like the Super Bowl, because they’re not calling it U.S. Open CII.

Tiger Woods will be the favorite, but that’s not unusual. He is the favorite in every tournament he enters. The Masters champion might even win the Open, for a second time, and, even better, get halfway to a potential Grand Slam.

It would be hard to predict, of course, and we know that’s the way it goes around here.

However, the real truth is that it’s not so difficult to predict some things that will occur at Bethpage Black this week. In fact, there are some virtual certainties.

Feel free to check them off when they happen.

It is guaranteed that there will be total chaos and absolute gridlock from the golf course on Long Island all the way to the Midtown Tunnel, since the USGA has all but banned cars and intends to bus 42,500 spectators back and forth each day. After this experience, bus riders will understand why they call it Long Island.

It is guaranteed that no matter what he shoots, Andy Miller, the son of NBC commentator Johnny Miller, will get some air time.

It is guaranteed that some virtual unknown will appear for an instant atop the leaderboard, someone like 21-year-old qualifier Kevin Warrick of Division II University of West Florida in Pensacola, who has never played in a national event. Warrick qualified in Tampa, one shot behind Greg Norman and tied with John Huston.

Said Warrick: “I watched the Golf Channel a few times and they showed my name up there under Norman and Huston. It’s pretty neat.”

It is guaranteed that Singh will miss the cut. Not Vijay, but Jeev Milkha Singh, a 30-year-old from New Delhi who has never played in a major and has missed his last three cuts on the European Tour.

It is guaranteed that there will be some ridiculous ruling. It will be reminiscent of 1994 at Oakmont when Ernie Els was awarded a free drop because a TV crane was ruled a temporary immovable object--even though it was on wheels.

Els went from a probable double bogey to a par to the championship.

Then there was 1985 at Oakland Hills, when Denis Watson got a two-shot penalty for waiting too long for his putt to drop and wound up losing to Andy North by one shot.

It is guaranteed that someone will say, “This is one of the most unfair pin placements in the history of the U.S. Open.” It will remind everyone of the 18th hole at the Olympic Club in 1998 when nobody could stop a ball on the green unless he covered it with glue first.

It is guaranteed that someone will putt the ball off the green and back down the fairway, even though the greens are supposed to be flat enough to slip under a door.

It is guaranteed that someone will call Colin Montgomerie a fat slob. It will be a red-faced, overweight fan with his cap on backward and holding a beer.

It is guaranteed that someone will whiff on a ball in the rough.

It is guaranteed that John Daly, who is to the U.S. Open what stripes are to plaids, will have an incident in which he hits to the wrong fairway, slaps a ball while walking and trades his caddie for a box of doughnuts. It is guaranteed that there will not be a playoff. There was one last year at Southern Hills, the first in eight years, so we’re not due for another.

It is guaranteed that Retief Goosen won’t repeat as champion. No one has done that since Curtis Strange in 1989, so we’re not due for that, either.

It is guaranteed that the U.S. Open will be entertaining, quirky, funny, sad, touching, enthralling and even unpredictable. Except for the obvious, of course.