U.S. Open Observations

Bits and pieces left over from the U.S. Open:

* With Angel Cabrera's win yesterday, the last four U.S Opens have been won by non-American's. This, I believe is an indication of both the rise in the quality and depth of professional golf around the world, and the deterioration of quality and depth of U.S. professional golfers. When you combine this with the abysmal results of the U.S. in the last several Ryder Cups, you see a pattern emerge. Foreign players are used to grinding and having to hit all kinds of different shots to scrape out a win. U.S. course are promarlity dsigned to play "target golf", i.e., bang a driver, hit a wedge on and sping it back to the hole, then putt. Then when you set up a course for tougher conditions, such as a major or Ryder Cup, the U.S golfers have a hard time adjusting .their game.

* Everyone was talking about how built up Tiger Woods has become. Obviously, his workout routine has been paying off. However, I wonder if the built-up biceps and chest are not also partially responsible for his increasing wildness off the tee. If you noticed on Sunday, down the stretch Woods used an iron off the tee or else cut down his swing to hit "stinger" shots with the driver or 3 wood in the effort to keep it in play. You hear the analysts keep talking about how Woods keeps "getting stuck" in his down swing and blocking the ball off to the right. I'm starting to think that the built up chest and arms are gettin in the way. David Duval did much the same thing to himself some years ago when he started lifting weights seriously and buffed up.

* To my eyes, it looks like the time when the tour was intimidated by Mr. Woods is over. Five years ago, when Woods started climbing the leaderboard on Saturday, the rest of the field would just collapse and start playing for second place. You could hear the other players admit it. Well, that era obviously has passed by and here is why. First, while Mr. Woods' length off the tee was intimidating 10 years ago, now a lot of the guys out there can hit it as long or longer, Woods is no big deal anymore. Second, at 30 years of age, Woods has been around long enough that the other players have gotten used to him. Third, the tour has finally figured out that if you post a good score on Sunday and make Woods chase you instead of cruising, he has a hard time (like every one else) doing it.