Pinehurst No. 2 - US Open 2024 (Scheffler's Last Stand?)

[I Should Coco]

Great post, maumann.

And while the picture of Rory looking devastated at the scorer's table said a lot, it still would have been better for him to at least make a short statement to the media after DeChambeau did all his interviews. Even if it was just a hat tip to Bam Bam and a "I can't explain what happened on those two putts."

Even after a devastating loss, there are much worse things that can happen to you, as maumann mentioned.

 

[UPChip]

My pop was a huge Arnold Palmer fan. He loved the excitement of him getting into trouble and finding a way out. The swashbuckling style. And the connection with the fans.

Not too many players have that. DeChambeu certainly does right now. He definitely seems like a different dude than a few years ago.

I can't decide what I think about him. As a friend of mine called it, he sold out to play on the "bonesaw tour" and was wearing the ridiculous logo of his golf "team" while collecting the trophy. The list of evidence for "He's an asshole" is significant. But, as some folks have said, there is an increasing amount of evidence for "he's mellowed out." Whether it was the plus-fours or the single-length clubs, he's always seen the game itself in a different way, and maybe that explains some of the LIV crap. I mean, generations of Tour golfers dicked around for peanuts in places like the John Deere or the Greater Greensboro Open for years. Someone is willing to pay you market value for your services. No one seriously went after Tiger about Nike's labor practices, and I think the more we learn about Rory the more likely it seems like there are some skeletons in that closet.

I'm still not watching LIV, but at least this week I decided Bryson can have this one, if for no other reason than the Payne Stewart comparisons came thick and fast down the stretch (worth noting, Payne is on the first page of this SJ thread). In a way, it was too bad that he was wearing slacks on Sunday.

 

[Slacker]

This comment is worthy of an entire chain of posts in the Journalism forum.

From the time we penned our first news brief, we were taught "ask the tough questions." It leads to the Why, or sometimes the How. I always found myself feeling a bit queasy about putting someone on the spot when their emotions are the rawest. But that's we were trained to do. You try your best to put your own emotions on auto-pilot and function as a reporter.

NASA squirreled away Christa McAuliffe's parents -- and the other relatives of the Challenger astronauts -- before we could get a comment, and to be honest, I really didn't know what they could have said to add to the story that day.

I can tell you it never gets easier talking to someone who just lost a championship. But we're talking about a game -- yes, someone's livelihood -- but we all woke up this morning. Try knocking on the door of someone's home whose spouse was found dead, or trying to interview people who lost everything in a natural disaster. Or in @MileHigh's case, when suddenly you're the one answering instead of asking.

I agree with @Chef2 that Rory should have given some response before he left the course, even if it was just "I need time to think about what I want to say."

Yes, it makes for powerful prose (or a video clip) if the subject can clearly express his or her emotions with a minimum amount of time to process what just happened. But that's rare, and usually there's an uneasy silence while the words are trying to form.

Rory's reaction and expression in the scoring room was all anyone really needed to be able to write a damn good column Sunday night. Anything he might have said might have diminshed that emotional gut punch we all witnessed. And to put the shoe on the other foot, if it had happened to us, what words would make a difference?

I do agree that Rory shoulda stuck around and said something. But he did not.

And so I also agree that you have your column right there when he was too blown apart to talk about it.

There's a reason stuff like this is called "a crushing loss." Give a guy some room to weep in private sometimes, for fork's sake.

 

[Chef2]

Greg Norman is an asshole.
Has always been an asshole.
But when he shot his 78 or whatever in the final round of the 1996 Masters, he talked to the media.
This was such a bench move by Rory.

People are going to feel a lot more sympathetic towards you if you come up to the microphone and say something. Not just put your clubs in your courtesy car and jump on air Missed Putt.

 

[Sam Mills 51]

How did Pinehurst manage to becomes such a huge deal anyway? It's in the dead middle of nowhere now, much less a century ago. There's a reason no one ever winds up in that yawning void between Charlotte and I-95 by happenstance.

1) It's the home of a bunch of good golf courses. Not just No. 2 ... No. 8 is considered quite good, and there are a lot of good golf options.
2) For years, it was originally the home of the World Golf Hall of Fame (which is nice and all ... but update the passport and go to St. Andrews because nothing really beats the home of golf IMO) and it is again the home after a stopover at Ponte Vedra Beach.

If you took a drink every time NBC mentioned "native vegetation," you'd be halfway through that gift case of IPA you got for Father's Day.

You mean ... no one from the state offered him some extra side money to keep saying "so-and-so hit it into the North Carolina Sandhills"?

Well ... it was an idea, anyway ...

Does Chamblee ever tire of thinking he's God's gift to golf analysis?

I dunno ... but his willingness to keep slamming Bam Bam over LIV Golf after winning the U.S. Open was one of the smallest moves I've seen from a talking head in a long time. Would be a longer time if the WWL's massive-ego talking heads didn't almost monopolize all that spotlight.

 

[MileHigh]

This comment is worthy of an entire chain of posts in the Journalism forum.

From the time we penned our first news brief, we were taught "ask the tough questions." It leads to the Why, or sometimes the How. I always found myself feeling a bit queasy about putting someone on the spot when their emotions are the rawest. But that's we were trained to do. You try your best to put your own emotions on auto-pilot and function as a reporter.

NASA squirreled away Christa McAuliffe's parents -- and the other relatives of the Challenger astronauts -- before we could get a comment, and to be honest, I really didn't know what they could have said to add to the story that day.

I can tell you it never gets easier talking to someone who just lost a championship. But we're talking about a game -- yes, someone's livelihood -- but we all woke up this morning. Try knocking on the door of someone's home whose spouse was found dead, or trying to interview people who lost everything in a natural disaster. Or in @MileHigh's case, when suddenly you're the one answering instead of asking.

I agree with @Chef2 that Rory should have given some response before he left the course, even if it was just "I need time to think about what I want to say."

Yes, it makes for powerful prose (or a video clip) if the subject can clearly express his or her emotions with a minimum amount of time to process what just happened. But that's rare, and usually there's an uneasy silence while the words are trying to form.

Rory's reaction and expression in the scoring room was all anyone really needed to be able to write a damn good column Sunday night. Anything he might have said might have diminshed that emotional gut punch we all witnessed. And to put the shoe on the other foot, if it had happened to us, what words would make a difference?

This is spot-on and perfectly said.

 

[Alma]

The media would have been tactful and thoughtful with Rory. This idea that the questions would have been - as Shane Ryan put it - "inane" is the old thing journalists like to do to each other where, in a fit of humility, we remove all grace for ourselves and paint ourselves with a caustic brush.

One thing about Rory is that he's a genuinely open, giving guy to the golf insiders. Ryan, the NLU folks, a few others. And so they can probably live inside Rory's thoughts more than the rank-and-file folks there and, even if they have misgivings about him bolting the lot, probably soften what they'd say vs. if the guy missing those putts was Koepka. (Ryan wrote a piece after the Sunday piece that got a lot of praise but I personally found vainglorious and poorly organized.)

Eamon Lynch texted Koepka for an interview Thursday and got a really good story out of why Koepka didn't talk. (Koepka also responded.) Lynch did not appear to ask Rory for the same interview aftrr Sunday. (Or, if he did, he didn't note it on Twitter.) But, then, in Lynch's universe, Rory is a good guy and Koepka is a bad guy, so the rules are different.

Rory doesn't doesn't really "owe" those folks, because he'll catch up to them later, or unpack everything off the record via text, etc.

Does he owe the rest? The public? NBC, ESPN or the USGA? I dunno. He didn't think he did.

 

[Alma]

I dunno ... but his willingness to keep slamming Bam Bam over LIV Golf after winning the U.S. Open was one of the smallest moves I've seen from a talking head in a long time. Would be a longer time if the WWL's massive-ego talking heads didn't almost monopolize all that spotlight.

Chamblee - and many other golf analysts and journalists - have lived inside a bubble for several years on this issue.

 

[playthrough]

The media would have been tactful and thoughtful with Rory. This idea that the questions would have been - as Shane Ryan put it - "inane" is the old thing journalists like to do to each other where, in a fit of humility, we remove all grace for ourselves and paint ourselves with a caustic brush.

One thing about Rory is that he's a genuinely open, giving guy to the golf insiders. Ryan, the NLU folks, a few others. And so they can probably live inside Rory's thoughts more than the rank-and-file folks there and, even if they have misgivings about him bolting the lot, probably soften what they'd say vs. if the guy missing those putts was Koepka. (Ryan wrote a piece after the Sunday piece that got a lot of praise but I personally found vainglorious and poorly organized.)

Eamon Lynch texted Koepka for an interview Thursday and got a really good story out of why Koepka didn't talk. (Koepka also responded.) Lynch did not appear to ask Rory for the same interview aftrr Sunday. (Or, if he did, he didn't note it on Twitter.) But, then, in Lynch's universe, Rory is a good guy and Koepka is a bad guy, so the rules are different.

Rory doesn't doesn't really "owe" those folks, because he'll catch up to them later, or unpack everything off the record via text, etc.

Does he owe the rest? The public? NBC, ESPN or the USGA? I dunno. He didn't think he did.

I usually like Ryan's stuff but that Sunday wrap felt like it was written for other golf media. "Look at me dropping all these names!"

I'm on the side of Rory having to say something. A drive-by with NBC or just a moment with USGA media officials would have sufficed. Didn't have to be a full press conference baring of the soul.

 

[BTExpress]

Rory had plenty of time to process it and come up with a short statement, even if it was just to congratulate the winner. From the moment he missed on 18, the feeling had to be, "I just lost it," and any other outcome would have been a marvelous surprise.

If he's the leader coming into 18, and he four-putts and loses it . . . yeah, give him time to process it.

 

[Michael_ Gee]

Question. Do any of the PGA Tour's major sponsors NOT do at least some business with Saudi Arabia? Don't tell me Wells Fargo and RBC don't.

 

[MileHigh]

I usually like Ryan's stuff but that Sunday wrap felt like it was written for other golf media. "Look at me dropping all these names!"

I'm on the side of Rory having to say something. A drive-by with NBC or just a moment with USGA media officials would have sufficed. Didn't have to be a full press conference baring of the soul.

I agree. Two questions with NBC or as he's walking to the parking lot. And at least give Bryson a handshake of congratulations -- like Bryson did with Xander at Valhalla. Not run to the parking lot and skid your tires on the way to the airport.

I wanted Rory to win too. I'm as anti-LIV as there is. But Rory obviously gagged. Just own it with a quick answer and move on.