U.S. Open – intriguing course history, but condition, coverage terrible

Although I normally don’t find myself spending a lot of time watching PGA golf on television other than the Master’s tournament, the locale of this past weekend’s U.S. Open made it a somewhat more convenient view.

With host course Chamber Bay being located in Washington state on the Pacific Ocean (and time zone), weekend golf suddenly became available during prime time in a season when the normal decision was which rerun would be watched.

Playing on what was just a decade ago a 1000 acre “gravel pit”, which is what I assume is that region’s term for what we in this region would call a “rock quarry”, the PGA players struggled with the long and rough conditions of the links style Chambers Bay course – especially with the dry, course and bumpy surface of the greens.

Chip shots that wouldn’t stick, hard to read greens and putts that often left players coming back to the cup from distances that were farther from their original position, made for plenty of controversy throughout the week and weekend.

Then there was the coverage. Fox earned the U.S. Open contract, rather than the normal NBC/Golf Channel coverage, and I must say, regardless of the conditions of the course, the job that Fox did with the golf tournament coverage was, well . . . it stunk. Really bad.

Players struggled with high rough, thick and plentiful sand bunkers – some deep enough to require ladders – and bad turf, but viewers were plagued with a team of commentators who couldn’t keep up with what was being shown, a camera crew that couldn’t find the golf ball and a team of producers that didn’t know what an instant replay was and couldn’t come up with a style of on-screen graphics that were informative or readable

Still, I watched and enjoyed as best I could and I found myself reading everything I could get my hands on about each round and many of the side-stories surrounding the course and the players.

Then, finally, with night skies outside of my living room, I watched that final drama unfold as Jordan Spieth won his second straight major of the season with a birdie on the 18th, after Dustin Johnson missed an eagle putt to win the tournament, then missed a birdie putt to force an 18 hole playoff on Monday and finally settled on a tap-in par putt to end the bad Fox coverage with a tied for second place finish.

I think what was making that final down to the wire finish so enjoyable was seeing two players with American flags next to their names on the leaderboard, battle down the stretch for our own tournament – the US. Open Championship.

Things are still a little slow around here as far as local sports action goes, so I think maybe I’ll wipe off the clubs and maybe head out to 76 Falls this week for a round of golf. I’ve played a few times this spring, and one thing is for certain – the gang here has our course in better shape than Chambers Bay was in.