Pumped for the US Open this week which will be held at the historic Oakmont Country Club, which has always prided itself on being among the most difficult golf courses in the world. Oakmont is an incredibly unique setup that has hosted 9 US opens since 1927. Oakmont is located in western Pennsylvania and is a par 70 measuring out at 7,372 yards. This is a pretty long golf course for a par 70, but in my opinion still allows shorter players to compete based on the architecture and past results. This golf course features gigantic, lightening fast undulating green complexes, extremely thick 5 inch rough, penile bunkers that are often very deep, and uneven lies along the fairways all of which will give these players problems. Love watching these guys in difficult scoring conditions and this should be as difficult as it gets. I will detail below what I think is the best skill set to separate at Oakmont.
You can certainly separate on this golf course by being long off the tee, but if your consistently missing fairways you’re going to have problems regardless of how long you are. This rough and fairway bunkers will absolutely penalize these players as we typically see at US Opens. It’s also important to note that there will not be graduated rough here, so players that just barely miss the fairway will still be in that 5 inch luscious rough. Ultimately the players that hit the most fairways will have the biggest edge, and I am willing to sacrifice distance for accuracy at this venue. Off the tee will be super important this week so I will definitely be looking at players’ recent strokes gained off the tee and total driving. I will have an increased emphasis on off the tee play this week due to the importance of hitting fairways at this venue.
This is an interesting handicap in terms of approach play. These are extremely large green complexes with severe contours that should play very firm and fast. Contrary to most major championship venues, there is not a ton of long irons and wedge play appears to be of more importance this week. The par 5s are also extremely long leading to a lot of lay ups with wedges in. This decreases the importance of approach play a bit in my opinion as most of these players are good with their wedges, but with how penile the green side areas and bunkers are the best approach players will have an edge. I’ll be looking for solid long term wedge players and in form overall approach players. There is also a linksy aspect to this golf course due to the firmness and seemless transitions from fairways to greens, there will be opportunities to hit low, running shots and I think players that have performed well in open championships is an intriguing angle as this course does have some characteristics of a links course.
The biggest challenge of this golf course and the most defining feature are these complex green surfaces. I mentioned these greens are big, probably the biggest greens that I can remember seeing on the pga tour ever. This effectively decreases the importance of around the green play in exchange for 3 putt avoidance. The big, undulating surfaces will result in a ton of 30+ foot putts for these players, the best lag putters in this field will be at a much bigger advantage this week than a typical pga tour stop. I will be emphasizing 3 putt avoidance in my modeling. These greens are also going to be about as quick as we see on tour. I’ll be taking a peek at players who perform well on fast greens as well.
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