Balls, Sticks, & Stuff | Phillies, Eagles, golf and other matters of great importance...

Up the Creek

As the 2013 U.S. Open at Merion approaches, there will be a lot of focus on the history of golf in Philadelphia.  To that end, a group of local men who met on a golf architecture message board are leading an effort to restore Cobbs Creek G.C.

Among the interesting little known facts I learned from the article:  the driving range on City Ave, adjacent to Cobbs Creek, was once an anti-aircraft battery that was meant to protect Philadelphia from Soviet attacks.

Officially Official: Merion Golf Club Gets 2013 U.S. Open

Link: Merion Golf Club To Host 2013 U.S. Open | USGA.

The club’s members, representatives of nearby Haverford Township and Haverford College, the Southeastern Pennsylvania Transportation Authority (SEPTA) and the surrounding community have helped secure all of the necessary ‘outside the ropes’ infrastructure required for a modern U.S. Open.  These entities will provide acreage and assistance for needs such as transportation and parking, larger tent facilities, and support services for the event.

I hadn't questioned the ability of the USGA to pull off a U.S. Open until I realized SEPTA was involved...

Seriously though, this is great news.  Not a chance I'll be letting my USGA membership lapse now as members get first dibs on tickets.

More on Merion and the 2013 US Open.

Merion to Get US Open

It isn't often in life that you look forward to something seven years in the future with great anticipation.  Perhaps for me, the last time I wanted to fast forward seven years was when I was nine years old and couldn't wait until I was sixteen so I could grow a mustache and drive a red ferrari like Thomas Magnum [and now at almost 33, neither have yet to take place].  But that is just the way I felt, brimming with anticipation that is, when I read Joe Logan's space in the Inquirer:

While nobody will say so officially, it's official: Merion Golf Club is getting the 2013 U.S. Open.

Just a few years ago, the idea of a U.S. Open being held at Ardmore's Merion was out of the question.  The conventional wisdom was that club and ball technology had rendered the club obsolete to today's long hitters and there was the question of logistics -- too little space to accomodate the spectators and general hoopla that comes with a U.S. Open.

But that was before last summer's U.S. Amateur Championship at Merion.  Though the logistics of an Amateur are much smaller in scale than an Open, things went smoothly enough for the powers that be in blue blazers at USGA headquarters to reconsider.  More importantly, the course stood up quite well to the assault of the best amateurs.

Merion has held more USGA championships than any other venue, and some of golf's greatest moments have taken place there.  Bobby Jones completed the Grand Slam on the eleventh green in 1930 (the Open was match play in those days) and we've all seen the photograph of Ben Hogan lacing a one-iron to the eighteenth green to sew up a par and a berth in a playoff, which he would win the next day.  What made Hogan's win so special was that he was coming back from a near-fatal automobile accident.

One has to wonder what we will witness in 2013? Perhaps a moment such as Hogan's or Jones', or, something like Tom Watson's chip-in on his way to defeating Jack Nicklaus at Pebble Beach in '82... Maybe something like the wonderful duel between Payne Stewart and Phil Mickelson at Pinehurst in '99.

Of course, there will be much less dramatic moments to look forward to as well, but special in their own way.  Like running into Adam Scott at Peace A Pizza or realizing that's the normally reserved Justin Leonard cursing the red lights on City Avenue in the car next to yours.

Tiger, I'm looking forward to it.  A key's under the mat and, we'll leave a light on for you.

The 105th U.S. Amateur Championship

Ardmore, Pa. -  The best golfers in the world that do not get paid to play met in the Philadelphia area this week to participate in the 105th United States Amateur Championship.  Those who followed the semifinal matches on Merion Country Club's East Course were treated to an intimate look at some incredible golf.

Thousands of spectators were able to follow only four golfers, but there was certainly enough drama to go around.

The first match, which teed off at nine in the morning, was between Dillon Dougherty, a student at Northwestern University, and J.C. Deacon, a student at University of Nevada-Las Vegas.  Fifteen minutes later, the second semifinal match teed off, this one between Austin Eaton, who at 36 was the grownup of the four semifinalists and Edoardo Molinari, an Italian engineering student.

If you can appreciate a great story, then you were pulling for Dougherty.  His father is caddying for him in the tournament, and Dougherty's grandfather had passed away unexpectedly several weeks earlier -- the father-caddy kept a photograph of him under his hat.

The Dougherty-Deacon match was close the entire way, and each player displayed why a never-give-up attitude and a skillful short-game are the tools of champions.

On the 597-yard 4th hole, Deacon's third shot finished to the right of the green.  Dougherty was on the green in three strokes, so Deacon would need to get down in two shots to halve the hole.  Between his ball and the hole was a deep sand bunker and only a few feet of green.  Deacon laid his wedge very open behind his ball, took a long backswing, and played a sort of explosion shot in the grass, similar to a sand shot, hitting probably an inch or so behind the ball.  The ball softly rose through the air and fell to terra firma just a few feet from the hole to ensure the halve.

For the rest of the round, the two players traded jabs, and after scrambling pars by each player on the sixteenth hole, a par four over an old quarry, the match stood at 1 up, Deacon.

The seventeenth hole is a par-3 of over 250 yards.  The players hit over the old quarry to a long and narrow green surrounded by sand bunkers and a hill to the left of the green.

Whether it was due to the pressure of the situation  -- finalists of the tournament get automatic berths to the U.S. Open and Masters tournaments -- or a result of overswinging in an effort to reach the green, both players pulled their shots to the left.

Deacon's ball came to rest a few feet off the green, while Dougherty's ball went further left, coming to rest on the side of the hill, probably fifteen or twenty yards away from the putting surface.