Who will win the 39th U.S. Senior Open, which starts on Thursday at The Broadmoor in Colorado Springs?
— Will it be Davis Love III (left in a USGA photo), who at age 54 is competing in his first senior major ever? Love is trying to become the ninth player to win the U.S. Senior Open in his debut.
— Will it be World Golf Hall of Famer Fred Couples, who has finished in the top 14 four times in four tries at the U.S. Senior Open.
— Will it be 60-year-old Bernhard Langer, who with 37 PGA Tour Champions wins is chasing Hale Irwin’s record 45 victories? Langer has already won a record 10 senior majors.
— Will it be one of the former UCLA golf teammates Brandt Jobe and Scott McCarron? Jobe, No. 1 in the PGA Tour Champions in driving distance, lived in Colorado for 29 years before moving to Texas, and McCarron won the PGA Tour Champions event last week in Wisconsin.
— Will it be Kenny Perry, who is seeking his third Senior Open title and second in a row?
— Will it be Tom Lehman, who won the Senior PGA at Colorado Golf Club in 2010 and scored a PGA Tour Champions victory earlier this month in Des Moines?
— Will be it one of the other World Golf Hall of Famers in the field like Vijay Singh and Colin Montgomerie (below)?
— Or will it be the East Course at The Broadmoor, with its confounding, devilish greens and thick rough? After all, just three players finished under par — Eduardo Romero, Fred Funk and Mark McNulty — when the 2008 U.S. Senior Open was contested at The Broadmoor.
Couples seems to cast his vote for the course — or for Love, since they have to present the trophy to someone.
“It’s a very, very hard golf course,” said Boom Boom. “And I think the guys who play well will have to do a lot of things, which is what a U.S. Open is all about — or a Senior Open. You have to drive it, you have to be good around the greens and (deal with) the rough. And obviously you have to be a really good putter. These greens, I think they’re (tougher) than Oakmont and Oakmont’s are the hardest greens I’ve ever seen. I think they’re brutal (here).”
Langer will second that.
“They’re as severe as they get,” Langer said of the putting surfaces. “Fred and I played in many Masters over the years. And they’re pretty severe and tough (at Augusta National). But these probably are another level still.”
The Broadmoor this week “is a test with a driver, it’s a test with the irons and definitely the short game too,” Langer added. “The rough around the greens is extremely difficult.”
And this from Irwin, who grew up in Colorado and won the 1967 Broadmoor Invitation: The greens “are confounding, they really are. … This might be the most difficult I’ve seen these greens.”
And there are other unique factors this week as well. The PGA Tour Champions allows its players to use carts for typical tour events; that’s verboten for the most part at the U.S. Senior Open. There’s the altitude as The Broadmoor sits at over 6,000 feet, which taxes the players as they walk up and down the hills and forces them to adjust their club selection with the thinner air. Also, the U.S. Senior Open is a 72-hole affair, instead of the usual 54-hole events for PGA Tour Champions.
As for Love, he and Couples were among the top American golfers for years. And in Couples’ opinion …
“I think he’s a good pick this week,” Couples said of Love. “I really do. He hits the ball so high and so far. And he doesn’t play many of our tournaments. So obviously he picks the biggest ones. … You could tell, he’s wound up for this week. And he should be because he’s one of the probably 12 or 15 guys that can win.”
Love owns 21 PGA Tour wins, and two of them came at The International at Castle Pines, most recently 15 years ago.
“I’m very excited, obviously, to play in a major championship and be back in Colorado,” Love said. “I’ve had some good luck just up the road at Castle Pines. I like playing at altitude. … I’m swinging for the fences on a lot of these holes.”
Love underwent hip replacement surgery in November, but has played in five PGA Tour events and two on PGA Tour Champions since then. There haven’t been any notable finishes — he was 49th last week in the PGA Tour Champions American Family Insurance Championship — but none of the tournaments have been majors, which should get his juices flowing.
As for Couples, he’s making just his third start of the year on PGA Tour Champions, but is playing in back-to-back weeks. He finished sixth in the Mitsubishi Electric Championship in January and third last week in Wisconsin. He’s constantly battling back problems, but seems to be doing OK this week. Of course, this is a minute-to-minute proposition in his case.
But when he does tee it up, Couples expects to be in contention. If that stops being the case, he’ll likely hang up the clubs for good.
“I have no interest in playing if it’s mediocre,” the 58-year-old said. “I don’t even want to leave the house as it is. Why would I want to go finish 50th? There’s no chance of that happening.”
As noted, Langer is the second-most-successful PGA Tour Champions player ever with 37 career victories, eight fewer than Irwin. This will be his 11th U.S. Senior Open and he has three top-five finishes — a win in 2010, a runner-up in 2012 and a third place in 2015.
Just a couple months shy of 61, can Langer surpass Irwin’s once-apparently-untouchable Champions victory total?
“Bernhard playing the way he’s been playing, it’s certainly a conceivable thing to do,” Irwin said. “And I’ll be the first to applaud him if he does it because I know how much it takes.”
Langer certainly thinks it’s possible to overtake Irwin.
“It’s amazing to win 45 tournaments in a span of (12 years as Irwin did),” Langer said. “That’s very difficult to do on any tour. And I’ve been very blessed to have won 37. Can I get to 45? I think I can, but I’ve got to do it soon. I can’t wait until I’m 65, expecting to win another eight tournaments. But I won seven last year. I’ve had a win and three seconds already this year. So it’s possible.
“I know that the clock is ticking. I’m going to be 61 in August. It’s not going to last forever. So I’m trying to enjoy my last few years at playing at this level and then we’ll see what I’ll do after that.”
This week marks the beginning of a stretch in which the next three tournaments on the PGA Tour Champions schedule are senior majors. The Senior Players is two weeks away and the British Senior Open is a month down the road.
Jacobsen Out of Action: Peter Jacobsen, who won the 2004 U.S. Senior Open, is the latest player to withdraw from the U.S. Senior Open, pulling out on Wednesday for personal reasons.
Jacobsen joined Tom Watson, John Daly, Steve Stricker and Steve Jones in having pulled out over the last week or so.
Replacing Jacobsen in the field will be Tim Hume, a pro from Crystal River, Fla., who was the first alternate from the Ocala, Fla., qualifying site.
Speaking of players who have withdrawn from the Senior Open, Daly was critical of the USGA for not allowing him to use a cart at The Broadmoor due to a bad right knee. This week, the two-time major champion told USA Today that he won’t ever play in a USGA championship again. It’s “just not worth it to me,” Daly told the newspaper.
Notable: Among the honorary starters on the first tee for Wednesday’s practice round was Colorado Golf Hall of Famer Christie Austin (left), a former member of the USGA Executive Committee. … World Golf Hall of Famer Colin Montgomerie (below) conducted a short-game clinic for kids at the junior pavilion on the first green of the West Course on Wednesday morning. … Wildlife roaming around The Broadmoor grounds is certainly not unusual. On Wednesday, a deer (below) crossed the 18th fairway and went behind the fourth green of the East Course before making its way up the hill. … Parking right around The Broadmoor isn’t cheap during U.S. Senior Open week, but the sign below certainly caught our attention.
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