Fore Play - 2017 U.S. Open Recap w/ Shane Bacon and US Open Caddie Mike Welch

Episode Date: June 20, 2017

The Fore Play boys break down all the events that happened in this past weekend's U.S. Open Championship. Patrick Reed and his Ryder Cup outfits, the irony between Rory McIlroy and Kevin Na, the beef between Johnny Miller and Justin Thomas, Rory putting Elk in a body bag on twitter plus much more. Great interviews with Fox sports reporter Shane Bacon and US Open caddie Mike Welch. We had some great From the Galleries and don't forget the Fore Play boys will be at the Travelers this week. Wednesday night the boys will be at Chicago Sam's and on Thursday they will be following Keegan Bradley around during his round. Hit it hard.You can find every episode of this show on Apple Podcasts, Spotify or YouTube. Prime Members can listen ad-free on Amazon Music. For more, visit barstool.link/foreplaypod

Hey, 4Play listeners, you can find us every Tuesday and Thursday on Apple Podcast, Spotify, or YouTube. Prime members can listen ad-free on Amazon Music. Folks, it was a great U.S. Open Sunday, and instead of order and food, I used our good friends at Blue Apron. This episode, this U.S. Open Recap, is brought to you by our friends at Blue Apron. Blue Apron is incredibly affordable for less than $10 per person per meal. Blue Apron delivers seasonal recipes along with pre-portion ingredients to make delicious home-cooked meals. There's tons of variety. You choose from a variety of new recipes each week

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Blue Apron, so don't wait. That's Blue Apron.com slash Foreplay. Blue Apron, a better way to cook. Foreplay with your boys, Riggs and Trent. Hello. Also joined, of course, as always, by our producer Sunshine. That's up. We have a lot to talk about, much to talk about.

We're coming off the U.S. Open. Lots that you on from this one. We're coming off of Father's Day. Happy Father's Day out there to all of the platrons. I bet we got some father listeners, right? I think we have probably many, I would assume. Yeah, I mean, dad's golf. So hopefully you had a good Father's Day.

Maybe the wife took the kids away and you got to golf all day by yourself. That would be the best Father's Day, I can imagine. Yep. The second best might have been you just got to sit your ass on the couch and not be bothered I didn't watch U.S. Open Golf all afternoon. I'm not a dad, and I did that. I'm not a dad either, and I did the same thing. My old man's a big fan of the show, so shout out to my dad,

who amazingly has figured out the technology to listen to this show. I was going to ask you that, because my parents could not know less about the technology. I could give them five years, and they would not find out how to access this podcast. So I'm impressed. I'm pretty stunned. I will say I think they were kind of getting to the point now where dads and parents, you know, it's been like 10 years or so that we've kind of had the smartphone around.

Yeah. I think we're getting to the point where, like, they can figure it out now. Now, I did say to my dad, because, you know, he comments, like, topically comments when I talked to him about things that we brought up on the show. Yeah. And I finally brought it up.

I was like, how do you know how to listen to the show? And he's like, well, your mom downloaded the app. There you go. She told me to hit this button like every Tuesday. Yeah. And that's what I do. My dad does not listen to the podcast. As far as I know, he could be more tech savvy

than I realize. But the only way I know he keeps up with me, because I helped him with his computer one time, and he gave it to me. I made him get a MacBook so I could, like, mess with it if he ever called me. Right. And up on the bar where it has, like, your saved pages, it has Trent's Twitter page.

So I'm guessing he just tweets that, or clicks on it from time to time to see what his son is up to. Very interesting. So until I see Trent's podcast up on the bar up there, I don't think he's listening. To my knowledge, my parents are not aware of Twitter or Instagram. Okay. But my mom's a big Facebooker. Oh, yeah.

So anything I put on, like, sometimes I'll put stuff up there specifically, like, redundant from my other social media accounts, but just so my mom will see it. Sure. Because I don't think that they're really in on the Twitter Instagram game. They could be surprising me and following all my tweets, which would be, like, which would be weird for me because I feel like they don't know about that part of my life. That's funny because that's, like, the only part of my life my parents know about. My mom checks Twitter to make sure I'm still alive. She's told me that in multiple occasions. I check your Twitter and make sure you're still alive.

Is that true? Oh, yeah. If we had, like, a rough night, I'll be like, Trent all right this morning. Check on Twitter. My parents will never be on Instagram. If they start Instagram and I might just quit the internet and build something in the woods. It's a weird dynamic, like your world's colliding like that. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

I remember that I had that weird dynamic when I first started a blog, like my own blog to itself. I never wanted my parents to find it because it was, it's what I do at Barstool now, but it was before I had told everyone like I want to be a blogger. So it was pretty fucked up. I think about that with some of the blogs I write where I'm like, oh, shit, my mom's probably going to read this. God damn it. My mom stopped reading the site probably two days after I started because she couldn't. She's fine with what I do for a living, but she's like, I'm not going to read it.

Yeah, that probably makes sense. Anyways, happy Father's Day to my pops out there. It's Travelers Championship Week. We have a little bit of an announcement. We are going to be there Wednesday night and Thursday. Trent, myself, Sunshine, we're going to be up there. We're going to be at the plan as of now is Chicago Sam's bar. We've never been there before.

No, but this is the place apparently where they met last year before the travelers. We're going to have T-shirts. We're going to follow Kagan around. the people's golfer. Uh-huh. There's a little bit of controversy about whether Smiley or Keegan is the current people's golfer. I believe there might have been an agreement made with Smiley, but according to Dave, neither he nor Smiley remember it.

Yeah, there's a couple things working against Smiley here. One, we don't know if Smiley remembers being crowned the next people's golfer. And also, we're going to a part of the country where Keegan is very popular. So we're going to follow Keegan around with our Keegan shirts on. Keegan, New Hampshire guy, big New England guy. So we're going to be there. We're going to be following Keegan. We're going to have a bunch of T-shirts.

We're planning on being at Chicago Sam's at 8 p.m. on Wednesday night. We're going to give out some shirts. We're going to hang out. So if you're in town, come hang out with us. We're going to be tweeting about it and posting a blog as well, so you can get all the details there. Depending on Kagan's tea time on Thursday, will depend kind of our plan for meeting up and how to approach things logistically on Thursday. We won't know it was tea time until later in the week. So we'll figure all that out.

But we're going to be up there for Thursday. It's going to be fun. Big episode this week, we've got a couple of guests. We've got Shane Bacon of Fox Sports. Yes. Who's a great guy. Was a really funny, interesting chat we had with him. Obviously, he's been through one of the biggest weeks of his career.

Yep. Being kind of their go-to on the course, interviewing guys when they come off the course. He's great at what he does. He really is. And he was an awesome guest for the podcast. Really good at what he does. I was even talking with a couple of my golf channel folks who were nothing but praises for the job that he and those guys did. We talked a little bit after the interview and I said, I want to buy as much Shane Bacon's stock as I can because he's going to be one of the next big things in that broadcasting world.

did say that. That's true. It's true. So we had a really good chat with him. We also had my buddy Mike Welch, Welchie, who caddied for Sam Ryder at the U.S. Open this past week. So we get a little caddies' perspective for a few minutes, what it was like to be on the grounds. Anyways, U.S. Open. It was, it's always one of the best weeks of the year. This one was weird. It was different, very different. We were not shy about saying we want as much carnage as possible. We want them to turn the screws on the players. We want as much fescue, as much wind. we want high scores, we want people to be hovering around par. That did not happen.

It did not happen. It's been an internal struggle for me, whether I'm pissed about that or not, whether I don't care, whether I just want to see good golf. I still don't 100% know how I feel about it. The bottom line is it was very entertaining to watch. Right. It's almost like long term, maybe in my long term brain, I want to be like, I want all U.S. opens to be really, really tough and hard and tough on the players. but then in the short term I watched something like what Justin Thomas did on Saturday. I'm like, I had a lot of fun watching that happen.

Brooks Keppel on Sunday. I had a lot of fun watching that happen. So it's tough to really make a decision. I'm not sure still how I feel about it. I very much enjoyed it. I think it's almost unanimous, undeniable in any way. The best player who played the best golf won. There was no doubt about that.

Right, and that's all you kind of want coming away from a tournament. So I feel like whether the course was firm as fuck, whether it was windy as fuck, or whether the wind was pretty much down and it was very soft like it was. If they played the way that they all played this week, I think Brooks Keppka was going to win no matter what he did. He won going away. It was actually pretty anticlimactic down the stretch because all week we had this packed leaderboard.

We had, you know, 15, 18 guys within three or four shots of the lead after every round. Nobody was running away. And then the last hour and a half kind of sucked. Well, then going into Sunday, you even had, well, you had the storylines where you had Justin Thomas, everybody was kind of pulling for him. Ricky Fowler, I know you were pulling for him, so are a lot of people. So you had an interesting leaderboard, and then Brooks Kepka, the last, I mean, down the stretch just pulled away. And it was kind of like, oh, I guess Brooks is going to win this thing.

It was a weird, it was very weird in terms of kind of analyzing the drama and however they unfolded in that the peak of the tournament was probably with two hours left in the coverage on Saturday. Right. When Justin Thomas, when he made that put for Eagle after having to sit there for like 15 minutes on his bag. Yeah. that was probably the peak of the tournament. I mean, that was like, holy shit. He's just all of a sudden, we had this huge pack of guys at nine. That put got JT to 11 under.

It was like, these guys are going to have to chase JT all day, Sunday. This is going to be crazy. And then everybody went out and finished several under. Harmon got, what, to 12? He teed off at 12 on Sunday or a couple guys at 11. And then it's just nothing really materialized on Sunday. I mean, yeah, at the turn, You know, it was still relatively tight, but nobody was doing anything.

J.T. was struggling. The only thing, J.T. was struggling. The only thing it really happened was Matsuyama made a huge run. He made a great run. When he got in at 12, you started to think, okay. And this is where I start to get a little, like, I start to wish that the course had been tough because it almost looked like nobody was nervous. No.

The course was playing, you know, the fairways were so wide and it was so soft. And even though it was way windier and it played a couple strokes tougher yesterday than it did. Saturday, it's still, it just didn't seem like those guys were nervous in the way that when they're playing some of those unbelievably tough, classic closing stretches, they're nervous as fuck because they know they have to have a perfect shot. These guys were just stepping up and ripping it. And maybe that's just a credit to where these guys are now, that they're so good and they're so well trained that they didn't care.

That's what I was going to say because they asked, I believe Brooks Kepka, like, were you nervous? Were you nervous? And he said, I was not nervous one bit on Sunday. I don't know if that speaks more to Brooks Kepka, the player or how. the course was playing. But yeah, nobody looked nervous at all. It's just kind of like a Sunday stroll.

And, you know, I don't know if I would have been nervous how it was him either, because he's hitting the ball fucking perfectly. He was just killing the ball. He hit, I think, 87% of fairways over the course of the week. 86% of greens and regulation. He had 17 out of 18 greens yesterday at the U.S. fucking open in the final round. And he wasn't just hitting like four irons out there too, 50. He was posh, like punishing drives.

It was crazy. He was hitting him like, you know, he hit his three wood, what, 379? on 18. He was ripping driver all week. It was, it was just, it was such a weird feeling to, to not see someone cling to a U.S. open lead. Yeah. But he just got, he just, you know, he had the three birdies in a row on the back night and it was just fucking over. It was over.

I mean, I guess a guy like Bruce Keppka, he's not going to lack in common to anything. He's a good looking man. So maybe that's kind of he, you know what's funny is I kept seeing today that, that Brooks Keppah, he's like, he doesn't care about golf. He's like, it's not his favorite sport. Yeah, he had said he had a quote from a couple years ago, wherever he was like, if I could do it over again, I would have stuck with baseball. It's crazy.

Now he's the U.S. Open champs. He's catching a $2 million check and he's like, yeah, I mean, yeah, I guess I'm pretty good to this golf thing. And it's almost impossible after the way that he played, especially on Sunday, to not fall into the like, well, this guy is just going to start winning all the time now because he looked that good. Right, exactly. This Brooks Kebkegave thing, it's been coming for a little bit.

He kind of was always the guy who looks the part. He kind of looks like a mini DJ in terms of athleticism. But then he never kind of turned it on and won that major. Now he's got the major and it's, I mean, Scott. the limit for him. Yeah, and he won the waste management in 2015. He was a big part of the Ryder Cup team. Yep.

And now all of a sudden, you know, he's got the U.S. open. It was, uh, it was wild. Like I said, it was a little anticlimactic, but there's really no way to, he just played fucking way better than everybody else, especially on Sunday. He looks so good. When he came out and buried the first two holes, it was like, because I had, you know, I had made it pretty public that I was bet. I bet on Ricky.

I was sticking with my bet. You not only made it public, you made a video cheering Ricky on you had the whole deal. You were in Puma. All in on Ricky. I pulled out my Ricky hat, which is uncomfortable. It's too small for my head, so my head was hurting. Yeah. But I stuck with it for a couple holes, and he started making bogeys.

I was like, fuck this hat. Yeah. But when Ricky was kind of shaky, grinding out par putts, and then I looked and saw Brooks Kepp could just rip and shot down the middle of the fairway, hitting irons in the middle of the tough greens, making birdies on one and two very easily. I was like, this is not good. Yeah, the most disappointing thing for me on Sunday was Justin Thomas. I was hoping that, I mean, you have a six.

It didn't have it from the start. That's a thing. Yeah, and you shoot a 63 on Saturday, and then you're supposed to come back and try and play again and play as good as you did that day. So that was tough. I was pulling for him. I wanted to see him finally get out completely from under the Jordan Spief's buddy deal, which now he is because he's already, what, won three times this season. Yeah. So that's in the past, but him getting a major would really put a stamp on it.

It's pretty much a career season for him. Yeah, and we were all excited because that picture of him and Spieth when they were like fucking 10 years old or whatever was going all over. We were going to put it on a T-shirt. We had dollar bills or dollar bills. or dollar signs in our eyes with t-shirts All up in our eyes and then he kind of came out and struggled. It's the biggest cliche in the world, but it's so true that it's so hard to follow up

and unbelievable around with another good one. Ricky did the same thing with his 65 to open the tournament and then never really got it going too much after that. So there's obviously all the talking heads. Does Ricky have it in the weekend in a major? He's been in the position a bunch of times now handful times. There's probably some validity somewhere, but that seems almost too easy.

I agree. hell of a player. He's a great player. He's going to get one eventually. It's just he's got to put four rounds together. And he gets the natural pushback because he's so popular. And so people are like, oh, well, does he deserve it, blah, blah, blah, blah. Well, this was that was the talk before he won the players a couple years ago was, is he the most overrated player? Right. That pole had come out among the guys on three. Now, I think that's going to start bubbling up a little bit more because, you know, people forget that he's, I mean, he won the players and he's a very good player. So we'll see where he goes with Ricky from here. Yeah, I mean, and he's, you know, he's a great putter and he was been hitting the ball really well. but he only hit, I think, 11 greens on both Saturday and Sunday, something like that.

So when you're playing against a guy that hit 17, you're probably not going to win. He didn't. There were a bunch of other storylines we had one of my favorites, a little fun one here, Patrick Reed. Yes. Rocking the old USA Rider Cup pants. You and I joked. I think I want to say Wednesday or Thursday that we're like, man, he looks like he's basically playing in the Rider Cup the way he's dressing right now. And then come to find out in an interview with our friend Shane Bacon, who you'll hear.

or later in the podcast. He brought like eight pairs of rider cap, rider cup pants and was rocking him the whole week because he's like, if I play well in the rider cup, maybe this juju will work when I'm out here at the U.S. Open. The fact that he actually is embracing the Captain America thing and is like, well, I play my fucking best when I'm dressed head-to-to-to-o USA. So I'm just going to do it in the majors in the U.S. Open.

I mean, he was legitimately in his rider cup outfit. He was wearing rider cup pants. I thought he was going to start shushing the crowd and stuff. I was all fired up for it. He just puts on a USA cap. He should wear USA colors all the time. I do love that he's embracing the Captain America thing because that's what he is. He was almost doing what I do in the Tiger Woods video game franchise when I create my own character.

I just make them all kinds of different U.S.A. color schemes, all of his different outfits. That's literally Patrick Reed is doing that. He's doing it literally on the course wearing Ryder Cup pants, wearing Ryder Cup colors. I mean, he didn't end up, I mean, what did he shot at 74 on Sunday? So he faded a little bit, but that was fun for a while. Yeah, it was good. I like that a lot. I think if he embraces that, he might get up to that, you know, top five player in the world stuff that he's always

talked about. I think he should have hypnotherapy done where every tournament he thinks is the Rider Cup. You're right. And then he just, he'll win. He'll never not win. Like his agent should just lie to him. Be like, no, no, this is Rider Cup week this week. Trust me. It's like the jokes people made before Dustin finally won at Oakmont where if he can get hypnotized into thinking every day's Thursday, Friday, then he'll win every single tournament. Yeah. So I think that his agent should talk to the tournament officials and they should pair him with speed and only speed every round and just see what he does. Have fans in the crowd with American flag. It's just like completely, you know, trick him into things.

Yeah, get him like those contact lenses, so everything looks like the whole crowd is dressed in, like, red, white and blue. I don't want to say we just saved. I mean, Patrick's Reade career is going fine. He's going to be just as fine as he was going to be. But if he thinks everything's a Ryder Cup, he'll never not win a tournament. We had a little irony, which I love. I love some good irony. We had the old, so, you know, Kevin Knapp, post the video.

I think it was last weekend, the weekend before the tournament started, about the Feskew. It went crazy virus. Rory had a little bit of a reaction to that. It wasn't necessarily a direct reaction, but he kind of talked like, you know, these guys talking about the fescue. Fairways are 50, 60 yards wide. If you're hitting it into the fescue,

if you're missing these fairways, you should just pack your bags and go home. Rory packed his bags and went home Friday afternoon. And Rory's big thing was the reaction to during a press conference, he found out that they were cutting the fescue back. Right. And he was like, they shouldn't be doing that. The fairways are wide enough, blah, blah, blah,

if you can't hit him, go home. Rory went home. Roy went home. He shot a 78 on Thursday. and they just never could get it back. Yeah, and I wrote down here, too, that Brandl Chambley and Frank Noblo had both picked Rory as their winner.

I picked Rory, too. I think on the podcast, I might have said Rory. Oh, no, I picked Dustin. I picked Dustin, who also missed the cut. I picked Rory. That was kind of, I guess, the big surprise was that all three of them missed the cut. I mean, excuse me,

Jason Day was fucking 10 over par. He looked horrific. I don't even remember him being, I don't know if they showed him on TV. I don't remember him being at this turn. whatsoever. He was absolutely terrible. DJ was four over, Rory finished five over, and that was with, I think he closed with a four-burty stretch, his last round to get to five-over. So seeing those three, I mean, it was, it's been already been beaten to the ground, and everybody's like Bombers,

Paradise, Bombers Paradise, Bombers, Paradise, three of the big bombers who are number one, number two, number three ranked players in the world, MC Hammer, going home early. There's a little bit of irony in there. We got Johnny Miller and J.T., getting into it. Trent, do you, want to read Johnny Miller's comments. So J.T. shoots the 63. He shoots a 63 to tie the lowest score in a major, but to break the lowest score in U.S. Open history relative to par, which had previously been seven. He was nine under.

Johnny Miller, when asked about this. And to quote, taking nothing away, oh, something just popped up on my screen, hold on, taking nothing away from nine under par, nine under, nine under is incredible. with U.S. Open pressure, but it isn't a U.S. Open course that I'm familiar with the way it was set up. A 63 for a par 72 is a heck of a score, even if it was the Milwaukee Open. So, I'm a huge Johnny Miller guy. I love it. Maybe the only one in the world.

I love Johnny Miller. I just think he's so blunt. He's so honest. He genuinely comes from this vantage point of, like, thinking he and his generation were way better and way more talented and wants to let everybody know about it, which, again, I don't think that's fake. That's just very genuine. And his reaction to this, I don't know. Was it reporters, like, tracked him down to get his reaction or something? Oh, God, I'm going to mess it up.

Ryan Lavner? Yeah, it was a golf channel. Track the Johnny down must have called him up. Genius move. Oh, yeah. I got to hear what Johnny has to say. That's how you go, like, that's how you take an opportunity and take it. Johnny was just sitting by his phone like, somebody fucking call me.

Somebody call me. I got to talk about this. Hey, I'm going to create a Twitter account right now if nobody calls me. His comment was perfect because everybody knows what he's saying. The whole part about. it isn't a U.S. Open course I'm familiar with. It's true. Everybody knows that's true. We had more people under par after the first round, second round, third round.

Overall, 31 guys finished under par more than it's ever been. 16 under ties the record. Everybody knows this is not, you know, the Oak Mons or the Shinnock's or the winged foots of U.S. Open golf course lore. But the way that he phrased it, throwing in the line about even if it was the Milwaukee Open. It's like a It's like a shooter McAvin line Yeah

chirping of Happy Gilmore Shot like a course record That's literally what the fucking riders Would have written in there If you had asked like all the Johnny Miller Heders out there which is everyone Except me Love Johnny Miller

Write a script for what Johnny's gonna say In response to Justin Thomas is 63 It would have been something like this It wouldn't have been Milwaukee Open It would have been something like that But that's the thing about Johnny Miller That I have a shred of respect for Is I knew this comment was coming

I knew it was gonna He wasn't going to be like, I'm so happy. I'm now passing this record on. It was going to be, it was the Milwaukee. It was so good. It was so perfect. And I had, so, you know, this was, this is Saturday evening. And I had a long day.

And I thought about, I knew it was just going to take one tweet. But everyone was like, salty, Johnny. And I was going to come out with this fierce defense of Johnny on Twitter. But I knew, like, my night would have just been getting started. Yeah. Yep. I would have been fending people off all night. So I didn't do it.

I just bit my lip, put my phone out, I fell asleep at like 9 o'clock. But I wanted to so badly, Johnny, I want you to know. My Twitter fingers were ready. I was excited, but I ended up, it just, I didn't think it was worth the fight. Here's the thing. We can talk a little bit about this. I don't disagree with what Johnny said necessarily because the course conditions were easier than a normal U.S. Open.

It was that he, as soon as someone asked him, 10 seconds after Justin Thomas's round, that's when he decided to take the jab. He couldn't just say, oh, yes, that was very well done. by the young kid I'm happy for him. He couldn't cut it there. He had to go on and say, but, you know, mine's better. So, you know, try again next time. But that's what I didn't like about it. Even if it was the Milwaukee Open is just such a good lie. Such asshole. Such an asshole. We also had some more drama. We had our guy, Steve Alkington, get into it on Twitter with Roy McElroy. Got buried. He, uh, there's really another way to put it. He kind of got buried. Yeah, I didn't, I didn't want to do the whole, which I forget what you

call it, like the politicization, politics. Oh, fired. Oh, you know, he got. Eviseration. The political people love that one. It's the John Oliver of the world. Like, whenever he does anything, he eviscerates. He pulls him out.

He does this. He does that. But Elk, he kind of, he said Rory was bored with playing golf. He said he looks like he's the most bored out there. And Rory did not take kindly to that whatsoever. Yeah, he said Rory is so bored playing golf without Tiger. The threshold is probably four majors with 100 mil on the bank. Rory came back with more like 200 mil.

Not bad for a quote-on-quote bored 28-year-old. Plenty more where that came from. And he also included a screenshot of his Wikipedia and all of his accomplishments. What a world we're living in? What are your thoughts on this? I mean, I love elk. Alex's an opinionated guy. He fires off tweets like this all the time about all kinds of different people.

You know, he went in on Polter when Polts played for second blatantly. And he goes after people. And occasionally, I mean, occasionally there's going to be people that are more successful and more famous and have more to gloat about than Steve Elkinkton does. And he ran into one of them and Rory came over the top. I mean, when you can basically dummy somebody's tweet and make them look like they totally undersold you by saying you have 100 mil in the bank, you're like, you're going to win that Twitter argument. So, I mean, I love elk.

I still do. Elks the man. He's opinionated. I don't think the place that he was coming from with this comment is like wrong. I think there is a certain amount of truth to the fact that when you make a ton more money as a young guy, you're probably become more complacent and less hungry to go out there and win. But I'm not saying that's 100% applicable to everybody or that it's 100% applicable to Rory here. But I think that the train of thought that he's coming from to some degree on some players is true.

I would, and I don't want to go at Rory because Rory is my guy. I think there have been questions about like if he's won so much early on, if he's motivated. I remember after he got that angle injury playing soccer with his buds and somebody asked him at one of the next press conferences and said, how much did you miss the game? What was that like? He's like, I didn't miss it at all. Right.

And he's also gone on the record and said, like, I don't want Tiger Woods's life where he's got all those majors and he seems like, not great how, not sure how great his off-the-course life is and all that. He said, like, I'd rather have my life. Yeah. So there's a little bit of, but obviously elk still got buried. He did. But I know where elk's coming from with these comments.

Me too. Maybe could have done it a little. less get buried. And as much as I love Elk, I love Rory just as much, if not more. So when I blogged it, I was like, he got buried. This is the, this is why I love Rory. Rory is willing to take haters and just be like, all right, well, then watch this. I have 200 mil in the bank. Yeah, it's what sets of apart, too. For a lot of the other guys, they're like, they just stay away from all this stuff, play it safe, secure. He just kind of fires from the hip, which I like. So that was fascinating. I kind of stayed quiet on that on Twitter. Like you said,

Elks my boy. It's like, I mean, they got, you're there fighting over your friends. It's like, I don't know what to do. I have no idea what to do. Exactly. It's like my mom and dad fight kind of in your own. There you go. I don't know. I'm not picking sides.

It was like, you know, just let him fight it out. I understood where both are coming from, but it was, I mean, too chate Aurora. He's got his Wikipedia page, which is impressive, and he's got 200 mil in the bank. I love Roy so much. I just, I can't say it enough. Steve Stricker had an awesome week. The guy's 50 years old. He's going to be the captain of the President's Cup team.

He got denied his exemption and then qualified. fight on his own to play in his home state. Yep. What a week for Strick. The guy just won't go anywhere. His swing, you know, he's got that dead arm swing. Getting around this track is a 50-year-old guy. You know, they're talking about how long it is, how it's a bomber's paradise, this,

that. He's out there making putts doing his thing. You got to love Steve Stricker. Yeah, I do. Anytime I am a huge sucker for people playing on, like, their home courses or in their home state. I am such a sucker for narratives and stories. That's probably why I got sucked up in the Justin Thomas thing because I was like,

oh, he's going to win this thing after shooting a 63. Stricker is, you know, he's at home in Wisconsin. Shits a 500 goes back-to-back-back-69s. Nice. Yeah, it was just cool to see. It was a good story. Yeah, I love Stricks. So, I mean, he just, he only plays, you know, a dozen or so tournaments a year.

I think he's playing in the senior open in a couple weeks. Nice. Up in Salem, Mass. So he's, he's the journeyman, the old guy out there at 50, making the cut. What, he shoot four under something. He might have back door like a top 25. He ended up at five under. Five under.

So you got to love that. He's 16. Look at that. He's popular in my part of the world as well, which is near Wisconsin because he dominates the John Deer class. That's right. He's won that like a billion times. He won it three years in a row. God, that's awesome.

They love him over there in the Quad Cities. So last thing on the U.S. Open that I want to address is the yelling situation. You brought that up like a teacher. You're like, all right, I'd like to address one more thing with the class thing on the syllabus, folks, is the yelling. We had some JJOs. We had some Viva Las Stools. There were a couple bab of booies. You know, it's people doing what they do.

And so I listened to the part of my take boys, if you don't listen to that show, go check it out. Part of my take on iTunes. They're obviously great. They're the biggest podcast on the planet. They actually covered this really well this morning show. Look, are people that yell into microphones like drunken idiots? Absolutely. That's what a sporting event is.

If you put somebody out there for several hours all day, out in the sun, drinking beers, and you put a hot mic and you put camera and a chance to get on TV, people are going to yell and be dumb. That's just what it is. That's how it is. Whether we retweet it or talk about it or whatever has literally no bearing on that whatsoever. Nope. People are going to do it. We might be able to have a bearing on what they say, but people are going to be saying things regardless. Absolutely.

And so the point is that if you're going to be out there bitching and complaining about that, you just don't get it. You don't understand who gives you shit. People are yelling, it's not affecting the play. They're yelling well after the guys strike the ball. They're yelling very dumb stuff. I totally agree. They are idiots. J.J.O. being one of those things.

J.J.O. is very stupid. The creator of it would agree. It's unbelievably stupid. I'll say it to his face right now. I'll bring him in here. Totally stupid. Everybody agrees with that. But it is what it is.

It's just a sporting event. If it bothers you, it actually makes us love it more than it bothers. I know. I got a couple tweets about that, and I agreed with those. Like, the more people, like get their panties in a bunch over people yelling at a sporting event, the more it makes me want people to do it. Because it's so dumb.

Who cares? I can't even imagine having an opinion to the point where I get so mad at someone yelling in a sporting event that I tweet about it, that I talk about it, that I get visibly mad about it. I can't even imagine having that opinion. Completely agree. And so, I mean, I get it when people, you know, people are like, well, this is lame. Of course it is.

It's absolutely lame. But people are going to yell no matter what. That's what people do at sporting events. They get drunk. They're out in the sun all day. They're going to yell. They're going to yell stuff. Might as well yell a little love towards us.

Yeah. Oh, and the barstool, Vivalastool, will forever be part of Brooks Keppka's U.S. Open because they screamed it right during his last pot. That one was timed perfectly. Again, absolutely no harm. That's the thing. Oh, okay. Think about it this way. It could be a lot worse.

People could be doing it during the swings. Maybe they could be yelling racial slurs. They can be doing anything. Instead, it's after. It's harmless. It's just stupid. It's just a little shout out to your boys over at Barstool Sports. Brooks Kevka taps in a one-footer

and the guy just right next to the hot mic gives it a little vivolo stool. It's just funny. We're going to throw it on the internet. We're going to show that our people are out there. They're representing. It's really not a big deal. I love it now more because people hate it so much.

I know. That's classic because we can sit here right now and tell people to stop yelling. Hey, stop yelling. And they're going to do it 10 times more. 100%. You can't stop it. It's out of the bag now.

I saw our guy, or not our guy, but Jason Sobel at ESPN, tweeted the ugly truth about the, These people yelling, there's no ugly truth. It's just harmless, stupid fun. Right. The ugly truth is like when, like, your uncle murdered somebody. Yeah.

The ugly truth of this family is that we are covering a murder. This is drunk spectators in an event yelling some sort of slogan that they picked up from a podcast or a radio show or something like that. Exactly. It's totally fine. Everybody, just take a deep breath. Just, it's going to be totally fine. It's going to be fine, folks. It's people at a golf tournament, having a couple beers, having a good time.

If you're basically, if you're, like, really that against it, then you're just against, like, having beers at sporting events. Yeah. Then you don't like the Rider Cup either. We need to have a whole other discussion with you, folks. All right. Next up, we got our interview with Shane Bacon of Fox Sports. Great dude. Very interesting chat.

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Now we are joined with Shane Bacon. If you don't know who Shane Bacon is, if you caught any of the coverage, he is the really good looking jack dude that was interviewing everybody on the course after they finished kind of uh we're kind of talking trit and i it's getting kind of annoying with brooks kebka and then you you're kind of starting to like it's not supposed to be like that dude i'm telling you this i mean kebka's like legitimately his arms in person i was joking so you know like when we get the interview guys

coming over you know they'll come instead and and they'll normally have a minute or two to just kind of chill. And Ricky comes over on Saturday. And he's sitting there and, you know, I've done, you know, two or three interviews already with Ricky that week. And, I mean, Ricky is legitimately one of the nicest people that you can interview in the world. And he's sitting there and I was like, I kind of asked him.

I was like, is Kepka's arms? Like, have they, like, had they, like, doubled in size last year? And he was kind of joking. And then he, like, cinched his shirt, like, and tightened it under his armpit right on his bicep. And he was like, is this kind of Kepkish? And I was like, Ricky, man, sorry, buddy. But, like, same close.

I don't want to be rude, but not even close. I couldn't tell if that was like, you know, you guys with Fox, you got all your graphics over that. I couldn't tell if you guys were like pumping his arms up or something. It felt like it, but, yeah, it was, man, it was a crazy week. And, I mean, I'm sure you guys have chatted about it. But, I mean, I think there was a lot of storylines going to the final round, and a whole bunch of us just forgot that's, like, the best guy playing golf currently, and one of the guys that has really kind of played the majors, you know,

the best out of that group that was, It was vying for that championship ended up doing it. But, I mean, yeah, it was a crazy week. It's just crazy when it ends, really. I mean, for all of us, I mean, it's been so much energy and time into it. And then, you know, you're driving to the airport all of a sudden. You're like, wait, this thing already happened? Yeah, because there's a ton that goes into it, and we're going to get into a lot of that.

I know we're really interested in getting into kind of the nuts and bolts, what goes into the production, because obviously it's a ton. I've seen you've been tweeting about it today. So obviously we're going to get into that real quick. Again, for those that don't know, Shane Bacon, Fox Sports, hosts the Clubhouse, golf podcasts. I actually listened to the Paul Asing everyone from last week. I was telling Shane a little bit beforehand.

Great insight, obviously with the access he gets from Fox, is able to get a lot of great guests. So check that out if you haven't. Shane, basically, you're just a golf nut. You've worked for AOL, Yahoo Sports, CBS Sports. Basically, anything, golf, you've done it. Yeah, I mean, if they paid me, I would do it. I mean, honestly, that was kind of how I got it.

into it. I mean, I was, I started my own blog back when blogs were a thing and, and, and it was called dogs to chase cars off that Leach Rabino quote. And, um, Shane, Shane, blogs are still a thing. Well, I mean, it's still a thing, yes, but it's not like the, you know, everybody does the individual, like you have the cute blog with the cute name. I feel like, you know, it's under your umbrella or, you know, bleach report or something like that. I feel like, uh, I feel like those are where like the professional bloggers sit. The amateur bloggers, like what I was doing, where I would misspell like every other word. I feel like that's kind of gone away. Again, still relevant. Well, we do still do that, but you're right. That, like, Trent and I actually both started

doing the same shit. We were just kind of cranking our own personal blog, emailing it to anybody that we could possibly ever hope to work for, and voila, you never know where you're going to end up. Yeah, and look at you guys. I mean, look at you. You guys are like one of the most popular podcast in the world, and you guys get to get hit, you know, on your ass by golf clubs. I mean, It's a glamorous business that we're in. It's really right. We're very classy. We've really made it.

Our parents are very proud of us. It's really impressive stuff. Has the bruised gone away from Page? I am actually interested. I got to tell you, Shane, I don't know if it's my body if I'm just like superior, but it went away within like a week of it happening. It is completely gone right now. No way.

I mean, I played golf with her. I mean, her club head speed is like sneaky fast. And when I saw that, I was like, and that could be there for like weeks on end. Dude, she was competitive as shit, too. like she was not holding back on that swing. Okay, really quick. For people that like look at Paige, they're like, oh, she's pretty, whatever.

She ever, like, legitimately is, like, one of the coolest people that you'll meet in the business. I mean, you know, like, she is, like, down to do stuff. She's got, like, a great personality and sense of humor. I mean, legitimately, like, a great human being, which in this business, you can run into a lot of people that are the opposite. I think people would be stunned if they met her that she's very insightful. She's very smart.

She's cool as hell and we'll do pretty much anything we want to do. And as we saw you. Yeah, right. Exactly. And she's, you know, I think people probably try to give her the paint her with like, oh, she's just the hot chick that holds a golf club. That could not be farther from the truth. She's cool and shit and she's got some absolute game, which is impressive. Yeah, she's got serious game.

I mean, I think I've lost more money to her than I've definitely won for sure every time we go out and tee it up. And I mean, and she'll tell you, she'll definitely remind you every time you talk about it that you've lost money. But, yeah, it was, I mean, like the U.S. Open Week, let me just say when you, go to the course the first day. And when you leave the course the last day, that feeling of relief from like not, you know, like having Brooks kept to get up and walk out of an interview or something, you know, I mean, it really is like a business where you feel like, you know, you're just trying to make sure that you don't do anything that, like, sticks out.

And, I mean, you know, I was just kind of happy that that went down. I mean, you know, you get to interview these guys. And the same, too, is like pre-interviews. You know, you're asking these guys to talk to you before they go out. And I really get surprised a lot of the time. the players are as cool as they are about it. Because, I mean, you know, I played competitive golf for a while. And, you know, you get there and you're locked in and you're ready to go.

And, I mean, I know it's their job. But I always get so surprised that the players are as cool and is willing to do a lot of stuff as they are. I mean, it makes my job a ton easier? Let me tell you. Is it really in the back of your mind, like you're trying to not go viral in the wrong way? Like, you don't want Kepka getting up. You don't want Patrick Reed getting up and storming out of there? Yeah, I mean, look, I mean, you know, at this point, I feel like I have a pretty good grasp of what I'm doing with them.

you know, I'm just trying to have a conversation. You know, like I don't want to ask them the generic golf question, even though, I mean, at times you do, but I'm just trying to ask them a question that I would want to know the answer to. You know, like if they did something on the course, if they had a great run, you know, I mean, when we had Paul Casey, I mean, I had Paul Casey on Friday, you know, he makes that eight. I mean, I asked him about it, you know,

because if you remember, he basically swung and almost missed it and then had to chip out sideways. I mean, those are the types of things that I'm interested in knowing because he makes eight and then he makes five or six birdies in a row after that, you know, as a golf fan, I mean, I'm a golf nerd. You guys said it. I mean, I want to know those types of things as well in the back of my mind. So, you know, those are the types of things I'm kind of focused around.

I mean, of course, it's sometimes you have to ask, you know, what would this mean to things like that? I mean, but again, I mean, that's relevant as well because at the end of Saturday, would we have like 12 guys that had a chance to like legitimately win? I mean, you know, when you have that, there really is kind of an overview type of question that you should bring up in an answer. ask him about. Right. And how tough is it at that point because, you know, Trent

and I were talking, that's a lot of guys that are coming in. They're coming in quickly. How hectic is it behind the scenes when they're shuffling guys in? It is hectic. Well, at one point on, this is pretty funny, at one point on Thursday, so Fowler shoots 65, okay? Well, Tommy Fleetwood, I think he'd shot five under. And

we, so I have a, I have somebody that helps me out of her name is Katie Miller, and she'll go grab. She actually is a great player. She played in the first time I met her. she played in the four ball the first time we did the USDA four ball at Bannon Dunes. And she'll grab players for us through the USGA. And I was like,

hey, I want Tommy and I want Ricky. But you kind of start prioritizing that, right? So like, I mean, Ricky shoots 65. Ricky's obviously a very, very big name. So Tommy Fleetwood walks up and Ricky's about to come up. And so I'm like, hey, Tommy, man, listen, I hate to do this, but do you mind chilling for like two minutes?

Like, interview Ricky Fowler Life. And I mean, again, so cool. Like, he gets it. You know, he understands. I mean, Ricky Fowler shot 65 and tied a U.S. Open record in the first round and all that stuff. So, you know, I mean, it is a little – Thursday and Friday, I feel like it's a little bit more hectic than the weekend because you've got guys coming off both sides. And at the same time, I mean, all of a sudden, you've got three hours of break. And then all of a sudden, all these guys are coming off the golf course. So, yeah, it's a little bit of shuffling, but it gets a little bit calmer over the weekend.

So you said that, you know, I think the director was at the course, you know, over 10 times or whatever. how many challenges come up the fact that this is a brand new venue nobody's ever really you know outside of the amateur put on a legitimate you know four-day major championship type production like fox has to do how much of a challenge is that going to a new place oh it's i mean it's just crazy it's funny too like you know chambers bay was a challenge and chambers bay was probably more of a challenge because um just logistically it was really really tough to get stuff certain places but we went to oakmont and it's like oakmont's like you know like like like setting up a barbecue in your backyard. Like, people know where stuff goes, you know, because they've done it so many times. Like, you know where towers were. You know where NBC put towers, you know, when they had the last, you know, U.S. Open there in 07. It was, it was really funny. It's like, it's very comfortable. And then you go to a new place. And yeah, I mean, the reason you have to go back so much is, you know, for instance, there was going to be a grandstand, I think, behind the sixth pole, the par three. And, uh, and our director was telling us that they went back on a trip

and decided they were going to put a grant stand there. So, you know, he's got a TV tower, going to lean against a grandstand. stand basically. And so he's got to basically change logistics all the way around that to get that to free stand. I mean, there is, you know, producing golf, as I would say, it's like 18 football fields. You know, I mean, if you do a football game, you know where the football is, you know where the action is. When you do golf, it's 18 holes. So, you know, that's the same as calling it. I mean, when you talk about like Joe, you know, Joe is watching a football game at Lambeau Field, right? He's looking at the game from his tower. And then you do a golf tournament and you're watching it

from screens because you're hopping from hole to hold to hole. So you're basically relying on all of these other people way more than you would in the other sport. It is crazy. It's really crazy to walk through the compound to go get lunch. And you're walking through like 50 trucks, you know, and you're like, I can't believe this is what goes down. It's unbelievable.

Thousands of the people they're working on it. So talk a little bit about, let's get into a little more details about the coverage, the Pro Tracer. I believe it was on all 18 holes this year. I think most people are a Mazzofan, but I love it. it because I think even kind of a really casual golf fan that tunes in, they usually have no clue, you know, how much the ball's moving, how guys are shaping it, who hits it what way, I think that's the coolest aspect of it.

From your guys' end, you know, what does it take to put that on? Why isn't that on every tournament? What's kind of the philosophy behind that? Yeah, I mean, I think it's simply that, you know, when Fox got these USGA events, they were like, you know, we're going to lean on technology first and let's make sure that, you know, above all else, when people are watching this, they're getting to see the newest and most innovative ways to present golf. And so, you know, that was basically how it went.

You know, let's find these things and do it. I mean, I think that's when you see the side-by-side shot tracer of it in the air, you know, with the pro tracer. I mean, it's golf's a hard sport to follow when you're watching on TV because you don't really know where the ball goes. I mean, think about watching, you know, if you go watch the 86 Masters, you don't know what kind of ball flight Nicholas hit on 15 or 17, you know, I mean, none of us know.

And I mean, it's funny when you look back at some of the time, Tiger shots even in the early 2000s. I mean, it's like shot Tracer porn. I mean, you wish you could have had it back. Oh, yeah. I mean, you know, that's a three wood on 18 he hit when they had the tracer and you could see that low bullet. I was sitting by, I was sitting by, it wasn't Curtis, but it was somebody.

And right when they hit it, it was a player. And he goes, oh, baby. Because he knew it was that low, like, stinging bullet. And he knew it was going to be, you know, it was hit really, really hard. And I mean, without that, we wouldn't have known that. We would have thought it was up in the air. it was, you know, maybe it was a little bit of a draw or a fade or something like that. So, I mean, that's the philosophy.

It's why not? I mean, why not if it takes a little bit more technology, if it takes more cameras, it brings something more to the viewer. And I think, I mean, universally, everybody wants more ProTracer. I think there's apps now that you can have for your own shot. Trust me, there's a couple that I do not want out there. But unfortunately, close to the couple. Yeah, the ones I've seen, it's nice because you can actually just tell it where the ball lands,

so you can just lie, which is great. Oh, that was beautiful draw. So even you guys had, I saw you guys getting like a little bit of hate on this, but the mics inside the cups, people thought you guys were like piping in noise and things like that. I know. They always think that. That's why I had that picture on my phone. I took one. I grabbed one last year.

I think it was like Friday. I grabbed one in the truck. And I just took a picture of it to show people. They think it's fake. The idea, okay, so here's the idea behind that. It's not as much to hear the ball go in the cup, even though that is an addition of it. it's to hear convos on the green. So if you think back to like the two biggest,

most important moments really of our coverage, number one was Dustin last year at Oakmont. That whole conversation you hear with the ball moving, that was all mic. That was all the mic in the cup. So it's more of that than it really is picking up the cup noise. The idea is that if anything's happened around the green, if there's a guy of ruling or if a guy's got to move a mark,

if there's a conversation about a read, you know, that picks that. So that's why that's really cool. I mean, it's been all 18. It's just, again, it's something else. It's like, you know, we're always trying to say, think of these types of things and people always say you know put a camera on a caddy i'm sure the caties probably at some point we'll have like a go pro on their hat or something but you know that's

no way of us to get some noise you know yeah absolutely so let's go uh let's go back i mean obviously the biggest storyline throughout the whole week was the golf course you played it uh what was it like a month or so yeah yeah played about two and a half weeks ago so what were your original thoughts on the course you know would you have expected it to kind of turn out the way it did that type of thing. Yeah, so I played it in September with my dad. I like to go out to these places before we do the media day, because the media day, you know,

it's a little stop and talking and you do some videos. I like to actually go play it, you know, so you can actually play 18 holes and get a feel for it. Right. When I played it in September, I thought that we'd see low scores. Like, I thought it kind of loosened off. When I played it four weeks ago,

it was blowing probably harder than it blew yesterday. I mean, I'd say it was blowing 20, 25 in our face like that, that Western. win that came out like basically in your face on three and four and in 15 and that's kind of what these guys had on Sunday and I mean I shot like 90 I did so bad I hit it all over the place I hit in the fescue and I thought then if it blew like that we'd see you know four five six under wind but you know it's the golf course where as you saw the wind is the defense I mean if the wind wasn't blowing you know the big story early was that feske getting cut down I mean if they hadn't

to cut that down it wouldn't have affected the scores I mean this was a place where without win these guys aren't going to miss those fairways that much. I mean, I think Kepka hit 87% of the fairways, and he's hitting at like 340 every time. I mean, these freeways were receptive, and the rain obviously didn't help. But I'll say this, if they went back and went back in two months, okay? Yeah. I think you could see the weather. It's just all predicated on how the wind blows there.

I mean, that's really difficult sense the place. And if it doesn't rain, those grains can be firm. You know, that shot Justin Thomas hit on 18. We were talking about it at dinner that night, and Steve Flesh said, he said, you know, If it hadn't rained before the ball was up in the green. You know, he said it's off the 18 and he's got an eagle butt. So, I mean, it's just, it was really weather. It felt, it felt very open-ish like that.

Yeah, and it was interesting because even that pin on 18 on Saturday, you know, we watched Fleetwood finish. And, you know, he was chipping it all over the green. So it's like, I feel like people can't really tell that that shot the JT hit was that good. Oh, he sat down. When he sat down with B, we went through the highlights, you know, we've got a little monitor. It's not a very big TV. And he said to me, he's like, this is the one I'm most excited to see. He just wanted to see how it reacted.

coming in like that in landing. I mean, I'll say this. I mean, you know, a lot of people were like, oh, when it didn't get that a hard, I want to see the U.S. Open play that. Saturday was one of the fun days I've ever had watching golf. I mean, it felt like the final run of the 2011 Masters, really to me. Yeah, and it was with all the drama.

I mean, it was funny because J.T., you know, his 63 happened with the Eagle, and everyone was going nuts. And then we still had, I feel, like, an hour and a half of awesome golf after that. Exactly. We actually, yeah, Brad Baxon's, dead during a break. He said, are we off at six? I'm like, no, no, no, we're off at seven. Like, we have a whole other hour. It felt like that was the end of the day, you know?

Definitely. So, right now, you know, it's Monday. You know, how relieved are you? How good are you guys feeling? Are you exhausted? You have been up all week? What's the feeling like right now? Yeah, I mean, last year was more exhausting for me because of the rain delays. I had to go super early and stay all day. So, Ophmont felt a little bit more draining. I mean, I Everybody's really, really pumped. I thought the coverage came off. Great.

I mean, you know, the mix of technology, the comfort level everybody has with each other. I mean, Aisinger, I mean, Aisner could talk for days and I would listen. I mean, I think there's like minimal, like little additions, like Ken Brown's Gray. You know, Gil does such a great job of just explaining golf courses. You know, I go to dinner with Gil and just let him talk. I don't even say anything. I just want to hear about how he looks at golf courses and sees things. You know, it's so funny.

It's like every single architect that watches. Like the 12 holes about. And you're like, well, I guess the 12 holes of best. You know, you and I will play it. You know, that's a cool hole. That's a cool hole. But they all are like, that's the best hole here. And you're like, oh, I don't really understand it, but okay.

But no, I think all in all, everybody was really, really happy with the way it came out. And, you know, I think we would have loved to see, you know, maybe a closer end to it. But, I mean, what can you do? Kepka plays like that. I mean, you can't do anything about that guys are going to win these events when they do that kind of stuff. Yeah, it's, as guys like us that are just, we just want as much drama, carnage as possible. We would love to hate on it. But, I mean, he blatantly played better than everybody else.

Like you said, I mean, he hit, what, he hit 17 out of 18 greens yesterday. He was, I think, 87% fareways and 86% greens regulation for the week. I mean, you just can't hate on that. No, it was funny. So I did an interview with Kepka on Friday, and we didn't air it because we're, like, one of our, one of the monitors of the Fox does that I, I love. And, I mean, even if I wasn't a part of it, I would love it, is, you know, over the weekend, it's let's show golf.

You know, like, let's show as much golf as we. can. So if I do an interview, a lot of the time it's taped because they don't want to interfere with the live golf going on. You know, I mean, people want to see golf. They're tuning in to see that. So I did, I did a sit down with Kepka. And I asked him, I said, you know, 36 holes, you know, you played really well. And, you know, how are you feeling about the weekend, you know, or, you know, do you think you have a chance all this stuff? And he said, he just looked at me and goes, it's Friday, bro. And I was like, you know, like, that's the guy. Like, he's just a dude, man. I mean, like, he's unbelievable at golf.

He knows he is. And, you know, it was a golf course that, you know, in hindsight, we probably all should have picked, you know, him and, you know, some of the bombers. And, I mean, one of those guys was going to have a good week. And, you know, it just turned out to be Kefka. But I think all on all on our side of things, we were really, really happy. I mean, I thought Oakmont was great. And really, I mean, the drama on Sunday with all the stuff with Dustin, you know,

I mean, it kind of played our story out for us. And this year, you know, we got to really draw the picture. And I thought, I thought everybody. on our side was really happy. How much talk was there of trying to pay off that pilot from flying around the course? Oh, my goodness. I got so many people on Twitter, and they're like yelling at us. Right, like you can't do anything about that.

Yeah, what we want to do? I mean, and I know in Augusta they have a no-fly zone, I think, over the golf course, and I think they do it at the PGA. But I was interested. I don't know if they do it at the U.S. Open or not, but it was like around the perimeter. So it wasn't like flying straight over the golf course, so maybe there is. But it was like around the perimeter, but it was nonstop. And it was, it was crazy.

Somebody was like, I hope that guy's not here all weekend. And I was like, I know. And then, of course, what was the blonde run all weekend? Right. Yeah, I love the people on Twitter that are expecting you guys like shoot him out of the sky. Yeah, like, what are we supposed to be, like, call the guy? I don't know who is. It was like a cross-dusting plane.

All right, Shane, well, if for those that don't know that don't already follow that already subscribe, the Clubhouse Golf Podcast, Shane Bacon on Twitter. Twitter. We really appreciate you joining us, especially after such a long week, man. For sure. Can I ask you guys a quick question? Absolutely. Did you guys think Kepp was going to win going into Sunday? No. No. Who did you guys have?

So, I mean, I'm very biased because I'm a big gambler, so I bet Ricky 18 and one at the beginning of the week. So I was basically like, oh, yeah, Ricky's just going to win. And I just, in order to make it more fun for me, I just put all my eggs in that basket. matter what. Yeah. I thought he was going to do it, so I thought it was going to be Ricky. I thought it was going to be Ricky. I know a lot of it.

It actually made me a little concern when everyone was picking Ricky even Saturday night, because, like, that never works out well. It was, and I just thought even, like, Brooks looked so good Saturday, too, that I was like, well, he can't look that good against Sunday. And then, I mean, I felt like even three or four holes, and he comes out in Bertie's one and two and did it, you know, pretty fucking easily. So I was thinking, like, this is not looking good for my Ricky. He bet.

Oh, yeah. I mean, he was, he was just mashing it. I have a buddy, a degenerate buddy of mine in Vegas that's basically lived there since he was 19. And he asked me for like, he asked me four names every time, you know, who's four guys you like? And I just out of nowhere said Tommy Fleetwood. And so he was, I mean, my phone battery was probably like 40% and about, you know, 60% of the battery usage was my buddy text me going, this guy is this guy going to do it? You know, he makes like this eight-footer for four on three and he was freaking out. So it was, it was a good week, man.

I appreciate you guys having me on. And yeah, I'm going to take a little bit of time. I actually have Scotland on Wednesday to go play golf. So I don't have that much time off. And then I go straight to the senior open. So it's back to back. But, I mean, I don't think a lot of people are going to explain to me. You poor bastard.

Who's got it worse than you? I'm so sad to go play golf in Scotland, I know. All right, Shane, we really appreciate it, man. We'll definitely have to have you back on. And, I mean, awesome week. I thought we loved the coverage. You thought you guys did a great job. Yeah, Shane, you were great.

You had an awesome week. Thanks, guys. Appreciate it. All right. Take care, man. This next bit of the show is brought to you by the 4Play merch store. Go to barstoolsports.com slash 4. It's barstoolsports.com slash F-O-R-E.

Trent, we got all kinds of good stuff in the store. We have made ourselves quite a collection in the barstool store. We've got our brand new Saturdays are for F-O-R-E. Get it? The boys, shirts. With our cool new logo of idiots like us making or taking a drop. Because we do dumb shit on the golf courts. We've got...

You made a good point this one. weekend on Twitter. Our most underrated shirts are the American Guys shirts between Patrick Green and Jordan Speed. The American Guy's shirt is a classic. It's also going to have unbelievable longevity because I don't see that team going anywhere. Oh, yeah, they'll be here forever. President's Cup, Rider Cup, whatever it is. Those two guys are going to be there. We got the I Love 4 Play Cousy Pack. We've got the golf towels are a hot item. They're actually very high quality. They are. Which I think stuns people. I think the reason that they're selling so well is because when people get them and take pictures of them,

other people see how high quality they are, see how good they look, boom, put them up there. I think the same goes for the polos. Those are high quality. We got a couple of, we got a bunch of those in there now. We got the Navy. We got the green and yellow. Those are high quality. When people get them, they're shocked. It's great. We are not messing around in the store. So go to barstoolsports.com slash four. That's barstoolsports.com slash F-O-R-E. Get yourself some gear. Next up, we got my good buddy, Mike Welch, Welchie. He's played plenty of professional golf. He's a very, very good player. as shit he caddied at the U.S. Open this past week.

He was there all week. He was on property. Like I said, he was caddying during play. So he's got a very good perspective as well on the course. Enjoy this bit. All right. Now we're joined by a good buddy of mine, Mikey Welch. Welchie's been referenced on the podcast a couple times.

He actually, I was just thinking about it, you beat Renner in terms of making your first appearance on the four plate podcast. Yeah, how about that? I don't know if he's going to be happy about that one. The people's golf are. O.G. is going to be pissed. I know, right? We've been doing this podcast for a few months now.

I don't think I've seen Riggs as excited to interview somebody in a long time. So Welchie and I, for a quick little background, Welchie and I played golf together quite a bit last year. We had some wild rounds, some really good times. Welchie played, so you caddied this last weekend in the U.S. Open, which we're going to get to. You've also played in the U.S. Open, 09, Beth Page. Yes. So that one, that one, I was doing a little, I was kind of looking back going through the rabbit hole of Wikipedia of different articles.

That one was pretty rain-soaked as well. Yeah, I mean, that week I was, I think I was slated to tee off like last on Thursday, and I didn't end up teeing off till Friday afternoon. Jesus. That was kind of hard. I mean, I had the nerves built up for two and a half days. Yeah, no shit, you're finally playing the ESO, but you've got to wait an extra day. Yeah. I mean, it was such a great week, though.

So you've caddied, you jumped on the bag, what, a couple months ago for Sam? Okay, gotcha. So he's been ripping it up on the web door. You guys go over to the qualifier for the U.S. Open. Tell us about that day, because that day is a grind. Yeah, it's a great. Hell yeah. Yeah, you were texting me and you were like, dude, we didn't even know, like, what he was fucking at.

We were like, we'll just add it up at the end. That's fucking fantastic. So you guys qualify. All of a sudden you're like, well, in a week and a half or a week, we're going to Aaron Hills. You didn't know, right? You weren't like 100% sure you were going to get the call up. All right. So you guys roll into Aaron Hills.

I mean, everybody's talking about the course. It's a beast. It's new. You know, it's 7,800 yards or whatever. What were kind of your first impressions are you guys rolled on to the property? Right. How, what were the practice rounds like? I mean, are you like, all right, this is my big, like, I'm caddying on the biggest stage.

every caddy before on i'm gonna get real serious out here yeah i mean he's good he's young uh so i mean obviously he'll be fine it wasn't like he played terrible either what he shoot like five over yeah he also i mean he played better than a couple big names like uh day well roary rory you're like let's go uh so so you talked about walking the course i mean these caddies talk about us all time like we saw bones out there walking the course are you just kind of strolling around, taking a couple notes, or are you, like, pretty fucking into it the whole time? Yeah, I mean. We, uh, we, we famously had Kip Henley on this podcast, and he said that the guys who are out

there walking the course are just like a bunch of try hearts looking, trying to look busy. So we kept hearing a ton about, you know, if the wind was up, if the wind was up, if the wind was up, obviously Kepka shot, you know, fucking 16 under Tide Rory's record. There were 31 guys that finished under par. If the win was up all week, like, you know, what would it really have played like, you think? easy right yeah i i kind of feel the same way and they kept talking they're like all right this is this is the day that everybody's been looking for that's winds up the usga is pumped and i mean a lot of the guys in the final groups didn't shoot under par but he that was like the easiest that's like

the easiest 67 i've ever seen uh it was robotic it was yeah uh so i mean it was interesting how uh how tricky were the greens because they kept i mean they kept kind of saying like yeah the greens are pretty pretty straightforward here they're like not that complicated yeah yeah the sunday pen there was was great what was uh right yeah it seemed like you know all the drama about them cutting the fescue on what was it tuesday where they decided to cut a bunch of it you try to act like oh yeah yeah they totally cut up me like i just fucking figured that out two seconds ago That's great. Or are you guys going to get back out there together anytime soon?

Or what's the plan? Happy Father's Day, by the way. Yeah, thanks, buddy. I appreciate that. First Father's Day, right? Yeah, that's right. Oh, my man. That's nice.

Yeah, we might have to get you, speaking a teacher, might have to get you to take a look at Trent Swink. I need a lot of help. That was very nice, but I need a lot of help. We had Michael Breed look at him, and Breed was just like, oh, my God. Breed literally told me to quit the sport. Yeah, Breed told him to quit.

Yeah, right. I think that's your plan, Trent. Yeah, I agree. All right, Welchie. Well, thanks a lot for hopping on, man. I wish, I don't know, I wish, I was hoping if you guys were taking that thing down, that would have been a nice whole payday for my guy Welch. Yeah, definitely, man.

Yeah, guys, welcome. All right, dude, take care. No worries. See you guys. See you, man. Next up, everybody's favorite segment from the gallery. Huge shout out to the four-play platrons. Yep.

Who have really stepped up their game the last couple weeks. Been sending in some great ones. We are getting low. We're getting stockpiled again. But do not forget, email us for Play at Barstoolsports.com. Follow us on all of our social media shit at ForeplayPod. A couple really good ones this week. We do have good ones.

We'll start with our, with listener Joe. He titled his email, Taking Range Balls Home, Taking Balls Home from the Range. My buddy wasn't having a good range session, and he hadn't finished his jumbo bucket yet. So he took the balls with him and is saving them for a later date. Is this a psycho move? what do you think this is fucking insane okay i'm very glad we have sunshine who's like about to defend this guy to the grave yeah let's sunshine let's hear your stupid reasoning for this well i mean if it's a jumbo bucket clearly it's a large bucket and he didn't finish it so he

paid for those balls i don't know why it's psychota but this is like that'd be like going at bowling and being like oh we didn't finish all the frames we're going to take the pens home with us that's a little different i mean it's a little different but what i would say is you made my point for me it is a jumbo bucket he paid for it range balls aren't a million dollars you can just leave those there it's not like you're wasting a ton of money i mean but it's a lot of golf balls i mean if it was like 10 or 12 that's one thing but if you know it's 55 balls i probably keep them if it's sunshine exercise a little responsibility and foresight if you go out there and you make the overhead investment of a

massive jumbo bucket of balls you either hit all those fucking balls during this session or you're done yeah you give them to somebody else you give them to the little couple of that's there, hit, and whatever. If he misjudged the amount of balls he's going to hit by that much, I'm glad he's losing money. That's on him. I mean, I'm not saying I'd make the same mistake. I'm just saying that if I was in his position, which I wouldn't be. Okay, so let me ask you this.

What's the process of packing up the balls? You sneak them into, like, your bag, like you bring a backpack. How are you bringing the balls with you? And imagine if you, this is a place you go to all the time and people see you doing this. And you roll up to the tee, and you're, like, dropping balls out of your personal belongings on to the thing. I guess you have to own it as the crazy driving range ball stealer guy. You just got to walk around like, yeah, fuck you, I'm doing that. I'm not going to lie.

I'm not going to lie. There's got to be an age cutoff for this because if like a 75-year-old guy does this, I'm like, that's fine. That's fine. Go right ahead and do that. You are, you know, you're trying to be. If you're like a 31-year-old, like, normal life person. Yeah. And you're doing this.

You're crazy. That's really what the real whatever is. It's your age. If you're 75, it's fine. If you're 31, it's not. Then again, if you're 75, you can do anything in the world. Well, that's kind of, it's an extension of you can drive however you want. You can drive.

You can do anything. It's the old Seinfeld bit. You don't even look when you're backing out of the driveway. Totally. You can just go play golf. You don't have to have a tee time. You show up and start hitting golf balls. If you've lived for 75 years on this godforsaken planet, you can take as many range balls home as you want.

Yeah. So, I mean, that's a pretty psycho move. It's a weird one to get away with. But I guess if you're going to do it, you just kind of own it. Next one, we have Chelsea. This one's about girlfriends who play golf discussion. Because we had this. I think we did it a little bit on KFC radio and then we did it a little bit more on here talking about.

Is it a good idea to play with it? a girlfriend, or is it a good idea to play with your girlfriend who's good at golf if she wants to play golf? Right. So I have to start by saying that Chelsea might be a stripper because her name is spelled C-H-E-L-S-I. I. You could spell Chelsea. Chelsea.

It's like Spanish. She could spell that name in any different way. Her parents decided to go with S-I. That's tough. If she's doing anything other than stripping, she is, you know, she's doing well. So this submission is about her and her boyfriend golfing. Just heads up to Chelsea's boyfriend. Your girlfriend might be a stripper.

Wanted to chime in on the whole girlfriends who golf discussion. I golf, as does my boyfriend. We used to have zero fun every time we tried to golf together. Yeah, no shit. So we gave up. We golf separately now. If we ever do golf together, it is with another couple, so we don't even have to ride in the same cart together

or really even interact if I'm being honest. Works great for those who need a solution. There you go. Playtrens helping other playtrons with advice like this. Yeah, this is genius. Basically, you're just saying that you guys hate to do shit together. This is like marriage. You guys are basically married.

Yeah, either they're married or they're going to break up soon because they clearly don't like spending any time together. Right, that's like if, you know, if you're in a relationship, you like refuse to go to one-on-one dinner with your girlfriend, you make sure that like your good buddy and his significant other who can be anyone on Earth, you guys go out together, you sit next to your buddy, you guys just get shit-faced. Yeah, have a great time. Who cares what they're talking about? They can be on a different planet. They do their own thing, you do your own thing. That's just kind of life in general. Yeah, this isn't, this isn't outside of golf.

It could be anything. So shout out to Chelsea for understanding that. I will say that if you're in a relationship with someone who golfs, I think this is the best solution. I think she nailed it. I think so, too. The part where she says or really even interact at all, if I'm being honest, that should concern Chelsea's boyfriend in terms of whether she really likes him or not,

because I'm guessing Chelsea is not a married woman. They're kind of in a relationship where it's been going for like six months to two years. Right. That should be a cause of concern probably. But, hey, it's a great solution if you want to golf with your girlfriend. Yeah, the only other solution is the one I've been preaching forever, which is you take your girlfriend to the range and you give her horrific advice

so that she sucks and she hates golf and then... Sabotage it. Solves everything. Submit stuff if you got them to from the gallery. We love getting stuff from the playtrons for play at Barshaltsports.com. Quick reminder, we're going to be up

at the Travelers Championship this week, not on the weekend. We're going to be there Wednesday night. Chicago Sam's Bar. We're planning on being there around 8 p.m. We're going to clarify that on the interwebs. Yeah. So check that out.

We're going to be foul on Keegan. We're going to be passing out shirts, shirts, shirts. We're going to have Keegan's army. We've got to follow the people's golfer 2.0. Yeah. Keegan, what are they going to say? Keegan versus everybody. I think is what they said last time.

I think it's the little JR, like, you know, memorial. It's the old badge on the heart on the shoulder. It's a very classy shirt. It's a classy shirt. So we're going to be giving those away. We want everybody to join us. We're all going to follow Keegan on Thursday. We're all going to meet up at the bar.

Have a good time. Hang out a little bit on Wednesday night. So hope to see everybody there. This was a great one. The U.S. Open was great. We got the British Open coming up next month. Yep. We got a couple big guests lined up.

We sure do. Leading into that, which we're unbelievably excited about. A couple big names may or may or may not be major champs. May or not have won the tournament that we're talking about. So get excited. It's a good time. We're in the middle of the hot stretch of golf season. Yep.

That's it. It's all I got, Trent. Hit it hard.