Subpar - Recapping the shocking conclusion to the 2024 U.S. Open

Episode Date: June 18, 2024

On this week's episode of GOLF's Subpar Colt Knost and Drew Stoltz break down the incredible ending to the 2024 U.S. Open and what's next for Rory McIlroy and Bryson DeChambeau. -- We are excited to share our listener offer from Ship Sticks, who gets you from your front door to “fore” easier than ever. They’ll pick up your golf clubs from your home or office and deliver them on time, guaranteed, to golf destinations anywhere, in and outside the U.S. No more airport headaches, no more lugging heavy bags. Just easy, stress-free travel for golfers like you.Ship Sticks. Because golf is hard enough.Use code SUBPAR or visit www.shipsticks.com/subpar to learn more and take 20% off your shipment. -- Thank you to Callaway Golf for partnering with GOLF’s Subpar.  Visit www.callawaygolf.com to shop the Paradym Ai Smoke family and learn more about the line. -- Subscribe Now: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCt5ESUx6omMUsMoEKvMTzlA Shop The Birdie Juice Collection: https://fairwayjockey.com/collections/birdie-juice Follow Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/golf_subpar/?hl=en Follow Twitter: https://twitter.com/golf_subpar?ref_src=twsrc%5Egoogle%7Ctwcamp%5Eserp%7Ctwgr%5Eauthor

All right, here we go. Welcome back to another episode of Golf Subpar with Colton Nost and Drew Stoltz. We're going to recap this year's U.S. Open, but first, Sleeze, I'm out here at the Good Good Midwest Open playing the two-person scramble with Page Sprannock, and I cannot wait to get out there and hit some seeds with my paradigm AI smoke driver. It is sweeter from every spot designed with extensive player data and a new AI smart face to create sweet spots across the entire face. This new family is designed to maximize distance with tighter downrange dispersion. You want to get one yourself? You can visit CallawayGolf.com to shop the paradigm AI smoke family and learn more about the line. Look out. I'm dangerous in the scramble with my AI smoke sleeves.

Seeds. Big sweet spot down in French Lake. We've got a little two-man scramble or two-person scramble, I should say. How are we feeling about the game leading up? Well, I'm feeling very good about my game, but there is an issue, which we will address later on in the show. But I got here last night. I'm excited to get going. I heard this place is a monster.

but the good news is Paige gets to play from the empty. So if we play any of my T shots, we got a problem. Yep, that is an issue. That will be beneficial for you playing Pages T-ball. There is no doubt. Represent the brand. Don't take any bullshit from anyone. You know the routine.

I ran into our man, the DoD King in the lobby last night, had some dinner, had a couple beers with him. I mean, this is our first in-person meeting. And what a beauty that guy is. Wow. He's all the time. But I text with him like all the time now. and just some of the shit.

I'm like, I love this kid. It's beautiful. It fires up so many people online. Like, it's just, I don't know. It's all working. It's all working. I don't want to bury his street cred, but he's seriously like the nicest guy ever. He's so nice.

Yeah, everyone just sees his character and they're like, I hate this. I'm like, dude, this is exactly what it's for. He's winning. He's doing great. Yeah, his golf game looks pretty nice, too. It says it's good. So you have a lookout for him. I can't wait to see.

It's going to be a lot of fun here at the Good Good Midwest Open. But speaking of guys, the people, used to hate, and now they absolutely love him. He's become one of the fan favorites. This year's U.S. Open champ, Bryson DeCambo, put on an unbelievable performance out at Pinehurst number two, picking up his second major championship, his second U.S. Open in dramatic fashion. One of the most exciting back-nives I can remember at a U.S. Open in quite some times, please. This U.S. Open from start to finish, I thought was fantastic. There was a lot of question marks. I feel like, Colt, about Pioneers, what's it going to play like? How much are they going

to push it. I thought for my money, the USDA did an unbelievable job, making it extremely tough. I don't think they pressed it too much. A couple pin locations were close, but I never thought they crossed the line. There was always room to play, you know, where you could play it where it wouldn't get an out of hand. The scores, I mean, you look at it,

minus six wins the golf tournament. I think we would have signed up for that at the beginning of the week. There was only what, seven guys, I believe, under par for the week. We saw some bogey free rounds. We also saw some monster numbers. If you had it going crooked or you had it, you had some issues, you're going to shoot a big number. I thought they did a phenomenal job with the golf course.

And on top of that, I would say, Colt, you got the two most popular guys in golf right now coming down the stretch, basically like a two-man race. Cantlay was right there, too, just waiting for him to tip something over and get in the mix. But basically, it was a Rory Bryson showdown on the back nine. I mean, that's dream stuff. Combined with what I would say is one of the most clutch golf shots I've ever seen since I've been old enough to know what the hell is going on 18. that 55-yard bunker shot, dude.

My hands were dripping, watching that. All I could think about was that clubhouse. I was like, someone's going to die. Yeah, we'll get to that shot in a second. But, I mean, there were so many great shots hit coming down the stretchers. There's obviously not so great ones. Rory's a couple of missed puts. But I want to talk about the golf course a little bit.

I want to get your thoughts. Oh, and by the way, the bookmakers are just unbelievable because I believe the winning score, the over-under set at five and a half. Five and a half. 100%. I had some very interested people on that, by the way, on that last shot, they all had to under.

Because I was, I mean, everyone I was talking to out there, Colt, caddies, other guys, like they said, dude, like, par is awesome. And it was awesome. Yeah. But I did say on our serious XM show, I said, I'm going to go the other way. I'm going to go better than five and a half under just because I just think the guys are that good. And what they can do to a golf course. I mean, we're seeing Ludwig and guys hit seven wood or long iron into a 620-yard par five uphill.

It's just crazy how far these guys can hit it nowadays. But I want to get your thoughts on the golf course because there's a lot of talk. I said, you know, I have my mixed emotions about Pinehurst and how they've redone it with the natural areas with all the bushes and all the sand. What was your thoughts? Did you like it? Did you not like it? I'm curious to hear this. Going in, I'm kind of with you.

And I think U.S. Open, I think narrow fairways, firm fairways, firm greens, and crazy rough, right? And Pinehurst is not that. It's different. However, I've played Pinehurst a number of times. I love that golf course. I especially love because, I mean, clearly, around the greens, it's unlike anything that we play in the world. Maybe you can go over to Europe and get some links type golf where it's like that, but it's not like anything over here. With the, I was, I was interested to see how it would play when guys missed fairways because that's what it always comes down to at the U.S. Open, right?

Like, driving accuracy, more or less. Like, that's the number one stat. I thought it was the native area, the wiregrass, as they're calling it. I thought it was cool because there's a lot of uncertainty, like they said, they want guys to be nervous if they have. their t-ball in there, like, am I going to have a shot? Am I not going to have a shot? I thought we saw a lot of awesome recovery shots out of there, some beautiful recovery shots where it looked like guys might not have a chance, and then boom, they all of a sudden

have a great look for Bertie. And on the flip side of that, we saw some dudes get punished. Saw Max try to hit a wood out of it. Saw some guys try to play it through a wirebush. It didn't work out, things like that. So there was enough, like, volatility in that that it allowed for some escaping, and it wasn't just, like, hack out rough, you know, which I think it's like, oh, he missed the fairway, like he has no chance of hitting the green and regular.

he's going to have to lay it up to whatever and try to get up and down. So I enjoyed that aspect of it. I thought it might be in a little more forgiving than I had thought going into the week in terms of the amount of times the ball went in there, Cole and people had a clean line and could hit pretty much whatever they wanted. Yeah, like I said, I have mixed emotions about it. I'm not a huge fan of a lot of luck being involved. I mean, Brando Schambly kind of just killed Bryson.

I thought it was too much, honestly, dude. I did too. Like just saying how lucky he was getting and all this. Yeah. Like, Bryson played fantastic. He did drive it pretty poorly on Sunday, I thought. I think he ended up being 66th in driving accuracy, which isn't good. But as far as he hits it, I mean, it's ridiculous.

Like, I thought Saturday he put on a clinic with how he drove it. Sunday, it was a little crooked. He switched drivers right before he teed off because he said the face flattened more than he wanted it to. I wish they would have gone more into that. I was curious to know, like, why he thought it flattened more than like what kind of numbers changed. Because he did say when he was sitting with the golf channel, he goes, I probably shouldn't have changed it. So it was obviously playable.

But I would have gotten into that more. Like, what did you see that made you want to change drivers? Because, listen, I know his technology has dialed, and I'm sure that driver, the new driverhead, was very close to the old one. But it's still, it's a different one. And that puts a little doubt in a player's mind. Yeah, it was to switch your gamer driver with the lead out of US Open,

like right before the final round. Yeah, 15 minutes. A few shots with it. And then it was like, okay, let's go with this. I know they're all supposed to be the same. I got a backup driver. You've had backup driver. But there's a, you know, like, your gamer's your gamer for a reason.

It was interesting to see him do that. And I thought, yeah, like a little explanation. Did the face cave in? Is it cracked? If I was leading the U.S. Open driving it the way he was leading up, if that thing wasn't broken, it would have been in my bag going forward. But going back to the golf course. Like, I love the greens.

I love how challenging it is, how you have to be so precise with your iron shots. Just, I don't know. I don't know if they need to make it more severe as far as like the amount of wiry grass, native grass, whatever you want to call it, like more of it. so you can get in trouble. But for the most part, like, I saw very few golf balls that were in a lot of trouble that you had to just pitch out. I didn't see anybody taking unplayable for many of it.

Like most of it would bounce off of it and then go into a flat area. And you might have an awkward stance, but you could get a club on the ball. So therefore, I wasn't the biggest fan of that. But that being said, six under par did win the golf tournament. So it did play extremely difficult. I would just love to see, like, I love the rugged look with bunkers and the tall grass around it and stuff. Like, I'm all for keeping that. but what if the rest of it was rough?

Like then what would it play like? Would it play easier? Would it play harder? I don't know. It's obviously a big change, but I just have, and listen, you have to have luck to win a major championship to win any tournament. But the fact that you can hit it a foot apart from each other, basically the same distance off the T and one of you screwed and one of you is not, that kind of, that bothers me a little bit. Yeah, it wasn't just that you could get a club on it.

Like you could, you could hit it just like it was from the first. You could generate so much spin. It wasn't like, oh, I caught a good lie in the rough out of a year. US Open and I can hack an eight iron up there and it's just going to tumble and release. You could control the golf ball out of that stuff. But I thought way too much was made, in my opinion, about Bryson being like, quote unquote, lucky all day. He didn't drive it straight.

But dude, I watched that golf tournament. I've watched virtually every single shot that was played this entire week. I was glued to the television. Almost everybody that I saw that was hitting it in that stuff was having a shot, more or less, most of the time. There's a few times where they did. There's a few times where Bryson didn't. Rory caught one. They're on the 18th, by the way. It was a bad break right behind the bush where he couldn't, you know, the little tuft of grass that he couldn't get it over. But I watched people blow it into that stuff all week long and they were pulling out irons and playing for the green almost every time. So it wasn't like Bryson was the only dude hitting it in that stuff and having shots out of it. It was virtually everybody. It was challenging and there was some weird ones, but most people were hitting it out of it.

Listen, and I like Randall. I'm a big fan of his work. Like he does his homework, but this is where I disagree with him. I mean, he went on there and he said, I believe the last five U.S. Open champions have been top 10, top 15, and driving accuracy. Bryson was 66. And I don't think that has anything to do with how Bryson drove it. He didn't drive it straight, but that just shows you that driving, you don't have to necessarily drive it extremely straight at Pinehurst with that setup. And I think that's why a guy that drove it was 66 and driving accuracy with as far as he hits it,

was able to get away with it and win because it doesn't punish you like the normal U.S. open roughly see. Yeah, I think you play towards what the setup gives you. At Wingfoot, the fairways were so narrow. He was like, dude, I'm missing fairways with anything that I hit, so I might as well hit driver as hard as I can. That ended up being the right play. He wins.

This week, they give you that, you know, native area where you can actually, where you can play it out of it more often than not. And he's like, okay, well, that's worth the risk of me hitting driver to know that maybe a couple of these, I'll have bad lies, but the rest, I'll be able to play out of it. and you take what the golf course gives you. I mean, everyone was getting good breaks, bad breaks. Rory had a quick hook on 14 that bounced off the gallery and ended up having a wide open shot. You know, it's like the luck element I thought played way too much of a

of a factor in like what was being discussed on Bryson. Because dude, he was doing some unbelievable stuff. The big question mark, Cole, going into this is like, all right, is this a short game good enough? The long wedges, the soft, the touch shots and things like that. I mean, the three, I think he won the golf tournament, or he could have lost the golf tournament, I should say. 8, 10, 11,

the up and downs on those three holes were unbelievable. And that was right in the time when Rory was making his run and making all the birdies. If he doesn't get those up and down, I mean, eight, Bones said that was a top 10 up and down he's ever seen in his life.

Guy's been around some up and downs before. But if he makes just bogey on a few of those holes or PARs 10 and makes bogey on the other two or could easily make a double in that situation, like it's over. It's a wrap. Rory cruises in after those birdies, but he stayed in it and fought

and I thought, like, his overall game probably not getting enough love because I think the questions have been answered on that short game. Yeah, you're exactly right. The one on eight was all time. Yeah, 10, 11, the pitch on 10 over the bunker to get to spin the way he did was awesome. I'll go back to just a little last touch on the getting lucky part of playing Pinehurst. I mean, look at the two shots in the number five from the next to find, next to last pairing of Patrick Cantley and Roy McRoy.

I mean, Patrick hit the seven wood or five wood, whatever it was up there, didn't get as deep in the green as Rory's did, goes off and goes into the bunker. And it's not an easy shot, but it's fine. I mean, Rory, in my opinion, hit the better golf shot, hit a five iron that looked like he was going to get far enough up in the green to stay, catches more of the slope, misses the bunker, goes all the way down in the native area, ends up in a footprint, a divot, whatever, was absolutely dead.

Like, and that part bothered me because that was a great shot. I know you're supposed to play it more to the ride or whatever, or at least hit it far enough to cover. That was unfortunate. The fact that those two shots were so similar and patched up in the bunker, his end up down there. I know there's luck involved

and people get good breaks, people get bad breaks, but I thought that was a little much. I love the luck element. I love the volatility. I love not everything being cookie cutter because that's what we get virtually every single week on the PJ tour.

You land it right here, it stops. You land it right here, it stops. There's no guessing. That one particular shot that you brought up, and I'm glad you brought that up. I was sitting there watching it on the couch. And I thought his was as soon as it started rolling, I was like,

oh, it's going to go right by can't list. Yeah. And it kept going. It went around. And it ended up in that little hole, like you said, I was like, that's too much, in my opinion. If you're hitting up a shot that it's on the green, I mean, dude, it's a yard maybe from having a really good look at Eagle. And the next thing you know, like, he really didn't even have a shot to play it onto the green from there. No.

I thought that was a little bit too much. But I do, with that being said, I love all the volatility. I love the different bounces you can get out there. I love the uncertainty around the greens. It made me realize, Cole, after watching. this week and the variety of shots that I saw around the greens and the beautiful, unbelievable shots I saw and also just some terrible shots and people, you know, dumping it into the grain right in front of them made me realize like just how, I want to call it boring, but like mundane

or cookie cutter, like almost all other golf courses that they play on the PJ tour are around the green. It's like, Mr. Green, here's your lob wedge, open it up, hit your shot. It's the same shot over and over. Out there, it was like, dude, I saw seven irons, I saw hybrids, I saw lob wedges, I saw bounces into the hill to try to kill it. I saw everything. I thought it was awesome. I love that. Because the whole just starts sometimes once you get green side.

Yeah, it is exciting to watch. You want to have some fun, though? Just text our boy Riggs and tell him that Pinehurst is a muni or something a little hate, and he will lose his shit. It's so much fun. It was my entertainment on the plane yesterday as I was watching the U.S. Open. I was like, this place is a dump. I can't believe they're going here.

This is embarrassing to have a U.S. Open here. And he just loses his shit. It is so much fun. Is he pretty possessive? of over over finding that's his like adopted hometown now he acts like Donald Ross was his grandfather or something I mean he played a role in designing the thing yeah you like what I did we're here on eight a little runoff oh my god it's so much fun but congratulations to uh to brison de shambo some just clutch shots I mean I don't think the three wood on 13 gets enough love from 313 yards

I mean that was incredible all over it land right to the hill bounced up 20 feet just Awesome. Awesome shot. Right after the boge, left that putt just like a foot short. And then honestly, like that's when it was like, dude, Roy had a two-shot lead. I was like, this thing could be done. Like, he has to birdie this rival. But then you still needed some help because it was hard making birdies on any of those holes coming in.

Let's talk about Rory. We got to talk about Rory. Once again, right there. I mean, shit, just go back to L.A. He was right there against Wyndham. Like this, I believe this is seventh consecutive top 10 out of U.S. Open. But, dude, I mean, it's the two puts that are going to get all the attention. I'll say this. The one on 18, I thought, that's a fucking brutal putt. Downhill, greens that are

glass outside the hole. Fastest can be, and it's the 72nd hole of the U.S. opening need to make it. That's a hard put. I don't care if it's Thursday morning. That's a tough put. The one on 16, excuse me, that one, I would, I mean, I couldn't, straight up the hill, virtually zero break. And at that point, I believe, who was it, Justin Ray had tweeted out up to that point, Rory was 496 for 496 inside three feet on the PGA tour this season. That's the one that I look back on back. Oh, my God. I can't believe that.

And I'll even go back just a shot further because he got a lot of criticism for it for some reason. But the par 315th, which was 207 yards, I believe. And TV could have been wrong, but the no laying up guys were criticizing him about the flight of the shot again because his advantage is he can get it straight up in the air. the apex, which these machines normally are not wrong, the apex on that seven iron was 127 feet. Okay, PJ tour average with a seven iron is 96 feet. So he hit it 10 yards higher than the average guy. And I thought he was getting a little criticized for that.

Like, in my opinion, he flushed it. He just flew it too far. Maybe it should have been an eight iron. I don't know. Bryson hit nine iron. His lobs are different. I get that and it stayed on. But for it to be 127 feet in the air, that's freaking high.

I don't think people realize how high that. is. The height was not an issue if those numbers were right. So I thought that was, and then he got a horrible break. I went over the green and went against a push. And he made a good form, honestly. But then, yeah, 16. I mean, that's a putt. You slap back to him if you're playing around with him at home. I mean, you make it and put that. And to me, it looked like there was just a little acceleration in the stroke, pulled it left and lift out, made the grade up and down on 17. And then 18. So I've only seen a couple of angles from the side, like face on. You see everything from behind and it looks like, you know, obviously it was a tough put. And this is where as an

on-course guy, it's tough. Like Smiley Kaufman said he can hit this putt straight and still make it. And I'm sure he got abused on social media, as I have many a times for that. But that was an outside the whole putt that broke really hard. But if you look at it from face on, the putterhead comes up really high through impact and he hits it low on the face, which means it's going to be a little weak, face is going to be a little open and he pushed it a little bit. So I don't think it was his best stroke, in my opinion. It was a nasty foot and your whole body is shaking trying to do that. But man, this is one, I'm sure he did not sleep very well last night.

He's probably not going to sleep well for several nights. Bogian, three of your last four, when you have the lead, trying to break that 10-year drought is brutal, especially doing it missing two puts inside of four feet. And I'm with you on 15. I didn't think that was a bad shot. I thought it flew a little further into the green than he probably would have liked or would have hoped.

Maybe it was a little flat. Is he capable of hitting it higher? Maybe. Probably I thought that was a good golf swing. It was a great golf swing. I think it just flew further than he thought. Probably some adrenaline going on. I would think with three holes left at the U.S. Open.

But I'm saying, like, if you ever get a chance to get on a launch monitor and just see what your apex is, and then you hear 127 feet, you'd be like, damn, that is high. And yes, he can't hit it higher. But 127 feet, that was not the problem. The trajectory was not the problem of that shot. It flew five yards too far, which is what Pioneers does to you. You miss your spot.

You get punished. And long there is just the absolute no-no. It's like, if you're going to miss it, that's why you'd think if he was between, just smash eight if it comes up front and trickles off the front, at least you're chipping it uphill. But I don't even, I don't necessarily blame that golf shot. That was a great golf shot.

By the way, he made a really good up and down on 17 after pulling that iron shot. It could have been even, you know, he could have not made that up and down and made par on 18 and everyone would, you know, it wouldn't be as big of a story. But when he missed that put on 18,

I was like, that's it. It's a wrap. Bryson, I think Bryson maybe at that point, I don't even know if he'd putted his birdie putt yet on 17 after hitting a great shot, but I was like, he's going to make par on 18. This thing's over. then he blows it over there, Colton, which

that left spot had been fine almost all week. I'd seen a million people over there and they were all playing it at the green, no problem. I didn't even realize there was that tree, whatever the hell that thing was. And B, that it would be impeding his swing. As soon as he hit it there, I was like, dude, we're going to a playoff.

He's going to have to pitch this out. Maybe he can pitch it out. It's going to be a bogey. I was convinced we were especially once he hit it 55 yards, 45 yards out in the bunker. Yeah, so one, going back to the T-shot, I thought Rory should hit three with off 18, just because it makes the fairway a little wider there. And the covering the bunker on the right is no problem at all. Bryson, and I still, I haven't heard anybody talk about this.

I haven't been able to see by the replays. Did it hit a volunteer? Yeah, it appeared to. It 100% did. So that's what I thought it did. I thought it hit a volunteer. If it misses that volunteer, it goes up against the scoreboard. He gets a drop, and he's fine.

Exactly. Nobody said anything about that volunteer getting hit. and then it bouncing over by the root and being underneath the tree. I thought that was something like, oh, that possibly could have been mentioned. But he hit driver there all week long, Bryson did, made two birdies because he knows if he does blow it up the left, as long as it doesn't hit anybody. It gets far enough up there and he's fine and he can knock something up on the green. That was a tough break.

The second shot, I mean, he even said it. He goes, Gbo, I don't feel comfortable over this. And then three seconds later, he's like, I got it and just hit this quick little slash. And it went in a very difficult spot. And once again, I love these guys. I love Brando. I love Paul McGinley. Paul McGinley saying he had a free shot because he knew bogey got in the

playoff afterwards. I was like, man, that is really unfair. Like, let's give this man some credit. This is a 55-yard bunker shot with the U.S. open on the white. I mean, Smiley Kaufman tweeted afterwards, he goes, I would have scolded that ball so far over the clubhouse. It'd still be going. Tell me when you saw that shot and you weren't thinking like,

hmm, so if I was over this, there'd be two options. One, I just completely bail on it, a lay sawed. Maybe I get it to the front edge or maybe not. And then I got either a long putter, I got to get up and down from the short. Or I'm taking this thing on and I'm hitting it into fucking Raleigh over this. I mean, that's literally. I was like, there's just not a shot in the world, literally anything that I would prefer to have over that golf shot. And for him to not only like pull it off, Cole, he hit it inside three feet or inside four feet.

It was one of the all time, all time shots in the history of major championships. Like that's going to go down in history. By the way, Lou Stagner, who's the golf statistician, came out. He said on a 55-yard bunker shot, there's a 1.7% chance tour players have to hit it inside four feet. By the way, that doesn't factor in that it's the 72nd hole of the U.S. Open. You need to get it up and down to win, which multiplies it by a 10x multiple. Like, that was an unreal shot. Actually, I thought it was until Johnson Wagner came out later in the night and hit it to a foot on his second try, by the way.

Still, shout out, Johnston Wagner. Best shot I've ever seen. He was the co- MVP of the U.S. Open. The shots he was hitting around the Greens were awesome. That one with Bryson there and then holding the U.S. Open trophy after he did, it was incredible TV. Shout out Johnson Wagner. You're the man.

But yes, that shot, I mean, Luce Stagner's numbers. Like you said, that includes Thursday. That doesn't include Sunday. Just Sunday at the U.S. Open, everything on the line. Now, if he does pull it off, like he had a lot going for him. He had the green running away there at the start, and then it runs uphill. If he catches a little thin, maybe flies into that up slope and spins, but still, just applaud Bryce and DeCambo. One of the best shots you'll ever see.

The up and down by Payne Stewart always gets talked about. This shot will also always get talked about for the next 100 years. I mean, they will go back to that. No telling how we're going to be watching golf 100 years from now, but they will go back to that shot and be like, look what this guy did to win the U.S. Open. I was going back and thinking, I was like, what's a more clutch shot I've seen on the 72nd? Just on the 70th, I was like 2008, Tigers Putt at Torrey. Yeah. That one's pretty high up there.

Payne's put to win, incidentally, there at Pinehurst. That was a pretty good one. Like, I was hard pressed to find other ones on the 72nd. You go back to Jack's One Iron at Pebble. Pretty damn good. Maybe Hogan at Marion, like those. Like, it's that type of a shot, in my opinion. You know, it's a huge problem, though, for Pinehurst, Cole?

It's like when Sergio did the helicopter thing up at Medina, and then everyone wanted to try to hit that shot, so they had to like rope around it because there was no turf. They were just killing all the grass off. The amount of people that are going to come plop a ball down there that are playing Pinehurst on trip with their boys and just missile it into the clubhouse, they're going to have to defend that clubhouse in some way because it's about to get peppered for the rest of history.

Yeah, at least over the next year, I would not have lunch on the back patio of Pinehurst, number two clubhouse because you're going to get one right in the dome or right on your salad plate because people are going to begin there hitting the shots. going back to just like clutch moments, I feel like we remember more of the mess-ups, which is what is so easy to see happen on the 70-second hole. I mean, you go back, Colin Montgomery at Wingfoot, hit the very poor seven iron from the middle of the fairway. Phil, obviously, I had his problems there.

We remember more of the disaster. Shout out John Rom. The birdie putts at 17 and 18 he made when he won at Tori Pines. But this is going to go up there is one of the greatest shots in U.S. Open history. Yeah, good call on the ROM putts on 17 and 18. Those are huge, too. But yeah, like, we've seen some unbelievable clutch shots over the course of major championship history on the 72nd hole to win the thing.

There's very few. And this one's up there. And I would argue, cold, of all the, we've seen some incredible putts, you know, some great iron shots and things like that. I don't think, for my money, there's not a more difficult shot in golf than that shot right there. The margin fair on that shot is razor thin from hitting it right in front of you or hitting it, like we've said, into the clubhouse. And to hit it to almost dead. I mean, it wasn't dead. but it was pretty much and straight up the hill too,

not even behind it or anything. I mean, it was, dude, give the guy all the props in the world. And it's mind-blowing cold. If we go back like five years ago and say, hey, in a couple years,

this guy might be the most liked golfer been golf. You said zero percent chance of that happening. He's changed it. He has, nobody has turned their opinion of them more than Bryce and DeShambo. He was a guy that everything bothered him. He wasn't the nicest to volunteers, to fellow players, to caddies. He had a very bad reputation.

And now all of a sudden, things have changed in his life. I know his team gives his caddy GBO a lot of credit for that. He has been just a game changer for him. Bryson credits YouTube and just embracing the audience so much more. But the way he has handled the crowd, I mean, when he made the putt on 8 and he turned around and just yelled, come on and looked at him and the place was going nuts was so cool. Them chanting USA, I mean, I don't know if that was the biggest thing. but then just chanting for him the whole day.

I walked with him at Valhalla, and it was just awesome to see how much the crowd was behind him. Like, he's an entertainer. He is so much fun to watch. He's different. He's good for golf, man. That's all you can say. He went out there, and he ran around the whole place on 18.

He wanted every person to touch that trophy. So cool to see. He has just, he has totally changed who he is. The people love him. If he's, I don't know how it's going to work. I'm guessing he can't be on the President's Cup team since the PGA Tour owns the President's Cup team. But if he's not on the Ryder Cup in New York, what are we doing? A lot of people I saw tweeted, I responded to a few of them.

Imagine what would have happened if they would have took him Bryce instead of JT. I'm like, well, they still would have lost because mathematically, it doesn't matter if he goes 5 and 0. He doesn't make up enough points. We can't go back and look at not one person made the difference. But going forward, I hope he's on these teams. He's great. It feels like the fellow players are starting to like him a lot more, starting to enjoy him a lot more. he needs to be on that team at Bethpage.

Yeah, and I'm the biggest, like, the live guys need to play in everything, I think, right? But you go back to that Ryder Cup, I saw all those tweets too. Bryson really wasn't even in the conversation for that, right? It's coming down to a few guys, and his name went in, and now it's easy to go forward, you know, a year, and be like, oh, we should have had him because he's playing unbelievable golf right now. But really, at the time, he wasn't in consideration for that. I think it's a shame about the Olympics. I think he'd probably got, I don't know where he would have stood up with all the points

and things like that, but he feels like a pretty good representation for the U.S. at the Olympics right now. And then, yeah, going forward, the Ryder Cup dude, like, they got to be on it. And I think they will be on it. I'm pretty sure Bryson's going to be on it. How about this stat, though, Cole? Hold on real quick. Real quick by the Olympics, real quick, because people need to realize this. People are saying he's not eligible for the Olympics. That's bullshit. He is eligible. It's off world rankings. And because Liv doesn't get enough points, he fell too far down in the rankings. He 100% could qualify for the Olympics. It's just the way the world rankings.

are all messed up. He couldn't. But it's not like he's off the list. Like he can't make it. He could make it. It's mathematical. It is possible for him to play on the, he's not banned from the Olympics for playing and live. It's just an incredibly unrealistic task being that the only tournaments he plays with points are majors. And by the way, he hasn't finished outside the top six. This is a stat in the three majors this year, Colt. He has not finished better than seventh in any live tournament this year. How about that? His worst finish at a major is better than his best finish at any live event, which is, I mean, that's, that's weird. That's very weird.

Yeah, that's shocking, honestly. This isn't a shot at live. I just think the major championships, the amount of people, he embraces the crowd, it gets him going. And I think everything he does is a buildup for the major championships. And he's out there at live events. He wants to do his YouTube stuff and film all those cool videos that he does, the break in 50, the matches against people. people, and then when he gets the U.S. Open or the Masters or the PGA, it's go time. It's time to get down to business and focus on winning a major championship.

I just, I don't know if those other events get his attention. Yeah, the vibe is definitely not close to what you see at a major championship. It's not close on the PGA tour either, although there are some of events where it feels pretty big. But, Colt, I thought even going into the week, I thought they did a great job of I felt like for the first time, like, discussing. living live guys more engaging with them. Johnson was out there with like Cam Smith, you know, Bryce, a number of these guys, whereas before I kind of felt like it was like, yeah, we'll cover them if they're

up top on the leaderboard or somewhere high. I feel like that changed a little bit this week. And do you think that Bryson winning this like bridges it at all between like PJ fans and live fans? Because right now, Bryson seems to be one of the only guys that has people on both sides of the fence that like really like him or at least love watching him. You know what it comes? down to it, it's business. I know that Bryson is good for business and the PGA tour is going to want to get him back as soon as possible. You know, there's talks that they do have an agreement now and it's supposed to be coming out Tuesday at Hartford about what that agreement is. I hope it happens. I'm tired of all this stuff like the amount of people doing the scoring average of live versus the

PGA tour guys when there's 12 guys on the field. I'm like, what are we doing? Like this just this just divides it even more. Like let's celebrate how the great golf Bryson just play. Not that it's a win for Liv or a win for the PGA tour. Bryson just played unbelievable golf. It was one of the most exciting majors we've had in a long time on an iconic golf course. Like, let's celebrate that. Like, that was great golf. And we could have more of that if we'd get rid of all the other bullshit.

But I will say this. Shout out to Flushing at Golf who put out a pretty incredible staff. Since joining Liv and being banned by the PGA tour, Bryson Deschambo and Brooks Kevka have more PGA tour sanction wins than Justin Thomas, Jordan Spieth, and Ricky Fowler combined. Damn. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, like, I've been pretty down the middle on all this stuff.

You can bash live all you want to say the product. I don't like it. I don't like the music. I don't like the 54 holes. I don't like, the team stuff's not for me. That's fine. If that ain't your thing, it's fine. What you can't say is that they don't have some dogs over there on that tour.

They got some dudes. Their top 12 stacks up with the BJ. They got some. Is it easier? to finish top 20 over there? Absolutely, in my opinion. Top 25? Of course. There's fewer guys and it's not as deep. But at the top, that thing is flush at the top. They just need some youth because they don't have a ton of that right now. I've always said this. Listen, they have great players. You cannot argue with that. There is no doubt. They have some studs over there.

It doesn't mean the product is great over there. So I'm going to say. Yeah, that's what I'm saying. If you have an issue with like, good golf is being played. If you're like, I can't get it with the music. I can't get 54 holes suck. Shotgun. Whatever. That's like personal opinion. Fine.

That's a valid argument. Assuming you've actually watched it and consumed it and been like, all right, I gave it a chance. It's not for me. That's fine. But the argument like, oh, guys go over there. They check out. They don't care.

They get the money and they be done. Like, I had this conversation with somebody else. I was like, when's the last time Jordan Speeth had to worry about money? Or Justin Thomas or Scotty. Like, dude, they're getting, they're done game over money too. Like, what's the difference? Patrick Mahomes got paid. Do you think he doesn't try anymore?

There may be a guy or two over there that is taking it easy compared to what they used to be, right? I think there's a couple ones that will stand out, one for sure. But for the most part, I'm like, dude, why is it only, that's the only time we bring it up is when it's like live, these guys get paid. They're getting paid in every other single sport across the board, golf included. And when guys play bad, we never say like, oh, they've checked out. They're done practicing. It's like, dude, it's golf. It's up and down.

I mean, look at ROM right now, you know? I would have been willing. to bet. You and I, too, I think at the beginning of the season, we said three and a half wins on Live over under for John Rom. I hadn't had one yet. Had not his best stuff.

It ain't because John Rom ain't trying. As a dude, as competitive as there is in life. I'm with you. I just guess golf's been so different as far as the upfront money from like an actual tour. Sponsors is a different deal.

And this has never happened before. So a lot of people, yeah, they've gotten criticized for taking that money, but it's life-changing money. It's hard to hate on the guys. When you get about $3, 400 million dollars, how are you going to say no to that? I don't know.

I sure as hell like the opportunity, though, Colt, at some point. I'm very much for sale, if anyone's out there listening. But all in all, dude, that U.S. Open, I thought delivered from start to finish, awesome stuff. Bryce, I think we got the right winner. I think we got the two most popular guys than go. I don't know that it necessarily could have gotten a whole lot better. USDA did a great job of making it really, really hard without going over the line, which is tough. That was, we've now gotten back-to-back major championships that have delivered.

Very different, by the way, from Valhalla, the Birdie Fest to shootout to Pinehurst to just grind it out. There's double lurking every hole, which I prefer personally. Yeah, I thought both were incredibly exciting. Obviously, you had to be, you couldn't fake it around Pinehurst. Valhawley, you can get away with a little more, but still, both were awesome. Shout out, Bryson de Shambo, your second major championship. Another USJ title for the ponies, please. Ponies, dude, they like Pinehurst.

They like Pinehurst. They like Pinehurst, as much as it pains me to say. good you guys win somewhere. You got more wins at Pineros to do on your own football field. Okay. Calm down. Don't be a. Just because TCU's best product is J.J. Colleen.

Don't discuss T.C. with me. We'll be back. Everything will be fine. And you know what else is fine? Like, we were talking about, uh, a little question marks around Piner's and things like that. All right.

Cool. Next year, Oakmont. Yep. Buckle up. That's the one. If you like your stereotypical U.S. Open. hard as hell.

I mean, they could make plus eight win that thing, no problem if they want to. So I personally love Piner's. If it wasn't your cup of tea, just hold on a year. You can get the big boy, the biggest boy.

I loved it. And once again, shout out Johnson Wagner for what you're doing for the game of golf. It was awesome to see. So ladies, we got to get to ship sticks.

Are we in the trust tree right now? I'm going to throw it out there. Did we live in the tree? That's all this is, is the tree. So I'm here, French-Lick, Indiana, the good, good Midwest open, okay? And it's, Paige has been on me all week. She's like, listen, I need you to be practicing. I need your game to be sharp.

So I was. I was practicing at Westbrook every day. And therefore, I couldn't use our newest partner shipsticks. Okay, I had to take them on the plane with me because I had to practice Saturday and I flew out Sunday. I couldn't risk shipping them and getting here in time to go. So I took them to American Airlines. I put my babies in their hands.

I had to connect through Dallas. They make it to Dallas. I have an hour and a half layover. No big deal. I have rather nice status on American Airlines, by the way, about as high as you can get. I get to Louisville, Kentucky, no clubs. Imagine that. I just put trust in American Airlines one time, and they don't show up.

Shipsticks, they would have been sitting there at the door, waiting on me, greet me like a happy puppy dog. But no, not today. Now I still have no clubs. Apparently they're in Louisville. Supposed to be FedExing them here to me in French Licks. So I might be playing. with Pages clubs. Still no clubs. This is what happens, dude. If you trust it with the airlines,

you're at your own risk. Also, if you have a connecting flight to get to wherever you're going, then all bets are off at that point. Then multiple people have to not fuck up their job, which never happens, by the way. It's bullshit. It's an hour and a half layover. One of my bags makes it. I land over and goes, oops, we're sorry. One of your bags is delayed. I'm like, really? Yep. Every time. Every time. I feel like it's happened more and more frequently right now, just based on people reaching out to me in stories that I'm hearing. So good luck to you. You were in a tight spot, couldn't use Shipsticks,

but going forward, always use them. It's the easiest thing in the world. You can just pack them up, forget about them until you get there. They show up. They're waiting for you. You ship them back home. They're waiting when you get home. If you want to use Shipsticks, which you should,

just go to Shipsticks.com slash subpar or just Shipsticks. com and use code subpar. 20% off your next shipment. You will not regret it. shipsticks all the way now. This is just, this was perfect partnership because of what just happened

and I will never go against my guys over at shipsticks once again. By the way, Slees, we're heading up, we got the Travelers Championship this week, then we're heading down into York for a little birthday trip,

play a little golf. I actually invited you on the trip. You turn me down. I will be competing, dude. I'm competing that week in LACC trying to get a dub for the kid in the Midam circuit,

which I never try. That's a nice little golf course in all, but I had a friend. who connected me over at Shinnecock on Monday. We're heading out to Shinnecock's Teap. I called to set up, give everybody the names. One of the assistant pros goes, oh, Drew didn't get a look?

I'm like, what? He goes, the Slees? You didn't invite the Slees on your trip? I was like, shout out to you. That's awesome. I said, this place is way too nice for Slees. We cannot risk bringing him out to Shinnock, but going to be playing Shinnock for the first time.

First time. So I've played it two times. You're right. It's way too nice for me. Button up, be on your P's and Q's out there. It is, I believe, and I've played Oakmont, but I haven't gotten to play Oakmont. It was soft. It had just poured rain right before I played it.

I don't know that there's a harder, and I played it all the way back because I wanted to feel what it was like for the U.S. Open. I don't know that there's a harder golf course in the world that I've played. Especially if you get a little breeze, which it pretty much always is, it's fun. Are you going to go all the way? Are you going to kill yourself and go all the way back or no? The guys I'm going with, it's probably not the best idea, and I don't want to be back there by myself. It takes seven hours. it depends on what happens Sunday night.

I'll evaluate the situation when we get there, but I'm so excited to play. We're going to be, they're actually having a women's member guest that morning, and then we're going to be like the first group off that afternoon, so I can't wait. That's an all-time trip. There's no better golf in the country, in my opinion,

than up there in that place right there. It's the real deal. Parr will be winning a lot of bets, a lot of the holes out there. I don't care what the handicaps are. Net PARs are going to be winning everything. All right. Well, quickly. before we get out of here, because we got some more stuff to do.

We got to make our picks for the Travelers Championship. It's crazy to think about a signature event after a major championship, our second signature event in three weeks. But the field's loaded. Roy McElroy is still in the field. I've heard a little rumbulling that he might withdraw. I hope he does not. But Scottie Shepler going off at plus 360.

No surprise there. Very disappointing week for him. But for me, my favorite, I'm going to go a little farther down the board than normal sleighs. I'm going to go Tony Fee now at 35. to one coming off at T3 at the U.S. Open, starting to play some really good golf. I'm not going to worry about him celebrating that major championship at all. I think it's just going to help his confidence.

Tony Fienow 35 to 1 at the Travelers. Tony putted it incredibly nice out there on some really hard greens to put, by the way. Going with the claw, he changes it up a lot. I was very impressed with Tony Fien out throughout the week. I thought those greens might be an issue for him. Other than that one little slip-up, dude, the triple on 13 or whatever, where he ran into some issues on Saturday. that kind of, by the way, that got Ludwig as well, that same hole. That was a dicey. That was a

dicey little hole. That wasn't, I love that thing. All right, I'm going to just kind of go off the cuff here, Colt. I'm going to go based on, I think there's some guys that want to be there, some guys that don't want to be there based on last week. Good to see this guy in the mix. Got close. He was right there the entire time. Just couldn't make butts. I'll take Patrick Cantlay, 25 to 1. Got good track record around this place as well. Yeah, shot 60 as an amateur, I believe there. 60 piece as like a 12 year old. Okay, my dark horse, I can't believe this guy is this far down the port. And I know he will be excited to be there.

This is basically his home event. And he's the defending champion. 55 to 1. Give me Keegan Bradley. Yep, love that pick. This is the major. This is one guy, like, I truly believe some guys are like, I don't want to be here. I'm used up from last week.

He ain't one of them. This is as big as it gets. So I'm going to go with a guy that I think we still got a lot to play for this week. Also 55 to 1. I think his golf game is spectacular. especially since he switched to the broomstick. Ben on. He's going to win. You're going to win some stuff. All right. It's a fun one. This is also home of my heckler. Oh, this is the guy. Yeah, somebody locate that. Oh, I'm going up there for a day. It's going to be

my one mission. Find this, dude. I'm going to just hold a sign. Who hates Colt? Is it weird when 70 people stand up? Yeah. All right. Single file, single file. Jesus. I'm with you, though. There's a lot of guys that aren't going to want to be there. I'm not a fan of this scheduling going signature event, major. So brutal. I don't like it. Even Scottie Sheppard came out and said he goes, I think the best for me is not to play the week before a major, even though he did win, didn't have it at Pinehurst. But I hope they change this going forward because the travelers is a great event. They deserve a big time field. But it's going to be a lot of fun. Once again, congratulations to Bryson DeShambo on winning the 124th U.S. Open.

We'll talk to you on next week's subpar.