Biggest Questions Facing Golf's Top Stars Ahead of 2015 US Open

There’s so much to unpack for the 115th U.S. Open at Chambers Bay. If the Masters is about tradition and the Open Championship is about lore, the U.S. Open seems like the one that is purely about golf.

There’s no pan shots of antebellum Georgia landscapes or wind-whipped links from a faraway land. The U.S. Open is like the Belmont Stakes in horse racing: the "Test of the Champion."

A year ago Martin Kaymer got out front and never trailed. Hard to believe, but it was 15 years ago that Tiger Woods crafted the most dominant performance in the history of this tournament being the only player under par, winning by 15 strokes.

So for this year there’s any number of concerns and questions facing the world’s best players. Let’s get right down to it and see what answers Woods and Phil Mickelson, Rory McIlroy and Jordan Spieth have in the Evergreen State.

Can Bubba Watson Contend at a Major Other Than the Masters?

Bubba Watson has played little competitive golf of late. Since finishing in sole possession of third place at the Cadillac Championship, he finished in a tie for 38th at the Masters, a tie for 17th at the Match Play and a tie for 42nd at The Players Championship.

Watson will need to use his ultimate strength: his power off the tee and ability to shape shots to get as close to Chambers Bay’s contoured, conveyor-belt greens. He ranks 39th in strokes gained-putting—not bad, but not great either.

The U.S. Open isn’t a tournament that suits Watson. His best finish was in 2007, when he finished in a tie for fifth. In the two years he won the Masters (2012, 2014) he subsequently missed the cut at the U.S. Open.

History suggests a bumpy road for Watson.

Will the US Open Be Rickie Fowler's First Major Win?

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Rickie Fowler’s past four PGA Tour tournaments look like this: Cut, T9, P1, Cut. What will the U.S. Open hold for this big-game player? He did play in the Irish Open at the end of May on a course that resembles Chambers Bay.

“There are going to be some tricky situations out here, so you have to be aware of what’s around you and use some possible slopes,” Fowler said, per TJ Cotterill’s News Tribune story. “But at the same time, you want to keep it as simple as possible. You just have to deal with it as you go.”

When Fowler won the Players, he was wizardly with the putter. His strokes gained-putting was 3.994, this after a Saturday round of minus-0.213. Putting will be the X-factor at Chambers Bay.

Course designer Robert Trent Jones Jr. noted in a PGATour.com story that greens are what make Chambers Bay’s pulse beat. The way he sees it, since half the strokes typically take place on the green, why not make that the most challenging surface the players will face?

“They're strongly contoured,” he said. “They're lightning fast. You can't even tell where the fairway begins and the green starts."

If Sunday Fowler arrives with a 3.994 strokes gained-putting number, watch out as he guns for his first major.

How 'Sick' Is Dustin Johnson?

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Dustin Johnson, smasher of all things golf ball, withdrew from the St. Jude Classic in Memphis due to illness. Going bogey, bogey, bogey will turn anyone’s stomach, and he took his bag and shipped out after nine holes.

Jason Sobel of ESPN.com tweeted (via Kyle Porter of CBSSports.com), “Dustin Johnson WDs from Memphis due to 'illness.' He was also several over par and has the U.S. Open coming up, if you're into theories.”

USA Today's Luke Kerr-Dineen lists DJ as one of the heavy favorites despite his disreputable short game. That’s a big hitch heading to a place where the greens are in and of themselves an in-play hazard.

How he handles those—if he handles them at all—will determine if he’s in for a top five or another “illness.”

Can Forgotten Martin Kaymer Defend His Title?

Charlie Riedel/Associated Press

Forgotten among the young talent is Martin Kaymer, a two-time major champion. He has more majors than Jim Furyk, Rickie Fowler and Sergio Garcia combined.

"A lot of times," Kaymer said (via the Olympian's Meg Wochnick’s), "I feel like (I am), which is fine."

What he did a year ago at Pinehurst No. 2 was frightening, winning the U.S. Open going wire-to-wire. Sometimes a player takes zero time to adjust to a course, and Kaymer struck gold from the word go in 2014.

This year he missed the cut at the Masters after focusing all his early-season attention on Augusta National Golf Club. He put his eggs in one basket, and the basket broke.

Kaymer needs to find the DNA from his Pinehurst No. 2 performance and clone that Indominus Rex. He was first or tied for first in eagles, birdies and driving accuracy.

He’s entirely capable of repeating, especially given the links-style motif Chambers Bay is wearing this week, a course many of the Euros are accustomed to.

Will Justin Rose Make It Two US Opens in Three Years?

Jay LaPrete/Associated Press

Speaking of somewhat forgotten players, Justin Rose rarely gets mentioned as a major tournament contender, this despite winning the 2013 U.S. Open.

Few players are hitting the ball as well as Rose. This goes back to the Masters where he never wilted in the final pairing with Jordan Spieth. He finished in a tie for second at Augusta and followed that up with a win the Zurich Classic.

Rose said, per Derek Lawrenson’s of the Daily Mail:

"

I’m in the form of my life at the moment. I think I showed at the Masters that I can be a contender in all the majors. I’ve had top-five finishes at all of them over the years and I felt at Augusta I did everything bar win it. I feel very confident in the majors these days. I think they bring the best out of me.

"

He finished in a tie for 17th at the Match Play, missed the cut at the Players and finished second in a playoff at the Memorial.

Rose ranks 20th in ball-striking, second in birdie average and second in sand-save percentage, all vital stats for a U.S. Open. The No. 5 player in the world promises to be in the mix come Sunday.

How Concerned Should Rory McIlory Be with His Game?

Peter Morrison/Associated Press

Two missed cuts in a row? Maybe all McIlroy needs to do is come back to the States.

His last two tournaments—the Irish Open and the BMW PGA Championship— saw two missed cuts and a finishing position of T101 and T106. So much for the home continent.

Uncle Sam loves seeing McIlroy. His last four tournaments in America have seen him finish no worse than a tie for eighth (the Players). He took sole possession of fourth place at the Masters, won the Match Play and won the Wells Fargo Championship.

“My game’s in great shape. I took a whole week off after the Irish Open there a few weeks back, and now this week I’ve had a good few days of practice back home in Florida,” McIlroy said, per James Corrigan of the Telegraph. “I feel like I can have a summer not too dissimilar to last year.”

You remember that summer, right? The one where he won three tournaments in a row: the Open Championship, the Bridgestone Invitational and the PGA Championship.

There’s little concern for McIlroy heading to Chambers Bay, and he’s a deserving favorite and the likeliest winner.

Will Jordan Spieth Win the Masters-US Open Double?

Jay LaPrete/Associated Press

Jordan Spieth, this year’s Masters winner, may be playing the best all-round golf heading into this U.S. Open despite going winless since Augusta National.

As Bleacher Report’s Ben Alberstadt wrote, “The tour’s strokes-gained leader is on form and has to be a favorite at a new venue, given his aptitude for dismantling courses he’s playing for the first time.”

Spieth has two top threes since winning the Masters and, you know, good memories to draw from when the tournament gets tight. You could say clutch.

“I told you, I don't believe in that word," Spieth said, per Alan Shipnuck of Golf.com.

Whoa, OK. JS gets one green jacket, and suddenly certain words in the English language become suddenly taboo.

“I believe when I'm in a pressure situation, I have memories I can draw on and gain confidence from,” he said. “I don't believe that is clutch because when you don't do it; I don't believe that is a choke, which is the other side of that word."

Thursday will tell the story for Spieth. He got in front of the field at Augusta and held them off. He'll try and do that again at Chambers Bay.

Can Phil Mickelson (finally) Win the US Open?

Mark Humphrey/Associated Press

Everybody together now: Will Phil Mickelson finally win the U.S. Open? It’s his most coveted major, the one trophy he doesn’t have. He’s another second-place finish away from going full Ahab at this tournament.

Like Ahab and the ill-fated Pequod, Mickelson has a game plan to bring down this white whale. Mickelson has spent a great deal of time diagraming his approach to every hole at this course. He can see the pins and he knows how he plans on hitting them.

“It’s a special course in that there’s a lot of different ways to play shots to a lot of different pins,” Mickelson said per John Strege of GolfDigest.com. “If you play the highest-percentage shot, it’s not a hard golf course. But if you don’t know what that shot is and you play the wrong one, there’s a lot of penalty there.”

A six-time runner-up in the U.S. Open, Mickelson is also up against the clock. He turns 45 Tuesday and will be the same age as the U.S. Open's oldest winner. Hale Irwin was also 45, when he won his title. As Strege said in his piece, the “fairway is narrowing” for Mickelson.

How Will Tiger Woods' Patterns Fare at Chambers Bay?

Darron Cummings/Associated Press

Will there be an 85 on Woods’ scorecard? Will he go full-on quad-bogey building snowmen with the aplomb and sadism of Calvin from Calvin & Hobbes?

Questions surrounding Woods burn hotter than most as we enter a seventh year without Woods winning a major.

Woods has been out-of-character funny of late. He hasn’t cracked a joke since Charlie Pierce “busted” him for it in 1997. When Woods shot that 85 at the Memorial he quipped, “It's about getting reps. I got a lot of reps this weekend."

Then at Chambers Bay, while playing a practice round, he said, per Steve DiMeglio of USA Today, "Every hole seems like it is uphill. Feels like we played 18 today."

DiMeglio said Woods “joked” and “smiled.” Joked? Smiled? We all knew his swing was off, but it looks like his personality is on a different swing pattern as well.

Obviously when Woods tees up his Nike and hits it…somewhere…his plan is to win. However, no rational person thinks he’ll win this tournament. He probably won’t win in 2015, but like every time he rolls out a new swing, he’s willing to take two steps back in order to take 10 steps forward.

Woods said, per Alan Shipnuck of Golf.com, “I kept telling everybody I'm making some changes in my game, and it's going to take a while. It was only a matter of time before it started clicking.”

That was 1999 during the U.S. Open at Pinehurst. Once that first major swing change took place, he went on a stretch of some of the most dominant golf we have ever seen.

Stats are courtesy of PGATour.com and EuropeanTour.com, unless noted otherwise.