US Open 2016: Biggest Winners and Losers from Oakmont
For those who like their major championships with a side of drama, it was a masterpiece.
The U.S. Open at Oakmont had intermittently awful weather, a lingering anonymous interloper and a final round that included a meltdown, a redemption and a look at the perpetual silliness of golf rules.
When the sun went down in suburban Pittsburgh, Dustin Johnson was the 2016 U.S. Open champion.
But the story of the tournament includes more than the guy who'd long been known for snatching defeat from the jaws of victory. Toward that end, here are the biggest winners and losers from four days of golf.
Winner: Andrew Landry
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Sometimes, the fairy tale ends badly.
But while Andrew Landry wound up a nondescript 15th-place finisher in his first major, he still leaves Western Pennsylvania as the top story among the people not called "U.S. Open champion."
Ranked just 624th in the world as play began, the 28-year-old Texan impressed with his cool demeanor as he contended for a title no one had considered him qualified to win.
He was a shot ahead of the field after 18 holes, a shot off the lead after 36 and still within four of the lead as the tournament wound into its final day. He never seemed too small for the stage, which indicates it may not be the last time he's on it.
"No nerves, very comfortable," he told NBC after Saturday's round. "I feel like I played good golf on hard golf courses where par is a good score. That's just kind of my game. It's always been my game.
"It's kind of like Q school. It's the same thing with Q school. It's such a hard, long six rounds of golf. You just have to stay really patient and try not to make a lot of mistakes."
Loser: The Big Three
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Big Three, schmig three.
Just when it appeared either Jason Day, Rory McIlroy or Jordan Spieth was a lead-pipe cinch to challenge for every single major championship on the schedule, in came Oakmont.
The country club made mere mortals of the Australian, Northern Irishman and American, reducing the clear pre-tournament favorites to also-rans from Thursday to Sunday.
Day's opening-round 76 put him in catch-up mode for the remainder of the event. McIlroy's 77-71 had him out of the competition by the midway point. Spieth was uncharacteristically scattershot in scoring above par in three of four rounds and was never a factor.
According to Odds Shark, Day was a 6-1 betting proposition entering the week, while McIlroy was 13-2, and Spieth was 8-1.
Incidentally, the eventual winner, Dustin Johnson, was a 14-1 pick going in.
Big Four, anyone?
Winner: Jack Nicklaus' Grand Slam Record
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Jack Nicklaus hasn't breathed this easily in eight years.
The most prolific winner of major titles was seen as a short-term standard-bearer when Tiger Woods earned his 14th at age 32 at the 2008 U.S. Open. But the subsequent decline of the world's former No. 1 player has once again cast the Golden Bear's record as one not likely to ever be broken.
Jordan Spieth's two wins in 2015 generated optimism that the young Texan was beginning a long-term run, but his self-destruction at the Masters in April and a non-factor performance at Oakmont kept Nicklaus a full 16 majors clear of any player who's won any big trophies since the start of 2015.
Unless Woods, now ranked 569th in the world, catches fire again, there's no imminent danger.
And take heart, Jack: Sunday's first-time winner, Dustin Johnson, still has 17 to go to tie.
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Loser: Phil Mickelson's Career Slam Hopes
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Sorry, Lefty fans, this dream appears dead.
The reality when he wakes up Monday will be Phil Mickelson is 46 years old.
He's not won a major tournament in three years, and his last three trips to the U.S. Open have now resulted in ties for 28th and 64th, along with a missed cut.
So while he's an all-time great, the idea he'll be any closer to crossing the American national championship off his bucket list as a 47-year-old at Erin Hills or a 48-year-old at Shinnecock Hills seems a significant stretch of "he's our favorite" sentimentality—no matter how badly he still wants it.
"I could BS you and tell you I don't think about it, but I think about it all the time," he told Ron Cook of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. "It's my national open. It would mean the world to me. Until I ultimately win this tournament it will be my biggest thought, my biggest focus because I view those players that have won the four majors totally different than I view all the others."
Mickelson has finished runner-up at the U.S. Open a record six times.
Winner: Fox's Television Coverage
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Let's face it: There was nowhere to go but up.
Fox was on the short end of heavy criticism at this time in 2015, following year one of its 12-year contract ($93 million per year) to carry the American national championship.
But while some would have preferred NBC or CBS talent in the broadcast tower this time, too, the level of quality commentary presented by the newest of the four major networks in its second U.S. Open go-round was higher by comparison.
Quarterback Joe Buck was every bit as solid at Oakmont Country Club as he would have been 14 miles away at Heinz Field. Adjacent colleagues Paul Azinger and Brad Faxon were more critical and less cheerleader-ish than Greg Norman in the same role in the debut outing.
The coverage shined particularly in its on-course reporting.
It illustrated the differences between Shane Lowry's one-stroke penalty on the 16th hole Saturday and Dustin Johnson's initial avoidance of the same infraction at No. 5 on Sunday. It explained the reasons behind an advantageous ball drop that Johnson was given a while later on the 10th hole thanks to a conveniently positioned TV tower.
Having ex-USGA boss David Fay on hand to interpret the murky world of golf rules and etiquette was a gigantic bonus for the fledgling network, and the post-round interview with current managing director Jeff Hall put an informative bow on a chaotic breaking news day.
And hey, even the ball-tracker wasn't so annoying this time either.
Loser: Late-Season Media Hype
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One thing's for certain: Coverage of the British Open will be different this year.
While the 2015 event at St. Andrews was awash in the casual fan awareness that Jordan Spieth could be three-quarters of the way to a single-season Grand Slam, this year's run-up to Royal Troon may instead focus on which of the game's best players is ready for a redemption.
Hardcore fans only need apply.
Spieth's final-round disintegration at Augusta short-circuited any hope for his own repeat run in 2016 and instead handed the Masters to unheralded Englishman Danny Willett. Willett proceeded to shoot nine-over par at the U.S. Open to end any hype that a slam pursuit was again possible.
Spieth also finished nine over at Oakmont and will arrive in Scotland next month answering questions about whether his 20-something domination has already reached its end.
"What's tough to swallow leaving this week is you do all this work on this course, and it was the easy little iron/wedge holes that tore me apart," he told reporters after Sunday's round. "But I think that's just kind of bad timing on them."
Winner: Dustin Johnson
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The poster boy for cringe-inducing meltdowns managed to evade rules-interpretation disaster Sunday at Oakmont while winning his first major by three shots over Jim Furyk, Scott Piercy and Shane Lowry.
"There's no player out here that deserves it more than Dustin Johnson," Fox analyst Brad Faxon said. "For him to accomplish this, especially after what happened last year, is awfully impressive."
Johnson was a shot off Andrew Landry's first-round lead, went up a shot after two rounds and found himself four back of Lowry entering Sunday.
He remained steady throughout his final round—birdieing the second and ninth to offset bogeys at the fifth and 14th and then sticking an approach shot within three feet on the 18th to lock up the title, even with a one-shot penalty.
The win made him the fifth player to win a year after finishing second, putting him in a legendary group alongside Tiger Woods, Payne Stewart, Jack Nicklaus and Bobby Jones.
"It hasn't quite sunk in yet. It feels great," Johnson told Fox's Joe Buck after the trophy presentation. "I've been here a bunch of times and haven't quite gotten it done, but I did today, and it feels really good."
As for the greeting from Paulina Gretzky and their toddler after the 72nd hole, he'll remember that, too.
"Best Father's Day ever," he said.
Loser: The USGA
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Luckily for the USGA, it ultimately didn't matter.
When a rules official following Dustin Johnson on Sunday's fifth hole opened a career-defining can of worms, only a wishy-washy call by the U.S. Open's governing body seven holes later at the 12th—when the player was informed he might be given a penalty after the round—could have made it worse.
And when it did, the rest of the back nine at the American national championship was transformed from a victory lap for Johnson to a social media flare-up in which some of the game's highest-profile names vied to be first to land the pithiest jab.
"This is ridiculous," Rory McIlroy tweeted. "No penalty whatsoever for DJ. Let the guy play without this crap in his head. Amateur hour from @USGA."
Jordan Spieth chimed in, too.
"Lemme get this straight," he opined, also via Twitter. "DJ doesn't address it. It's ruled that he didn't cause it to move. Now you tell him he may have? Now? This a joke?"
Johnson's decisive win made the point moot, but the chaos is sure to leave a mark that'll be revisited on a yearly basis.
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