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 You Snooze, You Lose
Posted: Friday June 18, 1999 11:47 AM By Alan Shipnuck, Sports Illustrated PINEHURST, N.C. -- O.K., a confession. I awoke Thursday morning circa 6:45 and -- in keeping with my promise to you, the readers -- was all set to pop out of bed and scurry to Pinehurst No. 2 in order to memorialize the day's events. Then I remembered one of the national championship's most shopworn cliches: You can't win the Open on Thursday, but you can lose it. This applies to the performance of writers as well. I rolled over and slept until 11. I got to the course in time to see Phil Mickelson and David Duval play the 18th and stake their claim to the lead at 3 under, which, surprisingly, held up throughout the day. It's no coincidence that the names atop the leaderboard were mostly big boppers, John Daly and Tiger Woods included. The course was playing brutally long with the soft fairways and saturated rough. The afternoon sun was a welcome development for the rest of the field, as a faster course will neutralize the long hitters' advantage, at least to some degree. A word on Daly: We've grown strangely numb to his trailer-park hairdos, and though he makes Fat Bastard look like Manute Bol, Daly being tubby is hardly news either. But what up with those howlingly absurd glasses? Does he think he's a member of Devo? Has he been infected with a strain of the madness that made Tom Kite wear those ridiculous specs for two decades? Know this: No golfer will ever win the U.S. Open wearing rose-colored surfer-dude shades. Either he loses 'em or his fate is sealed. Sadly, I got to watch almost no golf Thursday, and it had nothing to do with the free food and drink that was beckoning in the Sports Illustrated publishing side's hospitality tent. I've got an early week assignment that kept me sequestered in the Village of Pinehurst throughout the afternoon. It was a pleasant way to spend the day, but I'm gonna get up bright and early Friday and walk the course until my feet blister. That's the plan, unless the Pine Crest intervenes later tonight. Alan Shipnuck is a Sports Illustrated staff writer. The opinions expressed here are solely those of the writer.
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