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Stat attack!: U.S. Open preview

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Dustin Johnson of the USA waves to the crowd on the ninth hole during the second round of the WGC - HSBC Champions at the Sheshan International Golf Club on November 1, 2013 in Shanghai, China. (Photo by Andrew Redington/Getty Images)

The 2013-14 PGA Tour season has taken some getting used to. Tiger Woods is injured and has been supplanted – at least for the time being – by Jordan Spieth as the game’s must-watch star. Phil Mickelson doesn’t have a top-10 finish on Tour. And of the top-10 players on the FedEx Cup standings, only Bubba Watson has won a major in his career. Should any of them be on our radar at the U.S. Open?

The top 10 players on the FedEx Cup standings

FedEx
Rank
PlayerWorld
Rank
U.S. Open history
1Jimmy Walker192 starts, none since 2002
2 Bubba Watson38 starts, 4 cuts, T-5 in 2007
3Matt Kuchar511 starts, 6 cuts, T-6 in 2010
4Dustin Johnson (pictured)156 starts, 5 cuts, T-8 in 2010
5Jordan Spieth102 starts, 1 cut, T-21 in 2012
6Chris Kirk432 starts, 1 cut, none since 2009
7Patrick Reed26Making his tournament debut
8Harris English48Making his tournament debut
9Brendon Todd55Making his tournament debut
10Kevin Na403 starts, 1 cut, T-29 in 2012

Initially, there doesn’t appear to be a lot to choose from. Only three players have a top-10 finish in the U.S. Open, and five haven’t played in any of the last four Opens. But that’s to be expected, isn’t it. FedEx Cup leaders don’t usually win the Open. Since the inception of the PGA Tour Playoffs, only Tiger Woods was ranked in the top 25 of the standings at the time of his U.S. Open victory, and he had to go extra holes on a broken leg to beat Rocco Mediate, who was 127th at the time.

Rankings of U.S. Open champions at time of win

YearPlayerFedEx RankWorld Rank
2013Justin Rose305
2012Webb Simpson3214
2011Rory McIlroyNA5
2010Graeme McDowellNA37
2009Lucas Glover2671
2008Tiger Woods11
2007Angel Cabrera15541

But if the U.S. Open winner wasn’t a FedEx Cup leader, recent history shows he was a world-class player. The last four Open champions have been first-time major winners, three of whom were ranked among the top 14 players in the world. All four were age 32 or younger (the Open winner has skewed young since 2007, when 37-year-old Angel Cabrera took the title). Four of the last six winners were in the top 32 on the FedEx standings, and the two who weren’t did not have Tour status but were worldwide stars in their own right. If the trend continues we can expect a young veteran star who has played well this year in the U.S. or Europe to win his first career major at Pinehurst. A second look at the current FedEx Cup leaderboard above reveals five players with a better-than-average chance at Pinehurst.

Major-less players in the top 30 on the World Ranking and the FedEx Standings

PlayerFedEx RankWorld RankAge
Jimmy Walker11935
Matt Kuchar3535
Dustin Johnson41529
Jordan Spieth51020
Patrick Reed72623
Hideki Matsuyama161322
Victor DubuissonNA2024
Jamie DonaldsonNA2938

Like McIlroy and McDowell when they won the Open, Dubuisson and Donaldson are not PGA Tour members, but I’ve inlcuded them here because they fit the criteria. They are in the top-five on the European Tour’s Race to Dubai. Among the group, you can probably eliminate Reed and Dubuisson for lack of Open experience and Donaldson as being too old. The others – although Kuchar and Walker are a bit over age 32 – fit our parameters. If form holds, the Open champion at Pinehurst will come from among Walker, Kuchar, Johnson, Spieth or Matsuyama.


But we know how often form doesn’t hold at a major. How else do you explain Angel Cabrera or Y.E. Yang. Are there any other ways to determine who might play well this week?

The typical U.S. Open set up – tight fairways, deep rough, slick greens – leans toward a player who hits greens and capitalizes by making putts. In the last 10 years no Open champ has finished outside the top 20 in greens in regulation or putts per GIR. Because of the variation between Open courses, distance and accuracy carry less weight. Case in point: When Simpson won in 2012 at Olympic Club he averaged less than 280 yards off the tee and ranked T-13 in accuracy at just 55.4 percent. A year earlier at Congressional, McIlroy averaged 32 more yards per drive, and ranked T-26 in fairways hit despite hitting five more fairways than Simpson. Here are the basic stats for the last 10 U.S. Open champions.

Statistics of U.S. Open champions: 2004-2013

YearWinnerDistanceAccuracyGIRScramblingPutts per GIR
2013Justin
Rose
300.4 (15) 75.0% (T-2) 69.4% (T-7) 45.5% (25) 1.820 (15)
2012Webb
Simpson
278.9 (53) 55.4 (T-13) 58.3 (T-16) 60.0% (T-9)1.738 (9)
2011Rory
McIlroy
310.6 (7) 64.3 (T-26)86.11 (1)70.0% (T-3) 1.710 (6)
2010 Graeme
McDowell
293.8 (31) 66.1 (T-34) 58.3 (T-12) 53.3% (22) 1.690 (2)
2009Lucas
Glover
291.1 (8) 71.4 (T-13) 72.2 (4) 55.0% (19) 1.731 (4)
2008Tiger
Woods
320.9 (2) 53.6 (T-56) 63.9 (T-14) 53.9 (27) 1.739 (10)
2007 Angel
Cabrera
310.9 (2) 48.2 (T-48) 65.3 (T-3) 36.0 (T-50) 1.787 (6)
2006Geoff
Ogilvy
306.4 (6) 57.1 (T-21) 58.3 (T-13) 60.0 (3) 1.833 (18)
2005Michael
Campbell
294.3 (36) 64.3 (T-8) 56.9 (T-16) 61.3 (9) 1.805 (16)
2004Retief
Goosen
314.0 (T-5)58.9 (T-12)58.3 (T-9)70.0 (1)1.738 (T-10)

What players rank among the leaders on Tour in greens in regulation and putts per GIR? There are seven players who rank among the top 30 in both statistics.

U.S. Open players in the top 30 on the PGA Tour in GIR and putting average

PlayerGIR rankPutts per GIR rank
Bubba Watson62
Sergio Garcia818
Dustin Johnson129
Ryan Palmer2113
Jimmy Walker237
Adam Scott2512
Rory McIlroy281

Now that’s a list! There are no players the USGA and NBC would not be excited about if they were in the final pairing Sunday. Maybe Palmer and Walker, but that’s about it. And it gets better. Zach Johnson, Matt Kuchar and Ryan Moore are in the top 50 in each stat, and Phil Mickelson ranks in the top 60 in both.


Three players - Dustin Johnson, Jimmy Walker and Matt Kuchar - fit both criterias, so let’s call them the Open favorites. Here’s how they’ve fared in previous Opens.

Johnson, Walker and Kuchar in the U.S. Open

JohnsonWalkerKuchar
Starts6211
Cuts 516
Top 10s101
Best finishT-8 (2010)T52 (2001)T-6 (2010)
Last year55DNPT-28
Career
scoring avg.
72.8674.1773.24

One final thought: Of this group, Johnson has come the closest to winning an Open. He held a three-stroke lead through 54 holes at Pebble Beach in 2010, but began his final round with a par, triple bogey and double bogey, shot 82 and fell to T-8. The 82 is the highest final-round score by a 54-hole leader since World War II, and Johnson has the second-biggest 54-hole lead lost at the Open in that span (Payne Stewart, four strokes in 1998, is the biggest).

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