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How the world’s best players navigate this classic George C. Thomas Jr. venue will be most intriguing. Firm-and-fast conditions should challenge players to control and shape shots into these rolling fairways and greens. There should be more of an emphasis this week on the ground game—which is often lost in this era of bomb and gouge—which should excite most purists.
Of course, there’s also the lingering news about the PGA Tour’s future with its PIF partnership. That’s for another day, though it won’t be totally ignored now that shots are being hit. All of it just adds to the anticipation of this Thursday at LACC.
U.S. Open 2023: Latest Updates (all times eastern):
10:45 a.m.: The morning’s first ‘featured group’ is getting underway on the first hole as Shane Lowry, Justin Thomas and Tommy Fleetwood all start their rounds off on the handshake opener. And actually all three players missed the fairway. It’s a massive fairway at No. 1, so that’s a bit of a surprise.
At No. 10, Tyrrell Hatton, Bryson DeChambeau and Francesco Molinari have began their days. It’ll be interesting to see how big and brawny Bryson does on this layout that demands finesse.
Molinari and Lowry converted birdies out of this sextet. That gives us 10 players tied at the top at 1-under. We’ve yet to see anybody reach 2-under, but there are some birdies out there this morning.
10:34 a.m.: How about this shot from amateur Michael Brennan! In this precarious spot right of the third green, it didn’t look like Brennan had much of a shot. But as we know from his incredible up and down he converted to earn a spot in sectional qualifying at the Woodmont qualifier, this kid’s got all the shots.
10:18 a.m.: You will see a number of players start their day with birdies at the par-5 opener. One thing you’ll see on some other George Thomas designs is how he liked to start golfers off with a nice opener, followed by a tough second hole—also designed to spread out groups for pace-of-play purposes. Ryan Gerard and Adam Svensson holed short birdie putts at the par-5 first. But Michael Kim and Scott Stallings actually birdied their first holes, the 10th, to start their days. Omar Morales will always have those 8-10 minutes where he led the U.S. Open by himself!
10:02 a.m.: We highlighted Morales below, and he hit two high-quality shots into the par-5 opener. His fairway wood from 245 yards out rolled nicely onto the green and came back within about 20 feet of the cup. The eagle bid slid by, but he converts the short birdie putt. Now the native of Mexico can boast that he led the U.S. Open all by himself, regardless of what happens from here. Seriously, Morales has played LACC North dozens of times being a UCLA kid. For those of us in office pools and playing DFS, why did we not play this kid?!
On the other end is Hank Lebioda, who did not have as easy of a time on his first hole. He went bunker to bunker for his second and third shots, leading to an opening double bogey.
9:45 a.m.: The first groupings are in position and ready to start the 123rd U.S. Open! The first tee shot of the day was hit by a kid with experience playing LA golf—Omar Morales, who just wrapped up his sophomore season at UCLA, and who shot rounds of 65-65 as the medalist at Hillcrest to qualify. It’s worth watching the USGA video below to hear more about Morales’ story:
Berry Henson was one of the first players to tee off as well, starting his round at 6:45 a.m. local time. Henson has an interesting story—traveling all over the world to try to make it, including playing the Asian Tour. He’s gotten a lot of publicity this week as he has been known to drive for Uber in his downtime. Our Joel Beall wrote a great story about Henson earlier this week.
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