Tiger's shadow looms, and that's fine with
Jones
By JOSEPH WHITE AP Sports Writer
BETHESDA, Md. (AP) - Grouped with Tiger Woods for the first
two rounds of the U.S. Open, Steve Jones stands to become one
of the most ignored defending champions in the tournament's history.
He doesn't seem to mind.
"Will Tiger's appearance in this year's U.S. Open take
pressure off me? Most definitely," Jones said Monday during
a visit to Congressional Country Club, site of the June 12-15
Open. "And I'm grateful for it. It'll be great playing with
him the first couple of days, maybe all four days."
It's not surprising Jones is willing to give away some of the
limelight. After all, this is someone who's been using last year's
prize money to move to Montana to pursue a passion for fly fishing.
But there will be no place for Jones to hide when he shares
a Thursday-Friday threesome with Woods and British Open champion
Tom Lehman. The crowds will be enormous. They will be noisy. And,
chances are, they'll be cheering for the 21-year-old phenom who
blew away the field at the Masters.
Then they'll scamper to the next tee as soon as Woods has putted
out, leaving Jones and Lehman to contend with a sea of moving
bodies if they're still on the green.
"I'll just have to play good enough so that I'm not hitting
last all the time," Jones said. "I'm thinking about
wearing headphones, maybe that will help."
More seriously, Jones said such distractions have become part
of the game.
"There's always noise," he said. "There's always
movement. I've hit when trains are going by. Normally, I try not
to make a big deal out of the noise because the more you make
a big deal out of it, the bigger your ears get. It can be tough
sometimes if there's a marquee player."
Woods should find Congressional a greater challenge than Augusta.
The 7,213-yard, par-70 course has the usual features of a U.S.
Open - a treacherous rough and a layout designed to reward the
consistent player ahead of the aggressive one.
"I guarantee you every Open course does not reward aggressive
play," said Buzz Taylor, a U.S. Golf Association executive
committee member. "If you play aggressively, you're going
to need a hell of a lot of luck. Anybody who's behind trying to
catch up will tell you that. You have to hit the ball to a certain
position on the green to have a chance to make a birdie."
That doesn't mean, however, that Congressional has been designed
to stop Woods - or anyone else, for that matter.
"There's a difference between great tests of a player's
shot-making ability and the ridiculous," Taylor said. "Would
we fundamentally alter the set-up of the golf course? No. This
course was fundamentally set up two years ago."
This year's tournament, for the first time in 88 years at the
U.S. Open, will have a par-3 finish. The downhill final hole was
played as No. 10 when the Open was at this venue in 1964 and again
when Congressional staged the U.S. Senior Open two years ago.
The tee has been moved back to 190 yards, and the steeper slopes
around the green mean the water will swallow up anything short
or left.
"It's going to be a harder hole than people realize,"
Jones said. "It's going to make things very interesting.
It's going to be like Tiger and Tom on the first hole of the playoff
at the Mercedes this year. It's going to be one shot - boom -
and it's over with."
The change means the pros will play the course in the same
order as the club's members do every day. The club also has removed
some trees between Nos. 17 and 18, so as many as 7,000 fans will
be able to watch both holes without moving. Needless to say, the
view from the 18th tee will be daunting.
"There'll be some butterflies when they stand over that
one, if the Open hangs on it," Taylor said.
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