SOUTHAMPTON, N.Y. — Emiliano Grillo was the first person to conquer the Shinnecock Hills monster on Saturday, so, of course, everyone wondered how he did it. It was like he had slayed a dragon with a dull sword when no one even thought the beast could bleed.
What Grillo talked about afterward, though, was more like fear. Before he’d teed off on Saturday, Grillo watched in horror as the broadcast showed the early action. He saw Dylan Wu five-putt and make an 8 on the first hole. He saw the wind blow Chris Gotterup’s ball off a green. He saw the U.S. Open test everyone expected had finally arrived.
So hours later, after Grillo somehow went birdie-birdie-birdie-birdie on Nos. 6-9 and sat on the 10th tee four under for his third round, he had only one thought: I need to get this to the house fast.
On Saturday at the U.S. Open, Shinnecock Hills finally became Shinnecock Hills. Grillo’s three-under 67 was the low round of the day. Only Scottie Scheffler, who shot 69, had the other under-par round. This came after a whopping 36 players were in red figures in the first two rounds.
Wyndham Clark nearly shot under par. He missed a 5-footer on 18 and had to settle for 70, and at seven under he takes a commanding lead into Sunday. Four chasers — including Scheffler — are six back at one under. Twenty-one players have held 54-hole major leads of six or more, and only one didn’t win (Greg Norman at the 1996 Masters).
“Scottie is the best player in the world, and he’s going to play probably really good,” Clark said. “He always does, but it’s nice to have a six-shot lead on him. But really I’m just going to keep approaching it the same way. If I go out and execute and go through my process and hit the shots I know I can hit, I like my chances.”
But conditions Sunday will likely be difficult again.
The USGA played it safe on Thursday and Friday (you don’t want the course to get away from you on Day 1 or 2). Back in 2004, a Sunday disaster on the 7th green cast a dark shadow on the tournament. In 2018, Phil Mickelson played hockey on the 13th green — his own unique way to protest conditions — and Zach Johnson famously decried, “They’ve lost the golf course.” The USGA and, perhaps, the host club, would not want that to be a storyline again this time.
That, paired with a strong wind forecast, led to a more benign Thursday setup, and Friday was similar. Fifteen players shot under par on Thursday. Twenty-one on Friday. But enough was enough, the USGA thought.
Ben Griffin warned everyone Friday night. He tweeted a text message players received from the USGA: “The course will be prepared to play progressively firmer and the target green speed will be 11.0 on the USGA stimpmeter.”
Boy, did it deliver.
Wu, after he opened with an 8, turned in 44. He shot 82. Jon Rahm played hacky sack with his driver. Justin Thomas started bogey, bogey, bogey. Matt Fitzpatrick started bogey, bogey, bogey. Scheffler: bogey, bogey. We could keep going.
James Nicholas missed the green on 10 and made an 8. Eleven had a pin location that would make you want to quit.
The sun and the wind — they can do wonders for U.S. Open setups — dried up the greens quickly. Players fired balls over and off them. It was like trying to get something to stop on an upside-down cereal bowl. So many shots rolled off the back of the 10th and 11th greens that an uneducated golf fan might have thought that was the goal.
“The fairways were starting to firm up yesterday,” Scheffler said. “Then the greens today started to firm up. You could see on the greens, you’d see some pretty green grass and then some very brown grass, so there was a little bit of mystery in terms of how the ball was going to react when it hit the green. But once again, that’s just part of the challenge of a U.S. Open is judging the conditions and putting yourself in the right spots and hitting great shots.”
It was windy but specifically gusty, and it was supposed to calm down later but did only slightly. Clark hit one from the fescue on 3 and had to cover his eyes as the wind blew the dirt back into his face. On 8, he missed the green and called it the worst shot of his life.
Sahith Theegala said short putts were so delicate that with the speed and wind factored in you’d almost rather putt from 10 feet instead of 5. Keith Mitchell tried to stick his tee into the green to fix a ball mark on 18 and it wouldn’t budge.
“There’s a few spots out there that are extremely firm already,” Mitchell said. “It changed all day. Depending on what they do tonight, tomorrow is going to be wild.”
Ah, tomorrow. Eighteen holes are left. In the four previous U.S. Opens held at Shinnecock in the last century, only three total players have finished the week under par. After Saturday — where the golf course finally fought back — that number is likely to remain low.
But let’s go back to where we started, with our man Grillo. He was asked about winning majors, and winning U.S. Opens — the most grueling of all the major tests. His answer was long and thoughtful and smart and worth reading in its entirety, but his first sentence does most of the work.
“I mean, it’s hard, man.”
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