BlogQuicken Loans National Preview and Picks

The Buzz:

Sorry first that we are a day late with this, sometimes it’s hard to be at a major and then get these previews done the next day.

Also sorry but here is a short take on the U.S. Open.

What happened is a shame, in past U.S. Opens the days after is always devoted to how well the winner did and what the accomplishment will do for his career.  But because the USGA got in the way of things, we are talking more about a rule and how bad the USGA handled things.

First of all, I don’t like the overall language of Rule 18.2 which is what is being discussed. I think this was a border ruling that the USGA felt that 51% of the movement was caused by Dustin Johnson and they were going to give him a one shot penalty.  Frankly I can’t see how they got that, the replays are very vague, but in the incident Johnson said he didn’t cause the ball to move, Lee Westwood agreed with him, the two caddies agreed and the rule official along with them also came to that conclusion.  So the case should of been closed.

Out of respect for the U.S. Open and the USGA who knows the rules better than anyone else, if they concluded that Johnson caused the ball to move, then we should give them respect that even though we don’t like the ruling it’s there tournament and they are the experts in things like this.

But the problem was the way they carried out the ruling.  Jeff Hall went out and told Johnson on the 12th tee that there was a problem and said there would be a possible penalty because of this.  Now Johnson is not one to argue and he took it that way.  As Rory McIlroy has told the world, he wouldn’t of hit another shot until he knew how he stood.  That is what the USGA should of done, they should of just told Johnson, the rest of the field, the fans in the gallery and the TV audience that they were going to give Johnson a one shot penalty and gone on with business.  At least everyone would of know how things stood.  But by saying that they weren’t going to give an answer until Johnson finished his round was totally wrong and took the excitement of the back nine away from the players and the outcome of the championship.

Guess that won’t happen again as the USGA issued an apology for getting in the way and said that they will review and make sure something like this won’t happen again.

Oh before we end the U.S. Open have to say that Dustin played great and it was a outstanding victory for him.  His powerful game gives him a distinct advantage over others, but he has practiced hard to make sure his power is straight and doesn’t get him in trouble which is the secret to his game.  Since stats were kept in 1980 only two champions led the driving distance stat and greens hit at the U.S. Open, Johnson and Tiger Woods in 2000.  When a person like Johnson can hit it far he does have a big advantage and I just wonder now that he has gone over the hump and won, if this won’t open up the flood-gates to many more wins.

Lot’s of excitement in the next three months:

This week we have the Quicken Loans Championship and over the course of the next couple of months, we will have one event and then a big event.  Next week is the WGC-Bridgestone along with the French Open, after that the Greenbrier, followed by the British Open, followed by the Canadian Open followed by the PGA Championship.  Then after that you have in a span of eight weeks the Olympics, the four FedEx Cup events and the Ryder Cup, so the next three months will be very busy.

Tournament information:

At the start of the 2007 PGA season, it appeared that The International, the PGA’s lone stop in Colorado, would be gearing up to host its 21st annual golf tournament. However, very early on in the season, doubts began to arise about the tournament’s future as the search for a corporate sponsor was at a stand-still. On February 8, 2007, tournament director Greg Vickers announced that the 2007 International would not be played, primarily due to the lack of corporate sponsorship.

As soon as the date opened up on the PGA Tour calendar, Tiger Woods, who has expressed a desire to host a tournament in the past, entered into discussions with the PGA Tour. His goal was to create an exclusive event that would not only fill the year’s void left by the demise of The International, but for years to come. On March 7, with less than one month of negotiations behind the two parties, Tiger Woods and the PGA Tour announced that the Washington D.C. area would play host to the inaugural AT&T National. The event took over for the Booz Allen Classic, which folded after the July 2006 event after a 39 year run with 27 of those in the Washington D.C. area. The 2007 event was played at The Congressional Country Club in nearby Bethesda, MD.

Despite the short time in getting it ready, the first year went off well, and it looked like the future of this event was going to be great.  In 2008 tournament host Tiger Woods had surgery right before the event and was not only able to play, but he couldn’t even attend the event. He did return the next year and won.

The event had a great run at Congressional and with it holding the U.S. Open in 2011 it needed to rebuild its greens.  So the AT&T National moved in 2010 for two years to the Philadelphia area with Aronimink Golf Club having a  successful run with Justin Rose and Nick Watney winning.  The tournament returned to Congressional in 2012 and held the event in 2013 and 2014 before it moved to Robert Trent Jones last year.  The change was brought on when Congressional members didn’t want the event on a permanent basis, so they voted to bring it back in 2016, 2018 and 2020.  Look for the event to move around the Washington area, going for a year to TPC Potomac at Avenel Farms in 2017.

Course information:

Congressional Golf Club

• Bethesda, MD.
• 7,569 yards     Par 36-35–71

From the beginning, Congressman Oscar Bland and O.R. Lubring envisioned The Congressional Country Club as a bond between Washington-based businessman and politicians. In 1921, the two founders took their idea to then Secretary of Commerce Herbert Hoover in hopes of gaining the approval of one of Washington’s biggest power brokers. Hoover loved the idea and agreed to become the Club’s President from the breaking of ground in 1922 to its inauguration in 1924.  Today the club membership is more family orientated. Some of the original founding members include Calvin Coolidge, Warren Harding, Woodrow Wilson, William H. Taft, Harvey S. Firestone, William C. Carnegie, William Randolph Hearst and Walter P. Chrysler.

Congressional has a big list of championships played on it including; the 1964, ’97 and 2011 U.S. Open, the 1976 PGA Championships, the 1995 nineU.S. Senior Open along with the site of the Kemper Open between 1980-1986, the 2005 Booz Allen Classic along with six of the seven Quicken Loans National.

Congressional boasts two championship courses, the Blue and Gold; however, the Blue course has played host to every professional event at Congressional. The course was originally designed by Devereaux Emmet in 1922. Since the Blue course’s creation, there have been three major changes to the golf course. Bobby Jones, in 1957, built nine holes that would eventually become part of the Gold Course. The final nine holes were completed by Rees Jones in 1989. In 2006, Rees Jones returned to The Congressional to redesign the Par 3 18th. The tee box and the green was flipped-flopped, and the hole now plays a lot harder with the water coming more into play. The hole is now the 10th hole, and each proceeding hole was shifted backward accordingly.

The Blue course received acclaim when it was ranked 89th among “America’s 100 Greatest Golf Courses” by Golf Digest in 2005 and most recently ranked 77th in its 2014-15 list. It’s 59th on Golf Magazines top 100 in the United States.  With a course rating, of 75.4, slope rating of 138, Congressional could be one of the most difficult stops on tour this year. The fairways tees and greens are bentgrass while the rough is a combination of fescue, rye and Blue grass making it very hard to get out and control the ball.

The Congressional Blue Course can be described as having a fair amount of bunkers in almost unfair places. Unlike most courses, the 102 bunkers that line Congressional are placed in the vicinity of where golfers are aiming. No hole better exemplifies this than the par 3 2nd. The 211-yard hole has six bunkers (front, left, and right) that guard the large, undulating green.

In 2014 Congressional played to a 72.33 average while in 2013 it played to a 72.124 scoring average, just over a shot over par.  It ranked as the 5th hardest course on the PGA Tour in 2014.

Let’s take a look at key stats that are important for those playing at the Quicken Loans National:

This is based on the most vital stats for the Congressional Country Club, based on data from the 2014 Quicken Loans and using data from all the players in the field with stats from 2016.
Congressional is a great course, it has held three U.S. Opens and a PGA Championship. It held the Booz Allen for eight years and when the Quicken Loans came into existence in 2007 one of the selling points was that Congressional would hold the event. It was played in 2007, ’08 & ’09 before it moved temporally to Philadelphia because the U.S. Open would be held at Congressional in 2011. The Quicken Loans went back to Congressional in 2012, ’13 and ’14 before moving for a year to Robert Trent Jones.

The course plays almost as tough as Oakmont did last week. In 2014 it played to a 72.55 average, ranked 5th hardest on tour that year for it’s one and a half shots over par performance. The key to the course is from tee to green, the fairways are hard to drive as most of the holes are tree-lined (difference from last week at Oakmont) along with some nasty rough. Congressional Blue can be described as having a fair amount of bunkers in almost unfair places. Unlike most courses, the 102 bunkers that line Congressional are placed in the vicinity of where golfers are aiming. No hole better exemplifies this than the par 3 2nd. The 211-yard hole has six bunkers (front, left, and right) that guard the large, undulating green.

The Washington area has had a fair amount of rain in May and June, so the rough, which is a combination of fescue, rye and Blue grass will be very hard to get out and control the ball. The good news is that after some light rain on Thursday, it will be hot and dry the rest of the week.

Every phase of the game will be examined at Congressional. First you have to hit it straight off the tee because the fairways are lined with strategy placed bunkers that are tough to get out of, along with rough that is 2 to 4 inches. Once you hit the fairway, hitting it into the greens is an adventure, they are hard to hold and with lots of undulations, you have to place the shot on the right side to have a putt at birdie. Just like at Congressional the winner needs to hit it long and straight; just look at the last three winners at Congressional, Justin Rose, Bill Haas and Tiger Woods, they all hit it long and straight.

So in looking at our four categories, our first is driving accuray. This is going to be the an important item, in 2014 the course ranked 14th in driving accuracy while winner Justin Rose was T-11th. New is greens in regulation, in 2014 Congressional ranked 17th on tour while winner Rose was T-13th. In 2014 Congressional was 3rd in scrambling, showing the importance of this stat when you consider how many players do miss greens. In 2014 Rose was T-27th in that stat. Last is par-breakers, it’s hard making birdies and pars at Congressional the course ranked 5th on tour (6th in Birdie average, 2nd in eagles per hole) while Rose was T-5th in par-breakers.

So you can see Congressional will set up a very interesting challenge for the players. In looking at past champions all six from Congressional are past PGA Tour winners so you need to have that talent of knowing how to win:
*Fairway Accuracy: percentage of times a drive is in the fairway

*Greens in Regulation: Stat is great barometer on how good players manage their games around Congressional. Every year the players that hit lot’s of greens do well.

*Scrambling: The percent of time a player misses the green in regulation, but still makes par or better.

*Par Breakers: The course allows a lot of birdies and eagles to be made, so parbreakers is the percent of time scores are under par.

Players from this year’s field with stats from 2016:

Click any column title in the table header to sort columns.

For the rest of the players, hit this link:

Here are some of the secrets of what it takes to play well at the Quicken Loans National:

Key stat for the winner:

Congressional played host to the 1997 and 2011 U.S. Open. Most believe that, like it would be in a U.S. Open, the key statistic will be fairways hit off the tee. The rough is at 4 inches which will be costly for players that don’t hit it straight. Just look at the winners of the last six Quicken loans held at Congressional and the ’11 U.S. Open played at Congressional to see how key these stats are for the winners. In 2007 K.J. Choi was T5th in fairways hit, T5th in greens hit and T5th in putting which is a deadly combination. In 2008 Anthony Kim was T12th in greens hit and T8th in putting while in 2009 Tiger was T7th in fairways hit, T3rd in greens hit and T13th in putting.  When Rory McIlroy won the ’11 Open at Congressional, he was first in greens hit.  In 2012 Tiger was T9th in putting so it just shows you have to play week in the fundamentals of golf to win at Congressional.  In 2013 greens hit was the key for champion Bill Haas who ranked T4th while he was T11th in putting.  In 2014 Justin Rose was T-13th in greens hit and putting.

Here are some more key stats to look to for this week:

Experience at Congresssional will be a big help, look for players that have played well at Congressional in the 2011 U.S. Open and the last three Quicken Loans played on the course to have the advantage.

If you want to see who can win, just look at the winners at courses like Quail Hollow, Riviera, Muirfield Village, Colonial, East Lake or even a modern course like Bay Hill or TPC Sawgrass.  I would almost bet the farm that whoever wins this week, will also have a title from one of those courses, just like Bill Haas in 2013 and Justin Rose in 2014 (Has won at Riviera & East Lake, Rose at Muirfield Village).

Hitting greens will be at a premium, just like in a U.S. Open hitting lots of greens goes a long way in this event.  Look for the winner to hit globs of greens this week.

The par 4s are some of the best in the country so playing them well is important.  For Choi and Kim, they were 8 under in victory while Rory McIlroy was the best in 2011 playing them in 11 under.  In 2012 Tiger was 3 under on them while Haas was 2 under on them in 2013 and Justin Rose was 3 over in his 2014 victory.

Weather should not play a factor like it did last week.  The weather has been wet the last couple of months, so Congressional will be lush.  It will be steamy this week with high humidity and temperatures in the mid-80s, but after Thursday morning showers there shouldn’t be any more rain.

Also like it is this time of year there is a small chance of a pop-up thunderstorms in the afternoon if it gets too hot.