ESPN.com - Golf Online - US Open Men 2000 - Nicklaus makes last stand at Pebble

By Doug Ferguson
Associated Press
Thursday, June 15

PEBBLE BEACH, Calif. -- Their relationship began nearly 40 years ago.

He was a 21-year-old hot shot from Ohio who nearly won the U.S. Open while paired with the great Ben Hogan. She was a California classic who could seduce players with her beauty and slay them with her ferocious temper.

Going out on a limb

Tree or no tree, Jack Nicklaus would just as soon see Pebble Beach play the way it did for the other three U.S. Opens -- a par 72.

The second hole will be a 484-yard, par 4 for the U.S. Open, primarily because a tree that once guarded the left side of the green is no longer there. The USGA experimented with the new hole during the U.S. Amateur last year and thought it was appropriate.

Nicklaus doesn't agree.

"Who cares whether or not there's a tree there? Don't you want to compare and keep the records and everything basically the same?" he said. "Why do you want to make it a par 4? It's a par 5. What difference does it make?"

The USGA has a history of changing par 5s into par 4s -- Pinehurst (No. 16), Olympic Club (No. 17). And next year, the 16th hole at Southern Hills will play 491 yards.

"I've yet to figure out the logic of taking a golf course that is being played on a year-round basis by its membership ... as a par 72," Nicklaus said. "You have the U.S. Open that's now a par 71. Why?"

David Fay, executive director of the USGA, said the loss of the tree altered the nature of No. 2 at Pebble Beach and left no choice.

His thinking: Most, if not all par 5s, involve some strategy of whether to lay up. The only way No. 2 becomes a three-shot hole is if a player misses the green.

"Is anyone going to lay up strategically?" Fay said. "I don't draw too many crazy analogies, but if Rae's Creek wasn't there on No. 13 at Augusta, that wouldn't be much of a par 5."

Jack Nicklaus has always loved Pebble Beach.

Give him one last round of golf, he has said countless times, and you would find him at Pebble Beach Golf Links. He has experienced some of his greatest triumphs there, along with a fair share of heartache.

"There are probably better golf courses than Pebble Beach," Nicklaus said. "But because of where it sits, and what it's been in my life, I really didn't care whether there are better golf courses. I happen to like it."

That relationship will be rekindled when Nicklaus returns to Pebble Beach for what almost certainly will be his final U.S. Open appearance.

All he wants is one more chance to walk up the 18th fairway next Sunday, hear the waves crash onto the rocks and feel the spray of ocean mist on his face.

The later in the afternoon, the better.

"If I'm walking up the 18th hole on Father's Day, it means I'll have made the cut and played a good tournament," he said. "I'll have been delighted to have played 72 holes, and probably sad that it will probably be my last (U.S. Open)."

Nicklaus is playing in his record 44th consecutive U.S. Open, but this is the final year of a three-year special exemption from the USGA. He doesn't expect another one, and might not accept it, anyway.

He turned 60 in January and hasn't finished in the top 20 in a U.S. Open since 1986, which was also the last time he beat the best, winning The Masters. Most mornings bring a creak in his body that wasn't there the day before. Most weeks bring a score he can't tolerate.

He can play The Masters and the PGA Championship as long as he likes, and the British Open until he turns 65. After this year, he probably won't.

"I don't really want to play much of any place that I can't play well," he said. "This will be, I'm sure, my last year of playing the four majors in one year."

He still believes he can compete, even though he broke par only twice in 15 rounds on the PGA Tour this year. He made a convincing case in The Masters, where he was just six shots off the lead going into the weekend.

"I was respectable for a couple of rounds at Augusta and fell on my face, you might say, the last two rounds," he said. "I'd like to not have that happen at the Open. I'd like to play reasonably respectably.

"And the better I can play, the better chance I've got of being respected."

Any time he plays Pebble Beach, there's a good chance of that happening. No other player has enjoyed such success there as Nicklaus.

It began in 1961, when he won the U.S. Amateur with a dominant performance that gave a glimpse of what he was capable of as a professional. He was the equivalent of 20-under in the 136 holes he played, and none of his eight matches went the distance.

A decade later, Nicklaus won his third U.S. Open by surviving the nastiest weather he's ever encountered. He clinched it with a 1-iron that hit the flagstick on the par-3 17th and stopped 6 inches away.

He was tied for the lead in 1982 until Tom Watson chipped in from behind the 17th green for birdie, then birdied the 18th for good measure. And when the PGA Championship came to Pebble Beach in 1977, the Golden Bear missed the playoff by one stroke.

Don't forget his three victories in the Bing Crosby National Pro-Am or the two matches he won in the Shell's Wonderful World of Golf exhibitions.

True, he has had success on other courses. He is the only player over the last 90 years to win a U.S. Open at the same course twice -- Baltusrol, where he beat Hogan's scoring record in 1967 and then shattered the mark in 1980.

He has won six times at Augusta and at Firestone.

"Sure, but not many of them are sitting on the cliffs at Pebble Beach," Nicklaus said. "I've been enamored with the course since first setting eyes on it during a practice round of the U.S. Amateur. It's as dramatic as any course in the country, but mostly it was the complete test of golf that intrigued me.

"I developed quite a love affair with Pebble Beach at that time," he said. "And that hasn't changed."