From the sports archives: San Francisco's Olympic Club chewing up pros at 2012 US Open

At the Olympic Club, a lot of those techniques just aren’t necessary. The Lake Course is a bear without adding or subtracting anything. With fairways that slant and slide all over the place and undulating greens, adding longer rough and slicker greens only makes it that much tougher.

“For the most part, that golf course is set up perfectly,” said Mitch Juricich, co-host of KNBR 680’s “Hooked on Golf,” who has covered the PGA Tour for 30 years and has played Olympic Club 40 or 50 times in his estimation.

“There’s not a lot of flat lies. It’s just going to be faster and firmer (over the weekend). By Sunday, I think we may not have anyone under par.”

It almost didn’t even take the weekend for no one to be under par. Co-leaders Jim Furyk, Tiger Woods and David Toms head into the weekend with scores of 1-under par. Last year, Rory McIlroy shot 16-under and tore of Congressional Country Club outside Washington D.C.

That was the aberration. Olympic Club is a more typical U.S. Open track and McIlroy missed the cut — along with a number of other big-name players, including world No. 1 Luke Donald.

“Sandy Tatum (a former USGA president and who helped lead the renovation of Harding Park), is like a father figure to me and he once said about tricking up a course, and I’m paraphrasing here, ‘We’re not trying to trick the best golfers, we’re trying to identify them,’” Juricich said.

There’s an old saying in golf that says a player drives for show and putts for dough. While many players are having a devil of a time figuring out where to place their drives on the tilting fairways, Juricich said the tournament will probably be decided on the wavy greens. He said during Media Day, he took a bunch of golf balls and his putter and went to every green and putted, just to find out how the green were playing.

“I was always an OK putter,” Juricich said. “I had nine three putt and nine two putts, and of those putts, I had to make four five- to eight-foot putts. If you were coming to play and asked me if there was one shot you had to work on, what would it be? I would work on the six footers (putts).”

And then there is the 16th hole, which, at 670 yards is the longest hole in U.S. Open history. The scary thing is, it’s only about 100 yards longer than how the hole normally plays. Juricich said members face a daunting 580-yard, dogleg left hole on a normal, non-U.S. Open day.

“I said this the other day, and I truly mean it. If I came to the this (16th hole) tee tomorrow and someone said, ‘For a hundred bucks, I’ll let you put down a seven and skip this hole,’ I would peel off five 20s and walk away laughing,” Juricich said. “For a normal player, that is a par-7 (it’s playing as a par 5) and half an hour (to play the hole).”

Now that the cut has been decided and the remaining players have passed the first test, the challenge will be ramped up this weekend. Of course it always helps to have Woods near the top of the leaderboard and Juricich believes Woods could be holding his 15th major championship in the gathering dusk Sunday evening.

“I think the overriding thing is Tiger. Is he back? It sure kind of looks like it,” Juricich said. “From the way he’s managed the golf course … he just has that look about him.”

And what about watching the best players in the world reduced to weekend hacks through the first two rounds? Juricich, like millions of others, has no sympathy.

“I realize the conditions are tougher, but this is a chance for the pros to feel like [regular players] do. It’s kind of nice to see them struggle like we do,” Juricich said. “If you don’t like the way it’s set up, there’s the door. If you think the USGA is going to have all the fairways slope to the middle … that’s not what this tournament is.”