By BRETT CYRGALIS
ESPN golf analyst Mike Tirico earlier said there was “no chance” play could resume by the 1:30 target and he was right. Jim Hyler, chairman of the USGA’s competitions committee, said he hoped there was a window of playability that will last 3-5 hours, in which case the first wave of golfers – the ones that teed off between 7 a.m.-9:12 a.m. on both Nos. 1 and 10 – will be able to finish their first round. He sounded not too optimistic about the prospect of the second wave of golfers – starting at 12:30 p.m. – starting at all today. That leaves the schedule for the next four, even five days uncertain.
Hyler estimated that 6/10 inch of rain dropped on the golf course since 5 a.m., and they are expecting another 1/4 inch or so, totaling a full inch by days end. That’s a lot of rain for a golf course, no matter if there’s an army of squeegee artists or not.
“The volume of rain falling was outpassing our ability to squeegee the greens,” Hyler said. “So that was the bottom line. And so the greens just became unplayable. And we just needed to suspend.”
Hyler also defended the USGA’s current policy of not allowed lift-clean-and-place. It is something he has stood by all week, saying, “We just don’t play lift, clean and place. If it gets that bad we’re going to suspend.”
Yet, they are allowing players to call for squeegees on the greens if their is standing water in their line (or think there is standing water in their line) – which is exactly what Tiger Woods did on the second green.
“I think where you have casual water on the green, where you have water on the green, we don’t see that as inconsistency to squeegee the line of putt,” Hyler said. “As long as you squeegee past the hole.”