Chasing Greatness: Johnny Miller, Arnold Palmer, and the Miracle at Oakmont by Adam Lazarus Read Free Book Online Page B

carded a masterful 67, the lowest Sunday score. Six shots behind the winner, Tom Weiskopf, he tied for fifth place. Nicklaus now had only three days left for practice prior to the start of the U.S. Open, but he had a clearer idea (whatever Palmer might think) about which parts of his game needed work before he was Oakmont-ready.
    Naturally, Nicklaus stood out as the clear-cut favorite to defend the title he had won at Pebble Beach. He could also become the first man in seventy years to win two U.S. Opens on the same course (Scotsman Willie Anderson won his first and fourth U.S. Open titles at the Myopia Hunt Club in Massachusetts in 1901 and 1905).
    Unlike the year before, the Grand Slam was not in Nicklaus’s sights in 1973: He had not won the Masters in April. But never before had he won four tournaments (out of eleven entered) prior to the U.S. Open. Las Vegas oddsmakers set Nicklaus as a four-to-one favorite. So, too, did famed sports prognosticator Jimmy “the Greek” Snyder, who predicted that the winner would set a new record score of 279, four below the 283s that Hogan had shot in 1953 and Nicklaus and Palmer had matched in 1962.
    Still, by the early 1970s, both the experts and journalists dubbed Nicklaus the favorite in just about every tournament. Since he’d recovered from a minor “slump” in the late 1960s, and especially since his father’s death in 1970, no one (save perhaps Lee Trevino) possessed both the shots and the intestinal fortitude to go toe-to-toe with Nicklaus in the final round of a tournament.
    Internally, Nicklaus had a personal, revenge-driven incentive to triumph again at Oakmont. From the moment he arrived in town in June 1973, sportswriters rehashed Pittsburgh fans’ heckling of Nicklaus eleven years earlier. They also stressed how much had changed in his public persona since then.
    “He returns now as the game’s premier player, acknowledged the world’s best and eyeing a plateau of performance and accomplishment unattained by any other man to play this old game,” wrote Bob Greene of the Associated Press. “He returns no longer fat, no longer a kid, no longer uncertain. He’s a trim 185 pounds. He’s a mature 33, quietly confident, self-contained, self assured, unfailingly courteous. His drab garb of the early ’60s is gone, replaced by quiet, subdued colors. His blond mane is at modish length.”
    Winning tournament after tournament, major title after major title, helped make Nicklaus more appealing to serious golf fans. And once he consciously remodeled his image in the late 1960s-losing weight, lengthening his hair, and modifying his wardrobe to follow the style of the day—Nicktaus transitioned from a spectacularly talented golfer to admire from afar, into a beloved fan favorite. “Jack’s Pack” now crowded the fairways with an intensity that, on occasion, almost rivaled Arnie’s Army.
    Nicklaus sternly brushed aside any hint of animosity toward the Palmer-faithful for their unkind behavior in 1962. The crowd’s scorn for Nicklaus may actually have motivated the Golden Bear, as he birdied the first three holes in round one.
    “Honestly, I don’t remember the gallery; all I thought about was golf,” he said. “I played with blinders on, I suppose.”
    Still, no one could deny that a second triumph at Oakmont, in Palmer’s backyard, would be payback to fans who had so harassed the rookie in 1962 that his father had to be restrained from physically lashing out—restrained by, of all people, Ohio State football coach and Nicklaus family friend Woody Hayes.
    In 1973, Nicklaus was the marquee name in a threesome that included reigning U.S. Amateur champion Vinny Giles and former Masters champion Bob Goalby. Teeing off at 10:04 a.m., Nicklaus did not get off to the same blistering start as he had eleven years earlier. He carded three bogeys and a lone birdie over the first thirteen holes. Still, that wasn’t as disturbing as how he racked up strokes. Not only did he