FARMINGDALE, N.Y. — After his nine-hole practice round Tuesday at Bethpage Black, Bryson DeChambeau bumped fists and made nice with his three playing partners on the 18th green, signifying that their on-course work was done for the day. Only it wasn’t. As his partners and their caddies milled around the green, DeChambeau grabbed his driver and strolled to the adjacent first tee. He wanted to answer a question that has been on many people’s minds this week: Can DeChambeau — who we now know will play in the opening foursomes match in this 45th Ryder Cup — drive the first green?
Well, we know he can. More to the point: Will he try, and, if so, will he succeed?
On the scorecard, the par-4 1st plays 397 yards. But as the crow flies, on what is a dogleg right guarded by a cluster of trees on the inside corner, the tee-to-green distance at the 1st is more like 365 yards, courtesy of a new, pushed-up tee that was added for this event. Yes, 365 is still a long way, even for DeChambeau, whose driving-distance average on LIV this season was 328.8 yards. But that figure doesn’t come close to DeChambeau’s full-send range. When DeChambeau fully cooks one — witness the 410-yard bomb he unloaded at LIV Mexico City earlier this year — he can make a par-4 look silly.
That much was clear during DeChambeau’s Tuesday-afternoon mash session, where he launched one ball after the other — seven in all — over the corner of the dogleg. Bethpage locals call that expanse of trees and rough the “Bermuda Triangle” for its propensity for swallowing balls alive — but none of DeChambeau’s tee shots was in any threat of going MIA. For one, every ball airmailed the trouble with room to spare. For another, the U.S. team had a spotter by the 1st green, radioing the result of each blast back to DeChambeau. From this reporter’s vantage point, it was hard to tell if DeChambeau accomplished his mission, but regardless, he still seemed to enjoy the exercise. The ”U-S-A”-chanting masses in the grandstand behind him did, too.
On Thursday morning, DeChambeau was asked whether he thought driving the 1st green was achievable. “Crosswind, into the wind, you have to have close to 200 ball speed to get there.” (Which is in DeChambeau’s wheelhouse.) And downwind? “Definitely drivable,” he said, adding, “If it’s downwind, I could definitely get the front edge if the conditions aren’t too soft.”
The conditions will be soft Friday, on account of on-and-off rain that soaked Bethpage Wednesday night into Thursday. When Ben Griffin visited the interview room late Thursday morning, a light drizzle was still coming down and star-spangled fans were still seeking shelter under a sea of umbrellas.
“It’s a little rainy, but I bet if Bryson went out now he could do it,” Griffin said when I was asked him about the possibility of the first-tee show everyone is aching to see. “I witnessed it him do it two days ago.”
Griffin said DeChambeau is likely the only American player with the muscle to get it there (presumably Rory McIlroy could too). “Everyone else is probably playing it to the left,” he said. “I know I certainly am right now.”
I asked Griffin to handicap DeChambeau’s odds of getting home.
“If I gave him 10 balls in the right conditions — if he knows he can get it there — he’s going to hit three probably on the surface or on the fringe, and five are going to be in a bunker or [just] off the green,” with the remainder missing left or right. “Maybe one bad one,” Griffin added.
What do the Bethpage regulars think? I asked a couple of them, too: Mike Pomerico and Mike Auerbach, both of whom are members of the Nassau Players Club, a close-knit society of Bethpage-ites with serious game.
Neither Pomerico nor Auerbach have played the hole from the new tee, but in their roles as marshals this week, they’ve had plenty of opportunities to watch the pros play it.
To drive the green at the 1st, Pomerico said, the required shot is a high, arcing fade that carries all the way to the green. A slope in front of the green will prevent players from running the ball up. When asked about the potential for DeChambeau creating some fireworks on the opener, Pomerico said: “It wouldn’t shock me. Nothing Bryson DeChambeau does shocks me anymore.”
Auerbach agreed that the feat was doable, and he’s hopeful Bethpage State Park keeps the tee box in play after the Ryder Cup.
“Guys are going to want to see if they can do it, too, especially if Rory or Bryson does it,” he said. “It would be a fun relic to keep around.”
