U.S. Open 2014: Martin Kaymer completes four-day domination at Pinehurst

The 114th U.S. Open featured one of the all-time dominant performances at America’s national championship. Martin Kaymer’s eight-shot wire-to-wire win at Pinehurst will have a deserving place alongside Rory McIlroy’s 2011 masterpiece and Tiger Woods 2000 tour de force. Colin Montgomerie said on Sunday night that he thought Kaymer’s performance was better than that record-setting showing from Rory at Congressional, and the best we’d seen since Tiger at Pebble (which is the best golf and major championship performance ever). Kaymer may not be as accomplished or marketable as those two, but he’s on a superstar path and this week could be the second of several more major championships.

Here’s the best and worst from the week at Pinehurst.

The grandstand rose as one and thunderously roared as the man in red and black drained his final putt for par and a 1-under finish in the U.S. Open on Sunday.

No, Tiger Woods was somewhere other than Pinehurst last week and his absence from his second straight major as he continues to recover from back surgery may have sucked the excitement out of the proceedings, but Erik Compton put the heart into it.

This was a pretty nice moment on Father’s Day at the U.S. Open. We saw Kevin Kisner do something similar on Friday, but Sunday afternoon, as sectional qualifier Zac Blair came up the 18th fairway, he asked his dad to caddy his final hole at Pinehurst.

There’s always plenty of Father’s Day treacle at the U.S. Open, but this was still enjoyable to watch.

Now on the first tee at the U.S. Open, from Jupiter, Florida, Mr. Tiger ... Erik Compton! He’s in second place, five shots back starting his round on the biggest stage of his career, and he strolls up in the Tiger Woods Sunday outfit.

To be fair, the two-time heart transplant survivor should have as many, if not more, supporters than the usual Tiger Woods contention at a major championship. A win for Compton would be one of the greatest stories in the history of golf. Here’s hoping he can make a run at Martin Kaymer.

The U.S. Open has been fairly devoid of drama thus far. One dude with a belly full of liquor and the keys to a golf cart changed that. The man was tasked with transporting NBC reporter Roger Maltbie, but met a little trouble along the way. From GolfWeek:

Valid reason to be upset, I’d say.

Sergio can just never catch a break.

Poor, poor Sergio.

We have our first hole-in-one of the 2014 U.S. Open thanks to Zach Johnson, who drilled the ace at the par-3 9th at Pinehurst. The hole is playing on the shorter side at 172 yards, and Johnson is one of the best iron players in the world. The former Masters champ lofted his tee shot out into the center of the green, catching a” fall line” as Johnny Miller would say and funneling the ball back down to the hole.

That’s a nice little 7-iron and a quick way to pick up two shots on a Pinehurst course that’s playing a little easier than Saturday. Miller speculated we’ll see another one at this hole before the day is over. Johnson’s ace is the 44th hole-in-one in U.S. Open history, and just the second at Pinehurst No. 2. Peter Jacobson made his on the same hole with the same club.

A day after being set up with brutal pin locations that made red numbers extremely rare, the setup for Pinehurst No. 2 on Sunday is more apt for low scores. That isn’t to say the course will play easy -- it’s still a tough U.S. Open track -- just that it may be easier than earlier in the week.

Only two players managed to shoot in the red in the third round, but more players are under par in their final rounds. A total of nine players from the morning wave are currently in the red, including Louis Oosthuizen who carded a 3-under round of 67. Oosthuizen had a chance to come in with a 66, but bogeyed No. 18. The 67 wasn’t enough to move Oosthuizen into contention -- he finished at 9-over -- but it proves low numbers are out there. A similar round from a player near the top of the leaderboard could put serious pressure on Kaymer.

The greens are the most menacing part of this Donald Ross Pinehurst No. 2 design, and on Saturday, they brutalized the field. It was a combination of no moisture, a little wind, and the USGA pushing it to the limit with the pin placement on all but one or two holes. Kenny Perry, the oldest player in the field, said it was the hardest group of pin locations he’d ever seen at a major championship. Leader Martin Kaymer said the 18th was the only real pin he thought he could take aim at, and multiple players said just getting your ball 30 to 35 feet from the hole was a success.

USGA Executive Director and course setup ace Mike Davis said Sunday morning that the final round hole locations wouldn’t be as tough as Saturday, but they’re not opening the door for any rounds of 65 like we saw Kaymer shoot earlier in the week. How you handle the repellant turtleback greens will once again make or break the leaders’ final round. Chipping is obviously a huge part of that with so many balls not holding the green, but this is also the most likely venue where you can go from putting back to chipping in an instant, as we saw Kaymer demonstrate on Saturday.

Martin Kaymer made history during the first three rounds of the U.S. Open, setting the Pinehurst No. 2 course record in a U.S. Open and the 36-hole U.S. Open record. Now, on Sunday, he’ll attempt to avoid making more history. At least in terms of adding his name to the list of biggest final-round collapses. Kaymer will try to hold onto his five-stroke lead and record a wire-to-wire U.S. Open win. Viewers will be able to watch nearly every key shot live, thanks to extended television coverage and multiple online streams.

At 8-under, Kaymer is in great position to come away with the win. The course hasn’t been as hard as some previous U.S. Open tracks, but it hasn’t let up many red numbers and certainly isn’t the type of course where a player is likely to score in the low 60s and catch Kaymer. Instead, if he does lose, it will likely be at least partially because he comes back to the field. If Kaymer doesn’t come away with the title, he would be the first player since 1919 to lead the U.S. Open by five or more strokes and not win the tournament. That isn’t likely to happen, however, at least according to oddsmakers. Kaymer is a massive 1/3 favorite to win. Henrik Stenson and Rickie Fowler are tied for the second-best odds at 10/1.

Martin Kaymer wasn’t able to maintain his record-setting pace in the third round, but the 29-year-old German enters Sunday in excellent position to win the U.S. Open. At 8-under, he’ll begin the round with a five-stroke lead. Kaymer has led wire-to-wire thus far and will once again be in the final group off the tee, this time joined by Rickie Fowler.

After being nearly flawless during the first two rounds on his way to setting the 36-hole U.S. Open record, Kaymer had to scramble on Saturday. He wasn’t as sharp off the tee, leading to a few challenging approach shots. Kaymer carded just one bogey during the first two rounds, only to bogey five holes in the third round. Still, despite the struggles, he was able to limit the damage and pick up strokes on some of Pinehurst No. 2’s easiest holes. His 72 was less than the course average of 73.8 and allowed him to maintain a healthy lead.

Martin Kaymer is just 18 holes away from becoming the first German to ever win the U.S. Open. After setting a U.S. Open record with back-to-back 65s in the first two rounds, Kaymer came back to the field just a bit in the third round at Pinehurst, finishing 8-under overall and five shots clear.

Kaymer did not have the same form that overwhelmed the field and the course in the first two rounds, but he held it together up on the green to keep some distance on all the chasers. He got a little loose with iron shots late on Friday and was even shakier in the third round, sending several drives off the course and misfiring on approach more than we had seen. He missed more fairways on Saturday (four) than he did in the first two rounds combined. But he was always able to mitigate the damage and avoid the total implosion that seemed necessary in order to get the rest of the field back into it.