Forgivable lies

THE TREE ate my ball. I swear it.

The 3-wood went a little left, sure; and yes, we heard it hit wood. Hard.

But the ball had to come down; that, or be eaten by one of the carnivorous conifers that decorate and complicate Merion's East Course. This particular stand of trees sits in a nest of the course's nastier gorse, but, like every delusional golfer to walk this track over its 101 years, I believed my ball could not be amid that evil stuff.

There was no trace; so, clearly, devoured.

The drop (cheating in the interest of pace) meant a 6 with an asterisk. My well-dressed partners were happy to accede to me the last 10 feet of my misadventure on that eighth hole. I was grateful for their mercy.

April 29 broke cool and rainy, a miserable day for the media outing at the site of this year's U.S. Open, which cast a dark shadow on the once-in-a-lifetime chance to play one of the world's better golf courses. However, as the interview portion of Media Day ended, the clouds lightened from black to gray; the rain lightened from downpour to drizzle; and, well, how else to accurately measure the professionals' efforts several weeks hence?

Some of the veteran golf scribes declined the chance, most having played Merion in a similar pretournament freebie. The true lovers of the game, and the out-of-towners who traveled with cumbersome golf gear, and the clinically deranged (present!) were not so easily deterred.

The other 75 percent of my original foursome was completely deterred, since they are reasonably sane. I joined a twosome teeing off on No. 3.

Named Rob and Ryan, they were extremely fit and impeccably dressed, which meshed nicely with the course, pristine and proper on its hidden plot. Rob and Ryan were all Tiger and Nike and 5 percent body fat, with those new, cool golf pants that have vents on the cuff.

I kind of clashed.

Really, a place like this might best be played in knickers, Tam 'o Shanter and necktie. If Payne Stewart ever won anywhere, it should have been here.

Designed by Hugh Wilson, Merion is a historic monument. It is where Bobby Jones Grand Slammed his way out of golf, where Ben Hogan came back and cemented his legend with a mythical 1-iron.

Team owners and board chairmen belong to Merion.

Sports writers, in many senses of the phrase, do not belong.

You feel as if your caddie should be named Godfrey, or Smithers, or Jeeves.

Ours were named Chris and Shawn. Chris was the veteran, so he carried two of the three bags. His boundless strength and endless patience were exceeded only by his consistently gracious aid. He dispensed a lot of aid.

There is no level lie, no straight putt. The wicked members' rough will be diabolical for the pros, having been overseeded and hyperfertilized and grown like rain forest primeval.

The course will play short by PGA Tour standards, but, with its fun-house fairways and some crusty greens, it could surrender nothing if rain stays away June 13 through 16.

In benign conditions, with hairy fairways and moistened greens running shag-carpet slow, it surrendered nearly nothing to us.

Starting any round on a par-3 should be illegal, but, since our shotgun start meant only two groups could start on No. 1, and with the likes of Chris Berman in town, that was not going to be my anonymous group. So, no complaints . . . especially considering how the par-3s treated me over the next 4 hours.

A golf philosopher once noted that every golfer should welcome par-3s, regardless of how daunting they appear from the tee:

"You only need one good shot in a row to reach the green on a par-3."

No greater wisdom was ever offered.

The shot in question called for a 175-yard fade; so, of course, I snapped a 180-yard hook over the green, over a tree left of the green, and to within 20 feet of the No. 4 tee box, where eloquent Golf Channel host Rich Lerner unknowingly nearly had his career ended.

Some quick things about Lerner: He is very tall, very graceful and has a swing that recalls Keatsean poetry.

Some quick things about me: I am neither tall nor graceful, and my evolving slash at the ball recalls some failed Transcendentalist.

Lerner was loping after his towering drive on No. 4 by the time I popped a lob wedge over the tree . . . to within 12 feet, leaving a lucky, uphill putt that broke right along the pull line that is my putting stroke.

So, par.

That score, or anything like it, did not surface again among us for quite some time.

We each had our foibles in the deep bunkers full of fine, soft sand, the "white faces of Merion," as they are known. Those faces laugh at you.

We each took turns sending or spelunking into one of these craters that would serve as splendid cover against an infantry assault. Typically, two of us would wait in sympathetic mortification near the putting surface as the third disappeared below the level of the green, and, it seemed of the sea.

The fortunate pair then would see a geyser of sand spray over the hairy lip of the bunker's high side; one, then another, and at least a third plume, like a series of Old Faithful eruptions.

Then, humbled, the bunkered man usually pocketed his ball, walked out of the low side of the bunker and awaited his partners' putts.

Compared with the rough, the bunkers were a day at the beach.

The fairways at Merion East are about as wide as the driving lanes in a parking garage, and they're about as easy to hold if your ball starts running sideways on them. Complicating matters, to preserve the character of the course for the professionals, we had to hit off mats if we were inside the 100-yard mark and in the fairway.

Mainly, we avoided using the mats by avoiding the fairways.

We each lost a ball or two, and strained a tendon or two, in that dank and wiry rough. Stroke-saver tip: When you can't see your shoes, don't use a 7-iron. Use a sand wedge.

When we reached No. 9, we had soaked feet and sore hands and 12 holes to play; all in all, a lovely state of being in which to face a 180-yard par-3, over water, sand and terrifying, unkempt Main Line acreage.

All to a pin tucked on a peninsula on the left side of the green.

As it turns out, if you swing really hard and scuff the top half of the ball with a 190-yard club and it somehow goes straight, you are left pin high from 25 feet. And if, say, Ryan putts first from 10 feet behind you and nearly makes it, your odds of not four-putting (again) get better.

Which explains our only birdie of the day.

Surely, the beneficent ghost of Hugh Wilson slowed my ball and moved the hole and tilted the green. However it came to pass, the putt dived home, to my delight, my satisfaction, my relief and certainly to my surprise. High-fives all around, and, for a change, no cheating to weigh on my conscience.

Chris the caddie was not fooled: "Good thing it hit the hole."

Yeah. So what?

Not much to speak of concerning the double-bogey at little par-3 No. 13 (fried egg in a tight bunker), while my partners found the green and left it bogey-free. Fast-forward to No. 17, which very well could tell the story of the Open.

For them, it will play nearly 250 meaty yards over a chasm of moonscape to a false-fronted, two-tiered green the shape of an inverted kidney.

For us, it played 225 yards to a pin maliciously placed on the left side at the apex of the slopes. At 225 yards, it meant either a well-hit 3-wood (which, remember, sent its last projectile to a woody death) or a punched driver. And it was starting to rain again.

Optimistic and forgiving, I used the 3-wood. This time, the ball avoided all impediments, landed on the lower tier of the green, spun like a yo-yo and trickled toward the hole, a scant 2 inches from the edge of the cup . . . and then some 15 feet farther. Again, the putt was uphill, playing to my natural pull; two-putts, and par, and that was all.

My first tee shot on 18 went just out of bounds, so, when I found it, I discovered my car was parked not 50 yards away. Now it was really raining, and I was laying three after a provisional shot, and, really, what more could Merion tell me?

The USGA had pounded home the point that the course could play as long as 7,000 yards. However, a lot of the pros will face the same decisions we amateurs faced; and those pros are much better with their hybrids and 3-woods than we are.

If it rains, it could be a bloodbath.

No, not like Media Day.

The other kind of bloodbath.

Blog: ph.ly/DNL