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What to Watch in Round 3: Big Shots, Big Names (Or Not) and a Full Day

Everything is lined up for a fantastic moving day at the U.S. Open, with the world Nos. 1, 2 and 3 all in the mix along with a colorful supporting cast.

Gary Van Sickle

Jon Rahm is pictured during the second round of the 2022 U.S. Open.
This may be the game face of Jon Rahm in a Saturday showdown. Or your face after a long afternoon glued to the television.  :: Aaron Doster/USA Today

Gary Van Sickle of Morning Read/SI.com will offer a preview before each round of the 122nd U.S. Open. Here's what he's watching:

Memorable Shots, From Anywhere

This is the U.S. Open, so be ready for anything or any kind of shot.

Friday saw Rory McIlroy take two big greenside swipes at a ball in deep fescue … and barely move it. He holed a lengthy putt for a heroic (is that the right word?) double bogey. Friday also saw MJ Daffue play a shot off a hospitality carpet left of the 14th fairway. If he’d taken a drop, he would’ve had tree trouble and been hitting from the rough. Instead, he gamely — smartly, it turned out — played it off the matting. No big deal? Well, he was only leading the U.S. Open at the time!

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Daffue had to keep his 3-wood shot under the low-hanging trees and left of a hospitality-area railing. He pulled off the shot, to roars from the gallery, and advanced it more than 280 yards up the par-5. But it ended up in the rough, he missed a par putt and took bogey. Still, it was the craziest shot of this Open so far.

In Round 3, there will be at least one uniquely memorable shot. Maybe Jon Rahm banks one off a low-flying blimp onto a par-4 green or something …

A Heavyweight Battle Royale

Keep your eyes on what looks to be a heavyweight U.S. Open bout in the making ... except a bout implies only two participants. Call it a heavyweight U.S. Open cage match then. Saturday’s last seven twosomes include Sam Burns, Scottie Scheffler, Rory McIlroy, Jon Rahm and Collin Morikawa. They’re all in the top nine of the Official World Golf Rankings and Scheffler, Rahm and McIlroy are 1, 2 and 3. Majors with big-name winners always seem more significant to the public and the media. This is the kind of leaderboard any major championship dreams about … when it’s not dreaming about Tiger Woods …

Or a Cinderella Gets In Position

The flip side of a marquee winner is a Cinderella champion. You’ve already forgotten the name of the guy from Chile who could have — or maybe should have — won the PGA Championship at Southern Hills last month. (He is Mito Pereira.)

With 36 holes left, you’ve got some potential Mito types to root for. There’s Joel Dahmen, a self-deprecating personality who looks as if he could be Fred Couples’ long-lost brother. On Twitter, he joked after Thursday’s round that he had tickets to a Ben Rector concert that night and because he was competing in the Open, wouldn’t down the usual “100 beers” that he normally does. Rector saw the tweet and replied, “Thanks man!”

Other potential Mito fill-ins include Hayden Buckley, a steady grinder who played college golf at the University of Missouri and whose last win was in February of 2021 in the LECOM Suncoast Classic on the Korn Ferry Tour; Nick Hardy, a University of Illinois star whose biggest pro moment was losing a Korn Ferry tournament playoff to Harry Hall; and Beau Hossler, a 27-year-old University of Texas alum who was beaten by Ian Poulter in a Houston Open playoff four years ago. There are others, of course, since the clock has yet to strike midnight …

Get Comfortable

Be prepared to watch golf well into the evening. The leaders won’t tee off Saturday until 3:45 p.m. With even the slightest weather delay, the leaders wouldn’t finish. No delay is expected but maybe that’s bad news because bad weather was forecast for Thursday and Friday beginning in late morning and both forecasts went belly-up. Which is the same position you’ll be in on the couch with your beer koozie and bowl of Cheetos while watching the leaders straggle in around 8 p.m.

More U.S. Open Coverage From Morning Read:

> At a Crossroads, Is Bryson DeChambeau Going in the Right Direction?
> Scottie Scheffler, World No. 1 and Under the Radar, Is Contending
> Phil Mickelson Shoots 73 Friday, Ending a Chaotic Couple Weeks
> Who Is This Guy? Nick Hardy’s Career Progression Has Been Slow, But He’s In Contention at Brookline
> Little-Known Guys Are Taking a Starring Role In This U.S. Open
> U.S. Open Day 2: Live Scores, Updates
> Rory McIlroy Is One Shot Back With the Mindset That It Feels Like the First Time
> Sergio Garcia Leads Large LIV Contingent Missing the Cut at U.S. Open

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Gary Van Sickle
GARY VAN SICKLE

Van Sickle has covered golf since 1980, following the tours to 125 men’s major championships, 14 Ryder Cups and one sweet roundtrip flight on the late Concorde. He is likely the only active golf writer who covered Tiger Woods during his first pro victory, in Las Vegas in 1996, and his 81st, in Augusta. Van Sickle’s work appeared, in order, in The Milwaukee Journal, Golf World magazine, Sports Illustrated (20 years) and Golf.com. He is a former president of the Golf Writers Association of America. His knees are shot, but he used to be a half-decent player. He competed in two national championships (U.S. Senior Amateur, most recently in 2014); made it to U.S. Open sectional qualifying once and narrowly missed the Open by a scant 17 shots (mostly due to poor officiating); won 10 club championships; and made seven holes-in-one (though none lately). Van Sickle’s golf equipment stories usually are based on personal field-testing, not press-release rewrites. His nickname is Van Cynical. Yeah, he earned it.

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