Mike Shaffer, director of golf course operations at Merion, isn't going to be looking to make life easy for players at the US Open.
The top of the US Open Championship trophy
Shaffer has promised to make the course setup for this year's edition as tough as possible for the world's best come June.
If the players start complaining, Shaffer says, he knows he's doing his job right.
"If they start complaining or whining, I'm winning," Shaffer told the Philadelphia Inquirer. "That's the way I look at it. I have almost enough money saved for retirement.
"Somebody's going to say something. Then you've got guys who take it in stride, man up, keep their mouths shut, put their heads down and go after it. Just like the real world. I've always said the best green is the one where the last 10 feet you walk next to the ball and it [rolls perfectly]. And a little gust of wind comes up and gets faster. It should be like glass."
And it isn't just the greens that will be made as challenging as possible.
"The rough will be higher, the greens will be a whole lot drier," he continued. "We'll take a lot more risks than we normally would, but not a tremendous amount.
"In my profession, you're supposed to kill weeds. Me, not so much. If they get a lie [in the rough] in a spot of clover, well, I'm thinking Angel Cabrera might have that shot, but old Tiger ain't [gonna] hit it because he went to
school at Stanford."
Shaffer says he will defer to USGA chief Mike Davis if the weather plays a part, however.
"If it rains, we can't really do anything," he said. "Then we'll get to see Mike Davis at work. He knows how they think. He'll out-think them. It's going to relinquish a lot of birdies. And there'll be a lot of bogeys.
"The USGA's always out to protect par, and Merion doesn't have the extra 400 yards like Bethpage or Oakmont or Pinehurst. But it's so good, you can only alter it so much. We might have a few tricks for them. These guys are the best in the world."
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