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The 7 juiciest U.S. Open storylines to follow at Los Angeles Country Club

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LACC is hosting its first U.S. Open. Trust me, I have played there, it will be a real test. And that USGA rough will be crazy this year! Like you wont be able to see the color of your shoes crazy in some spots!

Let’s face it – The golf world has already been turned upside down this month, and there are undoubtedly more fireworks to come this week with the third men’s major of the year, the U.S. Open.

In the wake of last Tuesday’s shocking announcement by the PGA Tour that it is combining commercial operations with the Saudi Arabian Public Investment Fund (which funds LIV Golf) and DP World Tour, the best golfers in the world — including LIV’s finest — head to Hollywood for golf’s toughest test on a mostly unfamiliar venue in Los Angeles Country Club.

Storylines will abound this week, but here are seven of the best we’ll be closely following.

1. Pro golf’s future…ad nauseam

PGA Tour commissioner Jay Monahan and PIF governor Yasir Al-Rumayyan.

The U.S. Open is not run by either the PGA Tour or LIV Golf, but you can bet those two tours will be discussed at length this week. The Open will be the first gathering of players from both tours since the stunning deal was unveiled. Relations had somewhat normalized four weeks ago at the PGA Championship where Brooks Koepka became the first LIV Golf major champion. But no one — save for PGA Tour commissioner Jay Monahan, PIF Governor Yasir Al-Rumayyan, and their respective inner circles — could have foreseen the circumstances surrounding the game’s third major. The arrangement is not finalized and the US Senate has just opened an inquiry on the nature of the deal…so there are still many unknowns about what pro golf might actually look like next year. Expect many of the players who have yet to weigh in to be peppered with questions about it early in the week. Get your popcorn ready!

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2. A different kind of U.S. Open venue

LACC North.

Now to the birdies and bogeys. Los Angeles Country Club will play host to its first-ever U.S. Open and its first PGA Tour event since the 1940 Los Angeles Open. Needless to say, LACC’s North course has changed a good bit in the past 73 years, especially since a 2010 Gil Hanse-led restoration of the George Thomas design. The club has typically been one of the more reclusive and exclusive in the country; until recently, the membership has been less reluctant to show off the course.

The course will still feature brutally long U.S. Open rough, but this will be Bermuda rough (a first at the U.S. Open since 2005) and there won’t be quite as much of it. Wide fairways will force pros to get strategic as they plot their way around. There are two par-3s that may play as long or longer than the par-4 6th. The U.S. Open is typically the hardest of the four majors — and that should still be the case this year — but just in a different way.

3. Can Phil Mickelson complete the Grand Slam?

Phil Mickelson at the PGA Championship. Can he FINALLY complete the Philthy slam?

Are we crazy for rating this the third-biggest storyline? Maybe. But Phil Mickelson made us all think twice about his major prospects when won the 2021 PGA Championship. Then LIV Golf happened and he put together a number of poor showings. But at Augusta in April, he redefined everybody’s expectations once again by rallying for a Sunday 64 and a T2 finish. He made the cut and finished back of the pack at the PGA Championship last month, but even as he celebrates his 53rd birthday Friday, is it that outrageous to think he could contend again? While I am sure there is some gas left in the tank, and he is a so cal guy, my money is on a missed cut. Sorry Phil, just gotta shoot ya straight. I hope I’m wrong, but this course is a different and unfamiliar beast.

4. When will Rory McIlroy win another major?

Rory McIlroy at the RBC Canadian Open last week. Lookin pretty in pink – see what I did there…

With the weight of his “PGA Tour spokesperson” role theoretically lifted, can McIlroy finally win a major after nine years? That’s right read that again – It’s been over 3,000 days and 35 Major chances without taking home the hardware. He shockingly missed the cut at the Masters after finishing in the top 10 in every major in 2022. At the PGA, he was solid but recorded a distant T7, seven strokes behind Brooks Koepka. He’s been near the lead in each of his last two PGA Tour starts only to fade out of contention on Sunday. Not only is he seeking to end his major drought, but he also has yet to win on the PGA Tour this season. McIlroy was in a similar position in 2022 before winning in Canada the week before the U.S. Open and later claiming the FedEx Cup. He finished T-9 last week at the RBC and will be paired with Keopka in the first 2 rounds of the U.S. Open this year – That is must-see TV

5. Who is No. 1?

Jon Rahm and Scottie Scheffler at the Memorial.

McIlroy may have begun 2023 with the No. 1 ranking, but Jon Rahm quickly asserted himself as the world’s best golfer by winning four times, including the Masters. But after two wins, including the Players Championship, Scottie Scheffler enters the year’s third major as the World No. 1. Scheffler’s struggles on the greens have been well documented but his otherworldly ball-striking has carried him to a T2 at the PGA, and T3s in his last two starts on Tour (he finished a shot out of playoffs each time). Rahm, meanwhile, has been quieter since his Masters win but is no doubt still poised to collect a second U.S. Open title. Of course, neither player won the PGA Championship. That accolade went to Koepka, who also finished T2 at the Masters and is looking very much like his 2017-19 World No. 1 self. Koepka is built to win majors and this course sets up great for him – I like his chances to give it a run on Sunday.

6. California King Max Homa returns home

Max Homa has two wins in his home state this season. He loves Cali golf – that’s for sure… Oh yeah, and he has the course record at this very venue!

You may have heard Max Homa owns the LACC North course record. Then a senior at Cal, Homa fired a nine-under 61 in the opening round of the 2013 Pac-12 Championships. Fast-forward 10 years and Homa is now a six-time PGA Tour winner with all but two of them coming in his home state. But Homa has still yet to record a top-10 in a major championship. He will no doubt have his attention divided this week with all the friends and family around. But there’s no better opportunity for him to get in contention at a course he might know better than anyone else in the field. I love the chances of a Top-10 run and maybe even a chance to hoist a trophy come Sunday Evening.

7. Will an amateur contend?

Vanderbilt’s Gordon Sargent is one of 19 amateurs in the U.S. Open.

The first two majors both thrilled fans with underdog stories. At the Masters, it was U.S. Amateur winner Sam Bennett who played his way into the final group Saturday and ultimately finished as low amateur with a T16. Last month’s PGA Championship saw club pro-Michael Block come from nowhere to hang around the lead all four days and eventually finish T15 and earn his way back to the tournament next year. While Bennett is playing his second tournament as a pro this week and Block just missed qualifying for his third U.S. Open, there are still 19 amateurs and plenty of other journeyman pros who could delight fans with a Cinderella story.

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Bets & Babes: Betting on Birdies

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In this latest episode of Bets and Babes join me and my special guest Robert from the World Series of Golf as we tee up a whole new way to think about betting on the green.

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We break down golf betting basics, share hilarious stories and talk about how to bet in a way that might resonate with us ladies.

Whether you’re a total newbie or just curious how to make golf Sundays more exciting, this episode delivers fun, flirty, and smart tips to get you in the game. 🎧⛳💸

Click below to listen to the entire episode and leave your comments and suggestions for future episodes.

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The Bogey Man’s Guide to Accidental Course Exploration: Or, How I Found My Ball (Eventually) in the Rough of Life

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Ah, golf. The gentle game of precision, patience, and occasionally, profound personal humiliation. You know, the kind that makes you question all your life choices, particularly the one where you decided to spend your Saturday morning chasing a tiny white ball around 18 acres of manicured torture.

Boo here, reporting live from the depths of a particularly thorny patch of “rough” that I’m fairly certain wasn’t on the course map. My mission? To recount a tale of a golf shot so spectacularly off-target, it became less about breaking par and more about breaking new ground. Literally.

It was a glorious Tuesday. The sun was shining, the birds were chirping, and my swing felt… well, it felt like something. I was on the par-4 7th, a hole notorious for its deceptive dogleg and a bunker that swallows balls faster than a hungry teenager devours pizza. My plan was simple: a nice, controlled fade, landing gently just short of the green. A textbook approach, really.

What actually happened was less “textbook” and more “abstract expressionism.” My driver, bless its misguided heart, decided that “fade” was merely a suggestion, and “controlled” was a concept best left to professional pilots. The ball, a brand-new, gleaming Titleist Pro V1 (because, you know, optimism), launched with the trajectory of a startled pheasant and veered sharply right. So sharply, in fact, it cleared the cart path, hopped over the maintenance shed, and disappeared into what I can only describe as a dense, untamed jungle previously known as “the woods bordering the 7th fairway.”

Now, a lesser golfer, a more sensible golfer, might have declared it lost, taken a drop, and moved on with their dignity mostly intact. But I, dear readers, am Mr. Bogey Man. And the Bogey Man doesn’t abandon his children, especially when they cost $5 a pop.

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So, armed with a 7-iron (optimism again, clearly), a profound sense of misplaced determination, and a faint hope that perhaps a deer had picked it up and was using it as a chew toy, I plunged into the abyss.

The first five minutes were a blur of tangled vines, unseen roots, and the distinct feeling that I was being watched by small, judgmental woodland creatures. My pristine golf shoes quickly became mud-caked relics. My carefully tucked-in shirt became a casualty of low-hanging branches. I swear, I heard a squirrel snicker.

Then, a glimmer! A flash of white amidst the green. “Aha!” I cried, startling a family of robins. I pushed through a particularly stubborn bush, only to find… a discarded plastic water bottle. My heart sank faster than my last putt from 3 feet.

I pressed on, muttering to myself about the unfairness of golf, the existential dread of lost balls, and whether it was too late to take up competitive napping. Just as I was about to give up and declare the ball a permanent resident of the arboreal underworld, I saw it. Nestled perfectly at the base of an ancient oak, gleaming defiantly, was my Pro V1.

The triumph! The sheer, unadulterated joy! It was like finding the Holy Grail, if the Holy Grail was spherical and prone to slicing. I carefully extracted it, brushed off a few leaves, and held it aloft.

Then I looked around. I had no idea where I was. The fairway was a distant, hazy memory. The cart path? A myth. I was utterly, gloriously lost.

It took another fifteen minutes of bushwhacking, a brief but intense wrestling match with a particularly aggressive thistle, and the accidental discovery of what I’m pretty sure was a very old, very moldy sandwich, but I eventually stumbled back onto the course. My playing partners, who had long since finished the hole and were contemplating sending out a search party (or at least ordering another round of drinks), looked at me with a mixture of pity and amusement.

My score on the 7th? Let’s just say it involved a number that would make a mathematician weep. But the story? The adventure? The sheer ridiculousness of it all? Priceless.

So, the next time your ball decides to take an unscheduled tour of the local flora and fauna, don’t despair. Embrace it. See it as an opportunity for accidental exploration. You might not break 80, but you’ll definitely have a story. And isn’t that what golf is really about? (Besides the frustration, the lost balls, and the occasional snickering squirrel, of course.)

Until next time, keep those swings (mostly) in bounds, and remember: even a bogey can be an adventure.

Boo

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Make watching golf more interesting.

Does the idea of sports betting intimidate you? Stick with me and learn how to make watching sports with your partner more engaging and fun.

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Hey there, ClickItGolf fam!

I’m the Sports Betting Babe, and I’m here to shake up your Sundays and sprinkle a little extra thrill on your tee times. I know most of the guys on here already love golf, but this one’s for the ladies, especially those of you who’ve been watching golf with your boyfriend or hubby and secretly thinking, “Wait, can I actually bet on this stuff?”

The answer is yes, you absolutely can and you should.

I’m going to make golf betting super easy to understand, a little sexy, and a whole lot of fun. You don’t need to be a pro or know who won the Ryder Cup in 1999. You just need to know how to make smart, simple bets and enjoy the ride.

Let’s Start with the Basics: How to Bet on Golf

Betting on golf is like picking your favorite brunch spot. You check the vibe, pick someone reliable, and hope it all works out. Here are the easiest ways to get started:

1. Pick the Winner (Outright)

This one’s like calling your shot. You’re betting on who will win the whole tournament. Odds are listed next to each golfer. For example, +1200 means a $10 bet would win you $120. Favorites are usually listed around +800 to +1400 and less favorites, or long shots, are usually +5000 and up. Big swings, big rewards.

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2. Top 5 / Top 10 Finish

If you’re not ready to go all-in, no worries. These bets are like hedging your weekend plans – low commitment, still fun. Bet on a golfer to finish strong (in the top 5 or 10) instead of winning outright. It’s a safer bet, but still gives you a reason to cheer all weekend long.

3. Matchups

This one’s juicy. Sportsbooks will pit two golfers against each other, and you just pick which one finishes higher. 

For example, if you see a matchup like Viktor Hovland vs. Tony Finau, and you think Viktor is trending hotter, bet on him to beat Tony. Even if neither of them wins, if Viktor finishes 8th and Tony finishes 9th, you win. It’s a simpler way to stay engaged without needing to track the entire tournament field because even if they’re not winning the tournament, you’re winning your bet. It’s low drama, high payoff.

Bonus? It’s a perfect way to gain low-key bragging rights during Sunday brunch.

4. Live Bets

Tournaments stretch over four days. That means the odds shift, players rise and fall, and you can jump in with bets mid-tourney. It’s like shopping sales in real time—see who’s hot in real time and grab the value before it’s gone.

Why Women Should Love Golf Betting

Golf is the perfect sport to ease into betting. It’s slow enough to follow, exciting enough to matter, and gives you tons of chances to win over the weekend. Plus, nothing gets a guy’s attention like a woman who casually drops, “I’ve got Rickie to finish top 10. Let’s go.”

You don’t need to know every stat or swing path. You just need to be curious, confident, and down to learn. The goal? Make betting approachable for women and show the guys we can hold our own.

Why I Love ClickItGolf

ClickItGolf is all about making golf more fun and accessible and I’m all about the same. Whether you’re here for gear deals, course perks, or just that perfect swing tip, this site is your clubhouse. Adding a little betting action into the mix? That’s just next-level fun.

So, ladies go grab your iced coffee, fire up the PGA app, and get ready to make golf weekends a lot more interesting.

Follow me here at ClickItGolf or on Instagram @sportsbettingbabe_official and let’s turn birdies into bankroll.

See you on the green (and in the winner’s circle).

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