NBC Sports Notable Quotes
120th U.S. Open – Second Round
Winged Foot Golf Club (West Course), Mamaroneck, N.Y.
Friday, September 18
**Saturday’s third round coverage of the 120th U.S. Open begins at 9 a.m. ET exclusively on Peacock, and shifts to NBC from 11 a.m. ET until 7:30 p.m. ET**
This week, NBCUniversal presents the most-ever live U.S. Open coverage by one media group exclusively across NBC, GOLF Channel, and Peacock, NBCUniversal’s new streaming service. In addition, GOLF Channel’s Golf Central Live From the U.S. Open provides comprehensive wraparound news coverage on-site at Winged Foot Golf Club, with interviews, highlights and analysis throughout the week.
120th U.S. Open – Second Round Leaderboard
| Patrick Reed | -4 |
| Bryson DeChambeau | -3 |
| Justin Thomas | -2 |
| Rafa Cabrera Bello | -2 |
| Harris English | -2 |
| Jason Kokrak | -1 |
On Today’s Difficult Playing Conditions
Brandal Chamblee – “If this were a horse race, the announcer would have been saying, ‘And here comes Winged Foot.’”
Rich Lerner – “Winged Foot at its brutal best…this is the biggest jump in scoring average from Round One to Round Two in U.S. Open history.”
Justin Leonard – “We have a true U.S. Open on our hands.”
Nick Faldo – “It’s a whole new golf course. It’s a good 15 degrees cooler and then, of course, it’s championship conditions – mentally as well. There’s one birdie hole – the 9th – and the other 17 are potential carnage. There’s no other hole you think, ‘I should birdie.’”
Terry Gannon – “Different areas of the golf course are tough today where they weren’t yesterday because the wind is different. It’s not only up, it’s a different wind.”
On Patrick Reed (4-under, 1st)
Reed’s post-round interview with Steve Sands on course setup – “It’s almost like they set it up to ease us into this golf tournament, and then they were going to show us what it’s really supposed to be like.”
Leonard – “I know he went to Augusta State, but he must have gone to grad school at Hogwarts, because he’s just an absolute wizard around the greens…but at some point, 72 holes on a golf course like this with green complexes like this, you just wonder how long it’s going to hold up.”
Chamblee – “It really doesn’t matter where you put him. Up slope, down slope, side slope, out of the bunker – he’s up to the task. He can match himself to the environment…no place you can put him around the greens that he doesn’t hit his target.”
On Bryson DeChambeau (3-under, 2nd)
DeChambeau post-round interview with Damon Hack – “It’s an awesome journey for me…I was out here last night, I knew (the weather) was going to be cooler, so I waited and I was able to hit balls almost in the dark. I knew it was going to be similar conditions.”
Chamblee – “The transformation he has made has all of us perplexed, intrigued, leaning in, on the edge of our seats. I’ve been playing this game a long time, covering this game a long time, and I haven’t seen a transformation like this. People were laughing at him all over the golf world Wednesday night when he said, ‘I’m going to hit driver everywhere.’…overall, he has made an enormous advance…it’s not just about bulking up, not just about hitting it farther. It’s about the angle of descent and coming into greens at major championships.”
Peter Jacobsen – “He’s becoming a must-watch. It’s so fascinating, he’s trying to change the way everybody thinks about how to prepare for a round of golf. Lift some weights, drink a bunch of protein shakes and swing hard.”
Faldo – “That 3-under is going to be pretty dominant by the end of the day.”
Gannon – “I’m going to write this down. It’s 1:21 p.m. local time, 3-under, somebody got in there and posted it.”
On Justin Thomas (2-under, T-3rd)
Thomas’ post-round interview with Steve Sands – “Those are the kinds of rounds that can potentially win you a U.S. Open. I was far from having good stuff out there today. I don’t know if I look as tired as I feel, but I’m pretty exhausted. That was a grueling day. A lot tougher conditions, much like we would expect in the U.S. Open. I just cannot drive it like that on the weekend.”
Paul Azinger – “It looked like he could have completely lost it today. Nobody can be emotionally weak or temperamentally weak and win this golf tournament. He really hung in there today when things got tough.”
Chamblee – “Over the weekend, if he can just hit six, seven fairways, that’s enough opportunities for him to make birdies, and you have to figure Patrick Reed isn’t going to keep up off the tee.”
On Harris English (2-under, T-3rd)
Chamblee – “Given the weather forecast for the next couple of days, it will eventually become more about controlling your golf shots, so you start to look at someone like Harris English. On a day when the entire field average nine greens, he hit 14 greens and is top-10 on the PGA Tour in greens-in-regulation. Really a great comeback story.”
On Tiger Woods (10-over, missed cut)
Woods – “It feels like the way the golf course is changing and turning, anybody who makes the cut has a chance to win this championship.”
Chamblee – “You think back to last year at The Masters when he won, and you look on the whole on what he did there…he had the single worst statistical driving week in the history of statistics that somebody won a major…you can get away with that at The Masters, you can’t get away with that at a U.S. Open…he’s not playing so poorly and swinging so poorly that a renaissance can’t happen and all of a sudden, he’s at the top of the leaderboard.”
Leonard – “Can he get enough reps, if he plays Zozo before The Masters, to be sharp? A lot of it hinges on how he feels, certainly the bulk of it. Not just the week of, but leading in because that determines how much he can practice and how much he can put in on his short game, which he needs to practice.”