If golf’s major championship planets are going to realign for Geoff Ogilvy, this is the week.
Ogilvy’s is a name that has slipped from conversations of contenders at the US Open – but as one of only 13 players in this field to have scaled its summit, it’s naïve in the extreme to write him off.
And while the Victorian can eloquently make his own case about his swing, it’s more a combination of other factors that makes some seasoned observers believe he can wind back the clock to Winged Foot in 2006.
He’s clearly striking the ball as well as ever.
There might never have been a major championship course better suited to his revered, crisp long irons than Chambers Bay.
The potential damage of his putting that — by his own admission – is the chief question mark over his game will be greatly diminished by the bumpy greens that bring the short stick marksmen back to the pack.
And at a new course that has many players privately querying its design and set-up as a US Open venue, possibly Ogilvy’s biggest single asset is his burgeoning love affair with its innovations as a major venue.
Ogilvy, whose passion for course design grows stronger almost daily, could barely be more effusive in his praise for Chambers Bay – and his sunny disposition has to be an advantage.
“It is sad, but modern touring pros seem to hate really slopey greens … but I like them. I think they are fun,” he said.
“The problem is our whole life we play strokeplay so we have to add up every shot and strokeplay is kind of the most ruthless unforgiving game to play.
“If we came here and played a matchplay event, no one would be talking about it, they’d be saying how cool is this, you can mess around and have fun with it.
“If you came out here with your buddies, with no scorecard and no score in mind you’d have the most fun in your life because there are so many cool shots to hit out here.
“Putting from 100 yards off the green (or) you hit some greens where you can putt it up one side like a half pipe.’
“It is the sort of course where if you miss it, it is extreme. But every hole, as extreme as it is, every hole has a place you can hit it where you have a relatively easy up and down because you have a bank shot.
“Every hole has a high side it feels like where if you position your shot and do it right, you are always going to have a chance, if you do it wrong you’re going to have no chance.
“So from an architectural perspective, that’s perfect – it matters where you miss the ball.
“The difficulty of your shot isn’t a measure of how bad your lie is, like a normal US Open, the difficulty of your shot is how bad, or good, your position is.
“For me, that’s perfect golf – that’s St Andrews, that’s Augusta.
“If you are in the right place, while the set up is on the edge of extreme, and will be really difficult, you will have a chance from the right place. It’s about placement, rather than the normal USGA punishment of bad lie. It is a more interesting way to make it difficult.”
As you can sense, the 38-year-old is excited, even if with a word of quiet, polite warning to his USGA hosts about a course that is already very firm and drying daily.
“They could lose this. If they get it wrong overnight and don’t water enough they will be out there with sprinklers and that will be a shame,” Ogilvy said.
“I am sure they are working it out and all in all, I think it’s cool that the USGA has stepped out of their comfort zone a little bit.
“And whether it is the best version of this style of golf in the world or not it doesn’t really matter. The idea that they have given us width, a course you can attempt to show your imagination and all the shots you have, and the more imagination you have, the more chance you have.
“It is fairer than a normal US Open.”
Which brings us conveniently to the question of Ogilvy’s form.
The former world No.4 fell as far down the rankings as 216th last year before he struck for victory at the US PGA Tour’s Barracuda Championship in August.
And while few have noticed, he’s quietly been playing better just about constantly since, with his putting the only anchor to his otherwise growing confidence.
But again, it’s Chambers Bay to the rescue.
“It is going to be more of a ball striking test than a putting test which is what tour players always ask for and yet ironically, as in everything in life, things are often opposite to your instincts, especially with golf.
“If you ask for fairness and long rough just off the fairway you end up having a putting contest because everyone misses greens and everybody is trying to hole putts.
“With soft greens it is a putting contest, firm greens (provide) a ball striking contest, usually.
“This should suit where my game is at.
“The past month, four in a row, I have putted well.
“And the game is coming around. Anyone who would listen I would tell them I am hitting it nicely and I like how I am playing.
“And I am starting to understand what I need to do away from tournaments and at tournaments to make myself play well not kind of sabotage myself by going down tangents with technique.
“I am working myself out and enjoying playing golf – and that’s a big part of it.
“US Opens are hard to enjoy when you’re out there because you feel like you’re getting beaten over the head all the time.
“But I like where my game is at and if it happens this week it will be sweet if it doesn’t St Andrews is next and good stuff is coming.”
So it’s more a matter of whether or not his best is still a match for the game’s best, as it has been for more than a decade.
“I am hitting way better than I ever did. My short game was pretty special back then and it is still there, it is (just) more inconsistent than at my best,” he said.
“The last month has been positive and I like where it’s going, so there is no reason the next five or six years can’t be my best five or six years.”
Doesn’t sound like someone who should be written off, does it?