Zach Johnson doesn’t whistle love song for Whistling Straits

HAVEN, Wis. - This isn't a love story.

Zach Johnson played great golf at the 2010 PGA Championship here at Whistling Straits. He was 10-under-par over 72 holes, and was just one shot from joining Bubba Watson and champion Martin Kaymer in a playoff.

But he's lukewarm to this rugged tract on the shore of Lake Michigan, and is candid about it.

'I don't like Whistling Straits,” Johnson said last January. 'I lost by a shot there and I don't like it. I mean I played for four days the best four days of ball-striking I've ever had consecutively, whatever year that was. Played there in ‘05. Played all right. Didn't really like it, and I still don't like it.

'Is it beautiful? Stunning. You feel like you're playing on the ocean. It's just contrived. That's why I don't like it.”

Part of this stems from him being a huge fan of the links courses that are in the British Open's rotation. Johnson expressed his love of links golf long before he won the Open Championship last month at St. Andrews. Many like to say Whistling Straits is a links course.

'I think this course is the furthest thing from links,” Johnson said here Tuesday. 'Links golf is using the land, using trajectory control, running things on the green, using the bounces and the rolls.

'This course is all aerial. You have to hit it from here to there. It may look like links standing from the clubhouse looking down, but it does not play like a true links course.

'In my opinion, outside of maybe the sand traps and the way they look, it's not a links golf course.”

But what's love got to do with hit? This isn't a romance novel, it's professional golf. A major championship is a major championship, whether it's at Pebble Beach, Whistling Straits, or Goat Hills.

Had Johnson shaved just one more stroke off his total here five years ago, he would have entered a playoff with Kaymer and Watson. Maybe he'd be now three-fourths of the way to a career Zach Slam?

'Four consecutive days, I don't know I've hit it that well in a golf tournament,” Johnson said. As for his putting then, he said 'Average would probably be a stretch.

'It's funny, I remember the first hole. I hit to five feet and missed it. Second hole, I missed like an 8-footer. I missed a lot of makeable, short putts that week and still had a chance to win coming down the stretch.

'But I hit a lot of fairways, which you have to do here, and I hit a lot of greens in regulation.”

Thursday at 1:20 p.m., Johnson, Rory McIlroy and Justin Spieth will be playing partners as the 2015 edition of this tourney commences for them. Each of the three has won majors within the last year.

'Everything happens so quickly that a year ago after I won this tournament it was the Rory era and then Jordan wins the Masters and it's the Jordan era,” McIlroy said Wednesday. 'And eras last about six months these days instead of 20 years.”

As Paul Simon wrote, the future is the present, the present's in the past. The most recent majors-winner is Johnson, 23 days ago. It's already time for someone to make new lore, someone's 'era” to start or to be extended.

'I'm going to cling to the positives of five years ago (here) and I know what those are,” said Johnson. 'Bottom line is, mentally I know I can play here. I know this golf course, kind of what it demands, and I think there's aspects of it that really suit my game.

'Embracing that, knowing there's a little bit of confidence is great. But the execution now comes on my shoulders and hopefully it happens this week.”

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