Who will win the 39th U.S. Senior Open, which starts on Thursday at The Broadmoor in Colorado Springs?

— Will it be Davis Love III (left in a USGA photo), who at age 54 is competing in his first senior major ever? Love is trying to become the ninth player to win the U.S. Senior Open in his debut.

— Will it be World Golf Hall of Famer Fred Couples, who has finished in the top 14 four times in four tries at the U.S. Senior Open.

— Will it be 60-year-old Bernhard Langer, who with 37 PGA Tour Champions wins is chasing Hale Irwin’s record 45 victories? Langer has already won a record 10 senior majors.

— Will it be one of the former UCLA golf teammates Brandt Jobe and Scott McCarron? Jobe, No. 1 in the PGA Tour Champions in driving distance, lived in Colorado for 29 years before moving to Texas, and McCarron won the PGA Tour Champions event last week in Wisconsin.

— Will it be Kenny Perry, who is seeking his third Senior Open title and second in a row?

— Will it be Tom Lehman, who won the Senior PGA at Colorado Golf Club in 2010 and scored a PGA Tour Champions victory earlier this month in Des Moines?

— Will be it one of the other World Golf Hall of Famers in the field like Vijay Singh and Colin Montgomerie (below)?

— Or will it be the East Course at The Broadmoor, with its confounding, devilish greens and thick rough? After all, just three players finished under par — Eduardo Romero, Fred Funk and Mark McNulty — when the 2008 U.S. Senior Open was contested at The Broadmoor.

Couples seems to cast his vote for the course — or for Love, since they have to present the trophy to someone.

“It’s a very, very hard golf course,” said Boom Boom. “And I think the guys who play well will have to do a lot of things, which is what a U.S. Open is all about — or a Senior Open. You have to drive it, you have to be good around the greens and (deal with) the rough. And obviously you have to be a really good putter. These greens, I think they’re (tougher) than Oakmont and Oakmont’s are the hardest greens I’ve ever seen. I think they’re brutal (here).”

Langer will second that.

“They’re as severe as they get,” Langer said of the putting surfaces. “Fred and I played in many Masters over the years. And they’re pretty severe and tough (at Augusta National). But these probably are another level still.”

The Broadmoor this week “is a test with a driver, it’s a test with the irons and definitely the short game too,” Langer added. “The rough around the greens is extremely difficult.”

And this from Irwin, who grew up in Colorado and won the 1967 Broadmoor Invitation: The greens “are confounding, they really are. … This might be the most difficult I’ve seen these greens.”

And there are other unique factors this week as well. The PGA Tour Champions allows its players to use carts for typical tour events; that’s verboten for the most part at the U.S. Senior Open. There’s the altitude as The Broadmoor sits at over 6,000 feet, which taxes the players as they walk up and down the hills and forces them to adjust their club selection with the thinner air. Also, the U.S. Senior Open is a 72-hole affair, instead of the usual 54-hole events for PGA Tour Champions.

As for Love, he and Couples were among the top American golfers for years. And in Couples’ opinion …

“I think he’s a good pick this week,” Couples said of Love. “I really do. He hits the ball so high and so far. And he doesn’t play many of our tournaments. So obviously he picks the biggest ones. … You could tell, he’s wound up for this week. And he should be because he’s one of the probably 12 or 15 guys that can win.”

Love owns 21 PGA Tour wins, and two of them came at The International at Castle Pines, most recently 15 years ago.

“I’m very excited, obviously, to play in a major championship and be back in Colorado,” Love said. “I’ve had some good luck just up the road at Castle Pines. I like playing at altitude. … I’m swinging for the fences on a lot of these holes.”

Love underwent hip replacement surgery in November, but has played in five PGA Tour events and two on PGA Tour Champions since then. There haven’t been any notable finishes — he was 49th last week in the PGA Tour Champions American Family Insurance Championship — but none of the tournaments have been majors, which should get his juices flowing.

As for Couples, he’s making just his third start of the year on PGA Tour Champions, but is playing in back-to-back weeks. He finished sixth in the Mitsubishi Electric Championship in January and third last week in Wisconsin. He’s constantly battling back problems, but seems to be doing OK this week. Of course, this is a minute-to-minute proposition in his case.

But when he does tee it up, Couples expects to be in contention. If that stops being the case, he’ll likely hang up the clubs for good.

“I have no interest in playing if it’s mediocre,” the 58-year-old said. “I don’t even want to leave the house as it is. Why would I want to go finish 50th? There’s no chance of that happening.”

As noted, Langer is the second-most-successful PGA Tour Champions player ever with 37 career victories, eight fewer than Irwin. This will be his 11th U.S. Senior Open and he has three top-five finishes — a win in 2010, a runner-up in 2012 and a third place in 2015.

Just a couple months shy of 61, can Langer surpass Irwin’s once-apparently-untouchable Champions victory total?

“Bernhard playing the way he’s been playing, it’s certainly a conceivable thing to do,” Irwin said. “And I’ll be the first to applaud him if he does it because I know how much it takes.”

Langer certainly thinks it’s possible to overtake Irwin.

“It’s amazing to win 45 tournaments in a span of (12 years as Irwin did),” Langer said. “That’s very difficult to do on any tour. And I’ve been very blessed to have won 37. Can I get to 45? I think I can, but I’ve got to do it soon. I can’t wait until I’m 65, expecting to win another eight tournaments. But I won seven last year. I’ve had a win and three seconds already this year. So it’s possible.

“I know that the clock is ticking. I’m going to be 61 in August. It’s not going to last forever. So I’m trying to enjoy my last few years at playing at this level and then we’ll see what I’ll do after that.”

This week marks the beginning of a stretch in which the next three tournaments on the PGA Tour Champions schedule are senior majors. The Senior Players is two weeks away and the British Senior Open is a month down the road.

Jacobsen Out of Action: Peter Jacobsen, who won the 2004 U.S. Senior Open, is the latest player to withdraw from the U.S. Senior Open, pulling out on Wednesday for personal reasons.

Jacobsen joined Tom Watson, John Daly, Steve Stricker and Steve Jones in having pulled out over the last week or so.

Replacing Jacobsen in the field will be Tim Hume, a pro from Crystal River, Fla., who was the first alternate from the Ocala, Fla., qualifying site.
 
Speaking of players who have withdrawn from the Senior Open, Daly was critical of the USGA for not allowing him to use a cart at The Broadmoor due to a bad right knee. This week, the two-time major champion told USA Today that he won’t ever play in a USGA championship again. It’s “just not worth it to me,” Daly told the newspaper.

Notable: Among the honorary starters on the first tee for Wednesday’s practice round was Colorado Golf Hall of Famer Christie Austin (left), a former member of the USGA Executive Committee. … World Golf Hall of Famer Colin Montgomerie (below) conducted a short-game clinic for kids at the junior pavilion on the first green of the West Course on Wednesday morning. … Wildlife roaming around The Broadmoor grounds is certainly not unusual. On Wednesday, a deer (below) crossed the 18th fairway and went behind the fourth green of the East Course before making its way up the hill. … Parking right around The Broadmoor isn’t cheap during U.S. Senior Open week, but the sign below certainly caught our attention.

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For all the essentials regarding this week’s U.S. Senior Open at The Broadmoor, CLICK HERE.

This week’s U.S. Senior Open will be the second held at The Broadmoor in Colorado Springs. And if this one ends up with as many interesting — and sometimes offbeat — storylines as the one the resort hosted in 2008, they’ll still be talking about it many years from now.

Let’s look back on some of the most memorable moments from the ’08 Senior Open:

— Power Couple: Greg Norman and Chris Evert were only married for 15 months before they separated, but they were still fresh from their nuptials when they came to The Broadmoor together in the summer of 2008 for Norman to compete in the U.S. Senior Open.

Evert, winner of 18 Grand Slam singles titles in her stellar tennis career, was a fixture in the galleries at The Broadmoor while rooting on her Australian hubbie. She even wore a Shark logo hat to match his. As you might imagine, the athlete super couple drew plenty of attention that week, just a month removed for their wedding.

Alas, their divorce became final in December 2009. And they said it wouldn’t last …

By the way, Norman finished fourth at The Broadmoor. The next year, he also placed fourth in the event, marking his final U.S. Senior Open appearance.

— Quiet, Please: World Golf Hall of Famer Hale Irwin, a former University of Colorado athlete who won The Broadmoor Invitation in 1967, had something to chime in about following his second round in 2008.

When Irwin was teeing off on the par-4 first hole at the East Course, the chimes from the Will Rogers Memorial Shrine of the Sun (below) on nearby Cheyenne Mountain went off in the midst of his downswing. He tried to stop his swing, but inadvertently still made contact with his ball. It went about 20 yards, under a Rolex clock just off to the left side of the tee.

“It was the shortest tee shot I think I’ve ever hit,” the three-time U.S. Open champion said at the time. “… It was like, what else can go wrong? I told them on press day they (the chimes, which go off every 15 minutes) were going to be a problem. It’s bothersome. People (here) may be used to it, but they’re not playing a golf championship. After that, I told my caddie to keep his watch handy every 15 minutes.”

For the record, Irwin still made a par on the first hole. After he received free relief from the clock near the tee, he hit his second shot, then his approach to 22 feet from the cup, and sank the putt.

Later in the round, on the 12th tee, the Rogers Shrine chimes went off while Irwin was set up to the ball, but this time he backed off with a slight smile before having begun his swing.

FYI regarding the chimes and this week’s championship: Russ Miller, the director of golf at The Broadmoor, told the USGA on Monday that the volume of the chimes has been reduced by 50 percent this week.

— Something’s a Bruin: The same round that he hit his 20-yard tee shot, Irwin encountered another wildly unexpected happening.

The former Coloradan and playing partners Tom Watson and Bernhard Langer — the highest-profile pairing that teed off Friday morning — were on the 13th hole when a large black bear ran across the fairway in front of them around noon (pictured at top). Then-ESPN on-course reporter Dottie Pepper was in the fairway with the group, and ESPN cameras captured the action.

“Dottie about wet her britches,” said Irwin, who noted that he saw the same bear in a back yard that Thursday.

“It was a crazy day.”

Added Fred Funk: “(Jack) Nicklaus isn’t here, so I guess that’s a substitute.”

The bear later made its way through two drainage pipes on the West Course and then departed the premises. But on Saturday night, a bruin — very possibly the same one — visited the concession stand at the seventh hole and helped itself to a smorgasbord of candy bars, bananas, hot dogs and bread.

Fellow TV broadcaster Roger Maltbie didn’t blame Pepper for being alarmed by a bear in such close proximity.

“The only part of me the bear would have seen was my backside headed out of the area,” he said.

Not surprisingly, the bear footage was a prominent fixture on ESPN’s SportsCenter for the remainder of the day.

— Green Issues: As if the bear and the chimes weren’t enough on that Friday in 2008, the pin placements for the second round that day drew the ire of many a U.S. Senior Open contestant.

Said 1992 U.S. Open champion Tom Kite: Some of the Friday pin placements “almost defy the imagination.”

Added Greg Norman: “The USGA should know better.”

Fred Funk, who finished second in 2008, behind Eduardo Romero, was amazed at the general difficulty of the greens that week.

“This is the hardest set of greens I’ve ever played,” he said. “And that’s throwing Augusta in — and Oakmont and Winged Foot and Pinehurst [No. 2]. I’ve just never seen greens with this much movement in them, meaning they don’t have any flat spots on them, like an Augusta (green) has. You have all that, and then you have to factor in that mountain. That’s what’s crazy. It just gives you that illusion that you have a putt that looks like it’s uphill, and it’s really downhill, or the other way around. It just keeps you guessing.”

— And then there’s these tidbits from that week: Bernhard Langer — the second-winningest player in PGA Tour Champions history, behind Hale Irwin — played in his first U.S. Senior Open at The Broadmoor in 2008. The German closed with a 66 to tie for sixth place. … None of the players with strong Colorado ties finished in the top 10 at the 2008 Senior Open. The best of the bunch were local resident Gary Hallberg (14th place) and Colorado Springs native and former University of Northern Colorado athlete R.W. Eaks (18th). But a player from fairly nearby — Jeff Klein of Scottsbluff, Neb. — placed ninth at The Broadmoor. His third-round score of 64 was just a stroke higher than the Senior Open record at the time. In fact, Klein was 8 under par after 14 holes before going 2 over in his last four. … The 2008 U.S. Senior Open — which featured a field that included World Golf Hall of Famers Tom Watson, Hale Irwin, Greg Norman, Bernhard Langer, Ben Crenshaw, Tom Kite and Curtis Strange — attracted an announced 128,714 fans for the week.

All in all, this week’s tournament appears to have its work cut out if it hopes to match or surpass 2008 in terms of sheer memorability.

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For all the essentials regarding this week’s U.S. Senior Open at The Broadmoor, CLICK HERE.

The USGA accepted 2,738 entries for the tournament — including 106 from Colorado — with 75 being exempt from qualifying. The entry deadline for the event was Wednesday.

Joining Irwin (20 PGA Tour victories, including three U.S. Opens) among World Golf Hall of Famers who have entered the championship at The Broadmoor’s East Course are Tom Watson (39 PGA Tour wins), Vijay Singh (34), Davis Love III (21), Tom Kite (19), Mark O’Meara (16), Fred Couples (15), Bernhard Langer (3, including two majors) and Colin Montgomerie (41 international victories).

Besides Irwin, players who grew up in Colorado and are in the field are 1996 U.S. Open champion Steve Jones and fellow Colorado Golf Hall of Famer Brandt Jobe.

In all, 11 U.S. Senior Open champions have entered the event at The Broadmoor: Irwin (1998 and 2000), Kenny Perry (2013 and ’17), Langer (2010), Montgomerie (2014), Jeff Maggert (2015), Peter Jacobsen (2004), Fred Funk (2009), Gene Sauers (2016), Olin Browne (2011), Brad Bryant (2007) and Roger Chapman (2012).

Others among the exempt players who are planning to play at The Broadmoor are John Daly, Mark Calcavecchia, Steve Stricker, John Cook, Tom Lehman (who won the 2010 Senior PGA Championship at Colorado Golf Club), Corey Pavin, Lee Janzen, Billy Mayfair, Rocco Mediate, Gil Morgan, Jesper Parnevik, Tom Pernice Jr., Loren Roberts, David Frost, Jay Haas, David Toms, Scott Hoch, Miguel Angel Jimenez, Scott Verplank and Kirk Triplett.

The Broadmoor is hosting its second U.S. Senior Open and its eighth USGA championship, with winners at the resort including Jack Nicklaus, Annika Sorenstam and Juli Inkster. The Broadmoor is celebrating its 100th anniversary on the Friday of the championship, June 29.

Thirty-four qualifying tournaments for the U.S. Senior Open will be held starting Monday. The Broadmoor will host a qualifier on May 28, with Pro Football Hall of Famer John Elway among those competing.

In all, the U.S. Senior Open field will feature 156 players.

One golfer with strong Colorado ties who won’t be playing is Colorado Golf Hall of Famer and former Aurora resident Mark Wiebe. Wiebe said on Twitter this week that he withdrew from the exempt list due to a lingering neck injury.
 

Kenny Perry was sitting within a few feet of a U.S. Senior Open trophy at The Broadmoor in Colorado Springs on Monday, but given that he won the championship last summer, he’s got one of his own back home in Franklin, Ky.

“It makes me nervous every day where it’s sitting,” Perry explained during a U.S. Senior Open Championship Preview seven weeks before the tournament comes to The Broadmoor. “I have a little muni (course) I opened in 1995 (named Country Creek). I’ve got the trophy right there on the counter where everybody who comes in and gets a greens fee can see it, have your picture taken with it or whatever. It makes me so nervous because we’ve been broken into four or five times, and I’m afraid somebody is going to get it. But I’ve still got it.

“We keep it shiny, keep it looking nice. When people grab that trophy and just start looking at the names (of the champions), I just sit back and take pictures of them. Everybody is in awe of all the names on that trophy.”

Along with the likes of Jack Nicklaus, Arnold Palmer, Gary Player, Lee Trevino and Hale Irwin, engraved on that trophy is Perry’s name — twice, in fact. The 57-year-old has won the U.S. Senior Open, arguably the top event in senior golf, two times in the last five years. The only other players who have claimed the title two or more times are Nicklaus, Player, Irwin, Allen Doyle and Miller Barber, the only three-time champ.

And if Perry plays well enough come June 28-July 1 at The Broadmoor, he could join Barber in the three-timers club.

Perry came to The Broadmoor Resort for the first time on Sunday, though he didn’t arrive until late at night. So he truly had his first good look on Monday morning after he woke up. And his first reaction to the resort was the same as many people’s.

“As a golfer, you travel the world, but you don’t see the world,” he said. “You just see golf courses. Last night I flew in from Houston. I got in here about midnight. I didn’t have an idea of what we pulled into, so this morning when I woke up early, they’d given me this beautiful suite. I opened the curtains and there was this panoramic view. There was The Broadmoor out there in front of my eyes. I was like, ‘Wow. This place is amazing already.’

“The place is phenomenal. It’s beautiful. Thank you all for picking a golf course where every hole goes from right to left because that’s (the only shot) I can hit. I noticed there’s a lot of hooking holes out there. That’s right in my wheelhouse. I’m looking forward to coming here.”

Russ Miller, The Broadmoor’s longtime director of golf, gave Perry a quick tour of the East Course, where the championship will be contested. Miller made sure Perry took notice of the Will Rogers Shrine on the side of Cheyenne Mountain above the course as putts break away from it to the point of being very deceptive.

As Dale Douglass, a longtime Coloradan who won the 1986 U.S. Senior Open, noted on Monday, “I wake up having nightmares about having to make a 15-footer at this place.”

Added Ben Kimball, director of the U.S. Senior Open Championship: “This is a very, very interesting venue and every time I come here I tell Russ I struggle to figure out The Broadmoor — and I think the best players in the world will too.”

Perry is sure to be fooled too — at least on occasion — during the U.S. Senior Open, just like about all 156 players in the field will. But he didn’t win 14 times on the PGA Tour and nine times on PGA Tour Champions by lacking for talent. And though he lost two major championships in playoffs — to Mark Brooks at the 1996 PGA Championship and to Angel Cabrera at the 2009 Masters — he’s won four majors on the senior circuit: a Senior Players and a Tradition to go along with his two U.S. Senior Open victories.

“When you’ve got Palmer, Nicklaus, Player on that trophy, it makes you feel pretty special you’re part of that company,” Perry said. “It’s been pretty rough on me my whole life. I’ve always come up a little short in my career. To finally break through and win a couple of these titles really means a lot.

“This takes the edge off the pain I still carry with me to be able to have some major titles associated with my name. It still motivates me very highly. It keeps me going, keeps the fire burning inside of me.”

Elway, Solich Will Team Up in Qualifying: As was noted months ago, U.S. Senior Open honorary chairman and Broncos general manager John Elway will attempt to qualify for the championship on Memorial Day at The Broadmoor. And, as Elway indicated in a video message on Monday, he’ll have a secret weapon of sorts to help bolster his chances.

Elway said George Solich, a co-founder of the Solich Caddie & Leadership Academy who himself caddied at The Broadmoor as a teenager en route to receiving the Evans Scholarship for caddies, will be looping for the Pro Football Hall of Famer on May 28.

“He was a caddie down there for a long, long time,” Elway said of Solich, a friend for years. “He told me he’d get me through it and make sure I qualified.

“I’m excited for the opportunity just to play in a qualifier. I don’t have high expectations. My practice for the last three months has been inside the (Broncos) draft room. It’s been the mental side of practice and nothing physical. But I’m glad to be part of the Senior Open and bringing it back to Colorado.”

A lifelong golf amateur, Elway has finished as high as 19th in the CoBank Colorado Senior Open, has made the cut once in the Colorado Open, and has placed in the top 10 14 times in the nationally televised American Century Championships celebrity tournament in the Lake Tahoe area. He and Tom Hart won the 2009 Trans-Miss Four-Ball at Cherry Hills and tied for second in the 2010 CGA Four-Ball.

In all, more than 2,200 golfers posted entries for the U.S. Senior Open, with most of them competing at one of 34 qualifying tournaments. The qualifier at The Broadmoor on May 28 has a full field of 84 players.

Irwin, Watson Conducting Kids Exhibitions: Russ Miller, The Broadmoor’s director of golf, said Monday that two World Golf Hall of Famers will conduct kids exhibitions the week of the U.S. Senior Open June 25-July 1. Former University of Colorado athlete Hale Irwin, the career victory leader on PGA Tour Champions, will do the honors on Tuesday afternoon (June 26) and Tom Watson on Wednesday afternoon (June 27).

Miller said that in addition to Irwin, Watson and Perry, among those who are planning to play in the U.S. Senior Open at The Broadmoor are Bernhard Langer, Davis Love III (who was previously announced) and Steve Stricker.

In Short: Among those in attendance at Monday’s U.S. Senior Open Championship Preview at The Broadmoor was a who’s who of Colorado golf. On hand were Judy Bell, a former USGA president; Dow Finsterwald, winner of the 1958 PGA Championship among his 11 PGA Tour titles; and Dale Douglass, who owns three PGA Tour wins and 11 on PGA Tour Champions, including a U.S. Senior Open. (Douglass and Finsterwald are pictured above.) Also at the festivities was Broncos placekicker Brandon McManus. … At least 21 hours of TV coverage is planned for the U.S. Senior Open, almost all on FS1. … The Broadmoor’s East Course will play 7,264 yards — and thereabouts — and to a par of 70 for the Senior Open. The 17th hole will be a par-4 rather than a par-5 for the championship. And the seventh and 11th holes will be flipped for the tournament, with both playing as par-4s.
 

Bernhard Langer, the second-winningest player in PGA Tour Champions history — behind former University of Colorado athlete Hale Irwin — will compete in a Senior Open at The Broadmoor for the second time. The German tied for sixth place in Colorado Springs in 2008.

Joining him in the exempt field for this year’s event — set for June 28-July 1 — will be fellow World Golf Hall of Famers Fred Couples and Vijay Singh. Another Hall of Famer, Davis Love III, was previously announced as a competitor, and Tom Watson has also indicated he plans to play at The Broadmoor. Two-time U.S. Open champion Lee Janzen has likewise entered.

As for the entrants announced on Monday, they have 52 PGA Tour victories among them, including six majors. Singh has 34 PGA Tour wins, with a Masters and two PGA Tour Champions titles. Langer won three times on the PGA Tour — including two Masters — plus has claimed 36 PGA Tour Champions wins. Couples owns 15 PGA Tour victories, with a Masters, plus 13 wins on PGA Tour Champions. Langer (pictured with Couples) won the U.S. Senior Open in 2010.

All three are in the field for this week’s Masters.

Online entries for the U.S. Senior Open are being accepted through May 16.

The Colorado Golf Hall of Famer, in just his third Champions start, tied for sixth place Sunday in the Chubb Classic in Naples, Fla.

Jobe (pictured), who turned 50 on Aug. 1, shot rounds of 70-69-67 for a 10-under-par 206 total, which left him five strokes behind champion Bernhard Langer.

It marked Jobe’s best showing on either the PGA Tour or the PGA Tour Champions since he placed second at the Memorial in 2011. He earned $57,600 on Sunday.

“He’s got a lot of game,” said Lanny Wadkins, a Golf Channel analyst who was working the Chubb Classic. “He may figure out how to win out here.”

Jobe, medalist at the PGA Tour Champions Q-school finals in December, won the Colorado Open in 1992 and five major CGA championships during the 1980s (three Match Plays, one Stroke Play, one Junior Match Play and one Junior Stroke Play).

Jobe, who has four runner-up finishes on the PGA Tour to his credit, was a resident of Colorado for about two decades before moving to Texas.