And you thought Winged Foot in 2006 was hard. Okay, Angel Cabrera’s winning score of five over par was the same as Geoff Ogilvy’s last year and the cut fell at the same number — +10 — but the average score at Oakmont was 75.72, .73 of a shot higher. Last year there were a dozen rounds under par, this year eight. And despite four par 4s under 400 yards, a long iron or hybrid followed by a poke with a wedge for today’s top players, not a single hole at Oakmont played under its par.

Did you get that? On a course slightly longer than average for the PGA Tour (7,230 yards) but by no means excessive, the best players in the world, using space-age equipment couldn’t play one hole under its par.

Make no bones, with an impressive brace of sub-70 rounds including yesterday’s one-under 69 under the most intense pressure he’s felt on a golf course and with the first and third ranked players in the world in his rear view mirror, Angel Cabrera richly deserved this U.S. Open. But on such a course as Oakmont and with a game as unpredictable and dependent on inspiration and motivation as those of other Latin players, most notably Seve Ballesteros, this has to go down as one of the bigger surprises in the championship’s 112-year history.

Oakmont called for patience, precision, and a level of meticulousness that Cabrera has never demonstrated in his 11 years as a member of the European Tour or the four years since coming to America. It called for Jim Furyk’s doggedness, tenacity, and resolve; Scott Verplank’s quiet persistence, and David Toms’ composed efficiency. A jumpy South American who, as Johnny Miller noted, was so wired up he could have charged a cart battery in under 10 minutes, was not the type of player most people had in mind as a potential winner before the championship started.

Don’t get me wrong, Cabrera is a player of incredible talent, of course, and a win, multiple wins, bigger than his BMW Championship victory at Wentworth, England, in 2005 were certainly on the cards. But even he would probably have expected them to come at the British Open or Augusta National (at least the old Augusta National), where free spirits are permitted more room to express themselves.

Since 2004, Cabrera has hit even fewer fairways on the PGA Tour than Tiger Woods, just 53.35%. At Oakmont he found only 27 fairways all week (48%) — good for 48th place in driving accuracy — 25% and 14 fairways behind the typically laser-like Fred Funk.

So how on earth could he have won on a course where the penalty for missing the short grass was so great?

He must have rolled them in from the four corners.

Well, no. With an average of 31 putts per round — 1.72 per green in regulation — the Argentinean hit 10 more putts than the week’s best putter Niclas Fasth which, considering how much he decelerates the putterhead at times, probably isn’t too bad.

Where Cabrera won the U.S. Open was with his superb iron play (65% of greens hit after finding only 48% of the fairways) and an incredible (so incredible you have to check this fact with several different sources) ability to dodge the double-bogeys and worse that lurked at every turn.

The difficulty of the course was a big talking point as it is every year at the U.S. Open but, just as at Winged Foot 12 months ago, most players agreed that though the course was absurdly tough it wasn’t unfair and didn’t go over the top like certain holes at Shinnecock Hills in 2004. “It is what it is,” said an exhausted and frustrated defending champion Geoff Ogilvy who added that the virtually automatic one-shot penalty for going in the rough or fairway bunkers was wrong.

Tiger Woods couldn’t have cared less how difficult it was, of course. All he was concerned with was winning a 13th major. The fact that he didn’t and tied for second at the second straight major will hurt — hurt bad and if he fails to win the British Open in four weeks when he is likely to be handicapped by the thought of his wife giving birth — he will have gone a year since winning one of the Grand Slam events, something that has happened just three times in the decade that has passed since he burst on the scene.

After a superb drive down the first and a rock solid par, Woods looked like the man to beat, especially after playing partner Aaron Baddeley, who started the day with a two-shot lead, chipped, chipped, putted, putted, and putted his way to a triple bogey seven. But a few dodgy swings featuring the irksome dipping of the head during the downswing in the middle of the round cost him. By the time Woods was swinging the club beautifully again it was too late and he found himself needing to birdie the hardest hole on the course to tie. He nearly did, of course, but a birdie at the par 5 12th, or the driveable par 4 17th would have made life so much easier. What he would have done for a ball-striking round like Saturday’s when he hit 17 greens in regulation and Hank Haney, his teacher, said that he had never seen his pupil swing the club better.

Nobody struck more solidly than Cabrera yesterday and after a number of near misses his stars finally aligned. But with a restless, excitable temperament and a streaky putter one wonders if they ever will again.

tonydear71@comcast.net