U.S. Open: Ranking the 25 Most Dominant Performances in History
By Bill Felber
4. Tom Kite, 1992, Pebble Beach, -3.10
Pebble Beach’s famously challenging weather was the story of the 1992 U.S. Open competition, but Tom Kite’s experience allowed him to survive those conditions better than anyone else in the field.
It didn’t look that way at the outset. Gil Morgan, a lightly regarded journeyman, opened with a 66 and backed it up with a 69 to assume a three stroke lead – over the equally unknown Andy Dillard — at the tournament’s halfway point. Kite, meanwhile, plodded along eight strokes off the pace.
But when the wind picked up on Saturday, turmoil resulted. With a birdie at the 7th hole, Morgan moved to 12-under before falling victim and turning in a 77. Dillard, along with fellow top five members Ray Floyd, Wayne Grady, Anders Forsbreg and Colin Montgomerie also disappeared from the leaderboard, while a host of players whose fortune it had been to conclude their rounds before the worst of the weather hit took their places. Among them was Kite, whose 70 left him tied for second just one stroke behind Morgan.
Sunday’s final round developed into a contest between Kite and Jeff Sluman, who began play four strokes out of the lead in a tie for 13th. When Kite double bogeyed the fourth hole Sluman moved with a stroke of him. But Kite responded with birdies at the sixth and seventh to build a three-stroke edge.
Sluman never got closer until his birdie at the final hole fixed the eventual two-stroke margin.