Kemper Open

When: Thursday through Sunday; pro-am WednesdayWhere: Tournament Players Club at Avenel, PotomacPurse: $1.3 million, first prize of $234,000Who: 156 golfers, including defending champion Grant Waite, reigning U.S. Open champion Lee Janzen, 1992 U.S. Open winner and former Kemper champion Tom Kite, 1991 U.S. Open champion Payne Stewart and two-time U.S. Open champion Curtis Strange as well as former PGA champion John Daly, Phil Mickelson and Fred Funk.Tickets:...

In the weeks after he qualified for his first PGA Championship, The Elkridge Club's director of instruction, David Hutsell, received all kinds of advice from some of his fellow club pros. A few who had played in the PGA told Hutsell to make a visit to Whistling Straits well in advance of the tournament. "They told me it would take away the wow factor," said Hutsell, who recently went out to Kohler, Wis., for a couple of practice rounds. "It's enough to try to play the golf course, but with a tournament of this magnitude, there's a lot more going on than at a section event.

POTOMAC -- A year ago, John Daly was an obscure and struggling PGA Tour rookie when he showed up for the Kemper Open. Despite his booming drives and respectable showing, barely anyone noticed.Daly's return to the Tournament Players Club at Avenel is much like every other appearance he has made since his celebrated victory at last year's PGA Championship."It's so much more fun having people know who you are and rooting for you to win," Daly said. "It's something that every athlete dreams about.

The PGA Tour might be returning to the Washington area a lot sooner than expected, possibly this summer. PGA Tour commissioner Tim Finchem said yesterday that the nation's capital would be on a short list of potential tournament sites to replace The International on the 2007 schedule. The International was scheduled to be played at Castle Pines Golf Club outside Denver from July 5-8, but Jack Vickers, the tournament's chairman and the club's president, announced this week that the event is closing after 20 years because it is losing too much money.

POTOMAC -- To paraphrase, some tournaments are born great -- the open championships of golf-loving countries, for instance -- while others have greatness thrust upon them: the Masters, the Ryder Cup competition and the Pebble Beach Pro-Am back in the days of Bing Crosby.Mostly, though, tourneys have to tough it out through some lean years, pray that sponsors and the crowds keep the faith and hope vagaries such as bad weather, an unappealing date on the tour schedule, player prejudices and course peccadillos aren't too much to overcome.

POTOMAC - The PGA Tour event formerly known as the Kemper Open has undergone its second name change in a little more than a month, with the introduction yesterday of a Virginia-based investment banking group as its title sponsor. Briefly called the Capital Open at Avenel after Kemper Insurance ended a 35-year association as the tournament sponsor, the $4.5 million tournament will be called the FBR Capital Open when it is played at the TPC at Avenel next month. Friedman, Billings and Ramsey Group, one of the nation's top 10 investment banks, signed a one-year contract as title sponsor.

POTOMAC -- Gil Morgan has earned more than $5 million during a 23-year career on the PGA Tour, yet is probably the least known of the 25 players who have crossed that financial threshold.Although Morgan, a soft-spoken Oklahoman, has had some impressive performances during his career, he usually draws more attention for his Doctor of Optometry degree, although he never has practiced.Morgan found himself in the Kemper Open spotlight yesterday, a familiar position for him since the tournament's move from Charlotte, N.C., to suburban Washington in 1980.

POTOMAC -- Mark Brooks used to believe that the only way to win golf tournaments was to shoot for the pin, to bury the opposition when you have the chance, to play smart but not necessarily safe.Yesterday, he found there's another way.Just have the other guy give it to you.With the final round of 2-under par 69 and a four-round score of 13-under 271, Brooks won the $1.3 million Kemper Open at Avenel. But his victory came only after third-round leader Bobby Wadkins tried to put some distance between himself and the rest of the field, but wound up self-destructing instead.

Reading Time: Two Minutes.While it's true this week's Kemper Open at Avenel in Potomac has had a "Who's He" instead of a "Who's Who" list of winners of late -- Grant Waite, Morris Hatalsky, Billy Andrade -- that figures to change momentarily with the tourney hosting its best field in a decade: Tom Kite, Payne Stewart, John Daly, Lee Janzen, Lanny Wadkins, Phil Mickelson (back from a broken leg), Curtis Strange, et al.* Actually, it's no big deal that the New York Rangers, who start the Stanley Cup final against the Vancouver Canucks tonight, haven't claimed the beloved cup over the last 54 seasons.

POTOMAC -- Scott Dunlap, in the midst of the best season of what has been an on-and-off PGA Tour career, highlighted his 3-under-par 68 with the third double eagle of his professional life during the first round of the Kemper Open at TPC-Avenel yesterday.Starting at No. 10 on the 7,005-yard, par-71 course, Dunlap had one birdie and one bogey on the back to turn even, then birdied the first and bogeyed the fifth to still be even going to No. 6.At the 520-yard dog-leg right hole, he hit driver, and had 219 yards to the hole.

BETHESDA -- When 55-year-old Tom Kite birdied the 18th hole and took a one-stroke lead after 54 holes of the $5 million Booz Allen Classic yesterday, the 33-year pro joked that for a moment, he thought he was on the Champions Tour instead of the PGA Tour. "Heck, if this was the Champions Tour, they'd be giving me the trophy right now," Kite quipped. "It's supposed to end after three rounds, isn't it? Obviously, I was just pleased [with] making some putts and hitting the ball like that and getting into contention."

BETHESDA - To many pros in this week's Booz Allen Classic, there's a single word that explains why this year's tournament has drawn eight of the top 10 golfers in the world and 17 of the top 25. Congressional. The 81-year-old country club in Montgomery County has played host to some of the sport's grandest events. Using words such as "classic," "traditional" and "wonderful," several players agreed that the move of the tournament to Congressional from TPC at Avenel in Potomac is what attracted its strongest field in recent memory.

ROCKVILLE -- Donnie Hammond and George Bradford started yesterday's U.S. Open sectional qualifier at Woodmont Country Club in places befitting their respective golf careers. Hammond, a 47-year-old veteran who's winding things down on the PGA Tour, began on the back nine of the North Course while Bradford, a 29-year-old Canadian Tour rookie, opened on the front. Unfortunately for the two Maryland natives, they wound up in the same place -- not playing well enough to be among the five survivors in the field of 74 to advance to next week's Open at Shinnecock Hills in Southampton, N.Y. Hammond, who grew up in Frederick and now lives outside Orlando, Fla., came a lot closer, shooting rounds of 69 and 71 for a 4-under-par 140. Bradford, who grew up in Columbia and now lives in Pikesville, struggled with rounds of 77 and 75. "It was a nice day to score, but when you only have five spots, you have to play pretty well," Hammond said last night.

Michelle Wie will apparently choose Williamsburg over Washington. According to the player's father, the 14-year old sensation from Honolulu who nearly made the cut in last week's Sony Open will defend her title in this year's U.S. Women's Amateur Public Links championship in Williamsburg, Va., rather than accept a sponsor's exemption to another PGA Tour event the same week, the $4.8 million Booz Allen Classic at Avenel in Potomac. "Her intention is she wants to defend," B.J. Wie told the Associated Press yesterday.

ROCHESTER, N.Y. - Much has transpired in the life of Rich Beem since he won last year's PGA Championship at Hazeltine National Golf Club near Minneapolis. Beem went from being a journeyman to a major champion. He found himself secure and confident among his peers, including the player he beat by a stroke, Tiger Woods. Yet nothing that's happened to Beem since could match what happened to him last month, when he became a first-time father. "I always knew I was going to be a father some day, but to be real honest with you, I wasn't too sure how I was going to handle it until the day he was born," Beem said yesterday.

POTOMAC - In its first year under a new title sponsor, the $4.5 million Capital Open has created its own memories. Given the amount of rain that has fallen on the TPC at Avenel, those memories might not be indelible. Yesterday's downpour washed out the third round, marking the first time that has happened since the tournament formerly known as the Kemper Open came to the Washington suburbs in 1980. PGA Tour official Mark Russell announced yesterday afternoon that because of the condition of the course, the third round would be held today beginning at 10:45 a.m. and the final round would be held tomorrow starting at 7:30 a.m. Asked if the tour had considered trying to play 36 holes today, Russell said, "I think it's going to be very difficult to do that."

POTOMAC -- Little by little, the Kemper Open is improving its image.The Kemper's reputation was tarnished five years ago when Greg Norman suggested, in frustration, that the par-3 ninth hole be blown up. Norman's comment simply wouldn't go away.But after the 24th annual Kemper yesterday, the tournament and the course received a few kind words."Ideal conditions for four straight days," said runner-up Jeff Sluman. "Hitting off the zoysia grass on the fairways is unbelievable. It looks like three strands of grass are holding the ball up."

More than one-third of the 90 qualifiers for next week's U.S. Open championship at Oakmont (Pa.) will be determined tomorrow when 150 players shoot for 34 available places at a sectional qualifier in suburban Washington.The field will be split, and golfers will play at either Woodmont Country Club's North Course in Rockville, or Congressional Country Club's Gold Course in Bethesda. There will be both morning and afternoon tee times.Because this sectional event follows the Kemper Open, which concludes today at TPC-Avenel in Potomac, there is an unusually large field.

POTOMAC - A month of rain gave way to sunshine and a stiff breeze helped dry TPC at Avenel, but conditions were messy for yesterday's first round of the Capital Open. Players were allowed to "lift, clean and place" their ball on the fairway. The leader said "we basically got to cheat," but if ever a player deserved a break from a tournament and a locale, Robert Gamez is due some kindness from this layout and its Montgomery County environs. Birdies on four of his first six holes and three of his last five boosted Gamez to a 5-under-par 66 and a one-stroke lead over Rich Beem and Notah Begay III. Beem was among the fellow tour pros who boosted the spirits of Gamez when his career went south after a near-fatal visit to the 1998 version of the tournament formerly known as the Kemper Open.

POTOMAC - The PGA Tour event formerly known as the Kemper Open has undergone its second name change in a little more than a month, with the introduction yesterday of a Virginia-based investment banking group as its title sponsor. Briefly called the Capital Open at Avenel after Kemper Insurance ended a 35-year association as the tournament sponsor, the $4.5 million tournament will be called the FBR Capital Open when it is played at the TPC at Avenel next month. Friedman, Billings and Ramsey Group, one of the nation's top 10 investment banks, signed a one-year contract as title sponsor.