"The changes certainly will help."

Brad Klein returns to Erin Hills--the course he originally dubbed "Errant Hills" and a comment that Golf Digest's Ron Whitten countered was payback for a lousy Wintonbury Hills review--and doesn't sound any more enthusiastic about what he sees in the fall reworking that the course hopes will usher in a U.S. Open bid.

And Open there makes complete sense when you can bypass a proven cash cow and weather wonder like Torrey Pines in 2017 and head straight to the middle of no where in Wisconsin! Don't worry scribblers, there's a Marriott just 45 minutes away...more points and you'll love the highway billboards.

Klein writes:

But for a golf course that touts a links sensibility, there’s actually little integration at Erin Hills between approach shots and contours into and around greens. Every recovery shot from around and behind putting surfaces is a lobbed shot, not a bump and run. And there are so many holes where the natural slopes leading into the green deflect the ball away from the putting surface rather than allowing you to feed the ball in. The contours might all be entirely natural, but they defy thoughtful shotmaking and end up requiring an aerial brand of golf in which everything is simply flown to the target. As for the bunkers, there’s nothing natural about any of their shapes; they are scraped out in such contrived, undersized pockets that they make you feel as if you’ve been lowered into jagged tea cups.

The changes certainly will help. A postage-stamp style, domed green on the short par-4 second hole will be expanded by 50 percent. The wild Biarritz green on the long par-5 10th hole will be flattened front and back so that it will be far more pin-able and playable. A ridge in the 15th green also will be modified. Awkward deflection slopes on the first and 17th fairways will be softened, making both far more receptive.