U.S. Open cancels qualifying, will be played without fans

The United States Golf Association announced Monday that it is canceling local and final qualifying for the U.S. Open.

Every year, the qualifying process determines half the field. Instead, the 120th U.S. Open taking place Sept. 17 to 20 will feature an all-exempt field. To minimize the number of people on site, the tournament will also bar fans from attending, according to Golfworld's Joel Beall.

"This is a decision that was exceptionally difficult. The openness of our championships is our DNA - 10,000 people following their dream," said USGA senior managing director of championships John Bodenhamer, according to GolfWeek. "It was not on the table at the beginning. We felt confident we could conduct qualifying for everything."

The original schedule featured 108 local qualifying tournaments and 12 final qualifiers, but rescheduling all the events was deemed too big of a task.

"Rescheduling that into the fall just wasn't possible," Bodenhamer added. "The biggest consideration has been the need to test players, caddies, and essential workers inside the so-called bubble. We looked at every single scenario before we decided to cancel anything."

Over the last 25 years, three players became eventual U.S. Open champions after making their way into the field through qualifying: Steve Jones in 1996, Michael Campbell in 2005, and Lucas Glover in 2009.

Now with an all-exempt field, Bodenhamer said the process of selecting who will play won't be straightforward. The field has already been reduced from 156 to 144 golfers, and it won't be as simple as including more top-ranked players.

"We will endeavor to create categories of exemption that will as best as possible be reminiscent of what qualifying would produce," Bodenhamer said. "It won't be perfect. It'll look pretty close when we get to the end."