Long Islanders serving as U.S. Open course marshals at Shinnecock Hills, and they take their job seriously

Jonathan Wiggins stood atop the raised tee box for the 13th hole at Shinnecock Hills on a gorgeous late Monday morning and took his stance facing the par-4 fairway. He checked his grip. He locked his vision in on the ball, certain to keep his eye on it.

The key to his success?

“Confidence,” he told Newsday. “You have to be aggressive.”

That’s a good mantra for playing golf. But it’s not what Wiggins was doing.

Practice rounds for the U.S. Open began on Monday and Wiggins was right in the middle of the action… or just a few feet away from it anyway. The 19-year-old from Mattituck was one of the 1,100 volunteer marshals who will be on the course this week — many of them representing various Long Island and East End clubs — and his job was working the “paddles,” standing behind the actual players with two long yellow batons that go straight up to ask for quiet among the spectators and then signal the flight of the drives like a hybrid between a grounds crew member at an airport and a crossing guard.

Whether the drives go straight, left or right, Wiggins tracks them with his sticks, letting folks down the fairway know if the ball is heading toward them and giving the other marshals who are spread along the length of the hole a better chance at finding the errant ones that might end up in the shin-deep fescue grass.

It may seem inconsequential, but this army of workers in their pink striped shirts is one of the many important jobs on the course that allows the Open function as it does. It is fun and enjoyable, but also taken seriously.

“You can’t be passive on the paddles,” Wiggins said, relaying another trick of his trade with sincerity.

And for many, it is a cherished aspect of hosting the event.

“It gives you a sense of contribution,” said Jen Plamondon, of Southampton, a member at Shinnecock Hills, who got the plum assignment of working the 18th hole this week.

Allan Gerstenlauer, of Shelter Island, the team captain for the marshals on the 13th this week who represent Gardiner’s Bay Country Club and Laurel Links Country Club, said he put Wiggins in that spot because he has “the best eyes of the group” and his golf acumen allows him to judge the flight of the ball off the club.

At the other end of the hole, some 374 yards away, Wiggins’ father, Michael, was working as a marshal around the green. This is his second time doing so; he was also a marshal for the 2018 Open here. Back then Jonathan was a young kid scrambling for autographs around the putting green. Now the two are out on the course together in their official capacities.

“It’s hard to put it into words,” Michael Wiggins said of the emotions of sharing this experience with his son. “We play golf together all the time, but this is just wonderful.”

The marshals aren’t allowed to interact with the golfers. They are there to be seen, not heard. But they take their jobs very seriously, whether they are on the paddles or opening the ropes to allow spectators to cross the fairways at designated points. At one point, Plamondon was nearly plunked by a drive and had to duck from it before it disappeared into the rough.

“But I found it!” she bragged.

While each hole is assigned to one or two local clubs who then recruit volunteers from among their membership to fill in the shifts throughout the week, many of the marshals on 18th hole are either members of the host club or, in some cases, members of the NYPD and FDNY who are given the honor.

“It’s a front-row seat,” Plamondon said of her perch while she pointed over at the green. “Right there is where the last putt of the Open is going to be made.”

Back on 13, Jonathan Wiggins was watching every golfer who went past him, not only to track their shots but to pick up some tips for his own game. While most laid up on that hole with a four or five iron, some of the big hitters, including Keegan Bradley and Rory McIlroy, went driver to try to reach the green in one. Wiggins was looking forward to watching Jon Rahm do that, too, but the Spaniard hit an iron. It wasn’t because he lacked the distance but because he grew tired of waiting for the group ahead of him to clear the putting surface.

“They are a little out of my range,” Wiggins said of the level of play he was witnessing, “but I think I was able to learn a thing or two about ball contact.”

That should come in handy when he gets back to playing his own game.

For the rest of this week, though, he’ll be happy foregoing that exercise for this opportunity. In between golfers, he took a moment to survey the rest of the course from his spot, one of the highest points on the course, soaked it all in, and could only imagine what it will be like come the weekend when the crowds swell and the scores will count and, he hopes, he will be back on paddle duty.

“This is the best seat in the house,” he said. “As long as I can have it, I’ll keep it.”

By Tom Rock

tom.rock@newsday.com@TomRock_Newsday

Tom Rock began covering sports for Newsday in 1996 and became its NFL columnist in 2022. He previously was Newsday's Giants beat writer beginning in 2008.