What does long game guru Butch Harmon think about pupil Phil Mickelson's tee ball strategy?

On the Golf Channel tonight, Phil Mickelson’s short game guru Dave Pelz is answering question after question about Phil Mickelson’s controversial strategy to leave driver out of the bag on day one of the U.S. Open - and what seems like any dry day at Torrey Pines this week.

But I want to know what Butch Harmon is thinking. Mickelson went to Harmon shortly after his Winged Foot debacle, mostly for the celebrity teacher’s genius in shoring up the tee ball.

Mickelson has had some success with Harmon but has also been hampered by injuries over the last year, so we haven’t really seen Phil get on a hot streak. It appears to be a work in progress still.

Mickelson and Pelz are defending the decision to go with a spoon-like driving club Thursday (I didn’t know you could bend woods, by the way. Maybe that’s why he couldn’t hit a fairway with it), saying if the driver is left in the bag, then Mickelson is going through too many fairways.

I also can’t figure out how Mickelson has played Torrey Pines hundreds of times - and is just now going with the no-driver approach.

Some analysts are likening Phil’s strategy to Tiger Woods’ 2-iron-happy approach to his 2006 British Open victory at Royal Liverpool. In that event, he used driver one time, albeit the course was much firmer than Torrey Pines, the longest course in U.S. Open history.

Of course, if Phil’s strategy works, then it will be considered one of the gutsiest decisions in modern major championship history, more so than Zach Johnson’s par-5 lay ups at Augusta National and Woods’ 2-irons at Hoylake.

If not, then it’s just another feather in Lefty’s colorful dunce cap.

Stay tuned for more on the Lefty Enigma from WorldGolf.com’s on-the-scene reporter Chris Baldwin. It’s good to see Chris made it out alive after sticking it out inside a jam-packed ropes on Day 1 of the heavyweight Thrilla in La Jolla.