Scotland’s Sandy Lyle, in blue at center, putts on the first hole Wednesday at the Old Course, St. Andrews, Scotland.

Thanks to Jordan Spieth, many sports fans who only watch golf on TV as a foolproof antidote for insomnia will try not to blink, much less nod off, during coverage of the British Open, which tees off today.

Along the way, viewers will be treated to a history lesson on the Old Course at St. Andrews, one of the world’s oldest golf courses. Golf was played on the Scottish grounds in the early 1400’s, nearly 600 years before Spieth’s birth.

Much will be made of the tradition of The Royal and Ancient Golf Club of St. Andrews and Hamilton Hall, the hotel that overlooks the 18th green.

And when the announcers go there, it all will ring familiar to Lawrence resident Dick Stuntz.

He’s an expert on grass. (No, not the kind that makes it easy to sniff out the presence of Willie Nelson’s tour bus from blocks away.) Stuntz studied agronomy/turfgrass management at Iowa State, where as a junior he earned All-Big 8 honors in golf by finishing fourth in the conference tournament.

Stuntz, who spent many of his 17-plus-years-and-counting in Lawrence overseeing the maintenance of Alvamar’s two golf courses and now runs his own business, Oak Golf Inc., has firsthand knowledge of the Old Course at St. Andrews as well.

He played four rounds on it in a three-day span in 1985. Two of the rounds came in a one-day, global superintendents tournament. Stuntz, a greenskeeper from Florida and another from North Carolina represented the Lawrence-based Golf Course Superintendents Association of America in the tournament.

Stuntz heard his name announced in a Scottish accent at the first tee: “Richard Stuntz from the United States of America.”

His hotel-room window overlooked the 18th green. He was regaled with tales of the course’s history.

He also knows that a lighter side is allowed on the hallowed grounds.

“Someone was asked how he would describe the caddies,” Stuntz said.

The response: “Drunken and irresponsible come to mind.”

Years after his first visit — Dec. 23, 1992, to be exact — Stuntz returned to the Old Course with stepson Chad Welter. The world-famous greenskeeper Walter Wood was eager to take Stuntz onto the frozen course to talk shop.

“We met him right outside the Royal and Ancient (clubhouse) behind the first tee,” Stuntz remembered of the day he played a cold round of golf and loved it. “He was an excitable kind of guy, an enjoyable person to spend time with. So Chad gets into the back seat of (Wood’s) jeep, and I ride shotgun. I had already told Chad what sacred ground this was, and Walter gets behind the wheel, drives down the stairway from the Royal and Ancient and across the first tee. Here we are bumping along, and I glance at Chad, and his eyes wide, he mouths, ‘What are we doing?’ “

Dress it up any way you want, with fancy bows and ribbons, formal dress codes and manners, when you get right down to it, golf is, always has been and always will be an excuse for men to be boys again. And again. And again. And again.

At the moment, the sport is being dominated by a man who looks like a boy at the age of 21. Spieth won the Masters and the U.S. Open and is coming off last week’s dramatic sudden-death victory in the John Deere Classic.

“Just think of how exciting the Open’s going to be if Spieth is in the hunt,” Stuntz said. “If he wins it and goes to the PGA with a chance for the slam, that would take golf to the front page and ramp up the interest. He’s the golden child of golf, bringing excitement to the game in all the right ways.”

Stuntz could think of just one more appealing scenario.

“It would be fantastic if he and Gary Woodland could come right down to the end,” Stuntz said, speaking for every golfer in Lawrence.

Hey, nobody expected Woodland to make it to the final of the World Golf Match Play Championship earlier this year, but there he was, walking stride for stride with Rory McIlroy, who ended up winning. You never know.