Must be bad for you Phoenix folks, isn’t Mickelson a Phoenix guy?
This is worse than Norman IMHO. Norman was the victim of phenomenal luck (Tway at the PGA, Mize at the Masters, even Jack at the Masters in 1986). A few times Norman’s game left him (that excruciating Masters against Faldo in 1996).
As I recall however, Norman never ever went away from what he had prepared for endlessly to cost himself a tournament.
Someone could argue “But Phil is Phil the Thrill! He didn’t go away from anything”.
To which I would reply: Phil and Bones prepared for this tournament for weeks, familiarizing themselves with this course and its challenges more than anyone in history -
- precisely so he could hit a long iron/short iron on the green at 18.
Not a driver bomb bouncing wildly off the corporate tent.
Here's me:
You’re too kind. Of Norman’s four biggest disappointments, in two of them he was beaten by a fabulous run (Nicklaus’ back-nine 30 at the ‘86 Masters; Faldo’s Sunday 67 at the ‘96 Masters); and in the other two by a miracle shot (’86 PGA, ‘87 Masters). Granted that Norman’s poor Sunday play also had a lot to do with the ‘96 Masters, the basic truism of Norman’s career is that you can’t play defense in golf.
But Mickelson? For last-hole meltdowns, I can only count Van de Velde on the one had and–thinking out loud here–an eight that Sam Snead carded in some US Open way back when.
Today was why Johnny Miller gets the big NBC bucks–he speaks the awful truth. As he said, had Mickelson won with a birdie, no one would have remembered. Had he gone two-iron, seven-iron, putt, putt for the win he would have been commended for his course management. But here was a guy whose driver had hit balls halfway to Montauk all day, and after escaping, escaping, escaping he decided to go to the well one last time. Tee shot: Off the hospitality tent. Then instead of wedging it out to the fairway, getting on in three and two-putting for a playoff (with Geoff Ogilvy, mind you–not Tiger Woods, Geoff Ogilvy) Phil decides to go Tin Cup, go for the green, and hits some cut running whateverthehell into a tree; and then instead of wedging it and going up and down for a playoff he tries THE EXACT SAME SHOT and puts the ball not only in a bunker but in a hole at the center of the bunker. QED.
In retrospect, Mickelson probably lost the Open at 17, when, with his driver, he hit the ball into a trashcan (bloody symbolic!), then decided to play croquet with a pair of trees and placed the ball on the green for an improbable two-putt par. A shot like that is like chasing the loss in Blackjack–it’ll work once in awhile. Other times . . . watching some guy push higher and higher stacks of chips as the cards get worse . . . ugh.
In Dan Jenkins’s stages of drunkenness, Stage 10 is “bulletproof.” A kind of drunkenness–of his abilities, of the fates he thought were smiling upon him–must have overtaken Mickelson on his walk to the 18th tee. He thought he was bulletproof. And we saw what happened.
I followed with this:
I see Jazz already beat me to some of the best points. Well played.
My father grew up in New Jersey and loved his New York Yankees, especially Mantle and Maris. My family has lived in the Phoenix area for 35 years, and watched Mickelson develop from the time he won a PGA tournament while still a student at Arizona State. There is a mountain near where they live; at its summit you can look down onto a golf course Mickelson designed. My family is a group of freaks for Mickelson, and for the Yanks.
So today the Yanks lose on a ninth-inning, two-run, walk-off homer. And then Mickelson . . . I called my dad tonight; his first words were, “One hell of an afternoon.” I said, “Happy freaking Father’s Day.” What else could I say?
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