Sometimes it's a soap opera

By Ron Green Sr – Charlotte Observer

CHARLOTTE, NC—Today, the trees get taller, the ponds bigger, the wind stronger and blowing constantly in the golfer's face. The greens shrink and the fairways look just wide enough to walk single file.

It's showdown time. The ante's on the table, stacked up there through the first three rounds. Now deal.

Today the PGA Tour's swingers play the final round of the Quail Hollow Championship and somebody wins.

Lucas Glover is one of the top contenders, lying in a tie for second, playing in the last group today with leader Zach Johnson, which, of course, invites his thoughts on winning. He had a ready answer and he nailed it.

"They're all hard," he said. "You see Tiger has won however many he's won, he looks dead beat tired when he finishes. That's because of his concentration and the grind that it really is to win."

Tiger Woods starts today two shots out of the lead but everyone knows he's the favorite. There's a long list of reasons for that but one of them will suffice—he has won 27 percent of the tournaments he's entered on the PGA Tour. A little better than one of every four.

Jack Nicklaus won 12 percent, Arnold Palmer eight percent, Raymond Floyd three percent.

Some guys play a career and never win. Jay Delsing has played 556 tournaments without a win. Larry Rinker played in 525 before he gave up. A dozen players have gone at least 311 tournaments without a W.

You don't have to win to get rich. Tim Clark has won over $12 million without getting a first. Brett Quigley has banked almost $10 million, Harrison Frazar over $8 million without a trophy.

The tournament sorted itself out Saturday, but not quite according to the script. Some of the heroes fell away unheroically. Defending champion Anthony Kim shot a ragged 78 and faded from view. Camilo Villegas vacated his threatening position with a 74.

And of course Phil Mickelson, whose golf is like a soap opera, gave us one of those holes that make us shake our heads. He reached a greenside bunker on the par five tenth hole in two strokes, the second only a five iron. Ordinarily, he will come out of that situation with a birdie, at worst a par.

But he tried to get too fine with his sand shot and left it in the bunker, in an awful lie. He blasted out, rolled his first putt well past the hole and missed it coming back. Double bogey. Seventy five blows for the day. An eight-shot deficit heading into today. Forget it.

We started the week looking at the likes of Woods, Mickelson, Kim, Vijay Singh, Sergio Garcia, Retief Goosen and Padraig Harrington as prime candidates for the Sunday leaderboard. We lost Singh, Garcia and Harrington to the 36-hole cut. Kim and Mickelson faded.

That leaves us with Woods and Goosen on a leaderboard that is, well, eclectic.

Woods, Goosen, Johnson, David Toms and Davis Love III are proven winners, Glover and Sean O'Hair and Bubba Watson are capable and tested, but mingled with them are the likes of Ross Fisher, Y.E. Yang, Brendon de Jonge and George McNeill, not yet household names.

It has the elements for a fine showdown.

Oh, one more statistic - Woods has trailed after 54 holes on 63 occasions. On 19 of those occasions, he has won.

RON GREEN SR.
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Provider:
Charlotte Observer