Eight feet. That’s the distance between Tom Watson and an astonishing British Open win. By now, you know the result. Watson beefed the par putt on 18 and completely fell apart in the “overtime period,” including a double bogey on the second extra hole. This allowed public enemy of the week, Stewart Cink, to snatch victory from the jaws of Watson’s defeat. Well, that and a timely, timely 15-foot birdie on the 18th hole. While Watson’s near-miss was the talk of the sports world this past weekend, his work resonated even more in his native Kansas City — home of some of the best sports writers in the business, and Intentional Foul.
Correlation? I’ll let you decide.
Anyway, two of the bigger names in the business, Whitlock and Posnanski, both had eulogy-like essays detailing Watson’s close-but-yet-so-far British Open.
Tom Watson and his incredible sweater are leading the British Open at five-under par. In other news, Tom Watson is a bigger pimp than you or I could possibly imagine. And yes, that sweater just oozes excellence, domination and awesome-ness. Oh, and for those of you who don’t think he can be a pimp with sweater like that, think again.
The eloquent BBC has more on Watson’s turn-back-the-clock performance (so far):
Thanks to Rebecca Kelley for this awesome, awesome find. Next up, their crack reporting staff will tackle Kobe Bryant. I hear he’s pretty good at basketball. After that, I’m almost certain they’ll start on their “Did You Know Grass is Green?” expose.
After enough rain to warrant ark-building, hectic crowds, crowd-favorite Phil Mickelson, and the reemergence of David Duval — it’s been awhile — relatively unknown Lucas Glover wound up holding off the field and finished at four-under to win the US Open. Glover had to hold off a crowd-driven rush of Duval and Mickelson to win his first major championship. While he shot a three-over for the final round, his birdie on 16 and his par, par finish was just enough to have his name immortalized. As for Tiger, in spite of the less-than-stellar play, Woods still managed to finish in the top-10 with an even score for the tournament.
While it’s not the defense of the title Tiger envisioned, the fact he was able to finish in the same sentence as the leaders speaks to his ability to grind, especially when he’s not shooting with his best stuff.
Yes, David Duval is currently tied for the lead at the US Open. Make that was. After back-to-back birdies, the unlikely co-leader is now tied with Phil at two-under. Lucas Glover is now in “control” with after birdieing 16. Phil’s in clubhouse and Duval is on 18th.
And down the stretch they come. Can Glover hold on?
It’s not too terribly smart to count Tiger Woods out, but if his the completion of his first round at Bethpage Black is anything to go on, it’s going to be a long weekend for the tournament favorite. After weather shenanigans prevented the first round from being completed yesterday, the groups were back at this morning in much better weather conditions — that is, no rain. Too bad for Woods the improved weather made absolutely no difference in his first-round finish which has him a four-over. What’s worse for Woods is that his poor play came on the last holes of the opening round.
After battling to get back to even par, Woods played his last four holes at an eye-popping four-over. However, a word of caution to those who think he’s out of contention. Just ask Jason Sobel:
Leads to this e-mail from Rob in Dallas:
Is 74 too many for Tiger?
No way. Not even close. Look at the leaderboard and he’s only five shots back with 54 holes to play. He won’t be happy about that score, but it hardly takes him out of the mix, either.
Because of yesterday’s Milli Vanilli weather, the second round has a staggered start, with half of the group starting today — first tee at 4pm Eastern — while the second group gets started tomorrow, beginning at 12:30.
With a big H/t to SportsByBrooks, I’m happy to bring you Anna Rawson’s first GoDaddy commercial. We’re big fans of Miss Rawson around here — much like every other sports blog on the planet — so we love it when she brings us new content.
Granted, it could be her simply watching paint dry and we’d run the video.
Or you can blame Milli Vanilli if you’d like. Regardless of who gets your ire, one thing’s for certain concerning the US Open: There isn’t any golf being played right now, thanks to that age-old baseball excuse, rain. That’s right, the US Open is experiencing a rain delay, and it must be pretty damn fierce — like Caddyshack-fierce — for the PGA officials to suspend play. Nevertheless, that’s where we are. For the Tiger watchers, Woods is currently 1-over par, trailing the 1-under leaders, Jeff Brehaut and three others, by two strokes.
