Tiger’s record of never winning a major championship when he trails the 54-hole leader continued Sunday when he failed to overcome Angel Cabrera at the U.S. Open. Tiger’s undoing probably came when he tried to drive the short 17th hole and hit his ball into the deep rough left of the green. He made par and then needed to birdie the difficult 18th hole to force a playoff. One again, he failed to hit the fairway, gouged a short iron to the back of the green and missed the birdie putt. Unlike his round Saturday when he his 17 greens, Tiger only hit 11 greens on Sunday.
Other U.S. Open notes:
Sadly, Aaron Baddeley succumbed to the pressure of trying to win his first major by opening with a triple bogey 7 and shot 80 for the final round.
My major complaint with NBC’s coverage was the lack of leader boards and overall field scores throughout the telecast. It’s OK to show the abbreviated leader board but they should run at least the first two full pages before they break for commercial. Also, they should run the crawl with updated scores for everyone in the field at least once per hour.
The USGA needs to invest in some new ads. The kid making the hole in one is cute, but it’s old. Likewise, let’s ditch the stupid ad about the guys waiting out the rainstorm to play and the one with foursome that shows up at dawn, one of whom is wearing pajamas. How many more years must we endure those things?
Bubba Watson, you win the worst visor award for that sea green number with the red lettering. What’s with the pink shaft on your driver? Very un-Bubba like, I think.
The short par fours and the long par three – all around 300 yards – were quite entertaining, albeit a tad on the ridiculous side, especially the par three.
I guess NBC was so confident that Tiger would win – the best story – that they forget to do some research on Cabrera. Viewers learned very little information about him during the telecast.
Jim Furyk might have won his second U.S. Open had he made a better decision on the 17th hole and not tried to drive the green. He left the ball in the deep rough and could only manage a par.
Hitting range balls while wondering whatever happened to Bob Rosburg.
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About Me
- Mr. Fairway
- Mr. Fairway’s love affair with the game of golf began in junior high. He once made his living as a journalist covering high school sports, cops and robbers and politics. Today, Mr. Fairway is a public relations consultant and a widely-published freelance golf writer. His current USGA handicap index is 9.3 and he averages 50-plus rounds a year.