Quail Hollow Championship, Round 4
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By PGATOUR.COM Staff
O'HAIR SURVIVES (5:56 p.m.): He had to sit and wait while Lucas Glover played the last two holes, but Sean O'Hair got his first victory of the season after Glover missed the green and made bogey on 17 and wasn't able to hold the green on his approach shot to the 18th. As a result, O'Hair not only gets his first victory since last year's PODS Championship, but he climbs to third in the FedExCup standings.
For O'Hair, the victory is something of a redemption. He reworked his swing under the watchful eye of coach Sean Foley and though he finished bogey-bogey, the swing held up well enough to get the job done after he began the day three shots back of the lead. Clearly the swing is still a work in progress for O'Hair, but just as clear is that his goal of winning multiple TOUR titles this year is certainly attainable. Remember, O'Hair is still only 26 years old -- he'll turn 27 in July -- and also has the most wins of any American currently under the age of 30. It certainly looks like he's got the game and the confidence for an incredibly bright future. -- Brian Wacker
WATSON AND WOODS (5:45 p.m.): Bubba Watson plays lots of Tuesday practice rounds with Tiger Woods. Sunday, though, marked the first time he'd ever beaten the game's No. 1 player in a tournament.
"I'll text him here in a minute," Watson grinned. And what will he say?
"That I beat him. Then he'll just tell me how many wins he has, but I'll tell you what, I'm in the right direction, I got him one time, so now we're moving up."
Watson admittedly was disappointed not to have picked up the first victory of his career. But he was proud of the way he kept his focus -- which has been a problem in the past -- and called Sunday "probably the best day of my golfing career."
Watson, who shared the lead until he made bogey at the 16th hole. finished in a tie for second at 10 under with Lucas Glover. He closed with a 70 in posting the third runner-up finish of his career.
What was the most satisfying part of his performance this week?
"How I handled everything," Watson said. "My mind was in there. I didn't get mad when I made a bogey. I didn't get mad when my birdie putt didn't go in. My caddie calmed me down. We stayed focused, talked about a lot of random stuff so I could forget about my bogeys and forget about my putts that didn't go in.
"As a team it was the best day that we've had in two and a half, almost three years now. It was a great day, a good learning experience, and looking forward to the rest of my career if I can act like this." -- Helen Ross
O'HAIR THREE PUTTS (5:36 p.m.): Seconds after a graphic stating Sean O'Hair's 91 percent on two-putting from over 25 feet flashed on a video board in the background, he three-putted for the second time today. O'Hair's first putt on the 18th sped past the hole, leaving him a tough one to save par. He wasn't able to convert and is now tied with Lucas Glover, who is on the 17th green right now. Stay tuned. -- Brian Wacker
DOWN TO GLOVER (5:33 p.m.): Lucas Glover hasn't three-putted all week, but he's going to have to take it a step further than that and make a birdie somewhere on the last two holes it looks like to catch Sean O'Hair, who could be closing in on his first win since last year's PODS Championship. -- Brian Wacker
OH MY O'HAIR (5:05 p.m.): If Sean O'Hair can hang on to win the Quail Hollow Championship, he'll have back-to-back birdies at Nos. 15 and 16 to thank. O'Hair has a two-shot lead right now as the final round winds down and this is starting to look like a flip of the final round at Bay Hill, where O'Hair came up one short to Tiger Woods.
At the Arnold Palmer Invitational presented by MasterCard, O'Hair had four bogeys in the final round, including one on the 16th. Woods, meanwhile, birdied two of his last four holes, including 18, that day.
This time it was Woods faltering. After driving the green on the par-4 14th, Woods left himself 23 feet for eagle. It was a difficult, breaking putt with a lot of speed on it, and Woods ran it by 4 feet, but his miss coming back really stung. Instead of a possible eagle, or an almost certain birdie, Woods parred the hole and wasn't able to make up any ground on the lead. -- Brian Wacker
TIGER THREE-PUTT (4:45 p.m.): Just when it looked like Tiger Woods was ready to pounce after driving it to 23 feet on the par-4 15th to set up eagle, something non Tiger-like happened. He three-putted for par. That leaves Woods two shots back, but what was more strange was how he three-putted. After running his eagle putt 4 feet by, Woods had right-to-left putt coming back for birdie. Only he jammed it through the break, missing on the high side and leaving himself 5 feet coming back to save par. He made the putt, but, as one colleague said, the color of his shirt might match his mood right now. -- Brian Wacker
LOGJAM AT THE TOP (4:25 p.m.): Another name has climbed to the top of the leaderboard with Sean O'Hair getting to 11 under thanks to a clean card after an early bogey on No. 4. Since then, O'Hair, who had five top 10s this season, including a runner-up at Bay Hill, has rattled off four birdies and is now at 11 under with five holes to play. That has O'Hair in a tie with Bubba Watson and Lucas Glover. The most interesting thing about that isn't that O'Hair is tied for the lead, it's that he hasn't made a putt from outside 10 feet all week. -- Brian Wacker
BYRD'S BIG WEEKEND (4:09 p.m.): Jonathan Byrd had never made the cut in five previous starts at the Quail Hollow Championship and it wasn't looking good Friday, either.
But Byrd birdied his final two holes -- "thank goodness it was 8 and 9," he said -- to make the cut on the number. He's made the most of his weekend, too, shooting 8 under to move into the top 10 and post his best finish of the season.
Byrd, who was a college teammate of Lucas Glover and Charles Warren at Clemson, spent 30 minutes on the range Saturday with his brother Jordan, an assistant coach for the Tigers. The two worked on getting him to be more aggressive, put more spin on the ball and make sure the heel of his club didn't drag the ground.
"I went out yesterday and played more solid, more free; that's a good word for me," said Byrd, who shot 70-66 in the final two rounds. "And I didn't try and play so hard. And today I just tried to do the same thing.
"The way I played the last two holes on Friday is what I've been trying to do all weekend, and I've really started to putt well. My short game got a lot better today. ... It just turned out that I hit it just as good as I normally do, as I have been, as I made some putts, and my short game is great. I made a lot of good saves and kept my round going.
"It was tough out there. The greens were firm. We had some breeze, and I just kept hitting good shots." -- Helen Ross
Here's a look at Byrd's scorecard from today:
PLAYERS PRACTICE (3:55 p.m.):After missing his fourth straight cut for the first time in his career, Adam Scott made his way down from the Quail Hollow Championship this weekend to get in some early practice Sunday afternoon for next week's PLAYERS Championship.
Scott, who became the youngest winner of THE PLAYERS when he won it in 2004 at 23 years, 8 months and 12 days, has struggled mightily since returning from a knee injury he suffered earlier this year.
After finishing T2 at the Sony Open in Hawaii, Scott took a month off to recover before returning at the World Golf Championships-Accenture Match Play Championship, where he was promptly eliminated in the first round. The next week he finished T66 in Miami before failing to play the weekend the next four events.
Charley Hoffman is also out at TPC Sawgrass practicing this afternoon. Hoffman has twice played in THE PLAYERS, missing the cut last year and finishing T75 in 2007. -- Brian Wacker
MICKELSON HANGING AROUND (3:35 p.m.): Phil Mickelson polished off a 67 at Quail Hollow on Sunday, did a few interviews and headed back for the hotel. He planned to pack up so he'd be ready to leave for Ponte Vedra Beach, Fla., and next week's PLAYERS Championship when his wife and children arrived.
Then Mickelson figured he'd come back out to Quail Hollow and watch the last hour or so -- just in case. After all, Lefty's 72-hole tally of 8 under was just two shots off the lead and there's a lot of danger lurking over the last few holes.
"I'll tell you, I wasn't really even thinking about winning starting out," Mickelson said. "The course is playing very difficult. The wind is picking up and it's very challenging. I had some of the best shots of the day the last three, four holes and still was not able to make birdies. It's a very challenging test with the wind, the firm greens.
"Again, I never really thought about winning until the last four or five holes." -- Helen Ross
SWEET 16 (3:25 p.m.): We're already on our third different leader today with Lucas Glover now holding a one-shot edge at 10 under, but we're probably not done just yet. There are 16 players within three shots of Glover right now, and only four of them have played more than 12 holes and only three of them are already in.
Of that group, four of them -- including Tiger Woods and Zach Johnson -- are just one shot off the pace. Speaking of Johnson, he's the only one of the 16 players over par on the day, though he recovered nicely from a triple bogey-bogey stretch with back-to-back birdies. -- Brian Wacker
POULTER POWER (3:10 p.m.): Add Ian Poulter's name to the list of contenders at Quail Hollow, where the colorful Englishman has birdied five of his last seven holes to get to 9 under on the week. That has him in a logjam with four others just one back of new leader Lucas Glover. -- Brian Wacker
WATSON EMERGES (2:45 p.m.): With Zach Johnson falling out of the lead thanks to an early triple bogey, today's leaderboard is starting to look a like yesterday's when several players took turns on the top of it. The leader of the moment? Bubba Watson. With others struggling around him -- and stealing much of the spotlight -- Watson has quietly moved to a one-shot lead thanks to a 2-under start through his first seven holes.
If Watson is going to win for the first time on the PGA TOUR, this might be the way to do it, flying in under the radar a bit with players like Johnson and Tiger Woods getting much of the attention.
Speaking of the leaders, two of the players who made big early pushes today just finished their rounds with Jonathan Byrd posting a 66 to get to 8 under for the week and Phil Mickelson shooting 67 to do the same. -- Brian Wacker
BYRD SIGHTING (2:25 p.m.): One of the best rounds of the day right now belongs to Jonathan Byrd, who is 6 under on his round and suddenly just one shot off the lead as he finishes up his day.
Byrd, who hasn't finished in the top 10 since last summer and has made just one more cut than he's missed this season, has seven birdies today, including three in a row to close out the front nine. He bogeyed No. 10, but bounced back with a birdie on the next hole and added two more at Nos. 14 and 15.
Whatever happens, this will likely be his best finish since that fourth place at the AT&T Classic last year. It will also have a little extra special meaning for Byrd because he's a native of nearby Anderson, S.C., and because his dad has been battling brain cancer the past two years, which has certainly had an effect on Byrd's play the past couple of years. More than a few people out in the gallery today will be pulling for Byrd. -- Brian Wacker
WHOLE NEW BALLGAME (2:10 p.m.): Things just took a hugely unexpected turn atop the leaderboard at Quail Hollow, where Zach Johnson triple bogeyed the second hole to lose his lead and fall back into a tie for second one shot back.
What was so remarkable, or shocking, about that was that Johnson tripled a par-3 hole with no water, no out of bounds and no real hazards. After hitting his tee shot well to the right of the green -- over 70 yards off line to be precise -- Johnson had an opening to the green with a tree just to the right of his line.
Johnson somehow managed to hit that tree on his next shot, sending his ball backwards before he eventually landed on the green on his third shot. He then three-putted from just inside 35 feet.
Things didn't get any better on the next hole for Johnson, either, when he hit a tree with his tee shot. -- Brian Wacker
| A sip of Maginnes | |
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MICKELSON ON THE MILE (2:00 p.m.): Since 2004, Phil Mickelson is 57 under for his first 15 holes at Quail Hollow. He's played the Green Mile 23 over, though.. Lefty will need to do better than that if he's to have a chance to win today. He's 5 under for the day and 8 under through the tournament -- one off the lead -- and he's about to embark on the treacherous final three holes. -- Helen Ross
ANOTHER TIGER-PHIL SHOWDOWN? (1:55 p.m.): Tiger Woods and Phil Mickelson aren't playing together today like they were in the final round of the Masters, but Mickelson is doing his best to throw up an early number and see what happens. And right now, Mickelson (5 under through 14) is tied with Woods at 8 under.
Woods bogeyed his first hole, but leader Zach Johnson, who has a three-shot edge on both, is in trouble on No. 2 after fanning his tee shot on the par 3 well to the right of the green, leaving him in what most certainly will be a bogey or worse.
Going back to Mickelson, since bogeying the par-5 fifth he's birdied five of his last eight holes to get into the logjam of players at 8 under. -- Brian Wacker
TRACKING TIGER (1:40 p.m.): Tiger Woods teed off a few minutes ago and found trouble off the tee to the right on No.1, where he went on to make bogey. That's obviously not the kind of start he was looking for and he'll now be facing an uphill climb in trying to catch leader Zach Johnson, now three shots ahead.
It's well known by now that Woods has come from behind to win 19 times in his career, but if he's going to make it 20, he's going to have to hit the ball better than he did on No. 1 and continue to make hay on the par 4s and especially the par 5s here.
Woods hasn't ever done well on the par 3s at Quail Hollow -- his last birdie on a par 3 here came on the second hole of the second round of the 2005 tournament. He's also hit just 52 percent of the par 3s in regulation and is averaging over 42 feet to the pin on his approach shots in his career in this event.
The par 4s and 5s, however, are where Woods has made his money -- except for yesterday when he had an eight-shot swing (for the worse) in how he played those holes compared to the second round. See below for more. -- Brian Wacker
| Woods scoring breakdown this week at Quail Hollow | ||||||||||||||||
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ZACH'S ATTACK (1:15 p.m.): Zach Johnson isn't close to what you'd call a long hitter on the PGA TOUR, but when conditions are so tough, as they have been at Quail Hollow (and as they were at the 2007 Masters), his accuracy off the tee and into the green definitely becomes much more of a factor and usually puts him in the hunt. That's been the case this week as you'll see by the numbers below. -- Brian Wacker
| Zach Johnson: This week vs. 2009 season vs. The field | ||||||||||||||||||||||||
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MORE WEATHER ON THE WAY (12:55 p.m.): Any time tournament rules czar Mark Russell is getting air time, you know it's a bad sign. That's because he's usually talking about the weather and that's exactly what he was doing early this afternoon.
There's a 40 percent chance of thunderstorms this afternoon and while Russell "hopes we'll be in that 60 percent," he and his crew will have their eye on the sky all day.
"Hopefully we won't have to take them off the golf course," Russell told GOLF CHANNEL. "Hopefully we're going to finish at 6 p.m."
That's two hopefullys in two sentences, and Russell didn't exactly look confident that there wouldn't be some sort of weather delay, but forecasters also called for thunderstorms yesterday afternoon, too, and they didn't arrive until there were just four players left on the course. In other words, wait and see. -- Brian Wacker
CHANGE IN CONDITIONS (12:45 p.m.): With rain overnight in Charlotte, it appears the conditions at Quail Hollow have softened a bit with some players able to go really low so far today.
Shaun Micheel is among those tearing it up, playing his first 14 holes today in 7 under to climb into the top 10. Micheel has continued to hit a lot of greens today, as he as all week, and as a result has made six birdies and an eagle.
Hunter Mahan is also deep into the red with a round of 6 under through 13 holes. Even Jonathan Byrd, who hasn't broken 70 all week, is low today with four birdies through his first nine holes.
Depending on what happens with the weather -- more thunderstorms are expected -- players may be able to attack more pins with softer conditions, especially on 17, which, Zach Johnson's 7-iron yesterday notwithstanding, has been nearly impossible to hold. If the greens do prove to be receptive, the field of players who could catch Zach Johnson may be a lot bigger. -- Brian Wacker
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