As the crowd roared deafeningly, the victor used both hands to
grab the head of the stunned, vanquished, and glassy-eyed
opponent.
If this were one of those Hollywood epics involving some
futuristic dystopia, the victor would have given his opponent’s
head a quick and vicious twist, and the neck would have sickenly,
audibly snapped, and the opponent would have sunk, dead, to the
ground.
But this wasn’t Hollywood. The victor leaned close and, smiling
and laughing, said this to his opponent: “You’re gonna be a
daddy!!!!”
The scene was the final green of the 1999 U.S. Open, ten years
ago this week. The victor was Payne Stewart, an irrepressible
free spirit who would die in a plane crash later that fall. The
vanquished was Phil Mickelson, who famously had said he would
leave the course even if he were leading in the final round if he
got word that his wife Amy, expecting their first child, had gone
into labor.
Stewart, a sometimes abrasive character early in his career who
had experienced a much-praised attitudinal shift as he himself
had experienced the joys of being a dad, had made a 15-foot par
putt on the final hole to snatch victory from Mickelson. Yet, as
Stewart began celebrating, his first thought was to tip his hat
to the younger man’s impending fatherhood. As it was, Amy
Mickelson gave birth the very next day.
The scene of Mickelson’s face in Stewart’s hands was acclaimed as
one of the more poignant moments in modern sports history — and
that was even before Stewart’s tragic death, and before
Mickelson’s series of other heartbreaks at the U.S. Open. In
retrospect, the moment looks not just poignant but epochal.
Here we are, ten years later, and Phil and Amy Mickelson are
again in the news. This time, their news is sad rather than
joyful. Amy, a beloved figure on tour for her outgoing manner and
charitable initiatives, was recently diagnosed with breast
cancer. Early reports were that Phil would not even compete in
the Open, but later diagnoses provided a better (if still
worrisome) prognosis for Amy’s potential recovery without
immediately debilitating treatment. So, with an eye back home and
a nervous heart, Phil will tee it up after all.
Poetic justice would give him the title.
Sure, the man has a certifiable record of … well, of being a
doofus. His final hole double-bogey to blow his lead in the 2006
U.S. Open was perhaps the most lame-brained collapse not
committed by a Frenchman in all the decades of televised sports.
And that collapse was, well, par for his course at least
in terms of his oft-bizarre decision-making at times of high
drama.
Many reports also question whether his public “aw-shucks”
affability is a bit of an act.
Well, in this case, who cares? His devotion to wife Amy is
certainly real, and his generosity is, too.
Set up as his nemesis, again, is Tiger Woods. Always Tiger. Tiger
comes in wearing a unique triple crown. He won the Open the last
time it was played at this week’s venue, Bethpage Black, back in
2002. (Yes, Mickelson was runner-up.) He won the Open last year,
in his incredibly thrilling and supernaturally gritty 19-hole
playoff over the highly likable Rocco Mediate while he, Tiger,
sported both a torn knee cartilage and a bad stress fracture in
the same leg. And Tiger won the last tournament he played, just
two weeks ago — at the course and tournament designed and hosted
by the game’s greatest-ever professional champion, Jack Nicklaus.
So Tiger is a title defender on all three levels, and on a rocket
ride toward every all-time record in the game of golf. Surely the
same script will play out as has always played out before, right?
Tiger as champion, Phil as phailed phoil, phlailing away in
near-miss heartbreak right at the end.
Well, here’s saying the fickle gods of golf this time won’t let
it happen. Sure, Tiger Woods is mostly an admirable character. He
does good work with his youth foundation, and he is a wonderful
supporter of all who serve in this nation’s uniforms. But if he
wins this year, especially with Mickelson as a bridesmaid, then
this whole world should give up forever on the cause of cosmic
justice.
I write not as a particular fan of Phil — I’m not. But as a New
Orleanian, I can’t stop myself from comparing Mickelson’s
response to Hurricane Katrina with that of Woods. Mickelson
played in the New Orleans tour stop the year immediately
following Katrina, knowing that his support could make a huge
difference for the tournament’s success. He then donated $250,000
out of his own pocket for Katrina relief — and followed up with
equal contributions from his charitable foundation each of the
next two years as well.
As for Tiger Woods, he never has played the New Orleans tourney.
Not once. Not even after Katrina, when he of all people could
have turned the beleaguered city’s event into a showcase for the
world. And not the next year, or the year after, or the year
after that. Never.
His absences have been just, well, wrong. Inexcusable.
But anyway, back to the Open. Mickelson is 39 now. He presumably
doesn’t have more than another four or five years of being enough
at the top of his game to actually win a brutal U.S. Open test.
He has finished second four times, without ever raising the
trophy. Time’s-a-wasting.
Others, of course, could win. Masters champion Angel Cabrera won
the Open in 2007. Geoff Ogilvy, who found the trophy in his lap
when Phil phlicked it away in the aforementioned 2006 debacle,
already has won two tournaments this year. Two-time Open champion
Ernie Els is finally hitting the ball brilliantly again, and
needs only to find his putting stroke to contend. Two-time Open
champion Retief Goosen won a tourney earlier this year and is at
the ready, while England’s Paul Casey may be the hottest man in
golf.
None of those stories would be satisfying though. Nor would
another Woods win — after last year’s heroics, another Woods
victory would seem ho-hum, and far, far too predictable.
And certainly not cosmic justice.
Fans should keep returning to that photo of Payne Stewart, face
alight in joy, holding Mickelson’s own face in his hands while
telling him that fatherhood beats a trophy any day. Methinks
Stewart, looking down from heaven, has one dispensation left.
He used his first one just months after his death when his best
friend Paul Azinger, once one of the game’s very best players
until his life was threatened with serious cancer at age 33, came
out of nowhere to win the Hawaiian Open in his very first tourney
after Stewart’s death. It was the first time in the six years
since his cancer that Azinger won a title — and he hasn’t won
one since.
The second dispensation again involved Azinger. For years one of
the great highlight shots used to open golf telecasts was the one
of Azinger, head barely peaking above the lip of a deep, deep
bunker on the 18th green of Nicklaus’s Muirfield Village
course, erupting in joyful shock when his sand shot trickled
sideways into the cup to beat Stewart by one stroke in the 1993
Memorial Tournament, just months before Azinger’s cancer
diagnosis. Fast forward to the 2002 Ryder Cup, the first one
after Stewart’s death, on the final hole, with the U.S. team on
the verge of defeat. Azinger again was bunkered, deep, and again
he faced a sharply sideways-leaning green. The shot was almost
identical to the one that beat his pal Stewart nine years earlier
— and only if Azinger holed it would the U.S. squad stay alive
in the competition.
If a viewer didn’t see Stewart reach down from heaven to shove
that ball in the cup, they weren’t looking closely enough.
‘Zinger’s heroics, alas, were not enough: The Americans still
lost, a few minutes later. But Zinger had done his part to ward
off defeat, in a shot so reminiscent of his iconic moment against
Stewart that it was spooky.
Well, here’s saying that Stewart has been saving his last
dispensation for seven more years. Here’s saying he intends,
through some blessed means beyond our knowing, to keep Phil
Mickelson’s head on straight down the stretch. Here is Stewart,
holding Mickelson’s head in both hands. Here is Stewart, saying
that the ten-year anniversary is the time to repay the debt of
sportsmen — and to somebody else haunted by cancer. Here is
Payne Stewart, helping Phil Mickelson overcome his years of
frustration, whispering into the younger man’s ear.
What is he saying?
“You’re a good husband, and now you’re a champion. Tell Amy that
this one is for her.”
