Dunno, the way he hit the big stick yesterday, all day, seemed to be the best solution, until it wasn't. Not that I'm near that level, but if you've been doing it, why would you change. Playing if soft, or safely, means you are overthinking it, and have seen that crater more often than not. Golf is not a game where you can 'guide' the ball, you must put your best swing on it at all times. Anyway, he exhibited all day that he has all the shots, and some he made from the boonies were tremendous. Tip of the hat to Rory.
Sorry, I just can’t buy that. As he approached the tee on 18, the only 2 ways he could lose the tournament was if Cameron Young holed out for an eagle (about 1000 to 1), or if Rory got a double bogey or worse.
The 18th is only a 465 yard par 4, and has a narrow fairway with trouble on either side. A 320-yard drive isn’t needed to par the hole, but an accurate drive is essential in avoiding big numbers. And Rory was a guy who was 90th out of 91 golfers in hitting fairways over the first two days! And now he’s dealing with the pressure of trying to close it out.
He had played well being aggressive from 7 through 17 (4 under for 11 holes), but he needed two great chips to par 16 and 17. He didn’t need a birdie or even a par on 18, he just needed to avoid disaster.
It‘s a similar situation to protecting a lead in football or basketball. A football team might have a strength of throwing the ball, but if they have a lead late they run the ball to close out the game by reducing the chances of disaster and shortening the game. And a basketball team that likes to run and gun, if they aren’t idiots, quit jacking up quick 3s when they have a multi-possession lead in the last minute. It doesn’t maximize their points per possession, but it decreases the chances of blowing the lead at the end of the game.
There are famous situations of folks not closing out contests by failing to be wisely conservative at the end of sporting events. Joe Pisarcik should have taken a knee against the Eagles in 1978; and Jean Van de Velde on the 18th hole at Carnoustie in 1999, where he hit driver with a 3-stroke lead, compounded his problems with his second shot, and lost in a playoff.
If Rory’s bad drive had ended up behind a tree, he could have lived to regret hitting the driver on 18 with a 2-stroke lead.
