‘Unbelievable’: Perks’ stunning win
‘‘You’re unbelievable. Absolutely unbelievable.’’
Craig Perks didn’t hear that often in his career. But he did after winning The Players Championship. His admirer? Tiger Woods.
When a swag of the world’s best golfers teed up yesterday at the 2019 Players Championship – Danny Lee is the sole Kiwi playing this year, at odds of 200/1 at the TAB – they’ll want to emulate what Perks did in 2002.
They may aim to do it with less drama.
The Kiwi scored one of the game’s most stunning and memorable triumphs when he won what’s considered men’s golf’s ‘‘fifth major’’.
It was the only win on the US PGA Tour of Perks’ career – five years later, he quit playing and now earns a living as an analyst for TV.
But for a brief period, the Manawatu product delivered three incredible moments to win a tournament that has a champions roll-call including Woods, Phil Mickelson, Sergio Garcia, Greg Norman, Nick Price, Fred Couples, Davis Love III and Adam Scott.
The then 35-year-old rode a rollercoaster to victory at the TPC Sawgrass course in Ponte Vedra Beach, Florida, with just two pars in the last 14 holes of his final round.
Perks had made a good start to the year with a tie for 15th at 11-under in the Phoenix Open, was tied for fifth at the Genuity Championship in early March and had made the cut in all seven tournaments he’d played on tour.
But he was still a 1000-1 outsider when he teed off in late March as the world’s 203rd ranked player.
Mickelson’s eight-under-par 64 gave him the firstround lead, with Perks seemingly an afterthought seven shots back.
But the Kiwi recorded a second-round 68 that drew him level with the left-hander, who shot 75 on day two, and Mark Calcavecchia. That put them just one shot behind the leaders – highlyregarded Jeff Sluman and little-known Carl Paulson.
Paulson’s third consecutive round of 69 kept him one shot ahead of Perks heading into the final round, with the last pairing being one no-one would have predicted pre-tournament.
Woods, the defending champion, was lurking in a tie for 10th, six shots back – but in the prime of his career, few were ruling out his chances of winning again.
Perks bogeyed the first hole while Paulson made birdie to immediately establish a three-shot advantage, but Paulson began to feel the pressure, making four consecutive bogeys from holes three through six.
The Kiwi responded with birdies on five and seven – which bracketed a bogey on six – to give him a two-stroke lead that vanished when he bogeyed eight and nine.
A birdie at 11 took him clear again, only to bogey 12 and birdie 13. Dropped shots at the next two holes – with a missed par put from two feet at 15 – put him a shot behind Trinidad and Tobago’s Stephen Ames.
But the heart-stopping moments hadn’t even started.
On the par-five 16th, Perks opted for a four iron from 199 yards with his second shot, aiming for a pin placed on the right-hand side of the green, with water further right.
‘‘I’m an aggressive player. I wasn’t going to back away from that flag,’’ he later told AP.
His approach bounced into the rough between green and water, leaving him a 21-foot chip with a tough lie – which he holed for an eagle.
That put him one in front of Ames, but ahead lay the terrifying prospect of the famous par-three island green 17th. Perks planted a nine-iron tee shot into the heart of the green, then rolled in a 28-foot birdie putt in treacherously quick conditions to give him a two-shot advantage heading to the 72nd hole over Ames, who held the clubhouse lead following a sparkling final-round 67.
A wayward drive on 18 required Perks to chip out on to the fairway and when he overshot the green with his third, he needed to make a tough upand-down for bogey to avoid a playoff with Ames.
No problem – for the third time in as many holes, Perks worked magic with his short game, flopping his chip softly on to the green and watching it roll into the cup.
‘‘As soon as it landed, I knew I had won. That was an incredible emotion.’’
Paulson shot 77 to finish tied fourth, four shots behind Perks, while Woods never featured, shooting 74. ‘‘That was the easiest 72 I shot in my life,’’ Perks joked.
By becoming the first player since Hal Sutton in 1983 to win the tournament on debut, the tour struggler earned US$1.08 million and leapt to 64 in the world rankings.
Perks said years later on the Golf Channel to colleagues that he flourished in the heady environment. ‘‘It was out of control, it was a raucous atmosphere and I was actually embracing it,’’ Perks said. But he admitted the nerve-racking 17th terrorised him. ‘‘Really, I had trouble breathing . . . the most nervous I’d ever been on the golf course.’’
The other . . . ahem . . . perks of the victory were plenty – a five-year PGA Tour exemption, entry to the next three years of the Masters and four British Opens, along with spots at the US Open and PGA Championship. He was also named New Zealand Sportsman of the Year.
But the majors didn’t work out well for Perks – his best finish was a tie for 29th at the 2002 PGA Championship and he never made the cut at Augusta. He had one more top-10 finish on the PGA Tour in 2004 as his game unravelled after his momentous win.
Perks changed equipment, caddie, management and his golf swing after The Players. He told a Golf Channel feature: ‘‘I don’t regret trying to get better . . . I think I regret the way I was going about trying to get better.’’
In his last year on the PGA Tour, Perks played 15 tournaments. He withdrew during two and missed the cut in the other 13.
But in 2015 he told the tour’s official website that each year when The Players Championship rolls around, he takes a golf cart alone, rides the course and reflects on his moment in the sun.
‘‘Every corner that I turn, every place that I go, I’m reminded that my greatest professional accomplishment is here.
‘‘It’s always good for me to be back and remember how good you were for one week.’’