Johnson storms to first major
One-stroke penalty moot with clutch play
Dustin Johnson’s reward f or winning the 116th U. S. Open by three strokes on Sunday evening was a trophy and a cheque for US$ 1.8 million dollars.
As an added bonus, he’ll never have to buy another drink as long as there’s a blazered United States Golf Association official ( on expenses, of course) in the vicinity.
Sunday’s final round was all set to erupt in one of the all- time golf brouhahas, 100- per- cent embarrassing to the USGA, over the delayed reversal of a ruling already made by a walking official.
The issue, about his ball moving on the fifth green as he prepared to address his putt — the official on the spot ruled Johnson was blameless — eventually cost him a one- stroke penalty when the USGA docked him in the scoring trailer after his round.
Johnson wasn’t even informed that there was an inquiry light flashing until the 12th hole. He and his challengers then played all the way to the clubhouse not knowing what the USGA was going to decide. That could have been kind of a big deal if his nearest pursuers hadn’t all folded like lawn chairs, allowing Johnson a comfy walk up the 18th hole to the long- awaited first major of his luckless career.
“It’s a big monkey off my back for sure. I feel a lot lighter,” smiled Johnson. “After everything that I’ve been through in the majors, I’ve knocked on the door a bunch of times. To finally get that major win, it’s huge.”
The scoreboard when he walked off the green read: Johnson - 5, Furyk, Piercy, Lowry - 1. A few minutes later, the five was changed to a four.
The 31- year- old, looselimbed bomber from Myrtle Beach, S. C., who has had victory snatched from him so many times at majors — some his own doing, some outrageously bad luck — helped himself with a finalround 68, oops, 69.
That there was a controversy at all summarized the USGA’s contradictory world view in miniature. It doesn’t care that Johnson hits 400- yard drives, having decided absurdly that the modern golf ball doesn’t go too far, but in order to combat the growing obsolescence of its classic old courses, it juices the green speeds to the edge of linoleum, and then expects the ball to stand still on them and behave.
In the third round, Lowry had grounded his club behind the ball, it moved, and he called a one- stroke penalty on himself. This time, Johnson did not ground his club and it was a mystery how the USGA belatedly determined t hat he had caused the ball to roll backward by about the width of one dimple.
“It doesn’t matter now, and I’m glad it didn’t matter because that would have been bad,” Johnson said. “I knew I was swinging well, and I just kept thinking: it’s just me and the course.”
Lowry, the beefy, bearded lad from Ireland, had a substantial constituency cheering for him when the day began, especially after he went out in the morning dew to finish four holes of his darkness- suspended third round and birdied two of them, to turn a two- stroke lead into four.
That should have eliminated a whole pile of players, but instead, Lowry began leaking oil, drop by drop, and played the front nine in three- over- par, while Johnson played it one- under. Tie game at the turn.
When the carnage continued on the back ( Lowry would shoot a disconsolate 76), it suddenly became Johnson’s title to lose.
“Bitterly disappointed, standing here,” Lowry said. “It’s not easy to get yourself in the position I was in today. It was there for the taking and I didn’t take it.
“I’m sure I learned a lot from today and I don’t know what it is yet, but when I’m in that position again, and I know I will be, I’ ll handle it probably a little bit better.”
The other two Heartbreak Kids — Lee Westwood and Sergio Garcia, who have had even more near misses in majors than Johnson — bowed out well before the credits rolled.
It’s not as though Johnson never got a break. He hit his tee shot far left on the 10th and got line- of- sight relief from a TV tower — from deep rough to a perfect lie beside an adjacent fairway — then lofted a wedge shot right over the same tower from which he had gotten relief.
Oh, well, it’s hard to say he didn’t have one coming.
Johnson, who’s been wearing the Kick Me sign on his pants for fate to land its hobnailed boots on his backside, finally caught a little justice.
Even the penalty stroke couldn’t take that away.