15 years since one of golf’s great meltdowns

[Jonathan Mallard]

I've played in hundreds of golf tournaments, won some and peed several down mum leg, and I've NEVER seen a leader with little confidence in themselves that they played two or more short iron shots to make bogey or double for a win.

K

David Toms

Quail Hollow.

8 on 18 - a par 4. Still had one shot to spare.

I just looked that up.  He made eight, but it was only because he played like a 15 handicapper.

And his other famous layup was to make birdie.

K

I remember watching it.

It looked like he was drained of his confidence after he dumped his punch out into the creek.

4 putts would tend to confirm that IMO.

[Tony_Muldoon]

Unless memory serves me incorrectly, David Toms didn't hit iron-iron-iron at the 18th hole at Quail Hollow. He simply hacked up the hole. He may have used something other than driver off the tee, but I certainly don't recall it being a short iron. I do believe he 4-putted.

And in his PGA Championship win, he laid up because he couldn't go for the green in two after a less-than-stellar drive. He didn't hit iron off the tee, and laying up short was not his plan until he drove into the rough. Again, please correct me if I'm wrong.

If we're just talking about hitting irons off the tee, we can just look back to Rory McIlroy on the 72nd tee last week.

Rory used driver on 18 on Saturday when pin was back right and he played it down the left hand side of the fairway. ON Sunday pin was on left and hit his an iron towards OOB down the right. He still attacked the pin with his second shot, not quite nailing it and ended up the front right bunker.  I don't think this has any relevance to the subject at hand.

[Colin Macqueen]

Gentlemen,

Jean Van de Velde's undoing is etched in my memory! I was an Australian resident in those days so I was a wee bit interested in how Craig "Popeye" Parry would go as the final day wore on. His final nine had been unprepossessing and I suspect he was quite willing to get the deed done and head off home. Parry was paired with Van de Velde in that final round and from memory Jean took an inordinate amount of time to finally decide that he was not going to play the ball from the tidal burn. At a late stage in this proceeding Parry approached Van de Velde and in a quintessential Australian manner informed Van de Velde that if he took much longer, what with taking shoes and socks off etc.,
"The f***king tide would have gone out and he (Van de Velde) would be able to hit the shot off the gravel"!

My heart goes out to the lad …..  shades of the Auld Alliance I guess. Every time I return and blether with Carnoustie residents he is second to the great Ben Hogan in their hearts! From what I can gather he doesn't seem to have let it ruin him psychologically and was much admired and liked on the tour.

Cheers Colin

[Sean_A]

Sean

The driver had been working for him all week. As long as he didn't hook it wildly he was generally going to be OK and that was what happened. He did push his drive but went beyond rough on the right and had a perfect lie. From their the right hand side was the correct play. He was either going to be on the green, in the bunker or getting a drop from the grandstand.

What happened next was a freak where he hit a 2 inch bit of scaffolding that was sticking out and as I remember it the ball came back over the burn. That's when he f*cked up by not going out sideways at that point, chipping on from their taking his two putts and composing his winners speech.

Niall

Niall

VdV was hitting his driver all over the park on the final day.  His recovery skills were most impressive.  Go back and watch the tape - he was truly wild, leaking oil like an od Fiat.  His drive on 18 was much like several earlier - wild.    

I am sorry folks, but VdV chose the option which could lose him the Open and he did lose the Open.  If he thought he could execute a long iron from rough (which he didn't, bad luck or not it was a poor shot), why couldn't he execute a 9 iron diagonal back in play - even if he doesn't hit the fairway?  It seems to me that is a much less risky shot than the one he chose.  I can understand (though I thought then and now it was the only option which could lose him the Open there and then) going for the second in a bid to end the tournament there and then, but I can't understand folks saying he had only one option or that he chose the best option.  Whatever the case may be, that event is one of the best sporting drama scenes I have ever witnessed.  As a golfer it made me sick to watch, but it was highly entertaining.

Ciao

[Patrick_Mucci]

VDV's explanation of his thinking on his second shot has merit, but what about his thinking on the tee ?

Why select driver?

He was very lucky his drive didn't go in the hazard to the far right.

If he irons it and makes bogey he wins by two shots

[Niall C]

Sean

I recall VdV having a perfect lie for his second shot. From memory he was on a forward tee for the 17th.

Ken/JLarhman

VdV attempted with his 3rd shot to carry a stretch of rough that was more of a carry than he would have had going out sideways. He also had to carry a fairly wide burn after that, followed by a stretch of ground before a bunker right in front of the hole. Tiger at his finest wouldn't have got it near the hole. Indeed Tiger at his finest wouldn't have tried.

On this site we keep banging on about strategic course architecture and yet you seem to be endorsing a fairly brainless approach to getting the required score. Irrespective of the pro's natural instincts, a more seasoned competitor, and by that I mean someone used to being in that situation, would have taken the medicine and played out sideways. Lose the battle, win the war.

Niall

[JLahrman]

Unless memory serves me incorrectly, David Toms didn't hit iron-iron-iron at the 18th hole at Quail Hollow. He simply hacked up the hole. He may have used something other than driver off the tee, but I certainly don't recall it being a short iron. I do believe he 4-putted.

And in his PGA Championship win, he laid up because he couldn't go for the green in two after a less-than-stellar drive. He didn't hit iron off the tee, and laying up short was not his plan until he drove into the rough. Again, please correct me if I'm wrong.

If we're just talking about hitting irons off the tee, we can just look back to Rory McIlroy on the 72nd tee last week.

Rory used driver on 18 on Saturday when pin was back right and he played it down the left hand side of the fairway. ON Sunday pin was on left and hit his an iron towards OOB down the right. He still attacked the pin with his second shot, not quite nailing it and ended up the front right bunker.  I don't think this has any relevance to the subject at hand.

I agree. Someone asked for examples of pros hitting short irons repeatedly on the 72nd hole when they had a lead. The Toms examples were as relevant as my McIlroy example. At least McIlroy hit an iron off the 72nd tee. I'm 99% sure that Toms didn't hit an iron off the tee on either of the examples given.

[Sean_A]

Niall

Yes, VdV got a huge break on 18 after blowing his drive way right.  Then he goes for the carry, unnecessarily, hits another horrible shot and doesn't get a break.  Honestly, if VdV can't get a 9 iron, wedge or 8 iron in play on the second shot then the entire conversation is pointless. Somehow its easier to make a 210 carry over water, with OOB left and horrible rough right after blowing a drive way right than it is to hit the fairway with a high iron in his hand?  No, VdV lost the Open with his choice of second shot. 

Ciao

[JLahrman]

Sean

I recall VdV having a perfect lie for his second shot. From memory he was on a forward tee for the 17th.

Ken/JLarhman

VdV attempted with his 3rd shot to carry a stretch of rough that was more of a carry than he would have had going out sideways. He also had to carry a fairly wide burn after that, followed by a stretch of ground before a bunker right in front of the hole. Tiger at his finest wouldn't have got it near the hole. Indeed Tiger at his finest wouldn't have tried.

On this site we keep banging on about strategic course architecture and yet you seem to be endorsing a fairly brainless approach to getting the required score. Irrespective of the pro's natural instincts, a more seasoned competitor, and by that I mean someone used to being in that situation, would have taken the medicine and played out sideways. Lose the battle, win the war.

Niall

He did have a perfect lie for his second.

On the third shot, the distance to the fairway may have been less than the distance to carry the burn. But the distance to carry the burn was not very much. If the lie was such that there was a question of him carrying the burn, then distance control on the sideways pitch would have been just as problematic.

I'm just making up numbers here because I have no idea what the exact distances were, but if the lie was bad enough that a pro couldn't carry a burn 40 yards in front of him with a full swing, then the lie was also bad enough make it very doubtful that he could hit a shot that would carry exactly between 20 and 30 yards sideways to the fairway. And if he tried it and couldn't execute it, then he's in the same predicament but possibly with an even worse lie.

I'm not talking about strategic course architecture. If we want to talk about how the course should have been set up for that Open, we would probably be in agreement. I'm talking about Van de Velde's options for his shot on the course that didn't leave much in the way of strategic choices, from the rough at least.

[David Federman]

I was driving in my car from the Jersey shore after playing a round on golf that Sunday morning - listening to the broadcast on the radio. For what it is worth, I enjoy listening to golf. In nay event, from the moment Jean stepped onto the 18th tee with a driver, Curtis Strange was beside himself - could not believe what was happening. Listening to the shot by shot meltdown on the radio was amazing - Strange's disbelief at what was happening in front of him was palpable. As a matter of fact, I seem to recall Strange saying on the radio it was the dumbest thing he had ever seen, or something close to that.

Whatever, Jean might have said in retrospect, neither he nor his caddy were thinking clearly. I am sure his mind was racing at a time that he should have slowed everything down. I think it just proves how difficult it is to control one's thoughts in the most critical of times. In his mind he was seeing his name being etched on the Claret Jug, when he should have been thinking of getting a sure bogey, possible par. It might not be life and death, but who among us does not have great regrets that could have been avoided with clear thinking. This was a career/live altering moment, that was lost forever.

[Tom_Doak]

Lost in this discussion so far is the reality that the game has changed.

The option of taking an iron from the tee is Old School thought -- as in, pre-Big Bertha golf.  In those days, the long iron from the tee was a high-percentage shot, and players were more confident in the straightness of their long irons than the straightness of their drivers.

That changed for good right about the time of Van De Velde's meltdown.  Today's players think, if I'm going to hit it into the rough, I want to hit it as far down there as possible, and the face of their driver is twice the size of the long iron's.  Most of them have LESS confidence in their long irons than their drivers ... which is not surprising considering they hardly ever hit long irons at all.

The guys in the booth [Curtis Strange, Paul Azinger, et al.] are thinking about what was the best play in 1980.  [Nicklaus did the same thing to John Daly in the '95 Open, berating him for not hitting iron off the tee coming down 15 and 16 at The Old Course ... even though there isn't any fairway left on 16 to play to anymore.]  Their thinking is outdated.

[Matthew Petersen]

Lost in this discussion so far is the reality that the game has changed.

The option of taking an iron from the tee is Old School thought -- as in, pre-Big Bertha golf.  In those days, the long iron from the tee was a high-percentage shot, and players were more confident in the straightness of their long irons than the straightness of their drivers.

That changed for good right about the time of Van De Velde's meltdown.  Today's players think, if I'm going to hit it into the rough, I want to hit it as far down there as possible, and the face of their driver is twice the size of the long iron's.  Most of them have LESS confidence in their long irons than their drivers ... which is not surprising considering they hardly ever hit long irons at all.

The guys in the booth [Curtis Strange, Paul Azinger, et al.] are thinking about what was the best play in 1980.  [Nicklaus did the same thing to John Daly in the '95 Open, berating him for not hitting iron off the tee coming down 15 and 16 at The Old Course ... even though there isn't any fairway left on 16 to play to anymore.]  Their thinking is outdated.

That's true. I sometimes stand on a tee and think, "this is a hole where accuracy is way more important than distance." And in that scenario, driver is still probably my best option. I hit it better than any other club in the bag.

That said, if I have a three shot lead on the 72nd hole of a major, I would be very tempted to just play three 7 irons and know I could still 3 putt to win.

[Carl Nichols]

Lost in this discussion so far is the reality that the game has changed.

The option of taking an iron from the tee is Old School thought -- as in, pre-Big Bertha golf.  In those days, the long iron from the tee was a high-percentage shot, and players were more confident in the straightness of their long irons than the straightness of their drivers.

That changed for good right about the time of Van De Velde's meltdown.  Today's players think, if I'm going to hit it into the rough, I want to hit it as far down there as possible, and the face of their driver is twice the size of the long iron's.  Most of them have LESS confidence in their long irons than their drivers ... which is not surprising considering they hardly ever hit long irons at all.

The guys in the booth [Curtis Strange, Paul Azinger, et al.] are thinking about what was the best play in 1980.  [Nicklaus did the same thing to John Daly in the '95 Open, berating him for not hitting iron off the tee coming down 15 and 16 at The Old Course ... even though there isn't any fairway left on 16 to play to anymore.]  Their thinking is outdated.

I agree, as between a driver and a 2 iron.  But I doubt that most pros think they are straighter with their driver than, say, a 6 iron.  And it seems like JVDV could've hit 6 iron and had enough to make his carry.

[Niall C]

JL

I'm a hacker who plays a lot of links golf so I know the type of shot very well. You're almost trying to hit it out to the nearest point of relief. Getting a flyer isn't really an issue, the danger is not shifting it far enough or indeed at all. That being the case far more danger going forward than going out sideways. Even if he can't reach the fairway with his first shot, he likely gets it out with next which leaves him with a half wedge approach followed by a putt to win the Open. As it was he went straight ahead and ended up having to get up and down out the bunker just to make the play off.

At the same Open I recall sitting behind the 3rd green. The hole was located on the lower tier just over the burn and to the left with the bunker just behind. I watched half a dozen guys, including a couple of major winners, hit drives down to the left and ending up in the fairway bunker about a pitch distance from the green. All bar one of them went for the green and all made bogey or worse with none giving themselves a realistic chance of the par. Only one guy went out sideways and he chipped to about 7 or 8 feet right of the pin, and just lipped out with his par putt. That guy was Van de Velde. If he'd used the same tactic on the final hole he would have been the Open champion.

Tom

Irons from the tee might be old school but as the last Open shows retro is coming back into vogue. I also recall when Harrington won that Sergio hit either an iron or 3 wood from the tee, leaving himself a long iron in. Unfortunately he put it in the bunker and just failed to get up and down which would have given him the win.

Niall