Rain delays are facts of life at golf tournaments, but on the final day of a big event, there’s nothing worse. At The Players, well, everybody likes for things to finish up at the time it’s supposed to. That didn’t happen on Sunday.
Tornado alerts are almost never a factor at PGA Tour events, but the National Weather Service is not composed of golfers. There were tornado watches all afternoon.
Then right around 1:15 p.m., play was halted for the day. None too soon either as there was a ginormous clap of thunder.
For four hours everyone waited. With the tornado warning not expiring until 5 p.m., it was probably smart to hold off resuming play until then. They restarted at 5:15 p.m..
At that time, Rory McIlroy was leading the tournament, and when he almost immediately made a putt for birdie, it looked like he was in the driver’s seat, three shots ahead of J.J. Spaun, Akshay Bhatia and Tom Hoge, who had finished with a 66.
Spaun had other ideas.
Spaun, who has one victory in 228 PGA Tour events, was looking for his second. And it would be a big one. He has only been home one week since the PGA Tour season stared because he needs to make money and earn FedEx points.
McIlroy, well everybody knows who he is. Famous on at least two continents, maybe three or four. Winner of majors. Generally, an all-around good guy. If you had to pick one to win, you’d pick McIlroy. But his game hasn’t been perfection lately.
He had complained about his chipping and putting. Analyst Paul McGinley agreed with that on Golf Channel and noted that, in addition, his drives have been leaking to the right instead of finding their way to the center of fairways. It was a chink in the armor.
Spaun was playing well, perhaps better than he ever has. But his putts were going right, commentators mentioned. So, neither one of them had a game in tip top shape.
Both looked pretty good to me, probably to you, too. They were not playing in the same group.
As the final round continued, the pivotal holes turned out to be the 14th, which is usually the hardest every year, and the 16th, which is usually the easiest.
“I'm trying to catch Rory, and I can't really control what he does, but I can control what I do, and I just started committing to my shots and my swing and trusting it more,” Spaun said.
At the 14th, McIlroy’s drive found the right rough. The gnarly stuff. He could only get his second shot about 90 yards farther, but he was in the fairway.
His third shot left him 15 feet from the hole, and when he missed the putt, it was bogey.
Spaun, on the other hand, belted his drive down the middle of the fairway, and then his second shot landed an amazing 14 inches from the hole. It was a birdie in the making and a two-shot swing in his favor.
On the 16th, McIlroy hit his drive just into the right rough. That made his second shot tougher, but he blasted one out to the grassy swale to the left of the green in line with the hole.
Then he chipped up, but left himself a little over 11 feet for birdie, which he did not convert. There’s nothing wrong with par, but on the easiest hole, a birdie is expected.
Then Spaun hit a drive into the fairway, a second shot left of the green, followed by a chip to less than a foot, and he made the putt for birdie. They were tied.
Neither hit into the water on 17 or 18, and that left us with a playoff on Monday. There was not enough light to continue.
“I'm happy to be in the position that I am, but also I feel like I had chances there on the back nine to close the door, and I didn't quite do that,” McIlroy said at the conclusion of play.
He told Smylie Kaufman of NBC that he was struggling to read the putts because it was getting darker.
“Everyone expects him to win,” Spaun said. “I don't think a lot of people expect me to win. I expect myself to win. That's all I care about.”
Tjhe playoff starts at 9 a.m. and will be telivised on Golf Channel. They will play three holes, which will include holes 16, 17 and 18, and add up the score after that, and if it’s tied, they go to sudden death, starting at the 17th.
