Mickelson Works Magic for Second Masters
By DAMON HACK - NYT
Published: April 10, 2006
AUGUSTA, Ga., April 9
"Phil Mickelson walked with his golf glove dangling from his back pocket, his reputation evolving in the soft light of spring. His grandfather Al Santos once predicted magical things for him at Augusta National Golf Club, and once more it was happening at the Masters.
Mickelson's family stood atop the hill behind the 18th green Sunday. Mickelson's close friend Fred Couples walked beside him up the last fairway. Mickelson's greatest rival, Tiger Woods, waited in the shadows to hand him another green jacket.
At the end of a long climb, Mickelson added a second Masters victory to his 2004 title, shooting a final-round three-under-par 69 to defeat Tim Clark of South Africa by two strokes. Couples, Woods, José María Olazábal, Retief Goosen and Chad Campbell finished three shots behind on a day when the golfers completed the third round in the morning.
Since April 2004, Mickelson has gone from a golfer with no major titles in 42 tries as a professional to one who has won three of the last nine, more than any competitor during that stretch.
"In '04 when I won, I felt this great feeling of relief," said Mickelson, 35, who ended the tournament at seven-under-par 281 and took home $1.26 million. "This time, it's a great feeling of satisfaction and accomplishment to come out on top."
With his P.G.A. Championship victory at Baltusrol Golf Club in Springfield, N.J., last August, Mickelson became the first player other than Woods to win back-to-back major championships since Nick Price won the British Open and P.G.A. Championship in 1994.
Mickelson will come to the United States Open at Winged Foot Golf Club in Mamaroneck, N.Y., in June as the only player who can win all four majors — the Grand Slam — and he is halfway to winning four in a row, which Woods accomplished in 2000-1. Mickelson has cultivated a large and loud fan base in the New York area, where he finished second to Woods at the United States Open at Bethpage Black in Farmingdale, N.Y., in 2002, and second to Goosen at the United States Open at Shinnecock Hills in Southampton, N.Y., two years later.
"Starting tomorrow," Mickelson said, "we'll start working for Winged Foot."
At the last major at Winged Foot — the 1997 P.G.A. Championship — Mickelson finished tied for 29th and was at the beginning of a pattern of being a talented player who could smash drives and do circus tricks with a wedge, but who had yet to fulfill his promise in a major.
In the interim, Mickelson has learned to harness his talent, throttling down an aggressive style and adding the occasional conservative touch.
"I started to control my game and control my ball flight," he said. "It started with the win here in 2004."
Last Sunday in Atlanta, carrying two drivers of different lengths that curved the ball in opposite directions, Mickelson won the BellSouth Classic by 13 shots.
He used the same system at Augusta National, taking a one-stroke lead over Couples into the final round after shooting a third-round 70 earlier in the day. At the end of the third round, a photographer distracted Mickelson as he teed off on No. 18; he ended up making a bogey, but the incident faded in the afternoon.
While his competitors began to backslide in the final round, Mickelson was steadily finding fairways and greens. He played error-free golf up until the last hole, where he carried a three-shot lead and finished with a no-worries bogey."
Continued
Rob
[ April 10, 2006, 05:30 AM: Message edited by: ITJock ]