Putter brings safe ending to Phil’s thrill ride

March 27, 2010

Phil Mickelson had just hit his best shot all year, and was still basking in the glory as the cheers cascaded down while he walked to his final tee box on Friday.

Then he abruptly veered over to the gallery rope and handed his ball to a little girl, who looked up from under a pink Mickey Mouse hat.

“There you go,” he said.

When Phil Mickelson was done spraying and slicing with his driver, the putter saved the day. (Getty Images) She was left completely speechless, which, considering her choice of headwear, was doubly appropriate.

Finishing off a theme-park-worthy round that left everybody struggling for words, Lefty put himself in contention heading into the weekend for the first time all year with a rollicking 5-under 67 that left him a shot off the early lead at the Arnold Palmer Invitational.

As is often the case with Mickelson, you had to see it to believe it. Even by Mickelsonian standards, it was a museum piece.

The effort matched his seasonal best relative to par, but it eclipsed all other 2010 rounds in terms of entertainment. Like most classic Mickelson outings, it was equal parts frightening, enervating and inspiring.

It made your hair stand up like a porcupine watching a horror movie. The end result, thanks to his best putting round of the year, is that the second-best player on the planet is relevant on the weekend again.

Mickelson, who isn’t above a little self-deprecation, laughed out loud when a British bloke asked him if rounds like this are stressful, or if he’s basically used to it by now at age 39.

“I find that an interesting question, because there’s some legitimacy to it,” Mickelson grinned. “I have a tendency to have up-and-down rounds like that. But it’s fun.

“I mean, I enjoy trying to create shots and hit shots and take on some of these pins and make birdies, and unfortunately I tend to make a few mistakes at times as well.”

He was an ad-libbing fool Friday, attracting the largest crowd of the day and moving toward the top of the leaderboard at Palmer’s Place for the first time since 2002, when he finished T3. The shot of the year, one of those unexpected strokes that can turn into a career catalyst, came at the eighth, his 17th hole of the day.

Mickelson had already bathed two tee balls on his wild back nine when he faced a 135-yard wedge shot from the fairway. He pulled a wedge and launched one dead at the pin, with the shot narrowly missing a bird in midair before it landed and plopped into the cup after two bounces.

Orlando might be Tiger Town, but the place went berserk. Mickelson, who won at Bay Hill half a career ago in 1997, fist-bumped about two dozen fans on the way to the next tee and deposited the ball into the little girl’s hands.

True, the occasionally sloppy shots made the round look a little too familiar for Mickelson, who had a spectacular autumn in 2009 yet hasn’t been able to muster a lick of momentum this year. But there was one huge difference: With the Masters beckoning in two weeks, he made every meaningful putt he faced.

“It was my best putting round of the year and I feel so much better with the flat stick,” he said. “I feel so much better on the greens, I have much better direction and I spent a bunch of time with [coach] Dave Stockton.

“I can just make those 15-, 20-footers. So it was a little bit different feel to the round today.”

But in some ways, certainly as it relates to the white-knuckle portion of the menu, it was epic Mickelson. The fun started on his eighth hole, when he laid the sod over a hybrid approach shot on a short par-5 and made birdie anyway.

He had 246 yards to the flag and the ball traveled … 180. It didn’t even reach the pond that fronts the hole. He put both hands over his head and covered his face.

“That was my version of going for it,” he deadpanned. His back nine was even more creative. He aggressively pulled a driver on the short third hole and carved a wild slice into the water, 50 yards offline. After a penalty drop, he made a 12-footer to salvage a bogey from a greenside bunker.

On the sixth, he hit another booming slice into the water and had to reload from the tee box. This time, he throttled back to a 3-wood and eventually had to make a 17-footer to save a bogey.

In both instances, he seemed to be on the verge of a meltdown, but the putter bailed him out. Bogeys never felt so good.

“You could say that every shot is equal, but when you make a double-bogey it’s a devastating feeling,” he said.

He didn’t sniff a double on Monday, when he played a Fred Couples layout in the Palm Springs area and shot his lowest round ever, a stellar 58 that included 12 birdies and an eagle. But nothing can prep him for Augusta National like tasting blood on the back nine Sunday, especially against a deep field.

“I think for me it’s important to get into contention and get that feel and that nervousness of being in one of the last few groups, having a chance to win the golf tournament, looking at the leaderboard, being able to focus on your own game, all of those things combined,” he said. “I haven’t had that this year. I haven’t played the way I expect to.”

Mickelson won a pair of big events in the fall, twice beating Tiger Woods in the process, but his best finish in five starts this year is a forgettable T8 at Pebble Beach. He is playing next week in Houston, his first sustained stretch of the season, partly because of the well-documented family issues with his wife and mom back home.

“Heading into this week I feel very confident with where my game was headed, but I still need to shoot the numbers,” he said. “Now that I feel that’s coming, I still need to get into contention and be able to perform and it’s important for me to do that heading into Augusta.”

More than anything, he was relieved to see balls start falling into the cup, because nobody wins at Augusta if they have scar tissue on the greens.

Mickelson had 11 one-putt greens, plus the hole-out on the eighth for eagle. He mentioned three weeks ago after another lackluster he has gone from missed cuts to victories in successive weeks too many times to mention. Maybe the eagle can help nudge him back to the fore.

“It certainly could, but this was the turning point for me, this round on the greens, because the putter, I rolled it,” he said, his enthusiasm obvious. “I wasn’t stressing over it. I just feel different with the blade.”

Given the multiple stab wounds endured by the game this year with a sour economy, flagging TV ratings and the endless Woods scandal, having Mickelson b and talking about.