This weekend, which started out with a lot of promise for Kentucky golf fans, ended up being quite disappointing. As Eric has already noted, Miss Emma Talley shot a 72 today -- her best round of the weekend -- and finished in a tie for 46th, but missed out on being low amateur by one stroke. At the Greenbrier Classic, Kenny Perry couldn't build on his second-round 66, and also finished in a tie for 46th place. J.B. Holmes, who was tied for 3d place going into today's final round, shot a four-over par 74 today and finished in a tie for 27th. And the golf tournaments themselves were virtually unwatchable. Webb Simpson, the U.S. Open Champion who led the Greenbrier Classic after three rounds, stumbled to a seventh-place finish. Tiger Woods and Phil Mickelson both missed the cut at Greenbrier -- the first time that's happened in a PGA event since 1993. The tournament came down to a playoff between two complete unknowns: Ted Potter, Jr. and Troy Kelly (Potter won). And at the U.S. Women's Open, Na Yeon Choi shot a rather desultory 73 today, but still cruised home with a four-shot victory. She becomes the fifth woman from South Korea to win this tournament since 2005 -- remarkably, none of those five women have won any other major tournaments.
On the whole, it was a good weekend to watch tennis. Serena Williams and Roger Federer both won at Wimbledon -- the first pair of 30-somethings to take the singles titles at Wimbledon since Billie Jean King and Arthur Ashe did so in 1975. It's been a long, long, time since tennis was more interesting to the typical middle-aged American sports fan than golf; but we have reached that point again.
Here is the final leaderboard. Congratulations to 2010 champion Paula Creamer, who finished as Low American.
1. N.Y. Choi (KOR): -7 (71+72+65+73=281)
2. A. Yang (KOR): -3 (73+72+69+71=285)
3. S. Gal (GER): +1 (71+70+74+74=289)
T4. I.H. Lee (KOR): +2 (72+71+77+70=290)
T4. S. Feng (CHN): +2 (74+74+71+71=290)
T4. G. Sergas (ITA): +2 (74+71+73+72=290)
T7. P. Creamer: +3 (73+73+71+74=291)
T7. M. Miyazato (JPN): +3 (71+71+73+76=291)
T9. S.R. Pak (KOR): +4 (72+73+76+71=292)
T9. S. Pettersen (NOR): +4 (71+68+78+75+292)
T9. C. Kerr: +4 (69+71+77+75=292)
T9. I. Park (KOR): +4 (71+70+76+75=292)
T9. N. Castrale: +4 (73+70+74+75=292)
Miss Talley had essentially 9 really bad holes of golf. What's impressive to me is that after those 9 bad holes at the start of the 3rd round she shot par over the next 27 holes. That's something to be proud of.
ReplyDeleteDuring Friday's coverage on ESPN2 they talked about how the US women were fired up to win this year and that's why they were dominating the top 10 of the leaderboard. It's amazing to me how badly they collapsed in the final two rounds.
It's not amazing to me.
Delete