Glover chasing a little history;
needs patience to make haste
CHASKA, Minn. – When last seen, Lucas Glover was in a rocking chair on the veranda, rockin’ and talkin’ and doin’ everything but whittlin’, chawin’ and spittin’, and allowing as how this fellow, where him and some pals go to play golf, makes some great pickles. The greatest pickles, actually. Full-size pickles. And an earnest visit Glover was having with his pal, Stewart Cink, in a scene from some downhome sit-com, except that this was in a promo for the PGA Championship on ESPN.com, a tournament that Glover, at the moment, has dealt himself quite a hand in. Given a little patience, a few putts escaping the devil’s clutches and the like, this PGA would be a perfect bookend for the U.S. Open back in June, which, to everyone’s surprise, he won. And this U.S. Open-PGA double in the same year – half of the Grand Slam – has not been easy to come by. Just Tiger Woods, Jack Nicklaus, Ben Hogan and Gene Sarazen is all. Then there’s this: If Glover, who will be 30 in November, can pull in this PGA, he would be only the sixth player to win two majors in the same season while still in his 20s, the others being Woods, Nicklaus, Tom Watson, Sarazen and Bobby Jones. That’s a Hall of Fame neighborhood. Not that he would gain admission simply by adding this PGA, but it should be at least a foot. Or maybe a big toe, anyway.
And the key is – patience. Which he didn’t have at his last hole, and the resulting bogey would cost him a stroke that grew ever more precious as the windy, hot day drew on as Tiger Woods, who started the day with the lead, spent his time fending off all comers, like Luke Skywalker brushing away the Tie-Fighters, to borrow on the distant future. So Glover finished with a 2-under-par 70 and sits at 3-under and in a crowd of five tied for second behind Woods going into Saturday’s third round.
“I was in a few spots today where I couldn’t get it up-and-down, and I had to hit a career shot just to get inside 10 feet,” Glover said. “You can’t live like that. Just got to be patient.”
Which he was not at his final hole, the par-4 9th, where what he believed to be a perfect tee shot got foiled by the wind and ended up in the light rough. And from there?
“I shoulda played to the left and two-putted,” Glover said. “But I tried to jam it in there.”
So the try for a birdie at a clumsy time turned, predictably, into a bogey for a 70. Still, he’s nicely off, with 36 holes to play. In his three previous PGAs, he missed the cut in 2005, was 18th after 36 holes in ’06, and 55th in ’07. That was a younger, less accomplished Lucas Glover. Winning the U.S. Open has a certain maturing quality.
“Just a sense that I could do it,” Glover said. “You know – pretty high pressure that week, and I performed. And that was very comforting. Just gives you a little bit of a confidence boost.”
Actually, it was more than that. It was more than just paying dues. It was plunging into the cauldron and coming up on the other side and finding that you’d not only survived, but you came through unscathed. Sergio Garcia, former Spanish whiz kid who’s never quite made it despite all that promise, had said earlier in the week that in the 1999 PGA, in that celebrated duel with Tiger Woods, he hadn’t realized the magnitude of the moment or of his opportunity. Perhaps -- the notion was advanced to Glover -- breaking through in the U.S. Open spared him a lot of scar tissue he’d have to deal with later.
“Good idea,” Glover said. “I hadn’t thought about that. That was the first time I ever made the cut in the U.S. Open, and I’ve only been in contention one other time at a major. So, I can’t say because I don’t know.”
Then this kind of question always seems to pop up. It’s as though someone’s expecting a guy to apologize for being successful, as though winning a championship doesn’t count unless you win a bunch more. Either that or someone was practicing the word “validate.”
“How important would it be,” someone asked, “to validate your first major victory?”
Glover didn’t think long about that one.
“I think winning any tournament is important,” Glover said. “I don’t think I have to validate anything. I’m not looking to prove anything to anybody else. It would just be nice to win another one.”
Speaking of patience.
Return to Man About Golf archives