Phil Mickelson has a flair for the dramatic, and even though he’s far off the lead at The Barclays, Lefty still found a way to dazzle the crowd.
Mickelson shot a 1-under 69 on Saturday at Plainfield Country Club in Edisonm N.J., getting him to 2-under for the tournament, nine behind leaders Jason Day and Sang-moon Bae.
On his last hole of the day, Mickelson tried to drive the par-4 18th and ended up in some thick rough on the edge of a greenside bunker. He decided his only option to get the ball on the green was to hit it backward, over his head.
He nearly pulled it off, but the ball came up a couple yards short and trickled back into the bunker.
“It [the lie] was so vertical I just couldn’t get a stance to get the club on the ball,’’ said Mickelson, who splashed out and made a four-footer for par. “I was negative-two yards from pulling it off … but I’ll take par.’’
Asked if, even in competition with a poor lie, there is an element of fun to trying a shot like that, Mickelson said: “Immensely. … I love seeing shots like that and trying to pull them off. I love the challenge of it.
“At that moment I was really trying to find the best way to get up and down and make a three [birdie]. The other option was to just chip it in the bunker. I couldn’t get it any other way it was such a vertical lie. It’s hard to imagine [the lie] unless you see it.”
Carlos Ortiz went out early and shot a tournament-best 8-under 62, getting him to 7-under for the tournament. Ortiz is the first Mexican-born player to be on the PGA Tour since Esteban Toledo in 2004, and he played at the same course in his native Guadalajara as women’s star Lorena Ochoa.
Ortiz is currently ranked 112 in the FedEx Cup standings, meaning he needs a high finish to advance to next week’s second leg in Boston.
“You start looking at that and you’re going to get crazy because you cannot control how the other players do,” Ortiz said. “If I play good, I advance for next week, and then I’ll see from there.”
The darling of the first two rounds, Tony Finau, came back to earth with a round of 1-over 71, bogeying the last hole to put him at 5-under for the tournament.