There's no definitive reason why there's been such a history of first-time winners at the Travelers Championship
Marc Leishman has a theory, though.
"I think the last four holes have a lot to do with it," said Leishman, who became the fifth first-time winner at TPC River Highlands in the last seven years and 15th overall in the 61-year history of the event. "You can shoot a really low score here. But if you're not playing well, it'll punish you."
Leishman of course did play well, playing his final six holes in 3 under while everyone else around him made varying degrees of mistakes.
"I don't know whether that's why first-timers have won," he continued. "There's finishing four holes on a lot of other golf courses you'd rather play with a two-shot lead coming in than the ones here."
And to further Leishman's point, none of the top 5 players on the leaderboard at the start of the final round shot under par on Sunday (even though the course played to its second-lowest scoring average of the week).
"It is a great tournament because of those last four holes, because of all the things that can happen in there," saidRoland Thatcher, who was one of the two co-leaders entering the final round. "No lead is safe coming down the stretch. There are so many difficult holes, and there's some birdie opportunities there, too."
It certainly didn't hurt that Leishman shot a career-best 62, or that he finished his round more than 2 hours before the last putt dropped.
Only a week ago, Webb Simpson talked about the very same thing and how it probably helped him win the U.S. Open.
"You never want to take the lead going into Sunday and then need two birdies on the last two holes to catch up," Thatcher said.
Especially here.
THE BACK NINE: 9 THINGS YOU NEED TO KNOW
1. "I wouldn't say it was pressure by any means," Charley Hoffman said of his double bogey-bogey finish. "I visualized everything I needed to do coming down the stretch. I just put two bad swings on it at the wrong time." Well, that's what pressure does sometimes -- it causes a bad swing. In Hoffman's defense, the 17th did play as the hardest hole on the golf course all week. The one that really upset him, however, was his drive and subsequent approach shot on the 18th. "What I did on 18 was pretty pathetic," he said. "Pretty easy drive for me, sets up pretty good, and fanned it out to the right, and pretty poor second shot, pretty poor bunker shot and even worse putt, so when it's said and done, obviously a bad finish and bad taste in my mouth."
2. The 296-yard par-4 15th baffled Bubba Watson again. He has a history of hitting it in the water there and did so again on Sunday, fanning his 4-wood way left and with it possibly his chances of winning. Watson made par, yes, but said he never thought about laying up. Why? "It really doesn't go that far, maybe to the front of the green if I hit it perfect," Watson said of his 4-wood. Still, after struggling with what's an awkward yardage to get it all the way there for Watson (3-wood is too much club), why not just lay up to a wedge distance? Even with the water ball, though, Watson still had a 17-footer on the last hole to tie for the lead, but the birdie putt didn't break as much as Watson thought.
3. Speaking of Watson, we might not see him again until the British Open. There's a chance he could play The Greenbrier Classic, according to his wife Angie, but the couple has a lot on their plate at the moment with the adoption process for their 4-month-old son Caleb still to be finalized, a new house to be moved into and some other odds and ends.
4. Roland Thatcher can't seem to catch a break. A little over a decade he go, he came to the final hole at Q-school and famously hit his approach shot off the cart path and onto the roof of the clubhouse at Bear Lakes to miss getting his TOUR card. Last year, he bogeyed the final hole. Sunday, he began the day with a share of the lead only to bogey three of his first six holes. He bounced back, though, with a birdie on the most difficult hole on the golf course, No. 17, to pull within one of the lead and appeared to be headed for a possible birdie to tie on the 18th ... until his approach shot came up about a foot short and buried in the bunker. "I was staring it down," Thatcher said. "I thought it was perfect." What hurt Thatcher more was failing to birdie the par-5 13th. If there's a silver lining to the dark cloud for Thatcher, it's that he certainly played his best golf in months after not having made a cut since March.
5. Stat of the Week I: There have been 32 come-from-behind victories in the 61-year history of the Travelers Championship. Of those, 19 of the winners came from at least three shots back. Sunday, Leishman came from six back, which brings me to ...
6. Stat of the Week II: Leishman was the fifth player this season to come from at least six shots back in the final round with just nine of 26 54-holes leaders having won this year.
7. Stat of the Week III: This one plays into what I was saying earlier about first-time winners at the Travelers Championship, and the nature of the final four holes and the unpredictability of it all. Only one player --Phil Mickelson -- has successfully defended his title in the six decades of this tournament.
8. There will be a tournament within the tournament the next couple of weeks with the top two players on a mini-money list not otherwise eligible for the British Open getting a spot in the field at Royal Lytham & St. Annes. Right now, only about $100,000 separates Michael Thompsonand John Merrick on that list.
9. It ain't over till it's over. Case in point: Hunter Mahan, who made the secondary cut on the number last week before shooting a career-low 61 in the final round to move from last place (T68) into a tie for 11th.
Source PGA Tour
