The announcer in the stands on 16 sounded like Chris Berman. I’m sure it wasn’t, but how crappy would that job be? The announcer can’t be rude or pissy, screaming at people in the crowd because a riot would probably occur. So he just has to drone on for each and every player: “Quiet please. Quiet.” And I thought Calcavecchia needed a drink. Somebody help this guy out.

Mahan and Allenby were on the tee at this point, and both of them stuck it close. After Allenby hit, aside from all of the cheering, I heard a comment normally reserved for Ian Poulter: “Alright pinkie!”

I found a seat just left of the ASU section, and it was really dead in here today despite all of the noise. I heard familiar cheers from the stands up to the skyboxes for somebody to chug their drink, but I heard a new one today. It happened when a couple tried to exit the way they came in, rather than continuing down the grandstands to the normal exits. Everyone around me started cheering: “Wrong way! Wrong way! Wrong way!” And one of the college kids below me made a melodramatic move with his body to point in the actual direction of the exits to help them out. This happened over 10 times during the span of only a few groups, making me support their decision to make fun of these people. That has to be annoying if you’re sitting down front to have people walking in front of you.

Mahan rolled in his birdie, and the scoreboard across the grass showed that he had now moved to 16- under, one ahead of Fowler. I just hoped that Fowler could birdie 15.

Below, three girls—who were all wearing next to nothing, stilettos, and caked on makeup—walked across the grandstand. Within a few seconds, every man stood up and started applauding and whistling. When the girls realized what was going on, they tried to duck behind the guys they were with, like a child evading attention. But come on—why even dress like that if you can’t take it? Did the Thunderbirds force you to wear that? I think not. But nice effort.

When Fowler walked up to the 16th tee, I glanced at the scoreboard to see that he had only managed to par 15. I would hear later during his interview that he just wasn’t comfortable going for the green unless he could do it with a 5 iron. He was too worried about the narrow landing area from his 4-iron / hybrid distance. His argument for the wedge into the green was good, but in retrospect, that might have cost him the tournament—16, 17, and 18 are not easy birdie holes. Perhaps he should’ve taken a gamble. But, I’m not the one wearing creamsicle today.

For the first three rounds, Rickie was blowing everyone else away with how close he had been able to consistently stick his tee shots on 16. After three rounds, his total was just over 30 feet. Today, he still stuck it fairly close, but was only able to manage a par. Mahan was now in the clubhouse with a 65 and a 16-under total, meaning Rickie needed a birdie on just one of the last two holes to get into a playoff.

Geoff Shackleford had been talking all week in the media center to players, other writers, and consulting with the statistics on the Shot Link laptops to compose a story about 17. While everyone else is writing about 16 this week, his focus is on figuring out how to play the 17th hole. It wasn’t until today that I realized how necessary an article like this was. The 17th here reminds me of the 10th at Riviera—a short par-4 that is drive-able, but if you miss in the wrong spot(s), then you’re screwed. The green is about the most interesting thing I’ve seen so far this year. If you hold up your right hand, holding in your thumb, ring and pinkie fingers and extending your pointer and middle finger, that is what the aerial view of this green looks like. A bunker is placed just above your ring and pinkie fingers, and the undulations of the green funnel the ball right into it if you have the pace. Surrounding the back and left sides of the green is water, and the narrow section of green where your index and middle fingers would be is crowned and falls away from the players, meaning the back left pin location today means water if you aren’t careful.

Fowler had a tough downhill second shot to this green, yet somehow threaded it between the undulations on the right side and stopped the ball just before it went into the water. But, he could only manage par. So that meant 18 was it.

And we all know what happened on 18. Gave the putt enough pace, but it just stayed right and Mahan was the winner. Nice solo second, though. The 18th hole was the only time all day where I really had to dodge people, but because of the slopes around the green, I still had a perfect view of all the action. My hat is off to this course for its design in favor of spectator viewing.

This post was edited on 3/20/20 at 5:38 pm