BleedGopher
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per ESPN:
Try to imagine, as you watched the final moments of the PGA Championship at Kiawah Island's Ocean Course last year, how you would feel if someone had told you -- in that moment -- Phil Mickelson was on a path to become the most divisive figure in professional golf.
How could the outpouring of affection that was unfolding, the throngs of jubilant fans chanting "Lefty! Lefty! Lefty!" as they stampeded over the ropes just so they could be close to him in the fairway, fade in a year's time?
How far would the oldest major champion in history have to fall that he would choose, by his own accord, to not even defend the Wanamaker Trophy?
It happened, as Ernest Hemingway once described the act of going broke, gradually, then suddenly. But one year later, here we are, with Mickelson choosing to skip his second straight major, still mired in the controversy he set in motion by airing his frustrations with the PGA Tour and flirting with joining LIV Golf, the upstart professional tour financed by the sovereign wealth fund of Saudi Arabia.
But the damage Mickelson did to his own reputation in his attempt to leverage both sides -- trying to use the prospect of joining LIV Golf to extract various concessions from the PGA Tour, then boasting about it to a journalist writing a biography on him -- is hard to overstate. Even his friends concede that much.
"It's crazy," fellow pro Kevin Kisner said. "It's a pretty big fall. I can't imagine what he's gone through mentally and emotionally through that whole year. But a little bit of humble pie never hurts anyone."
Nearly all of them are asking the same question: How in the hell did we get here?
www.espn.com
Go Tom Lehman!!
Try to imagine, as you watched the final moments of the PGA Championship at Kiawah Island's Ocean Course last year, how you would feel if someone had told you -- in that moment -- Phil Mickelson was on a path to become the most divisive figure in professional golf.
How could the outpouring of affection that was unfolding, the throngs of jubilant fans chanting "Lefty! Lefty! Lefty!" as they stampeded over the ropes just so they could be close to him in the fairway, fade in a year's time?
How far would the oldest major champion in history have to fall that he would choose, by his own accord, to not even defend the Wanamaker Trophy?
It happened, as Ernest Hemingway once described the act of going broke, gradually, then suddenly. But one year later, here we are, with Mickelson choosing to skip his second straight major, still mired in the controversy he set in motion by airing his frustrations with the PGA Tour and flirting with joining LIV Golf, the upstart professional tour financed by the sovereign wealth fund of Saudi Arabia.
But the damage Mickelson did to his own reputation in his attempt to leverage both sides -- trying to use the prospect of joining LIV Golf to extract various concessions from the PGA Tour, then boasting about it to a journalist writing a biography on him -- is hard to overstate. Even his friends concede that much.
"It's crazy," fellow pro Kevin Kisner said. "It's a pretty big fall. I can't imagine what he's gone through mentally and emotionally through that whole year. But a little bit of humble pie never hurts anyone."
Nearly all of them are asking the same question: How in the hell did we get here?
'It's a pretty big fall': How everything changed for Phil Mickelson in just one year
A year ago, Phil Mickelson was on top of the world, golf's oldest major champion at age 50. This week, he won't be at the PGA Championship. How did it all fall apart so fast?
Go Tom Lehman!!
