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To Be Continued: Woods Birdies 18th To Force Playoff

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By MICK ELLIOTT | The Tampa Tribune

Published: June 16, 2008

Updated: 06/16/2008 12:44 am

SAN DIEGO - Of course Tiger Woods' birdie putt from 12 feet on the 72nd hole of the U.S. Open went in Sunday. That's what one-legged legends do.

"You can never expect him to miss," Rocco Mediate said. "Amazing."

Just the same, Mediate had to see for himself. He was standing - actually pacing - in the scoring area just off the 18th green as Woods was playing the par-5 finishing hole. He was clinging to a one-shot lead and aspirations of becoming, at age 45, the oldest U.S. Open champion in history.

Woods, meanwhile, seemed to be making a mess of the 18th hole. His tee shot found a fairway bunker on the left. His second shot went right, gobbled up by rough 105 yards from the hole. Johnny Miller was just saying how hard it would be "just to get it close," when Woods' third shot stopped 12 feet from the pin.

Everybody had a feeling what would come next.

"I knew he'd make it," Mediate said. "I just knew it."

Mediate, being a former Florida Southern College Moccasin, proved to be a smart man.

Now, how will he do today in golf's ultimate test, an 18-hole playoff with the world's No. 1 player after both finished four days at 1 under?

The knee-jerk reaction is that he's toast. Woods has won 13 major championships, two of them - the 2000 PGA and 2005 Masters - in playoffs. Mediate has five PGA Tour garden-variety career wins, the last coming six years ago.

Rocco Rocks

That does not mean Mediate would not be a popular winner. He makes friends quicker than a 6-month-old puppy. He is talkative and outgoing. You know - the total opposite of Tiger. He's also in love with golf and having the time of his life.

"It was a blast," he said. "I've never had more fun and more insanity. It's just amazing."

But the force of Woods' ordainment looms like a tidal wave that will not be turned.

Before arriving at Torrey Pines this week, he had not hit a competitive shot in nine weeks while recovering from knee surgery. He hadn't even walked 18 holes until Thursday's opening round. He spent the past four days wincing, limping, missing fairways and still finished as one of only two players to break par.

The pain, Woods explained, comes only after the club made impact. That makes the game plan obvious: Hit the shot and let everything else take care of itself.

"If the pain hits, pain hits," he said. "So be it. It's just pain."

Make no mistake, the hurt was real. While there may not have been a bloody sock to prove it, Woods' performance - no matter what happens today - has been about as courageous as golf can get.

No, he hasn't crawled back into the lineup with, say, a busted spleen, but golf's different in that way.

"I think every one of us hurts," said Mediate, owning one of golf's worst bad backs. "Sometimes it's worse than others. But a lot of times just the littlest thing can take us down. It's ridiculous, actually.

"Because it's such an unnatural motion, the golf swing. No matter how good you are at it or how biomechanically sound you are with the motion of your body and golf swing, it's still not right. It does something to you. Whereas, if you're a football player, you can have a broken arm and still play. It doesn't make a lot of sense."

Neither does what Woods is doing.

Limping Home

For the third time in four days, Woods butchered the par-4 opening hole with a double bogey. After a bogey at No. 2 dropped him out of the lead, it was impossible to wonder if the knee would hold up. The image of Woods being carted away in the middle of the final round of a U.S. Open while in contention did not compute, but he was hitting it sideways.

"Oh, I was going to finish," he said.

As demanded by the script, with a birdie.

"The putt was probably about two-and-a-half balls outside right," Woods said. "And the green wasn't very smooth. I kept telling myself make a pure stroke, if it bounces in or out, so be it, at least I can hold my head up high and hit a pure stroke. I hit it exactly where I wanted it to and it went in."

Who wouldn't have known that?

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