Frankly, I hate playoffs. If they can’t thresh it out in regulation, split the pot and go home. What happened Sunday is, a member of one of the royal families of golf in America, one of the many Haases, and a Californian who went to Oklahoma State to find his future were fighting for the Tour Championship at East Lake Golf Club. The event is becoming a tradition at the grand old golfing community that has, frankly, become famed because the great Bobby Jones founded his game there.
But, moving on, let me assure you that what had begun as a rather casual final round of golf that would determine the winner of the Tour Championship and the FedEx Cup title this year had developed into a stirring climax. Bill of the Haases would be playing Hunter Mahan, of the Orange County, Calif., Mahans, for the big check and the sprawling championship trophy. Both Bill Haas and Hunter Mahan are about the same age, both college grads who took their game on the road.
Mahan came out of Oklahoma State, where a lot of kids go to polish their game. Bill Haas has golf in his blood and in his background all the way back to Bob Goalby, who won the Masters in 1968. Goalby was Jay Haas’ uncle, and Jay, Bill’s father, was a golfer of historic note, all the way back to his days as a scholarship player at Wake Forest. From that family that came out of Illinois, golfers have been rolling off the Haas assembly line, to this historic Sunday afternoon at East Lake.
Jay Haas has continued competing on the Champions Tour, and he and as many of the Haases who could make the cut were on the scene Sunday. Calmest of them all, it seemed, was Bill, who rarely shows emotion, even when he stood before commissioner Tim Finchem, who was making it official that Bill had earned, not just another piece of trophy-room decor, but 10 million in American cash. That annually goes to the winner of the FedEx Cup title.
It seemed that he might have blown it when he bogeyed two of the last three holes, but he’d built up enough of a cushion to survive for the playoff. It was in the playoff that he reached back for his shot of the day, splashing it out of the water to within three feet of the pin for the putt on the 17th hole that would extend the playoff to another hole. He then closed it out the second time around on the 18th green.
Calm, unflustered, a nerveless wonder through it all, while in the gallery his father’s face was a flourished red. Great family, a gift to golf, and in this case, the beginning of another generation of golfing Haases. Quite a launching.
Retired sports columnist Furman Bisher writes occasionally for The Atlanta Journal-Constitution.
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