Phil Mickelson stunned rivals and fans with a controversial decision to play a moving ball at the 2018 US Open, and his reaction only fueled the fire
During his career, Glory was Phil Mickelson from the US Open. Instead, he became synonymous with National Open near misses and one particularly strange incident.
Mickelson is a six-time US Open runner-up and his career Grand Slam chances are dwindling as the 53-year-old has gone three years without a tournament win. Unfortunately, Lefty’s main memories of him at the US Open are his heartbreak and controversial decision at Shinnecock Hills in 2018.
Mickelson was clearly out of contention when he arrived at par on the ninth of the third round. 4 13. at 10 – more than a week. He left himself with a slippery 18-foot putt for bogey after another unlucky hole and misjudged the tempo as the ball sailed past the cup and into the fairway.
But remarkably, the six-time champion ran after the ball and hit it again before stopping, knocking it back out of the hole to stay on the putt. Mickelson didn’t cheat, but he bent the rules to his advantage.
If Mickelson’s ball had gone off the green, he would have been left with a dangerous chip. He made a deliberate decision to accept a two-stroke penalty for hitting a moving ball to avoid the challenge of returning to a lightning-quick green.
In the end, the decision did not help Mickelson much. He left with 10 and finished the day with 81. And he was widely criticized for his actions, with claims that he should have been disqualified.
“It must have fallen in the same place, behind the bunker,” he said. “I didn’t mean to take a picture. I don’t know if I could have blocked the shot or not, but I know it’s a two-strike penalty, hitting a moving ball. I tried to hit it as close to the hole as possible to make the next one and you take two shots and move on.
“I mean no disrespect to anybody. I know it’s a two-shot penalty. At the time I just didn’t want to go back and forth and hit the same shot. I finished the double sentence and continued. Here is my take on the rules. I wanted to do it several times, but I finally did it.“
Mickelson could be disqualified under Rule 33-7 by the United States Golf Association (USGA), which hosts the US Open. Former USGA CEO David Fay told Golf Digest that he would have actually kicked Mickelson out of the tournament, but Mickelson only received a two-stroke penalty and ended up tied for 48th.
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