For Phil Mickelson it must have felt like the end of a dream. The left-hander will never admit his challenge for the US Open title is over until he is retired, but as he walked off the 18th green and tipped his hat to the crowd there was a palpable sense he was saying goodbye to his chances of completing the career grand slam.
It was a horrible way for his -tournament to end. Mickelson, the magical short-game merchant, whiffed a chip in the cabbage at the back of the final hole and took a -double-bogey seven. As he trudged in to sign for a 73 and a 13-over total, the US TV network rather cruelly showed details of the six times Mickelson has finished -runner-up in his national championship.
He is undoubtedly the player who come closest to filling the set, to -joining Tiger Woods, Jack Nicklaus, Gary Player, Ben Hogan and Gene Sarazen. It now seems also certain that will be his epitaph.
Mickelson declined to speak afterwards; he knew the questions which would have been coming. On -Tuesday, he had insisted he was not in last-chance saloon. "I just don't know if it's this week or next year or -whenever, but I feel like it's closer than it has been," he said. But this belied what he said after his last second place, behind Justin Rose in 2013. "If I never win it then every time I think of the US Open I will just think of -heartbreak," he said.
The week had begun with such high hopes. He had come in with such hopes after finishing with a 65 for a tie for third in Memphis and after eight holes of his first round this confidence had appeared well-placed. He was three-under and apparently loving the creative demands which these wildly undulating greens present.
But then, it began to go wrong. Three bogeys on the back nine, -followed by a 74 on the Friday and a 77 on the Saturday. He hit only 60 per cent of the greens and the fact that his touch failed showed up in the statistic which said he took 127 putts. Mickelson was outside the top 60 and gone more than two hours before the leaders teed off.
The identities of those leaders highlight the task ahead for -Mickelson. Jordan Spieth, 21, Jason Day, 28, Brande Grace, 27, Dustin Johnson, 30, were level on four-under and their ages could not have passed by Mickelson. The previous four majors had all been won by players younger than 30. The young -generation were ringing the bell.
But even allowing for the stampede of the new guard, history is against him anyway. Mickelson will be 46 for next year's renewal and that means he would have to break Hale Irwin's record as the US Open's oldest winner. The course seems to be against him as well. Mickelson's record at Oakmont is not good. In the two US Opens he has played at the brute of Pittsburgh he missed the cut and -finished tied 47th. In 2007, he damaged his wrist trying to play out of the notorious Oakmont rough. Happy memories he has not.
Mickelson will return, however, as will Lee Westwood. The 42-year-old with everything but the major only briefly flickered into any sort of -contention here. A run of birdies in the second round had hurtled the Englishman under par, but then a treble-bogey on the 18th derailed him. Mentally as much as anything.
Like Spieth, Westwood was angered by the flipping of the final hole from a five to a four. "It's a great par five, but is a dumb par four," Westwood said. "My main criticism of the course is that it's a pretty solid test, fair in most places so why bother tricking it up and switching the pars around?"
Mike Davis, the Executive Director of the United States Golf Association, had intended to play the 18th as a four again on Sunday, but suddenly changed his mind. He cited wind direction as the reason, but there can be little doubt that Spieth's -comments on Saturday night had an affect.
After calling it "the dumbest hole I have ever played" on Friday and -explaining that as he cannot carry it 310 yards, there was no real way to play the hole, he came up with an alternative game plan. "There's an option to maybe play it down the first and have a good angle in," Spieth said. "I'll have to check on the wind and where the pin is." There was some conjecture that Spieth uttered that comment to influence Davis and if that is true then the 21-year-old is even more of a mature competitor than we thought when he won the Masters in such style in April.
Spieth was aiming to become the first player to win multiple majors before the age of 22 in almost a century. His reputation is already big enough to make Davis listen, even though he did not confess to it. But David Duval, the former world No 1, believes he should have come clean.
"You had players saying we're almost going to be forced to play up the first hole and Mike should have taken the credit for it and said 'hey, I made a mistake'," Duval said on the Golf Channel.
Chambers Bay waited to find out and, as they did, Rory McIlroy was acting as a warm-up act, moving to three-over with a birdie on the first. It was not the role he wanted.
