Valhalla Golf Club holds some history for Phil Mickelson, with two top-10 finishes at the PGA Championship _ eighth in 1996 and a tie for ninth in 2000 _ and a successful Ryder Cup with the U.S. team in 2008.
Add all that to the fact Mickelson is coming off his best round of the year, a 62 last Sunday in the final round of the WGC-Bridgestone Invitational, and there’s reason to think Lefty might be poised to make a run at what would be a sixth major in the 2014 PGA Championship this weekend.
“It’s a really good thing for me, to get that kind of momentum from one round,” the ever-optimistic Mickelson said after a practice round Tuesday. “You don’t want to put too much emphasis on one round. But the way the pieces fell together _ I started to roll the ball well, and the wedge play started to get good, short irons got better. Just two days prior it was just horrific, so it was an important day for me to get some momentum.”
Win or lose this week, Mickelson will be putting a premium on playing well. He currently sits 10th in the Ryder Cup standings and only the top nine players as of Sunday night will secure spots. Having played in the last nine Ryder Cups dating to 1995, he’s a good bet to be a captain’s pick by Tom Watson if he falls short of the automatic spot. But he doesn’t even want to think about the possibility of being left off.
“I’ve got five more days here,” he said. “I really do believe that after the way I played on the weekend, I’ll continue that play into this week and I’m confident that I’ll get on the team on my own and won’t require that pick.
“And I want to keep that streak going of two decades that I have. I want to keep that going on my own, and not needing a pick.”
By any measure, it’s been a trying year for Mickelson. He hasn’t had a top-10 finish all year and missed cuts at the Honda Classic, Masters and Players Championship. Had there been a cut last weekend, his first two rounds of 71 and 73 might not have gotten him through the limited field event. But then he rebounded, first posting a 69 on Saturday and then following up with the 62, his low round of the year, on Sunday.
After describing his short irons as “pathetic” at one point last week, he said that Sunday was a revelation.
“The rhythm and the timing and touch started to come back,” he said. “It wasn’t quite smooth and rhythmic the first few days. So I’m trying to take that feel and touch from the weekend and bring it over here, and it seems to be a lot better.”
Mickelson got together with the Jupiter tandem of Rickie Fowler and Keegan Bradley along with another Ryder Cup candidate, Californian Brendan Steele, for a practice round Tuesday and it was Mickelson’s 15-foot birdie putt on the final hole that gave he and Fowler the bragging rights for the day. He was all smiles in the interview room afterward _ at least until someone asked him about all the young guys who grew up watching him play.
Asked how that makes him feel, the 44-year-old Mickelson replied, “Just makes me feel old, that’s all. When somebody says, ‘Yeah, I used to watch you on TV when I was six, how do you respond to that? Great.
“But it is fun to play with some of these guys, and it’s fun to see their energy and their excitement and how much they appreciate being out on Tour and all the great things that come with it. When you’re out here for 22 years, you sometimes take it for granted, and when you see the excitement and appreciation from these younger guys, it gets me excited too.”
