Spotted this last week in advance of the Players Championship. I've hacked my way through more than a few golf courses in my day, but this is exceptional.
Playing from the championship tees at Pete Dye's unforgiving TPC Sawgrass course, Spagnolo was ensconced in a bitter battle for worst of the worst with fellow competitor Jack Pulford, at 104 over par through 16 holes.Ouch. Just like Tin Cup, except with much worse golfing.
Then came No. 17.
Often called the most exciting hole in golf, the par-3 17th hole frequently is referred to as having an island green, but it's really a peninsula, with a thin strip of land allowing players access to the putting surface from the left side and water surrounding it from all other directions. To Spagnolo, it was intimidation personified.
"That could have been the English Channel I was trying to hit across," he says. "It was that daunting of a shot. It just looked like a near impossible idea to contemplate."
On his initial tee shot, Spagnolo found the water hazard. He hit another and found the water again. And again. And again. And again.
"It was painful to watch," Carney says. "Funny at first, and then not funny at all. You can't get a hip-high wedge shot to stop on a green like the 17th from 100 yards. [He] hit the green seven times. Those shots had no chance of staying on the green."
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