Dustin Johnson’s vulnerable nerves cost him another major title, The Open Championship
Dustin Johnson, the unfortunate runner-up at this year’s Open Championship is probably among the few players who face a dreadful meltdown going into the final rounds of high profile events. He went into the final round staying in contention for the top slot
and stumbled on several bogeys and a disastrous double-bogey at par-five, 14th to slide down the leaderboard, trailing Darren Clarke by three shots.
“Well, it was brutal out there. I think I held up pretty well. I hung in there all day, made some birdies on the back to get back in there and just unfortunately made the double bogey on 14, which really just took all my momentum out,” said Johnson.
But this is not the first incident in Johnson’s four-year-long professional career when he caved into the immense pressure of the final round. Johnson tee-ed off for his first hole at the 2010 US Open with an overnight lead of three shots, and stumbled on
a triple-bogey on the second hole and subsequently finished for a joint eighth. For the 27-year-old American, this could have been the third major victory in his career if he had not blown his chances in the final rounds of the US Open and the PGA Championship
in 2010.
With a one-shot lead over the rest of the field, Johnson walked up to the final hole of the PGA Championship in 2010, only to fall in for a dreadful bogey to finish tied for fifth. Although Johnson blames his poor choice of the iron on his last shots in
the Open at Royal St. George’s last week, he inadvertently is pretty much aware of his mental meltdown which has caused him high profile tournaments in succession.
“I probably should have hit 3-wood. I mean, I'm two back with the rest of the holes coming in are pretty tough. You don't really have --so it was definitely a go situation. But if I had to do it over again, I'd hit a 3-wood instead of a 2-iron,” said Johnson.
The 27-year-old Floridian has a long list of final round break downs in his short span of professional career. He threw away his lead at the 2010 AT&T National falling in for an over-par, 74 and also fell short of the courage to clinch the title at the WGC
Cadillac Championship at Doral this year. His career, however, also boosts of some stellar victories in the course of time.
Johnson’s last victory came last year at the BMW Championship on the PGA Tour where he took over Paul Casey by one shot to win the title. This marks Johnson’s highest finish in his major bids and also has two Top-10 finishes in other major championships.
He posted a joint eighth in 2010 US Open and a joint fifth at the PGA Championship the same year.
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