Graeme McDowell had to take the bitter with the sweet in this year’s U.S. Open, settling for joint-second place with Michael Thompson, one stroke behind champion Webb Simpson. The chances were certainly there for McDowell, who failed to sink a 24-foot putt on the 18th green on Sunday that would have forced a playoff with Simpson.
That was a far cry better than Rory McIlroy could do. The defending champion missed the cut and joined Peter Lawrie on the sidelines, leaving 2010 champion McDowell and Harrington to make strong bids for an Irish “three-peat” at San Francisco’s Olympic Club. Ultimately, McDowell shared 2nd spot with Mark Thompson, while Harrington was a shot back on 4th with four others.
McDowell contended for the lead from the outset, shooting rounds of 69, 72 and 68 to work his way into Sunday’s final pairing with Jim Furyk. He minimized his mistakes for the most part, but where he did fall prey to bogeys, such as in Friday’s round, where he recorded six, he countered with a fair amount of birdies (four).
Four bogeys on the front nine on Sunday had McDowell backpedaling severely, but he hung in, getting a couple of those strokes back at 11 and 12 with some crafty putting. His putter nearly earned him some more merits, but putts at 13 and 15 for par and birdie, respectively, were slightly off the mark.
The biggest problem for McDowell on Sunday was finding the fairway. He landed in the short grass on only three of the par-4s and 5s, leaving him with compromising approach shots that sometimes took bad bounces or stuck in thick grass.
Despite whatever flaws came to the surface on Sunday, McDowell found himself on the cusp of victory late in his round, rolling in a needed birdie putt on 17 to draw to within one stroke of Simpson, who was then in the clubhouse with the lead. McDowell needed to again hole a 24-foot birdie putt on 18 to match Simpson and appeared to relish the challenge as he charged and then stalked the green, but the break that he thought he saw wasn’t there and he rolled his putt straight left, four inches wide of the cup.
“That putt, it was weird, because I hit that putt in practice and it bumped left and it moved right of the hole and I just didn't do that today,” McDowell said. He expressed a mix of frustration with his inability to place his ball where he needed to, with a sense of pride for hanging in and still having a chance on the 72nd hole.
“Mostly just frustration, just because I hit three fairways today,” McDowell said. “That's the U.S. Open. You're not supposed to do that. You're supposed to hit it in some fairways. And that was the key today, really, for me. Not like I drove the ball awful. I just seemed to hit it in the semi-rough all day long.
“But I just really didn't have much of an ‘A’ game this week. I'm not sure you can have your ‘A’ game on this golf course, because it beats you up. The fairways are very elusive, the greens are rock hard, and it's a tough test of golf, the toughest, and I don't think anyone had their ‘A’ game this week; it's impossible to do. So to compete as well as I did with my ‘B plus’ game, I'm very proud of myself.
“I don't know what it is about these setups that I enjoy as much as I do, but they certainly do appeal to me. The tougher the golf course, the better for me. I’m happy with my preparation this week and happy with my execution in general. I hit enough quality shots this week to store in the memory banks and I'll be back.”
