Inside Jacob Bridgeman’s Terrifying Genesis Compilation
PACIFIC PALISADES, Calif. – A terrible golf putt is between three and four feet.
It’s short enough that you expect to do it.
Long enough that you might not be.
It’s getting harder, I would imagine, to hit a 3 and a half footer with 5,000 people watching on the hill in front of you.
It’s hard when they just gasp in fear of what you just did.
It’s even harder when one of those people is Rory McIlroy, who just happens to be one stroke behind you.
And it’s tough when someone is Tiger Woods, your childhood hero, watching from a perch near the clubhouse, 50 yards and 500 miles away, waiting to shake your hand if you just can’t get your ball down that hole.
It’s hard when you’re on the brink of winning your first PGA Tour event, something you’ve dreamed of your whole life, something you know you can do but also know isn’t guaranteed.
And the tenacity to know that deficit doesn’t just mean letting an opportunity pass – it can mean blowing a six-stroke lead, crashing on the last turn, snatching defeat from the jaws of victory.
It becomes stronger if the pressure is not slightly increased, but instead, after three rounds and 15 holes of low stress and many birdies, it hits like a freight train, with a shrinking lead, a growing crowd, decibels, nerves and hearts rising by the minute.
And it’s hard when you can’t feel your hands.
THE SUN on Sunday brought VERY BRIGHT WEATHER in the history of Los Angeles, tied for the first time in 80 percent of all days in the history of LA, 70 degrees and hot sun, a cloudless deep blue sky with a blue ocean visible from the balcony of the Riviera Country Club’s clubhouse is an iconic building.
That was the mood of the final round of the Genesis Invitational, which felt like it could go one of two ways. Jacob Bridgeman started the day with a six-over lead over Rory McIlroy and seven over the gang, having played nearly flawless golf through three rounds. Bridgeman has been very good and consistent since last season, but going into Sunday he was winless. Would he succumb to the pressure, explode and give way to a pack chase? Or would he keep his foot on the gas and continue his pace from the rest of the field? Those feel like two options.
Instead, most of the day was spent in conflict.
There are few better golf settings than the old-school vibe of the Riviera, though early times and an LA crowd living up to its reputation of getting there in the fourth inning led to a bit of an early lull.
The fans wanted McIlroy, wanted him back, but quietly supported Bridgeman, who is also unknown without an ounce of villain in him. Bridgeman matched McIlroy’s birdie putt on No. 1 to maintain his lead at six. He scored the third one to make it seven. And that was received with a little applause. McIlroy’s early birdie attempt to go over, did little to ignite the crowd. Hollywood seemed unhappy with this particular anticlimax aspect.
(One star among them: Ben Affleck, who walked the entire front nine between the ropes with his son and tried multiple times to frame the perfect iPhone photo of the McIlroy tee shot. Stars, like us!)
Bridgeman was born in the heat of competitive golf, first growing up in South Carolina, then Clemson and more recently in the game’s top circle. He has been on a steady upward trajectory. He made it clear that success is not his.
When he starts working with his skating coach Scott Hamilton, he has a job to do. “I didn’t hit the ball straight, I didn’t hit it high, I couldn’t control my irons properly,” he said.
When he settled on his first caddy, GW Cable, there was just one problem: he would have to take a paycheck to join Bridgeman on the Korn Ferry Tour.
“He gambled on me and luckily we spent one year down there and I think he’s happy with his gamble,” Bridgeman said.
He earned $4.4 million on the course last season. He was playing for a $4 million winning check on Sunday. Good pressure to have.
But just because he was good doesn’t mean it will be easy. As the day progressed, Bridgeman let the rest of the field do the same. He bogeyed 4. He bogeyed 7. He hit the middle of the green, scared the hole, just missing the putts he had watched fall in the first three days.
McIlroy finally made a similar push early in the back nine. A birdie on 11 cut the lead to five before a birdie from the bunker on 12 electrified the crowd for the first time all day.
Before, many other competitors made their presence felt. Aldrich Potgieter got to 15 under with an eagle at 11. Adam Scott played some impressive golf, including eight birdies and zero bogeys to put the clubhouse lead at 16 under. When Bridgeman found himself in trouble, Kurt Kitayama made his seventh and eighth birdies of the day for the group before posting a 17-under par.
Bridgeman swung in a wayward shot at No. 16, throwing his bell into the front room on the right, an inescapable prison.
“It was really easy until I got to about 16 and it got really hard,” Bridgeman said after the round. His card, looking at his lies, did not hesitate. He should have aimed well and played for bogey. His long par putt wandered past the hole; he negotiated a nervy try for bogey. It is led in an instant.
Things got tough on the par-5 17th, when Bridgeman’s second shot went right and found the fairway, leaving him with no good options. Well done for playing sensible football.
“Definitely in the green, it was the first time I played defense,” he said.
It was at this point that Bridgeman lost feeling in his hands.
“I didn’t really feel embarrassed until I got a five-foot bogey on 16; that was a draw,” he said. “I hit a really good putt and luckily it went in, and then I was really nervous from there. I didn’t feel my hands on the last few greens, I just hit the putt hoping it would land somewhere near the hole.”
But with the perfect shot, Bridgeman said, he still felt good.
“I felt like I was in robotic mode and on autopilot, I could swing the club and it would do what it was supposed to do,” he said. The feeling of envy.
That’s what he did on No. 18, sending a driver up the left-center fairway from the fairway and playing a towering fairway right into the hole, a 20-foot short, straight uphill.
Then he left it three and a half feet short.
The crowd groaned. They complained. Suddenly, the incredible opportunity was back: a miss would mean a three-way playoff between Bridgeman, Kitayama and McIlroy, whose incredible birdie had fallen off the front tee just minutes before.
Bridgeman is good friends with Chris Gotterup, a rising star on the Tour and a multiple winner. He also recounted watching the WM Phoenix Open, where Gotterup hit a birdie putt win with tremendous speed.
“We were like, what were you doing, you hit your putt so hard, it’s going four feet in the hole. He said, ‘I don’t know, I can’t feel my hands.’
“I thought you were crazy until I got to this moment and I was like, yeah, I know what you’re talking about now, Chris. I didn’t know what to do.”
It’s hard to do a three-and-a-half footer, and it’s tough when you feel that a certain part of the crowd that’s hanging around is hoping you’ll do it.
It’s hard for you or me.
But, as he and we suddenly realized, it is easy for Jacob Bridgeman.
“The hole is really white and looks pretty big for whatever reason on 18,” he said. He was educated – he hit it in the middle – and he knew what he could control.
“I was hoping that the ball would roll where it was supposed to roll.”
Most of the time, nothing good can happen with three and a half feet. A multiple-choice test with two options: Help or disaster. However, this time, salvation was within. The ball rolled as expected. Bridgeman’s victory was official. He threw himself into the victor’s whirlpool; his wife greeted him green, floated during his CBS interview, walked up the stairs, shook hands with Woods, didn’t work on anything he said.
“This is way, way better than I ever dreamed of,” he said.
He agreed again.
“I’m glad it’s over now.”
Dylan Dethier welcomes your comments at dylan_dethier@golf.com.
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