Sometimes in the world of golf things transpire that are totally inexplicable.
Sunday at the Scottish Open was one of them.
It was an episode straight out of the old television series “Twilight Zone.”
There was Brandon Stone, staring down an eight-foot birdie putt at the 72nd hole, on the verge of European Tour history. The Scottish Open was already his but the putt was for 59 — 11-under on the vulnerable, windless Gullane Golf Club. Looked like a sure thing. After nearly 700,000 rounds of golf on this tour, a 25-year-old kid from South Africa was about to accomplish the improbable, that has basically been impossible for everyone else on that side of the pond.
Eight feet, right-to-left, doesn’t get any better than that.
What looked like a sure thing turned into the 29th time someone shot 60 in Europe.
What made it even more mind-boggling is that this was a kid who had done absolutely nothing on the tour this season. He was 144th in Race To Dubai points, basically on the verge of losing his card. Although he has two wins on his resume, he hadn’t done better than 28th in any event this year.
What you had at Gullane was a guy who made Cinderella look like a prohibitive favorite.
Yet there he was, shooting a 10-under par closing round, getting to 20-under to blow away the rest of the field. Keep in mind there were 17 players within three shots of the overnight lead of Swede Jens Dantorp. None of the other 16 saw Brandon Stone coming.
What got him to the winner’s circle was 31 going out then a birdie-birdie-eagle run on holes 14, 15 and 16. At the par five 16th he had just a mid-iron in after a monster drive. You’d figure two putts from 35 feet for birdie would be fine but no, Stone got it on line then it fell in the cup at the last second like a wobbly drunk tumbling off a curb.
Two pars and it was 29 strokes coming home.
They’ll talk about this for a while but the biggest topic of conversation will be that last eight feet that Stone could not conquer.
Even crazier was the post-60 revelation from Stone:
“My caddie came up to me and said, you don’t get putts like this too often, so I let him read it. I said as we walked on the green, I’m not reading this one. This is completely up to you. I rolled it over his mark, but he did criticize my pace, he said it lacked a little bit of pace. So he probably is right. Didn’t hold its line, but we’ll take it.”
Even more surprising was Stone not realizing he was 10-under for his round.
“It’s incredible,” Stone said. “If I’m going to be brutally honest, I had no idea what my score was until I walked on to the 18th green. It was just one of those days where everything went well, hit it great, holed some beautiful putts, and obviously to walk away with 60 having missed an eight-footer was a slight disappointment, but I won’t really complain.”
He shouldn’t complain. He went from the possibility of losing his playing privileges to a berth in the 147th Open Championship this week at Carnoustie.
Yes, no complaints.
The only concern Stone had late Sunday was finding a place to stay for the Open.
