Golf

Second major eludes Love

He's been waiting eight years to make the leap to a more elite status.

By BOB HARIG
Published August 18, 2005

Phil Mickelson talked as good a game as he played Monday after winning the PGA Championship. About how he was going to savor the victory, knowing for the next seven months he is the last player to win a major. About how he never considered the ramifications of a second major title.

If Mickelson really was naive to the magnitude of winning a second major championship, all he had to do was pull aside his final-round playing partner.

Davis Love is stuck at one major championship, his 1997 PGA at Winged Foot. That eight years must seem like a long, long time.

Then, Love was 33 and heading into the prime of his career. After a few close calls in majors - much like Mickelson - Love broke through to win on an afternoon when a rainbow stretched across the sky.

Of course, it was easy to dream about more majors. No one doubted Love had the game. He was a star, and he stood up in a year when Tiger Woods won his first Masters, Ernie Els won his second U.S. Open and Justin Leonard was the reigning British Open champion and threatening to go back-to-back at the PGA.

"You obviously arrogantly think if you win one that the rest of them are easy," Love said Saturday, when he was tied for the lead with Mickelson heading into the final round. "The second one is just as hard. That's when you see a guy who has three or four of them. He's looked upon a little differently than the rest of the players."

That is the big difference today for Mickelson and Love.

Mickelson, who also won the 2004 Masters, took a step toward some elite company. Only 74 players have won more than one major, dating to the game's first major at the British Open in 1860.

If you look at a more recent time, when the current four major championships really took their place above the rest, the numbers take on some added meaning. From 1958, when Arnold Palmer won his first Masters, Mickelson is now part of a group of 35 players who have won two or more majors. There are just 16 who have won three or more, led by Jack Nicklaus with 18.

"One major puts you in the club, but it's just the club," Love said. "Four or five of them puts you in superstar status."

Or, as runnerup Steve Elkington put it: "The one person who wins this event goes down in history. Everyone else is history for the week, basically."

Elkington tried to make the point that nobody remembers who finished second. But we do remember if you finish second often.

Greg Norman, for example, is known more for his major disappointments than the fact he won two majors. Love might be remembered for having as many majors as Orville Moody.

For some, having one major is more than they could have dreamed, with players such as Moody (his 1969 U.S. Open victory was his only PGA Tour win), Larry Mize, Shaun Micheel and Wayne Grady immediately coming to mind.

Then there are those who won a major, and it helped solidify an impressive career, players such as Paul Azinger, Hal Sutton and Corey Pavin.

And then there are those who should have won more than one, players such as Tom Kite, Lanny Wadkins and Tom Weiskopf.

Love, who has 18 PGA Tour titles, is in that group now.

Mickelson, who has 27, has left it behind.

"Even after Augusta, having not won a major or come close this year, I didn't doubt the fact that it would happen again," Mickelson said. "I just didn't know when. I'm very fortunate and very pleased and excited that it was this week."

Now, Mickelson has plenty of time to mull it over ... and think about the significance of winning a third major.

[Last modified August 18, 2005, 01:05:19]