Leonard back at Ryder Cup 9 years after putt
Golfer's 'shot heard 'round the world' completed Americans' comeback win
 Rusty Jarrett / Getty Images Justin Leonard celebrates holing a long birdie putt on the 17th green during the final day of the Ryder Cup at Brookline Country Club in 1999. |
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This might have been the one time Justin Leonard was tempted to go after someone in the gallery.
Leonard had just missed a short par putt on the ninth hole at Callaway Gardens when he heard someone say, “Nice putt, Justin.” He stopped. He scowled. He stared. But when he saw the startled look on the man’s face, he realized the reference.
This was 1999, one week after the Ryder Cup at Brookline.
Oh, that putt.
It was “the shot heard ’round the world,” a 45-foot putt up the ridge on the 17th green of The Country Club that dove into the back of the cup on a Sunday afternoon of red scores, blue skies and white knuckles. So ended a stunning turnaround in his match, which guaranteed the half-point the Americans needed to complete the greatest comeback in Ryder Cup history.
Nine years later, Leonard finally returns to the Ryder Cup.
“It doesn’t seem that long ago because I’ve played in a couple of Presidents Cups, having kids and everything,” he said. “But when I think of the Ryder Cup since then and how much it has changed, how the players changed, it’s like, ’Has it really been nine years?”’
Leonard had three children in a 34-month span. He has revamped his swing and put it back the way it was. And he has watched the last three Ryder Cups on television, all of them European victories.
One thing that hasn’t changed is the conversation about him.
Never mind that Leonard won a U.S. Amateur and a British Open, or that his dozen PGA Tour victories include The Players Championship. His career is defined by a single stroke with the putter.
“It’s like 5-to-1 the comments I get about the Ryder Cup,” Leonard said. “Where would I put it in my golfing career? I’d put it first, too. I would. Because it wasn’t a total individual achievement. My little match was, but it meant something greater than that.”
It was so great that it turned ugly.
No sooner had Leonard turned with arms raised and ran off the edge of the green did U.S. players, wives and caddies charge across the putting surface to celebrate, even though Jose Maria Olazabal still had a 25-foot putt to tie. He missed.
In fact, he has never won a Ryder Cup match. Leonard’s record from two Ryder Cups is 0-3-5. All he cares about now is getting another opportunity to change that when the Americans try to end a decade of losing to Europe on Sept. 19-21 at Valhalla in Louisville, Ky.
Leonard, the star of the American rally, produced a comeback of his own.
He failed to make the 2001 team, then had to wait three more years to try again when the Ryder Cup was postponed because of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. He came close to earning a spot on the ’04 team, but needing a victory in the PGA Championship, he bogeyed the last hole at Whistling Straits and lost in a three-man playoff to Vijay Singh.
And last time, he wasn’t even a consideration.
In a search for length off the tee, Leonard finished out of the top 100 on the PGA Tour money list for the first time in his career in 2006. He started the next season by missing the cut in his first six tournaments.
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“People around me wouldn’t let me do that — Amanda first and foremost,” he said of his wife. “She always told me about believing in myself. I spent more time two years ago, when I wasn’t playing well, thinking about the Ryder Cup and the British Open, getting myself back in that mind-set. I really felt like I’d make another Ryder Cup team.
“I’m glad I didn’t wait another two years, though.”
Some of the slump was induced by trying to change his swing. A lot of it was due to changes in his life.
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