Jay Mariotti Golf

He was shrinking into someone else, wilting and cracking and melting down. Try as he did, he couldn't generate sufficient torque and let his first serve turn wilder than a podunk mayor throwing out a first pitch. He lost tiebreakers, which rarely happens, and he committed 15 unforced errors in the fifth set to merely four for a 20-year-old foe in his maiden Grand Slam final experience. Worse still, Roger Federer did something unbefitting a dignified, placid champion who speaks elegantly, wears stylish sweaters and counts Vogue editor Anna Wintour among his friends.

A gentleman lost his famed equlibrium, crashing for the shocked masses to see after Juan Martin del Potro challenged a shot via the electronic line-calling system -- which, by the way, Federer loathes. "No, no, no. I wasn't allowed to challenge after two seconds. The guy takes, like, 10. Every time. You can't allow that stuff to happen. Do you have any rules in there, or what?" he barked at chair unpire Jake Garner. When he was basically told to shut up, Federer responed with the latest obscenity in an expletive-filled tournament that should have been called the U.S. Bleeping Open.

CHASKA, Minn. -- His Sunday shirt is red, of course, as in the blood he usually extracts from his rivals. But this time, the blood sprayed all over Tiger Woods, staining him in ways we'd never observed in the final round of a major championship. He missed makeable putts. He hit tee shots into bunkers, off trees, into galleries. He cursed and talked to the golf ball and, in a revealing snapshot, leaned over and placed his hands on his knees, looking as desperate and exasperated as we've seen him.

"I did everything I was supposed to do,'' he said, "except get the golf ball in the hole.''

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CHASKA, Minn. -- So here we thought Tiger Woods' weekend would be a summer breeze, much like the vision of a high-heeled Prince riding his motorcycle in "Purple Rain,'' which is the lone factoid I can provide about the country roads and middle-of-nowhere milieu surrounding the Hazeltine National Golf Club.

Instead, this was a day when new, peculiar words were introduced to the Woods lexicon. There was "skanky,'' used by CBS commentator Nick Faldo to describe two terrible shots on No. 15, which prompted Tiger to slip into whiny-baby mode and swing his club violently. And there was "choking,'' whispered cryptically Saturday across the PGA Championship landscape as his four-shot lead disappeared. Just the day before, Woods seemed befuddled when a media member actually uttered the c-word at a press conference, inquiring, "In your opinion, has there ever been a single instance in a major where you've done what you consider to be choking?''

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Tiger? Is that you? The man who avoids controversy like Kate avoids Jon, the man who is apolitical and non-confrontational and quite possibly the dullest megastar in the history of sports, is abandoning his equilibrium to criticize the PGA Tour? All because an official decided that Woods and Padraig Harrington were dawdling too long Sunday -- 17 minutes behind, to be exact -- and put a clock on them for the last three holes at Firestone?

Of all times to walk on the wild side and boogie down, this is odd. What I took from Woods' 70th career title is that he was typically unbothered by the edict, issued by European Tour chief referee John Paramor. After he and Harrington were told of the slow-play violation on the tee at No. 16, Woods responded with one of the epic shots of this or any other golf season, a 178-yard rainbow with an 8-iron that crept to within inches of the hole. While he was fashioning a birdie, Harrington was hurrying because of the clock issue and choking away a rare chance to outduel Woods, hitting a shot over the green and then plunking a flop shot into the water.

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Urging Tiger Woods to win a major championship would seem laughably unnecessary, like telling Albert Pujols to get a big hit or Ari Gold to scorch Lloyd's earlobes on Entourage. Still, I would like to see him pocket one this week for the first time in 13 months. That way, he'll avoid any ticking-clock syndrome that might set in if, oh, he's in his mid-30s and remains five majors short of passing Jack Nicklaus.

He wouldn't want anyone crying "SLUMP!!!" as a certain someone did earlier this decade, when 10 events and 2 1/2 years passed without a major victory. I even began calling him Eldrick, figuring he wasn't Tiger anymore.

FARMINGDALE, N.Y. -- Just once, as his pleading fandom mustered a "Let's Go, Phil!" chant with the vocal force of a late-inning Yankees rally, you wanted him to focus and make the damned putt. All his life, Phil Mickelson has been missing the shorties in the critical moments. Now, as his cancer-stricken wife and concerned kids watched on TV in San Diego, he was standing over a ball that could pave his path to one of the most inspirational victories in the history of, well, sports.

This was on the 17th green at Bethpage Black, where Mickelson was being hand-delivered his first U.S. Open title by a chorus line of stumbling wannabes -- that is, if he could take advantage. He had nailed a 35-foot birdie putt at No. 12, sending familiar roars blasting through the trees and quaint, Buttafuocoan homes of suburban Long Island. On the 13th, he ripped an approach to within a few feet of the cup and converted an eagle. Was the Win One For Amy dream actually going to happen? Was a man who has experienced so much heartache in his career -- and, suddenly, in his family life -- about to trump just about anything we've witnessed in recent golfing memory, including the monumental victories of his far more successful rival, Tiger Woods?

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FARMINGDALE, N.Y. -- Their only common denominator right now, as this convoluted mess of a golf major begins to find closure, is that both have heard wisecracks from the galleries. The humor directed at Phil Mickelson has been in good fun, of course, as he is embraced by the throaty New Yorkers like no one since the Beatles or the Pope and has been particularly adored since news surfaced of his wife's battle with breast cancer.

"I've heard some great, great lines. The people here are really a lot of fun,'' said Mickelson, again enjoying his New York state of mind, though he has precious little in common with the natives. "The best ones I can't repeat, but they keep us laughing. I mean, Steve Stricker and I were laughing at a couple of them down some of the fairways.''

Tiger Woods also has heard lines. Rather pathetically, these were not nice comments in the least. It's a shame Woods would become a villain in the eyes of a few jerks as Phil Love reigns in the rain, but such was the case as he stood under an umbrella Saturday and waited to play at No. 10. I have to wonder if racism plays a role, sadly enough, when the planet's preeminent athlete is heckled by drunken fools.

FARMINGDALE, N.Y. -- He was a blond piece of eye candy who posed for photo spreads without a shirt, flashing a flouride-and-floss smile that landed him endorsement deals. He also had enough game at age 21 to beat Hunter Mahan and capture the U.S. Amateur title. So confident was the golf world that Ricky Barnes would be its Next Hot Fuss, an equipment company gave him a seven-figure contract and EA Sports programmed him as a character in the "Tiger Woods PGA Tour Golf'' video game.

Remember the 2003 Masters, when, as an amateur, he played with Woods the first two rounds and was tied for third after 36 holes? Surely, Barnes was about to emerge as a player who would compete for major championships. It was only a matter of time.

Yeah.

Six years.

FARMINGDALE, N.Y. -- So this is what his supposed 15th major title has come to: Tiger Woods is rooting for mudballs to sabotage other golfers at the U.S. Open. He was stuck with several of the dirty critters Friday at Bethpage Splash, contributing to a four-hole finish that was his second-worst in 230 professional starts. The way he sees it from 65th place -- BULLETIN: 10 SHOTS BEHIND AFTER ROUND ONE!!! -- the leaders far ahead of him in this rain-battered logistical nightmare will face the same crusty issues.

Editor's Note: This column has been updated from Wednesday's original version.

FARMINGDALE, N.Y. -- His wife and kids won't be coming this time, the first sign that this will be a different U.S. Open for Phil Mickelson. Before he left his San Diego home on Tuesday, he and his family celebrated his 39th birthday with particular flair. His three children brought him breakfast in bed, and then, a little later, his wife asked him to open his presents.

Suddenly, while recalling this special day in the interview room at Bethpage Black, a scared husband and father became quite talkative about what his wife gave him. Breast cancer has a powerful, haunting way of tapping a man's deepest and most private emotions about the simplest matters, even as millions watch and listen and follow Amy's ordeal with considerable concern.

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