But then Fowler did something this week what he hasn’t managed to do on four other occasions and that is to go on to capture success when leading going into the final day.
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The rousing finish by the German, playing his first USA event of the year, lifted him to a five-under 65, one stroke behind American rookies Cody Gribble and Wesley Bryan on a course softened by rain on Wednesday.
“I think when people look at Rickie and look at the stature he has, they go, ‘Well, he should win more.’ He’s trying to remedy that”.
Hatton, who opened with rounds of 68-67-66, bogeyed the first hole and had two more bogeys on the front nine and was never a threat to Fowler.
Rickie Fowler said his putter was his saviour in the final round.
A run of pars followed, broken by just one more birdie, a three on the 13th hole. His break came on the 17th hole when he went long into a clumpy lie in the collar of the rough. He took a penalty stroke and hit from the drop area, making bogey when he left his second tee shot six feet from the pin and made the putt. All but one of the eight tournaments in 2017 has been won by a player in his 20s, and Fowler actually raises the average winner’s age to 25.5. There’s plenty at stake this time. He’s got two top-10 finishes and two missed cuts in four PGA Tour events prior to the Honda Classic. “This was a tough wind to play this golf course in”.
“I was well aware that it was getting close”, Fowler said. “It’s a new course for me”. He’s been playing great golf, and he just hasn’t had that win for year and a half, or whatever it is. So we know what to do. “There were times when she said I should have gone and played”.
Two-time major champion Martin Kaymer was in position to join him until he took bogey on the 18th and wound up with a 68. He had to share second place – the difference of $128,000 – with Hoffmann, who missed a 4-foot birdie putt on the 18th.
Ryan Palmer and Wesley Bryan are the joint leaders at the halfway stage of the Honda Classic in Palm Beach. He handed that shot right back at the 9th hole when he failed to get up-and-down from right of the green.
Bryan, who is known for his trick-shot videos, is coming off his best tournament, a tie for fourth at Riviera in which he got within two shots of victor, Dustin Johnson in the third round. Rory McIlroy, Henrik Stenson, Hideki Matsuyama and Jordan Spieth have all won events since Scott last posted a victory at the WGC-Cadillac Championship almost a year ago.
Morgan Hoffman was 8-under through 12 holes in Sunday’s final round, but closed with six pars to end up tied for second – his best PGA Tour finish. “Glad to settle for bogey there and glad to get one on 18, tied for the lead going into the weekend”.
It marked the first time in five tries that Fowler converted a 54-hole lead on the PGA Tour.
It’s hard to win on the PGA Tour.
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“I did better than a year ago”, he said.
