"I hit a very bad second shot on 17," Romero said, "but I also had very bad luck." He switched to a three-wood for his fourth shot, knocked it on the green to 25 feet and two-putted for a double bogey. The two-iron was a terrible decision. With the lead in a major and four tough finishing holes practically guaranteed to make everyone else drop at least a shot on the way in, the smart play was to chip back to the fairway, hit onto the green and leave himself a par-saving putt. Instead Romero went to the Phil Mickelson playbook.
"I never considered playing safe," Romero said. "The lie wasn't bad enough for me to make that decision. I thought I had a chance to get it on the green. I wasn't certain of what club to play, and perhaps that was my mistake. The second time around I did it the way I should have, with the three-wood. I hit the right club."
While Romero was making his double, Harrington was eagling the 14th to go to nine under and produce a four-shot swing. Romero went to the 18th tee trailing by two and bombed a perfect drive down the middle. He hit an eight-iron from 190 yards but pulled it one bounce from another out-of-bounds fence. A weak chip and a missed 12-foot putt resulted in the bogey that would keep him out of the playoff. But at the time that mistake didn't loom so large because he was three shots back.
"I feel very pleased," Romero said after signing his scorecard. "The best players in the world are here, and I played with the Number 3 player in the world today. I felt comfortable playing with him and felt I belonged. No disappointment at all."
He surely changed his mind later when Harrington had a Van de Velde moment of his own. Romero's not-so-bad mistake was actually a classic Jean-sized blunder that may have cost him the Open.
"I did it on 17, not 18, but I could be put into that category by some," Romero said. "I certainly wasn't thinking about Van de Velde at that moment. I was concentrating very hard. What happened, happened."
What happened was, the Man Who Should've Won the Open, didn't.
