by Jeff Skinner
Colin Montgomerie drained a 30 foot birdie putt on his final hole of the day to take a one stroke lead at the Senior PGA Championship. He leads his old European Tour cohort and former Ryder Cup partner Bernhard Langer by a single stroke and the two will play together again in the final round.
Monty is still looking for his first official win on American soil. Langer on the other hand has 20 Champions Tour wins, including two senior majors and oh yea, let’s not forget those two Masters wins back in the day.
It will be interesting to see the two of them on Sunday. Monty is a quick player. Langer is as slow as they come. Monty shows his emotions, especially when he his frustrated. Langer rarely displays any sign of annoyance at his game or anything else.
But through his career, especially in the states, Monty has been known to get a bit rattled and not just at his own game. It was just like back in the old days on the PGA Tour today for Monty: he was getting heckled.
After he made a putt, admittedly a poor one, some knucklehead shouted “Nice putt Monty” and it was 2002 all over again.
Back then Monty was getting heckled so often that the folks at Golf Digest distributed 25,000 “Be Nice to Monty” buttons as he tried to win the U.S. Open at Bethpage Black. It didn’t matter, he didn’t win and he still got heckled, but at least somewhat less.
But again today there was Monty having to listen to some mook with too many Bud Lights in him spouting off at a guy that is just trying to do his job.
Now, for me to defend Monty says a lot. He can be pompous at times and he was pretty full of himself back in the day but that doesn’t give a fan the right to harass him.
Does he have rabbit ears? Of course. Is he thin skinned? The thinnest. Does he look like Mrs. Doubtfire? Oh yea. Is he an easy target? You bet. Does he deserve heckling? Absolutely not.
No professional golfer should have to put up with any of that nonsense. Not Monty, not anyone. Would they say that to Jack Nicklaus or Tiger Woods or Phil Mickelson or anyone for that matter?
Monty may be an easy target for some but there is no place for that during a professional tournament. To his credit he downplayed it and said he enjoyed the support he was getting over here.
He’s made a commitment to the Champions Tour, it is his future he says. He should be allowed to do it in peace.
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