You don’t become a Masters champion without a little bit of luck. And you don’t survive a full season on the PGA Tour without that luck continuing to bless your game.
Just ask Hideki Matsuyama. The 2021 Masters champ received a hefty dose of good karma on Thursday during the start of his first round at the Memorial Tournament at Muirfield Village Golf Club.
After a wayward tee shot at the par four No. 2 found the water, Matsuyama nearly went right back into the drink with his drop shot from 157 yards out. Except his ball caught just the right angle on its landing. As it was spinning back towards the hazard, it instead rolled onto a narrow bridge just off the green, saving Matsuyama from having to take back-to-back drops.
Take a look:
Saved by the bridge 😅 pic.twitter.com/COEgxvobdZ
— PGA TOUR (@PGATOUR) June 2, 2022
Matsuyama did indeed play the shot off the bridge and it was just as awkward as you can imagine. He was forced to stand with one foot on the bridge and one just off it on a stone support ledge. As much as I’d love to tell you Matsuyama miraculously holed out from 25 feet to save par, that’s not what happened.
He hit an incredibly short, but safe, chip shot into the rough and finished with a double bogey because lucky bounces in golf only exist to reinforce how cruel the game actually is.
Out of respect for Hideki 😔 pic.twitter.com/oh4YzK63QI
— PGA TOUR LIVE (@PGATOURLIVE) June 2, 2022
But still, what a bounce.
