Well done Dustin

Dustin Johnson did remarkably well to close out his first major win at the US Open. After his travails with near misses at Whistling Straits and Chambers Bay in recent years he didn't really need the USGA prevaricating for a third of his final round over whether to penalise him a shot under one of the arcane rules of golf which often seem to say it doesn't matter whether it was anything to do with what the player actually did. (For me he was blameless, but it doesn't really matter, it wasn't well handled either way).

Perhaps fortunately for Johnson, the situation seemed to spook his main rival, Shane Lowry, just as much. And also fortunately for him, no-one else posted a really challenging score.

But I thought he dealt with the situation really well. I've posted before about how flaky Johnson can be, especially with his putting on the last day of a tournament. He played very solidly over the last 3 holes. Remarkably, he hadn't checked the leader board until he asked his brother, also his caddy "where do we stand?" after he'd hit his fantastic approach shot to the last green. (The story is told at http://www.pgatour.com/news/2016/06/19/johnson-overcomes-adversity-to-win-u-s--open.html). Not sure that's sensible, mind, as he had at least a 3 shot lead as he stood on the last tee, even if penalised, but there you go. The Sky commentator had by then already branded him "not the brightest bulb in the floodlight" (or something similar). Even Butch Harmon, his swing coach hadn't disagreed with that assessment! He couldn't really have played the final hole better. Indeed the final few holes.

I've always admired Dustin's swing. He's always had the ability to be one of the world's top players. Maybe now he'll go on to achieve that and I won't need to post about his round on round stats through tournaments.

"Party boy won it did he?" said my other half. Actually she used another phrase which is our shorthand for Dustin which I won't repeat here, though apparently it was binge drinking rather than drugs that caused him to take his time out (see http://nypost.com/2015/01/20/dustin-johnson-binge-drinking-not-cocaine-was-my-problem/).

Good on him. But he has cost me a sleeve of 3 golf balls. I'm still in credit though, Dan!