Castle Rock – They came down the stretch Sunday at Castle Pines Golf Club, afternoon fading into evening, separated by five groups but sharing a similar thought.
Former Kent Denver star Brandt Jobe has been on the PGA Tour for the better part of 15 years, Jeff Brehaut for six. In a combined 358 tournaments entering the week, neither had come away with a victory, but Sunday, in the final round of The International, there was every chance the drought would end.
“I was thinking about it today, for sure,” Brehaut said after finishing the tournament in third place with 29 points, three shy of Retief Goosen. “I haven’t been in that position many times, especially on the PGA Tour. I was trying to enjoy it. I hope to get a few more cracks at it. I think a lot of it is learning how each individual deals with it.”
Moments after completing his round, Jobe was awash in a swirl of conflicting emotions. On the one hand, his 31-point finish was good for second place, continuing what already is his finest season on tour. Jobe lost to Phil Mickelson in a five-man playoff at the BellSouth Classic and tied for sixth in the Bank of America Colonial, marking the second time in his career he has had three top-10 finishes in a single season.
His $540,000 paycheck Sunday moved Jobe, who began the season playing on a medical exemption from injuries from the previous two years, from 62nd to 34th on the 2005 money list, at $1.35 million.
Even so, there was still a sense on his part he had let the tournament slip through his hands.
“When you’re leading with one round to go and you have a pretty good lead, you think about winning,” said Jobe, whose 31-point total was down three from his third-round total. “But to be honest, on the (final round) front nine I was really just trying to hang in there. I just got into a lull – I was whipped; I don’t know what happened. I had some horrible shots and some poor putts, and they just caught up with me.”
Because of his local ties, Jobe often has said that winning The International might be just as big an accomplishment for him as winning a major championship. That may have added to the pressure he was feeling. As his struggles continued – Jobe had but two birdies, with four bogeys and a double bogey in his final 18 holes – a number of his fellow pros said they could empathize with what he was going through.
“There’s definitely some pressure there; you’re not only trying to win for the first time, but you’re playing at home,” said Mike Weir, whose first PGA Tour victory came in his native land, in 1999 at the Air Canada Championship. “I know for me, it was pretty hectic – it would be big for him if he could come through.”
For Jobe and Brehaut, a day that lasted close to 12 hours might have come down to a handful of fleeting moments. With 28 points, Brehaut could have taken the lead with an eagle on the 492-yard, par-5 17th, but his approached shot from the fairway flew the green. While he did get up-and-down for birdie, Brehaut bogeyed the 18th.
Jobe also had par-5 issues, bogeying No. 14 to drop him out of a tie for the lead. Like Brehaut, Jobe got up-and-down for birdie at 17, but it wasn’t enough.
“You gotta have a little luck out there – I hit a great drive on 18 and it rolled through the fairway,” he said. “You’ve gotta have some good things happen. It’s disappointing – I’ll sit back and ask myself why I hit some of the shots that I hit, but I still played well.”
Staff writer Anthony Cotton can be reached at 303-820-1292 or acotton@denverpost.com.
