Phil Mickelson may not be able to find the fairway with a cannon ball at the moment, but the PGA Tour fan favorite is still a wizard with a wedge. As Mickelson was playing a practice round on Kiawah Island’s Ocean Course Monday night in preparation for this week’s PGA Championship, his caddie Jim “Bones” Mackay provided dramatic readings from yardage books. When the duo set up on the tee of the par-5 11th hole, fans enjoying themselves in a neighboring house spied the pair and gave a yell.
As eyewitness Golf.com’s David Dusek recounted, Mickelson returned the wave, prompting one party-goer to go all Michael Phelps on him and leap from a deck into a swimming pool, an act that received an even better reaction than the jumper could have imagined.
“Laser me a yardage, Bones, I want to wedge over to them,” Mickelson said, according to Dusek, who watched as the big southpaw hit a three-quarter-swing wedge shot 120 yards over swamp grass to the right of the house. Cheers erupted from the pool and one of the swimmers held up the Callaway Hex Black Tour golf ball.
"You know, if that kid had dived in the pool and gotten hurt, I'd have gotten sued," Mickelson said with a laugh.
As even the most casual golf fans know by now, that’s just Lefty being Lefty.