Mike Reid clinches title in playoff

For a guy nicknamed Radar, Mike Reid's instincts were wrong after he made a 20-foot eagle putt on what he thought was his final hole of the Senior PGA Championship.

``It just went in like a homesick gopher,'' Reid said Sunday. ``And I just remember thinking, `Great, I tied Dana (Quigley) for second.' This has been a great week.''

In a matter of minutes, it became far greater than Reid could have imagined even a few holes before.

Down by six shots to Quigley with eight holes to play and three shots to Jerry Pate with only No. 18 to play, Reid staged one of the greatest comebacks in Champions Tour history by winning a three-way playoff for his first American tournament victory in nearly 17 years.

Replaying No. 18 minutes after his eagle, Reid birdied the playoff hole to win after Pate missed his 6-foot birdie putt. Quigley was out of contention after hitting his second shot into the water guarding the green.

``I'm as shocked as anybody,'' said Reid, who got his nickname because of his driving accuracy, not his ability to forecast tournament-changing momentum swings.

Once known for his major-tournament failures, Reid benefited from the twin failings by Quigley and Pate. They don't quite equal Jean Van de Velde's triple-bogey 7 misery on No. 18 at the 1999 British Open, but they were memorable.

The long day began with Quigley, a former club pro, getting birdies on three of the final four holes of the rain-delayed third round to take a three-shot lead over Pate and Reid into the final round.

Quigley, playing in his 259th consecutive Champions Tour event, boosted his lead over Reid to six with an eagle-2 on No. 10. But Quigley gave Pate and Reid an opening with a bogey-4 on No. 17, and Pate took a one-shot lead by hitting his tee shot to within a foot on the same hole and tapping in for birdie.

Then came the decision Pate may regret the rest of his life.

The par-5, 515-yard 18th at Laurel Valley yielded 127 birdies, 43 more than any other hole, yet Pate laid up rather than go for the green with a mid-iron on his second shot. He needed only to two-putt from 18 feet to win, but lagged his first putt and then missed from 3 feet for par, forcing the playoff.

``It was just a bad decision I made. I wasn't even thinking of laying up, to be honest, it never crossed my mind,'' said Pate, who hasn't won since the 1982 TPC. ``But my caddy (Chris Frame) said, `I want you to lay up. All you've got to do is make 5 and you win.'''

The more he talked afterward, the more Pate convinced himself he was wrong.

``In my 30 years of career, the people that know me, (know) I don't think that way,'' he said.

Even Reid, who skipped his son's high school graduation to play in his first Senior PGA, found himself rooting for Pate, the 1976 U.S. Open champion who didn't play competitively for more than 20 years because of a sore left shoulder.

``I was thinking, `I hope Jerry makes it, I'm tired and I don't want to go out there again,''' said Reid, who played 27 holes Sunday and was eager to get back to his family in Utah. ``And he's played like a champion. He deserves to win this tournament.''

Quigley probably thought he deserved to win more. He won less than $100,000 on the PGA Tour from 1978-82 -- less money than Pate routinely made in a week -- partly because he never felt he had the game to play against the Pates of the world.

Now, Quigley is a star on the Champions Tour, winning 10 times, but he's never won a major -- and may never get closer than this.

``It's a little deflating to get there and not win it,'' Quigley said.

Quigley's fourth birdie of the tournament on No. 18 would have won it in regulation, but his second shot found a tiny greenside pot bunker. His wedge shot traveled only a few feet, but he managed to get up and down for par.

It wasn't enough, not on the day when Reid finally put his major tournament agonies behind him by winning his first PGA tournament since the 1988 World Series of Golf.

Reid led the 1989 Masters with four holes to play, but couldn't hold on. That year, Reid's bogey and a double bogey in the last three holes of the PGA allowed the late Payne Stewart to charge back and win with four birdies in the final five holes.

``I had control of that tournament and, by all rights, I should have won,'' Reid said. ``And today it was Dana Quigley and Jerry Pate, they had control and should have won. ... Fate takes a hand and I can't explain it. My putt went in, Jerry's missed and I'm feeling like I stole something.''

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