Phil Mickelson won one for old guys everywhere, even if we couldn’t jump out of our chair to cheer him
When Phil Mickelson hoisted the PGA Championship trophy Sunday afternoon, moments after becoming the oldest golfer to win a major, he simultaneously lifted up an entire creaky demographic.
A demographic that, given the chance, surely would have reminded Mickelson to lift the impressive trophy with his legs. Those things are heavier than they look, you know. Don’t want to throw your back out at such a moment of triumph.
Make no mistake: Mickelson’s win, a month shy of his 51st birthday, was also a win for those of us middle-aged folks who looked up from our youth only to discover, with much befuddlement and a whole lot of sentimentality, that we’re now all aboard that slow, non-stop train to geezerdom. “A win for the old guys,’’ as Jim Nantz put it on the superb CBS broadcast.
You know how you know you’re one of the old guys? When those celebrated for being old don’t register in your mind as old, that’s how.
Mickelson – as affable as a golf prodigy with more than $90 million in career earnings can be – never slipped from a sports fan’s consciousness, but he did from prominence within the sport.
Entering the PGA Championship, he hadn’t won a major since the 2013 Open Championship. He didn’t have a single finish in the top 20 this year. We’ve seen him on TV endorsing an arthritis remedy more than we’ve seen him in contention on Sundays in recent years.
It was easy to understand why the gallery followed him at the Kiawah Island course Sunday like ants swarming a loose cookie at a picnic. Mickelson has always been both affable and fallible, a believer in his own immense talent to the point of detrimental daring, the sweet-swinging lefty with the distinctive side-to-side walk that is just a little too dad-ish to qualify as a strut.
He’s been a favorite for so long that the golfer I most associate him with is not Tiger Woods, but the late Payne Stewart, who beat a gracious Mickelson by a stroke at the 1999 US Open. He’s always been self-aware, even acknowledging after his win Sunday that it very well may be the last tournament he ever wins. “The peoples’ champion, that’s what he is,’’ said Nantz.
Though golf has a way of making all victories seem fleeting, Mickelson slowed down the sands in the hourglass this weekend, and given that he is as physically fit as he has ever been, perhaps he can sustain his success. Exceptional athletes are defying age at a higher rate than ever these days. Some haven’t even needed rejuvenation or redemption; they’ve been here all along. Serena Williams, 39, is ranked No. 8 in the WTA rankings and might be the most accomplished athlete of any gender of her era. Aaron Rodgers, 38, is the reigning NFL Most Valuable Player. Tom Brady, 43, is multiple seasons into making us wonder if he’s the exception to the notion that every athlete will get old sometime.
Mickelson wasn’t even the only aging athlete who enjoyed a redemptive Sunday. While Chris Paul, 36, was helping the Suns defeat LeBron James, 36, and the Lakers in Game 1 of their playoff series, 32-year-old Derrick Rose, surprisingly rejuvenated along with the Knicks franchise this season, was scoring the tying bucket in regulation in the Knicks’ eventual loss to the Hawks. “Cool to say I still hoop a l’il bit,’’ wrote Rose in a heartfelt Instagram post over the weekend.
Someone like Rose is considered no longer in his prime only by his particular sport’s blunt standards. He’s still a young man. For Mickelson, part of the appeal of his PGA Championship victory is that his athletic prime is undeniably past, and so is his youth. He raged at it and embraced it at once, emerging victorious. It wasn’t just satisfying or compelling or relatable. It was affirming.
So this one was for those of us who can’t throw down a bag of mulch without wondering if the world record for herniated discs is within reach.
It was for those of us who can’t stop playing those torturous little math games in our head: Oh my god I’m the same age now my dad was when I was in my junior year in college how did this happen.
This was for those for whom the “Dr. Rick” Progressive Insurance commercials hit a little too close to home (maybe the waiter does want to know my name, huh?)
And it was for those who embrace their aching nostalgia and schedule Saturday errands around the vintage 1970s “American Top 40” replays on the oldies station. One more time for all the old times, or something like that.
Mickelson’s win was for those of us who ain’t that young any more, but remember those long-gone days with the sun-drenched vividness of a recent yesterday. Watching someone live out a flashback, especially one that seemed unlikely to ever come, is inspiring.
Why, it’s almost enough to make an aging fella feel downright spry.
Don’t tell the boss, but I think I’m going to go out and chuck up a few jumpers in the driveway, get the old blood flowing. You know, see if I can still hoop a l’il bit, just as soon as one of you kindly helps me get out of this chair.
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