By Ferd Lewis
Advertiser Staff Writer
KAPOLEI — "Hang in there," they tell Karrie Webb as if she were struggling just to make the cut.
"It will come," they encourage her as though she hasn't hit the broadside of Diamond Head.
"Tomorrow is your day," is the refrain leaving the 18th hole, as if she hasn’t cashed a significant paycheck in ages.
Expressions of well-meant support have been almost as thick as autograph seekers for Webb this week in the Cup Noodles Hawaiian Ladies Open, where popular concern has followed her like an auxiliary gallery.
Such is both the blessing and the curse of being the best women's golfer on the planet. You are so good and have won so many tournaments these past two years (13) that when you win, it is expected. When, on the usually rare occasions, you don’t, something has to be off.
And when you have gone, heaven forbid, four tournaments now — and everybody is counting — without a title and are eight strokes back in this one entering today's payday, well, there must be a whole lot wrong.
A "drought" one headline called it for the three-time LPGA player of the year. A blotch on her career unseen this early in the year since 1997, we are breathlessly told.
"People are probably more concerned about it than I am," Webb said in her best what-me-worry tone. "The way it has been the last two years (where she has won one out of three starts on average), is not going to happen every year," Webb says. "I know that. I just don't know how many other people realize that."
Never mind that in those four previous starts this year there have been two runner-up performances in which just six strokes have separated Webb from taking back-to-back titles.
Or, that her $202,551 in winnings so far this year is second by only $1,239 to Lori Kane and would, by itself, have put Webb 43rd in the money rankings for all of last year.
When you are the cover player on the LPGA Media Guide and the featured figure on the front of every pairings sheet they hand out at the entrance to Kapolei Golf Course, there are ample expectations.
Perhaps only Tiger Woods, experiencing his own "drought" of sorts on the PGA Tour, can comprehend the situation. Or commiserate its effects.
In the meantime, "I know I’m not complaining," Webb says. "I'm not complaining at all. I mean, I’ve had three chances in four tournaments to win. I probably just didn't do enough of the right things to win. I’m fairly happy with where I am. I’ll go back down to play in Australia, see my coach and keep working.
"I know if I keep working at it and playing well I’m going to get my chances," she said.
Which, if you are Karrie Webb, means a lot of people not in the field will rest easier.
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