Kelly achieves 'classic finish'
| • | Kelly makes breakthrough in Sony Open and PGA |
| • | Sony renewed through 2006 |
| • | Pro golfers passionate about football, too |
| • | Cell phone call makes stroke of a difference |
By Ferd Lewis
Advertiser Columnist
When the adrenaline was flowing and the pressure could be measured in tons per square inch, Jerry Kelly began his walk up the 18th fairway at Waialae Country Club yesterday by looking squarely into the ESPN camera lens.
Then, giving it his most television dramatic voice, Kelly proclaimed it, "The Classic Finish."
As if there could be any other ending to the Sony Open in Hawai'i for the golfer victory had torturously eluded for 10 years.
After 199 previous tournaments without a championship and more than a few cruel endings, this would be the one that didn't get away.
It had to be.
Of this, he entered the day as sure of as his name is Jerome Patrick Kelly. "I was ready. I really was," Kelly said after holding off John Cook for a one-stroke, 14-under-par 266.
"I've been in this situation a decent amount of times. I felt like I was in it more (often) than I was, but I really felt confident. I wanted to go play as soon as I woke up."
All during a week in which he had either led or hovered in contention, his blue eyes had lit up at the prospect of being in position to win come yesterday's final round.
That it would find him in a down-to-the-wire showdown with Cook, who had out-played him last year when Kelly double-bogeyed the 16th hole at the Reno-Tahoe Open, would only add to the import of the situation.
"I don't think there is anybody out here trying harder to win than I am," Kelly had said after Thursday's opening-round 66.
For much of his career that had been part of the problem for the college hockey player/golfer. The aggressiveness on the ice that had earned him a scholarship had also been part of what continually separated him from a tournament victory. The competitive over-drive he had naturally slipped into had too often betrayed him.
That and the lingering doubts that had come from the lengthening list of disappointments that had gnawed at him.
But this time it would be a different story, a fairy tale ending instead of something that might have come from Stephen King.
When he stared over the last putt, the final foot-and-a- half standing between him and victory on the 18th hole, Kelly said, he curiously recalled a quote from the legendary Bobby Jones.
It was "that he always felt like even if he had a one inch putt to win a tournament that he would hit it fat and whiff the putt," Kelly said. "That's a great thing to think about on that last putt. Those are some of the things I have to work on, you know.
"I just got up there and all I said to myself was, 'this is exactly what I have been working for my whole life. Just be as calm as you can and stroke the ball in the hole.'
"And, it worked out."
Just the "classic finish" he had promised to deliver.
