‘Patrick Cantlay, he’s just like us’: World No. 4 chunks pitch — into a tree 

Patrick Cantlay recovered. We’ll start there. 

He birdied 15, 16 and 17 on Friday at Harbour Town Golf Links, his sixth, seventh and eighth holes after starting on the back nine during the RBC Heritage’s second round. He birdied the 5th. There was more. 

On the 200-yard, par-3 7th, Cantlay got home in one. On the swing, he held the finish. He club-twirled. At the green, his ball dropped about 20 feet short. And his ball rolled the rest of the way for the ace. In typical Cantlay style, he played it cool. One arm up. A smile. Some hand slaps. On to the next one. They call him Patty Ice, after all. All of it was part of a six-under 65 round that put four back of leader Jimmy Walker. 

Afterward, Cantlay even had some fun with the trolls. Over the past week, since his group was called out by Brooks Koepka for slow play during Sunday’s final round of the Masters, Cantlay’s pace has been picked apart some. He was asked about it earlier in the week. But the hole-in-one gave him the best response:

“Playing faster,” he wrote on Twitter.

Good one.   

But back to the beginning, where recovery suggests a stumble. Though if you’ve hit a bad shot or a dozen in your life, you can relate. 

To begin, on the 184-yard, par-3 14th, Cantlay double-crossed his tee shot left and toward trees, before settling a few yards behind one and in a waste bunker, about 25 yards from the hole. The play was clear, though problematic: The world’s fourth-ranked player needed to avoid the tree, but also land his ball exactly enough that it would settle close, but avoid water over the green. 

“Cantlay is going to try to chisel away at this one,” announcer Jeff Eisenbrand said on the PGA Tour Live broadcast. “He also has to worry about the water beyond the green. There’s a lot of factors here.”

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“At this point, I don’t think he’s really worried about the water,” analyst Andres Gonzales said. “I don’t think he’s trying to get it all the way there. Just trying to find the right line and land it where he might be able to get …”

And then Gonzales paused. 

Maybe you did too. 

Cantlay pitched his ball straight into the tree. 

“And that was worst-case scenario,” Eisenbrand said on the PGA Tour Live broadcast. 

Cantlay was now about a yard from the tree. He looked down. He shrugged his right arm slightly. He took a swipe at the sand. It appeared he simply chunked it. “Came off almost 30 degrees where he was looking to hit it,” Gonzales said on a replay. 

“Patrick Cantlay, he’s just like us, on rare occasions like that,” Eisenbrand said. 

And here, the bounce back began.   

Cantlay backed away. He took another club from caddie Matt Minister. He took one practice cut. He hit to 11 feet. He made the putt, and he was on his way. 

“Nice recovery,” Gonzales said on the broadcast.