These numbers explain how Bubba Watson won the 2018 WGC Match Play Championship
Bubba Watson took his second event of the year in Austin, here's how he did it
Bubba Watson, winner of two previous green jackets, is suddenly streaking into the Masters at Augusta National next week. Watson, who took the Genesis Open in February, dusted Kevin Kisner 7 and 6 in the finals of the WGC-Dell Technologies Match Play for his seventh match play win of the week and 11th PGA Tour title of his career.
Watson never even saw the 17th hole on Sunday as he beat the No. 2 player in the world, Justin Thomas, 3 and 2 in the semifinals. But not every match was that easy, as we'll see below.
Ever one who defies numbers and paradigms, here are three numbers that show how Watson was able to take the second WGC event of his career on Sunday in Austin, Texas.
2 under: In a pool play match against Julian Suri on Friday, Watson needed to play the final two holes birdie-birdie just to halve the match with the No. 64-seeded Suri. Watson was 2 down with a pair of holes to go and finished 2-3 for the halve. If he had lost, both he and Suri would have finished pool play 2-1-0, and they would have gone to an immediate playoff where anything can happen (and Watson may not have moved on).
1 birdie: On Sunday against Kisner, Watson led 6 up after nine holes. So he shot a 30 or 29 on the front nine, right? Wrong. Watson shot a pedestrian 1-under 34 on the front side, but Kisner made five (!) bogeys and dropped a 5-over 40. It was fascinating to watch Watson, not necessarily known for his consistency, play smooth and steady golf en route to the victory.
78 percent: In his Sunday match against Kisner, Watson hit 7 of 9 (or 78 percent) of fairways. For somebody who is as long as Watson is -- currently No. 4 on the PGA Tour in driving distance -- it was remarkable to watch him bend drives around tree lines and over hazards into the middle of so many fairways (with Kisner about 30 yards behind him in several cases). One of the few that didn't find a fairway, of course, led to maybe the exchange of the week in Austin.
This fan offered encouragement. @BubbaWatson gave an honest answer. 😂 pic.twitter.com/tSceCrDBHD
— PGA TOUR (@PGATOUR) March 25, 2018
















