Difficult to forget

Original post:  June 22, 2015

He was so close.

Dustin Johnson started the last hole tied for the lead. He was about a third of a mile (610 yards) away from the hole. Two shots later, he would be about twelve feet away with a chance to win the tournament.

Twelve feet is only about four strides. Professional golfers will usually make this putt less than half of the time. Still, it's usually certain that a miss will leave them in position to simply tap it into the cup. Even if he missed the initial putt, it was likely that there would be a full day of golf ahead. For the US Open, ties are broken through an 18-hole playoff which can often be the ultimate test of golfing endurance.

When he missed his first putt, the ball rolled past the hole about three feet. This is the length of a single stride. A yardstick. A virtual layup. On this crazy day, four rounds and 71 holes of excellence were undone by a simple lapse. Dustin Johnson would go on to do this:

That miss cost him a chance at golfing immortality.

Where is the lesson in this? I suppose there is nothing in our workplace which is quite so dramatic. While the stakes in any given situation may be high, we rarely face these types of clear-cut decision points. Still, there is much complexity in what we do. We need to remain vigilant even in little things. Sometimes, the simplest acts can undo long days of work unwittingly. Those lost moments are really difficult to forget.

Here is a link to some further background:  U.S. Open 2015: Watch Dustin Johnson 3-putt to lose year's second major | AL.com

UPDATE:  Here are some calculations of the odds that Mr. Johnson could have made those putts. The odds of him missing both of those putts was 11-1 against!
Link:  Dustin Johnson’s U.S. Open choke was a statistical improbability - The Washington Post