Roberts looking for redemption in Sonoma  PGATOUR.com Editorial Coordinator SONOMA, Calif. -- Loren Roberts doesn't miss putts like that. He's the "Boss of the Moss," for goodness sakes. He was first on the Champions Tour in putting average in 2006. He was among the top-10 players who needed the fewest putts per round last season. He makes 4-foot putts. 
But Roberts, one of the Tour's most reliable flatstick wielders, misread his putt at the Charles Schwab Cup Championship on the final hole last season. He bogeyed the hole, dropped from solo fourth into a tie for fourth in the tournament and lost by 20 points to Jay Haas in the year-long Charles Schwab Cup competition. He took 1,834 putts that year and lost the $1-million prize all because of one three-putt from 56 feet. "Of course last year we knew it would come down to the last hole. We joked about it and it did," Roberts said. "Hopefully I can avoid a repeat of that but it was good for the Schwab Cup itself because [the drama] lasted all year long. "...I've said this before, the Schwab Cup is a heck of an idea. If I can be so bold as to say -- I think the PGA TOUR has stolen the idea for the FedExCup from this, that's my opinion." Cue the demons -- Roberts is going to need to exorcize some this year the week before Halloween. Yet, ever the level-headed competitor, he isn't going to let the past affect him as he begins round one on Thursday at Sonoma Golf Club. "I think the best thing that I can do is focus on trying to win the golf tournament. The Charles Schwab Cup is a year-long race culminating this week and I think one of the things I don't want to get caught up in is trying to play Jay. I want to go out and try to win the golf tournament first and think about that second," Roberts said. This year things are a little different: Roberts heads into the final tournament with a 165-point cushion in the season-long points race whereas last season it was Haas who held a 126-point lead. With four wins and 16 top 10s apiece in 2006, only Haas and Roberts had a legitimate shot at winning the Cup. In 2007, however, Tom Watson and Brad Bryant could theoretically hoist the Cup on Sunday with a win at the tournament. In fact, Watson knows down to the letter exactly where he needs to finish in the race. "If Jay finishes solo fourth and Loren finishes solo eighth then I can win by eight points," Watson noted. As the season winds down, locker room chatter involves the Schwab Cup competition. Haas, with his four wins, seemed to have it locked up for much of the season but Roberts won his second tournament of the year at the Constellation Energy Senior Players Championship -- the Tour's final major of the season and the 52-year-old's third overall -- to sneak off with the lead. There could be more drama in Sonoma than downstate in Hollywood this week as Roberts and Haas could also be battling it out for two other end-of-season awards. Last season Haas took Player of the Year honors while Roberts earned the Byron Nelson Award for lowest scoring average. At 69.30 percent Haas leads Roberts (69.31 percent) by a measly one-thousandth of a point in the average amount of strokes they take to complete a round, so one of them will likely walk away with the Byron Nelson Award. And the Player of the Year trophy could very well hinge on who wins the Cup. If you ask Haas, he's fairly certain he knows who will win. "It may dry out a bit but it's pretty juicy out [on the course]. Loren will be tough. He drives the ball in the fairway consistently and is our best putter. I'd be very surprised if he's outside the top-3 in the tournament this year."
Roberts seconded the wet course conditions remark -- it's "very, very scoreable" he added, saying that he expects scores to fall around 4- or 5-under each day -- but he's not counting his Charles Schwab Cup chickens before they hatch. "I'm a tinkerer. I've never been blessed with what you call a perfectly great golf swing. I can be a very good ball striker at times but ...I like to tinker around with stuff," Roberts said. "One thing that's always usually pretty solid with me is my putter. I go out here and look at these greens and these might be the best greens we putt on all year. They are fast, they are smooth and I like that. I've spent my time out here really trying to get a feel for the greens and learning the greens. You have to have pretty good control on your speed if you are going to do well." Roberts grew up about five hours down the road in San Luis Obispo and attended Cal Poly-San Luis Obispo. He now lives in Memphis, Tenn., mainly because traveling from the West Coast became too difficult with the time change, but has asked for golf passes galore this week since he predicts at least 15 or 16 of his family and friends will make the trip to see him. "You always want to play good when you have family and friends around. I'm trying to really focus in this year on what I need to do... [Jay's] focusing on the same thing, to win the golf tournament and add this thing up on Sunday and see where we are." |
