Viewpoint: Spare Woody the water torture

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By Craig DeVrieze | Saturday, July 12, 2008 |

Woody Austin talks to volunteer Marcy Schnepf of Davenport last year during the John Deere Classic Pro-Am. Austin has faced plenty of heckling this year after he fell into the water at last year's Presidents Cup. (Jeff Cook/Quad-City Times) Buy this Photo

Please, please, please, John Deere Classic fans, don’t mention water to Woody Austin this week.

There is not an H2O reference you can make that Aqua Man hasn’t already heard.

And heard.

And heard.

And heard.

“I hear ‘Don’t fall in the water’ about 100 times a day now,” said Austin, whose misfortune it is to have taken the most famous, inadvertent swim in golf history at last year’s Presidents Cup competition near Montreal. “Every day on the golf course, 100 times a day. it’s ‘Stay away from the water!’ ‘Don’t fall in the water!’ ‘Where are your goggles?’

“I hear it every day, and it’s not something different. If it was something new, something original ... But when you are walking down the fairway, nowhere near water, and all you hear from people is ‘Stay away from the water! Don’t fall in the water.’ You know, that’s pretty crazy.’’

He is serious now. You have to feel his pain.

So, please Quad-Cities, let’s rise above it.

Austin, after all, was a darned good sport — and a pretty good stick — last fall in Montreal after shedding his shoes, wading into a pond, taking a mighty whack at a soggy golf ball and then losing his footing and making an epic face plant into the drink, all for the cause of the Stars and Stripes.

He made three straight birdies after that as he and teammate David Toms halved a match that ultimately helped the U.S. retain possession of the Presidents Cup.

The next day, he good-sported scuba goggles while walking off the first tee for another match at the Royal Montreal Golf Club.

“I know how funny it was at the time,’’ he said. “Everything is funny unless it happens to you. And like I said, it was funny.”

Austin even can accept that people think they are laughing with him when they, uh, shower him with those familiar comments.

“That’s probably true, too,’’ he said. “It’s not that it’s a bad thing. But when it is repeated over and over and over, at a certain point it does become annoying.”

Perhaps even detrimental to a golf game.

Hearing those familiar catcalls certainly didn’t help Austin’s cause at last month’s U.S. Open, where he was paired with hometown San Diegoan Pat Perez, who, like Austin, is known for showing his emotions on the course.

“He said he would be telling people off,’’ Austin said.

Austin hasn’t done that. Yet.

He typically reserves his anger for himself, as he did earlier this year in New Orleans, where he loudly declared himself “a choking dog” after hitting a shot from the rough just 10 feet when he was in contention at the Zurich Classic.

Austin finished fourth there, but until forging a runner-up finish at the Buick Open two weeks ago, hadn’t been in contention much.

Over a stretch of six May and June events, pre-Buick, he finished a combined 53 shots over par.

That was an especially frustrating run of golf, particularly after a lucky 13th season that saw him win once and finish second twice, one of the latter to Tiger Woods at the PGA Championship.

Austin said an uncooperative putter is the culprit — he likely would have won the Buick had he rolled it better — and he said last year’s success doesn’t make this season’s struggles on the greens any easier to abide.

Still, he said, “What last year does is it kind of reminds you that it is there and that it can be done. You just have to find it again.”

Despite having challenged Woods at the PGA in Tulsa, and then subsequently making the U.S. Presidents Cup roster, Austin said he isn’t viewed differently than he was a year ago at TPC Deere Run. Despite three career wins, he said he remains a “run-of-the-mill journeyman” in the eyes of the so-called experts.

“Unless you win something big,” he said, “nobody cares.’’

Austin cares plenty, of course, and he shows it. Always will.

“You can change a lot of things, but you can’t change who you really are,” he said. “I can’t be emotionless. Sorry. That’s just not my DNA.’’

As for H2O ... Let’s let it go, folks. Don’t go there.

Craig DeVrieze can be contacted at (563) 333-2610 or cdevrieze@qctimes.com.