Dustin Johnson blames poor putting for a missed cut at Augusta
Dustin Johnson blamed a poor performance on the greens for his early exit at The Masters after the defending champion missed the halfway cut by two shots at Augusta. Six three-putts in rounds of 74 and 75 leave defending Masters champion Dustin Johnson frustrated as he reflected on missing the halfway cut at Augusta NationalJohnson was left to rue six three-putts over the first two rounds which contributed to his downfall. November's runaway winner will now have two days of inactivity before reappearing in the Butler Cabin on Sunday evening to present the new champion with a Green Jacket.
The 36-year-old could also lose his world No 1 ranking if that champion is Justin Thomas, who is just three shots behind halfway leader Justin Rose. Johnson opened with an erratic 74 on Thursday and needed to better that to avoid crashing out, but he did not encourage himself at the first when he tugged his three-wood into the pines and started with a bogey-five. He remained safely inside the cut mark with four to play. Still, he came up short with his second to the long 15th and found the water at the front, leading to a bogey-six, and poor drives on each of the closing two holes resulted in a bogey, bogey finish, and a round of 75, leaving him at five over par for the tournament.
"Six three-putts in two rounds; you just can't do that," said Johnson afterward. "Obviously, I didn't drive it great, but I drove it good enough, and I felt like I was never really too bad out of position.” It was just the three-putts that killed me. You take all the three-putts away; I'm one under. That was the difference. But yeah, I didn't putt very well. My speed was awful. I just left it short from 10 feet there on the last hole. I don't know; I just didn't have a good beat on the speed the last two days.
Johnson warned pre-tournament that his game was not as sharp as when he romped to a five-shot victory and his second major just five months ago, but he denied feeling extra pressure as defending champion. It’s still the same," added Johnson, who confirmed he would play in next week's RBC Heritage. "Obviously, I wanted to be around for the weekend. I like this golf course; I feel like I play it very well. I didn't putt very well. It's pretty simple.” Brooks Koepka mirrored Johnson's scores of 74 and 75.
Brooks Koepka needed assistance from his caddie to climb out of the ditch on the thirteenth as he struggled with his knee injury." I wouldn't have been playing for another month if the Masters wasn't this week," he said. "So I'll take a nice long break after this. The way I look at it, I have two more days to do rehab that I probably wouldn't get if I were out here, and I'll get ready for the PGA.
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