One Week Later and People Continue to Pile on Phil Mickelson's U.S. Open Game Plan

It's easy to second-guess after the fact. When Phil Mickelson decided to leave his driver at home for the first two days of the U.S. Open -- all 7,600 yards of it -- I supported the decision. The media is forever lamenting Lefty's reckless style, and eagerly point to the 2006 U.S. Open as proof. So for the world's second-best player to take a conservative approach was, if nothing else, a refreshing change.

Unfortunately, the strategy blew up in his face. Which, of course, leads to third- and fourth-guessing. GolfWeek's James Achenbach takes the kids-gloves approach to Mickelson's master plan, which was nice of him, but the facts pretty much do all the talking.

Using his strong 3-wood (11.5 degree) off the tee during the first two rounds, Mickelson hit 6 of 14 fairways each day. For the final two rounds, with his driver back in the bag, he hit 6 and 7 fairways, respectively. His total, finding 25 of 56 fairways (44.64 percent) for the tournament, tied for last in the field.

As Dave Pelz, Philbert's short-game guru and the man behind the no-driver, five-wedge attack plan, pointed out, "The strategy is based on Phil hitting his ball in the fairway. If he doesn't, the strategy doesn't necessarily work."

That quote is my nomination for understatement of the year.

Mickelson's problems, as always, have never been physical, but between the ears. He's seemingly always overthinking ... something, and in the process, sabotaging his chances of winning.

My two cents: try Occam's razor. It worked for Rocco Mediate.

...the strategy of ... Mediate – aim right and hook it left on every shot – was executed brilliantly.

"I tend to hook it," Mediate said with a laugh, reflecting on his single-shot approach to golf. "Sometimes I overdo it, but I kept it in play pretty well here (36 fairways hit, or 11 more than Mickelson). It's all about fairways here, fairways and greens. (Mediate hit 46 of 72 greens in regulation. He used a Callaway FT-5 driver with 8.5 degrees of loft.)

The problem, of course, is that Phil didn't know where his modified 3-wood might end up, which made it sorta hard to play a particular shot shape. Somehow, this is Butch Harmon's fault.