Keith Sbarbaro, the VP of Tour operations for TaylorMade-adidas, filled in as a caddie for Dustin Johnson last week at the Ballantine’s Championship in Korea and Wednesday he offered his take on Johnson, his game and the trip.
Sbarbaro handles Johnson’s equipment needs and has played several rounds of golf with him so he knows his game well. He also hits it a long way as a player, so he clubs Johnson similar to the way he would club himself.
“We had a good time. It was a good trip,” Sbarbaro said. “We were there to win and came up a little short, but he played well.”
Johnson suffered one bad break on the 17th hole in the third round that cost him dearly. He made a triple bogey resulting from a bad kick over a bunker. The ball got wedged against a wall and Johnson wasn’t in a position to take an unplayable lie and had to hit the ball lefthanded. “It hit a tree and kicked kind of back where we were,” Sbarbaro said. “It’s just what happens in golf. It’s something that was kind of unavoidable and it was too bad but he played great after it and played good in the final round.”
In typical Johnson fashion he birdied the final hole of the third round.
“He’s very resilient,” Sbarbaro said. “He’s got about as good of an attitude as you can have. He’s got a lot of horsepower for sure. He handled it great and I’m not sure a lot of people would have handled it as good as he did.”
Johnson shot a 3-under-par 69 with six birdies and three bogeys in the final round while making a run at champion Lee Westwood, who finished three strokes ahead of Johnson at 12 under. Though he missed a couple short putts that could have pulled him more into contention, Johnson birdied five of the final 10 holes, with a pair of bogeys thrown in.
“He’s playing real good,” Sbarbaro said. “He’s ready to go for the last three majors and Players. There’s no reason why he shouldn’t be contending.”
