Southern Farm title goes to Slocum
BY Bruce Young | US PGA Tour | 2005 Southern Farm Bureau Classic | Wrap | 07 Nov 2005
In a week when many were looking to save their bacon in terms of their PGA Tour status, the only one who was able to do so was one who perhaps needs it least namely the 50-year-old Loren Roberts although Roberts is likely safe because of his career money list status.
All those looking to sneak inside the top 125 or move inside the top 150 have failed to do so and they will head to either stage two or final stage of the USPGA Tour School in coming weeks.
Heath Slocum won the tournament by two from last week’s winner Carl Pettersen and the veteran Loren Roberts, who was looking to join Ray Floyd as a winner on both the Champions Tour and regular tour in the same year. Roberts would also have become the fifth oldest player to win a PGA Tour event following on from Sam Snead, Art Wall, Jim Barnes and John Barnum and the oldest since Wall in 1975. That did not happen of course as Roberts slipped from a share of the lead when he bogeyed the 17th and Slocum birdied the same hole. Pettersen too had his chance to back up his win last week in Tampa but his late bogey came at the 16th and Joe Snyder looking for an eagle at the last, took bogey and dropped back to finish 4th.
Pettersen can however thank his great two weeks for his big move on the money list which will see him playing his first Masters next year having finished 31st on the final 2005 money list.
Slocum has long been considered a fine young player going places, especially after graduating from the Nationwide Tour in 2001 via the Battlefield Promotion when he won three times that year.
Not long after turning professional in 1996, Slocum contracted ulcerative colitis and did not play for nearly eighteen months. When he did return to professional golf he gained access to the Nationwide Tour via PGA Tour qualifying in 2000 and success quickly followed.
He has done well since graduating to the USPGA Tour, easily retaining his card each year. His win in Tucson last year consolidated his reputation but following that win his form fell away until the middle of this year, perhaps the real turnaround coming at the Byron Nelson event. He arrived this week in good form and given that he had played well here on previous occasions it may be that he was feeling closer to a win than most would have thought.
Aaron Baddeley and Paul Gow were the best of the Australians with Gow staking a late claim for some sort of status on the PGA Tour in 2006. He fell short after being within four of the lead heading into the last day. He finished 17th and will find himself back at stage two qualifying this coming week in Panama City in Florida. He heads there with the knowledge that his game is in good shape after an encouraging week.
Other Australians to make the cut were Steve Allan (40th) and Gavin Coles (58th) but they will both be back at stage two in the next two weeks.
The event, along with the Tour Championship brings to a close the 2005 season in terms of the money list with the 125th position going to Nick Price with US$626,000. The best of the Australasians was Adam Scott in 15th place with US$2.592 million. Stuart Appleby finished 23rd, Geoff Ogilvy 33rd, Peter Lonard 34th and Rod Pampling 48th.
