We've all done it - granted, not on Father's Day on the greens of the U.S. Open, but anyone who's played the game of golf for any length of time has done it. You've choked. You had the perfect approach shot, sticking the ball a mere 3 feet from the pin - perhaps the best shot of your day, season, maybe life. Too bad you have a long walk (or shorter cart ride) to think about that ball resting a comfortable three feet from the bottom of the cup. You take out your putter, feeling assured that you'll get the job done. But the pressure has begun to mount - whether you need this to break ninety or eighty (or one hundred...), to win the hole against your buddy or just to satisfy your own inner golf demons, you need this putt. Its a 3-footer. Everyone makes three footers. You stand over your ball, noting that you're not below the hole as you thought. Your brain begins to work, take a step back, read the putt again. A little break, you think. You exhale slowly, maybe use the skills read in a book long ago or recall the lessons purchased from the local pro. Any way you cut it, you draw the putter back...and FLUB IT! Of course, us hackers will start cursing loudly, perhaps throw the putter or something like it - the point being is that you show your emotion because the pressure of the putt got to you. Now, imagine, if you will, what it must have felt like for Phil standing on the 18th tee on Sunday at Winged Foot. The day is warm and perfect, and the crowds are all on your side. All it takes is an easy drive, a safe approach, a good lag and a simple tap-in and you walk off covered in glory. Your brain knows this. Your brain also knows that you actually have to hit that white spawn of satan otherwise known as a golf ball. And by the time that Phil was in his backswing, and the camera was glued to his face, you knew it wasn't going to plan. "Oh no" you saw him mouth. And then the shot trajectory, bouncing off the white tent and into the no-man's land of the rough at Winged Foot. The second shot. The third into the sand. The poor sand save that drifted into the second cut. The equally poor shot from that rough. With it went Phil's chance at a US Open title. I felt bad for Phil, but was immediately reminded of Jan Van de Veld of the British Open (in)fame collapse. I even said it - that Phil's choke was easy as bad as Van de Veld's. But it was Phil's head that got in his own way on Sunday. I have no idea how he slept last night, if at all. Me? I would've been sitting in my easy chair, rocking for hours, my eyes open and my brain frantically recollecting my shot selection, seeing my worst nightmare actually played out on national television. Worse, I knew that in the morning every single publication was going to have some form of "CHOKE" near my name. I suddenly was in a category that no one wants to visit, let alone take up residence in. I choked in the biggest competition of my life, with a slim but safe lead, and I gave it away. Completely. The next time you're on the golf course contemplating a big shot, just take a moment before you do and think about what the pressure must be like for a professional golfer. Think how joyful you feel when you hit that perfect shot, and how furious you get when you flub it completely. It's too bad that we had to watch a likable golfer fall apart at the worst possible moment. But it happens. Golf does that to people. At least us hackers have some company.