Unlucky 13: PGA Tour rookie blows up with disastrous octuple bogey in American Express
01/20/2025 10:00 AM
The new 2025 PGA Tour season has raced into action with record-low scoring in the opening events.
But for one PGA rookie, the peril of a Tour standard course took a brutal toll.
William Mouw was doing well in The American Express at the Pete Dye Stadium Course in La Quinta when disaster struck him on the iconic 16th hole which has a humongous greenside bunker.
The American rookie out of Pepperdine University in Los Angeles carded a 13 on the notoriously difficult par-five, a rare octuple bogey that had the whole golfing world talking.
Mouw struggled to read the putting surface with the contours of the green spitting his ball out in every direction but the hole, a reminder of the complexities of the best golf courses in the world.
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The hole has earned its reputation as being one of the toughest on the circuit. It demands precision and nerve, a test for all golfers, especially a newcomer on tour.
Mouw’s difficulty started with a wayward drive that found the rough and consequently set the tone for the rest of the hole.
When he found the imposing bunker with his second stroke he would have known that making par was a tall task, but surely wouldn’t have expected what unravelled.
From then, stroke after stroke missed the mark with the deep lid and unpredictable dance floor keeping him firmly footed in the gaping sand trap.
When eventually on the green, his putts swerved from left to right as gasping onlookers were hardly able to watch Mouw’s agony.
The few minutes on the hole that would have felt like an hour capitulate the difficulty of the game and the harrowing fact that long sequences of positive golf can be for nothing if you blow up on one hole.
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