"I don't want to consider what it would have felt like if I had lost," said Retief Goosen after finally triumphing at the US Open in Monday's play-off. "Actually, we'd prefer not to think about it ourselves," the South African's 208 Golf Masters managers, still recovering from the trauma of that Sunday night missed putt, may well have replied.
We never quite got around to ringing all 208 but we reckon if we did and if we asked them who they expected to win on Monday roughly 208 would have said Mark Brooks - because, usually, there are no second chances in Golf Masters land.
Not that the outcome of the play-off was of any concern whatsoever to Geraldine Doyle (Bettystown, Co Meath), Paul McDonagh (Navan Road) and Aidan Hussey (Dublin), all of whom were in the rather agreeable, "nothing to lose", luxurious position of having both Goosen and Brooks in their line-ups. So, whoever prevailed on Monday, a whopping £360,000 was going to find its way to their team accounts.
(We should point out that the performance of Geraldine's team, in particular, was quite extraordinary considering they were in 17,977th place on the leaderboard before the US Open, having averaged earnings of £42,619 in the first 15 weeks of the competition).
You'd imagine, then, that one of them would have won our weekly prize. Well, Geraldine, Paul and Aidan are entitled to look to the heavens and ask: "What do I have to do to win a fourball?" Exasperating, galling, maddening and infuriating - somebody beat them to it.
It'd be like having all six lottery numbers only to be told the rules had been changed, you hadn't won the jackpot because somebody else had the bonus number too. In this case the bonus number was £51,000, the amount Chris Perry, Fred Funk and Frank Lickliter had already lodged in the team kitty by the time Goosen and Brooks added their £360,000. Total winnings? A mammoth £411,000. The manager of week 16's most successful combination? Step forward John Hegarty of Ballinasloe, Co Galway.
Between ourselves Hego's Team No 11 needs all the money-spinning weeks it can muster between now and September. A fortnight ago they were in 11,353rd place overall before rallying in week 15, rising to 9,756th. Now? They're almost within touching distance of the Golf Masters big time, rocketing to 3,070th.
Completing the leaderboard double for Galway this week is Ray Charles who retains top spot despite Castle Street 1 bringing home just £57,000 from Southern Hills. Michael Delaney (up from 12th to second) and Brian Crowley (who climbed from 18th to seventh) were our biggest top 10 movers but hats off to Colm Hannon back in 20th who rose 30 places this week.
Time to put the glamour of the majors behind us and revert to our bread and butter tournaments. This week we're off to the Great North Open which, incidentally, was known until this year as the European Grand Prix - same tournament, same venue, so don't worry if you have seven starters in the field, it will count in the Golf Masters.
Tiger Woods' managers, reeling from the post-US Open realisation that he's capable of resembling a mere mortal once in a blue moon, will expect their man to resume his all-conquering stroll through the season at the Buick Open, week 17's American tournament.
