Bubba Watson's Victory at HSBC Championship Was Kind of a Big Deal

Whoever said the fall golf season hasn't been exciting didn't watch the HSBC Championship.

Two-time Masters champ Bubba Watson won a playoff after losing his place in a five-way tie that included three guys you've heard of, two of them major winners. There was screaming. There was fist-pumping. There was disaster. It was fabulously entertaining.

"It means a lot," Bubba Watson said after the victory. "To win outside the U.S., that's one of my goals for my career."

He added that he has some goals remaining, one of which is to win 10 PGA Tour events. He now has seven.

"This is very special to me. This one's going to go down for a while for me. Not because of the great shots that I hit but because of just winning here," he added.

Watson made it more dramatic than he needed to. He held or shared the lead most of the final round. For a time there was a five-way tie at the top with Graeme McDowell, Martin Kaymer, Tim Clark, Japanese newcomer Hiroshi Iwata and Watson.

Then at the 17th, he butchered the par three, taking double-bogey. That put him two shots back of the other four. His chances to get back into a tie and possible playoff did not look good because the 18th hole is a par five, and golf logic said surely one of the others would birdie for the outright victory.

After making the double at the 17th, things got worse for Watson. His second shot at the 18th found the left greenside bunker. He needed at least a birdie to tie the rest of the lead group. He would need to get up and down in two and hope none of the other four birdied. Slim chances with players of that caliber.

"The three guys coming down behind us, they all had a chance to make eagle. They all had a chance to make birdies. So, yeah, we looked at it that it could easily be a five‑man playoff," Watson admitted. (He and Tim Clark played together.) "I never saw I was going to struggle.  You never plan on struggling."

Just as it looked impossible, the world was treated to another Bubba Watson miracle shot. He settled into his stance, took the club back, slashed gracefully through the sand and proceeded to hole out. Bubba went nuts. The crowd went nuts. Tiger Woods at his best has never given better fist pump than Bubba Watson at HSBC.

"I was only one off the lead, so an eagle was heroic and had a chance to win, but a birdie still had an outside shot if nobody else birdied," Watson explained. 

He and his caddie had discussed the possible outcomes prior to the shot.

"I said right when Rickie [Fowler] was chipping, I said, 'It's been a miserable couple holes here, but this will change everything if this goes in,'" Watson recalled. "He (his caddie) says, 'This is how legends are made.' And it actually went in. And I didn't know what to do. So I just yelled."

So did everybody else.  

With the eagle made, Watson gained a one-shot lead. But the guys one back were not done.

"That's an incredible shot that he pulled off on 18," Clark said. "When it hit the green, it looked like it was going in. So, you know, you never expect that to happen but I was in a position where I knew I needed to make my putt to get in a playoff."

Clark made and secured a playoff spot. Iwata missed his birdie. Kaymer and Fowler hit into the water at 18. McDowell had fallen back earlier. It remained for Clark and Watson to fight it out for victory.

If not the shortest hitter on the PGA Tour, Tim Clark is one of the shortest. If not the longest hitter on the PGA Tour, Bubba Watson, is one of the longest. You had to ask yourself if the matchup was even a fair contest, yet Clark had birdied the hole in regulation. And the 18th was where the playoff began. 

As though the first time through the 18th was not enough, Watson repeated his first two shots almost exactly on the first playoff hole. However, his ball was not in quite the same spot in the same bunker.

"It was on the side slope, so it was tough to get at," he explained, adding that it would be easy to fat it or launch it into the water on the other side of the green. "Landed short of the green and trickled out. Lucky for me though, it was the same line as the bunker shot from earlier so I could see the line and knew what kind of pace I needed to hit on it, knew how much it broke, and I hit it perfect and again it was perfect pace, barely went in."

He went nuts again. But because he had momentarily lost his voice screaming after the hole out, he couldn't make much of a sound. The crowd helped him out. It was thunderous for the second time.

When asked what the significance a two-time Masters champ winning in China could be, he said, "The shots that I hit—holing out of the bunker, me getting excited, the crowd getting excited—I think if a junior golfer is watching that here in China or around the world, that might inspire them. They want to do that. It's kind of like basketball, you kind of want to hit that last game‑winning shot."

The only remaining question is, what are the rest of Bubba Watson's career goals?

Kathy Bissell is a Golf Writer for Bleacher Report. Unless otherwise noted, all quotes were obtained first-hand or from official interview materials from the USGA, PGA Tour, R&A or PGA of America.