Jordan Spieth’s modified Horrible Horseshoe

For Jordan Spieth, Colonial Country Club’s Horrible Horseshoe started one hole too early.

The result: a horrible outcome for Spieth, who finished two strokes behind Jason Kokrak.

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The Horrible Horseshoe, Colonial’s most famous stretch, is three holes long: Nos. 3 through 5. It consists of two daunting dog leg par 4s and an imposing par 3.

But it was a modified Horrible Horseshoe, holes No. 2 through 4, that did in Spieth Sunday, and all week for that matter. Spieth went bogey-bogey-bogey through that modified Horrible Horseshoe Sunday, eliminating his lead.

Suddenly the tournament was a back-and-forth contest, and one Spieth eventually could not win. Kokrak took the lead for good, at the 11th and saw his final margin set at two strokes when a desperate Spieth bogeyed the 72nd hole.

But it was the 2nd through 4th – and especially the seemingly innocent 2nd hole – that was Spieth’s undoing this weekend. The hole, a 379 yard par 4, is viewed as a solid birdie opportunity by most of the pros. But after getting a standard birdie and par on Thursday and Friday, he played the hole one over par Saturday and Sunday.

For the week, Spieth lost two strokes to Kokrak on the second hole, exactly the margin by which he lost the tournament.

Spieth came to the second tee Sunday looking as comfortable as it would have been possible to look. Kokrak had bogeyed the par 5 first, setting him two strokes behind his playing partner. But Spieth pulled his 300-yard drive through a fairway bunker into long rough. His approach wedge one-hopped through the green, and he stubbed his recovery shot, leaving it 18 feet short.

When Kokrak made a routine par, he was back within one stroke.

The 483 yard par 4 third – normally the introduction to the Horrible Horseshoe — deepened Spieth’s ennui. Again he pulled his drive into the left rough, leaving a 160-yard approach he had to wrap around a tree. This shot, too, skipped through the green into heavy rough. This time Spieth flew his recovery 25 feet past the hole. Another bogey and a deadlock with Kokrak.

At the 231 yard par 3 third, statistically Colonial’s toughest hole, Spieth again pulled his approach, this time into a greenside bunker. He blasted out inside of five feet, but his par putt rimmed out on the left edge. Kokrak also bogeyed, but when he dropped a 23-foot birdie putt at the closing hole of the real Horrible Horseshoe, the par 4 fifth, he found himself one shot in front.

Much of the rest of the final round was an exercise in frustration for the Fort Worth area native and prohibitive crowd favorite. Spieth birdied the ninth hole to move back into a tie, only to see Kokrak pull ahead again, this time for good, with a birdie at the par 5 11th.

If there was any hole other than the second that turned this tournament, it was the 11th. Kokrak played it in two-under for the week; Spieth got nothing more useful than four pars.

Another birdie at the par four 13th expanded Kokrak’s lead to two, and despite the leader’s bogey at the par 3 16th Spieth never could close the gap. Desperate for a birdie coming to the final hole, Spieth sliced his drive into the right rough, then sent his approach through the green into the pond framing the left side. The issue was over.

In reality, the issue had been settled much earlier, on the 2nd through 4th holes, the modified Horrible Horseshoe. Kokrak played those holes three under par for the week; Spieth only gained one stroke on par over the same stretch.