Brennan: Dustin Johnson saves USGA from embarrassment with win

OAKMONT, Pa. – Controversy and heartbreak have been Dustin Johnson’s constant companions at the end of so many major championships over the last half dozen years that it was hard to believe what actually happened to him as the sun was setting over the 116th U.S. Open Sunday evening.

This time, Johnson didn’t lose. No, this time, with uncertainty swirling around him, Johnson stormed to such a resounding victory at Oakmont Country Club that even U.S. Golf Association officials who ended up adding a stroke to his scorecard based on an arcane rules violation hours earlier had no impact on the totality of his victory.

Johnson, 31, not only won his first major title, he saved the USGA from what might have been the organization’s most embarrassing moment in memory, if not history – causing Johnson to lose his national championship not on the golf course, but in a small room tucked away in the clubhouse.

As it turned out, Johnson finished with a stunning 190-yard approach shot leading to a three-foot birdie putt on the 18th hole, initially giving him not a precarious one-stroke lead, but a gaping four-stroke margin. So, when the USGA assessed its penalty, Johnson’s scintillating 68 became a 69, and his four-stroke lead turned into three, but it was victory nonetheless.

“I just tried to focus on what I was doing and just playing golf until I got to the house,” Johnson said of the controversy. "That might be one of the best shots I’ve ever hit.”

Six years ago at the end of the PGA Championship, a bizarre rules violation – he grounded his club in a poorly-defined waste bunker – cost Johnson a spot in the playoff for the title. At two other majors, he has shot himself out of contention with remarkably poor play at the worst possible time: losing five strokes to par in the first four holes of the final round at the 2010 U.S. Open, and hitting the ball out of bounds at a key moment of the 2011 British Open.

And then there was last year’s U.S. Open, when Johnson faced an eagle putt to win the tournament on the final hole, only to three-putt to lose to Jordan Spieth by one.

“Obviously, I’ve been here a bunch of times and haven’t quite got it done, but today I did,” he said.

Johnson did it with the steadiest hand as controversy raged on social media, playing even-par golf through it all,  wresting the U.S. Open title away from the uncertainty that gripped it.

This was the situation: Facing a three-foot par putt on the fifth hole Sunday, Johnson grounded his putter to the side of the ball as part of his routine, then started to put his putter behind the ball – not yet touching the ground – when the ball moved ever so slightly backward.

Johnson immediately stopped his routine and called over a USGA rules official who was walking with the group. Johnson told him that he had not caused the ball to move. The official quickly made the determination that Johnson’s assessment of the situation made sense and allowed him to play on without a penalty.

Less than two hours later, however, another rules official approached Johnson on the 12th tee to tell him the USGA was once again looking at what happened on the fifth green. Instead of assessing a penalty at that time, though, the official told Johnson that the USGA wanted to look at the video of what happened on No. 5 with Johnson immediately after the round.

So Johnson would carry that burden with him for the final seven holes, not knowing whether he stood at 5-under at the time, or 4-under. Not knowing whether his lead over Shane Lowry at the time was two strokes or one.

And so it went for the next two hours as Johnson and all the golfers who were chasing him were off and running on one of the strangest finishes in U.S. Open history. A sport that is respected and loved because it’s instantly definitive had devolved into a combination of questions and finger-pointing – turning golf into a hybrid of the goofiest attributes of figure skating, professional wrestling and old-school boxing.

That is, until Johnson decided that his career would no longer be defined by anything other than the strength of his play, and saved the day not just for himself, but for the entire game of golf.

GALLERY: SUNDAY AT THE U.S. OPEN