Legends are human, too ... I guess

Eulogizing Mickey Mantle, Bob Costas said, "The emotional truths of childhood have a power that transcends objective fact. They stay with us through all the years."

I was reminded of the line Sunday when Tom Watson gagged on an 8-foot putt on the final hole at Turnberry that would have given him his record-tying 6th Open Championship and 9th major championship.

On the Mount Rushmore of Golf from my formative years, Tom Watson would have been Jefferson to Jack Nicklaus's Washington. Nostalgia is a powerful thing and we sentimentalize the legends of our youth, remembering them as mightier, stronger and more formidable than the mere mortals that are our contemporaries.

Jack would never have missed the putt Phil just missed. Staubach would never have thrown the interception Romo just threw. Reggie Jackson would never have struck out in the bottom of the ninth like A-Rod just did.

And so as Tom Watson made his way around Turnberry on Sunday, I did not see him as a man or as a golfer, but as a legend. A legend would never hit it past the flag on 18. A legend would never miss an 8-foot putt to win a major. But he did hit past the flag. And he did gag on the winning putt.

Throughout the tournament, I wondered why all 59-year-olds do not contend in major championships, so straight were Watson's drives, so accurate his irons and so certain his putts. He was making it look easy. The playoff with Stewart Cink reminded me why all 59-year-olds don't contend in majors and why my own golf game doesn't measure up. Watson hooked drives, pushed irons and needed two shots to hack out of very tall grass. Looked familiar. Didn't look very legendary.

So, Watson is now a human being for me more than he was before. It's sad, in a way. I want to believe in heroes, legends, superheroes who don't fail - even though age and experience have shown me that reality usually doesn't measure up to boyhood visions.

But, hey, I've still got Jack ... and Jack would never have missed that putt. Right?