GOLF ROUNDUP : After Bad Start, Mudd Cleans Up Act and Wins $490,000

Jodie Mudd lodged one shot between a photographer’s stomach and his belt, hit another ball out of bounds and still went on to win the biggest payoff in American golf.

“I’m bewildered how I can play a front side like that and win the golf tournament,” Mudd said Sunday after his one-hole playoff victory over Billy Mayfair in the Nabisco Championships at Houston.

“Remarkable,” he said, and shook his head. “There was all kinds of garbage going on.”

Mudd, however, put his various adventures on the front nine out of his mind and birdied the last three holes he played--the 17th and 18th of regulation and the first playoff hole.

“I really didn’t think I had that kind of game,” said Mudd, who had won only three previous titles in a nine-year PGA Tour career.

From a monetary standpoint, this was the biggest of them all. His 15-foot playoff birdie putt secured the first prize of $450,000 and another $40,000 from a yearlong bonus pool.

While Mudd and Mayfair were struggling for the title over the back nine, Greg Norman was simply struggling.

He never really got into it, matched par 71 and finished in a tie for seventh at 279, six strokes out of the playoff.

But it was enough to let him get away with the year’s money-winning title and the Vardon Trophy. Norman won $82,500 from the tournament purse of $2.5 million. He also collected an extra $175,000 from the bonus pool.

It all added up to $1,165,477 and made him the year’s top money-winner. Although the official figures will not be announced until today, Norman appeared certain of acquiring his second consecutive Vardon trophy for the low scoring average.

Wayne Levi, the only four-time winner on the PGA Tour this season, came from a tie for 12th with an eight-under-par 63 in the final round and tied for third at 276.

That was worth $146,250. When all the scores were in, Levi hastily did some arithmetic. He added in $106,000 from the bonus pool and found his total to be $1,024,647, second on the year’s money list and only the fifth man on the American tour to go over $1 million in single-season earnings.

George Archer overcame a four-stroke deficit over the final 10 holes and beat Dale Douglass by one stroke in the $400,000 Rancho Murieta (Calif.) Senior Gold Rush.

Archer, in winning his fourth Senior Tour event this year, finished with a six-under-par 66 for a 54-hole total of 204, a tournament-record 12 under par. He earned $60,000.