Cook Is Mr. Chips When It Counts in Hope Playoff : Golf: He outlasts four others who are tied after 90 holes, beating Sauers with an eagle.

In an uncommon five-man playoff Sunday at the Bob Hope Chrysler Classic, John Cook stayed alive with one chip shot and won with another on the fourth extra hole.

Cook, Gene Sauers, Tom Kite, Rick Fehr and Mark O’Meara were tied at 24-under-par 336 after 90 holes of the five-day tournament.

The playoff alternated between the first and 18th holes, both par fives. Only Cook and Sauers were in the competition when the 18th hole was visited for the last time.

Cook’s second shot on the fourth extra hole hit the grandstand bordering the green, and he was granted a drop. Then, his chip shot bounced, rolled, hit the pin, hesitated for a moment and dropped into the cup for an eagle.

Sauers, who had matched Cook birdie for birdie for three holes, had a chance to prolong the playoff with an eagle putt of 40 to 45 feet from the fringe. It was short by a few feet.

It was the seventh time in the past 11 years that the Hope winner was determined in a playoff.

And, it was only the fourth playoff in tour history involving five players. Cook, 34, who lives in nearby Rancho Mirage, won at Pebble Beach in 1981. Dave Barr won at Quad Cities the same year, and Fred Couples won at the Kemper Open in 1983 in five-man playoffs.

Cook earned $198,000 Sunday.

He had made a 20- to 25-foot chip for a birdie on the third playoff hole, No. 1. Sauers prolonged the playoff by making a six- to seven-foot putt.

“I wasn’t surprised that the first one (chip shot) went in. It had that look,” Cook said. “But the second one was a fluke. But I’m glad the fluke happened to me.”

Cook seemed in a state of shock as the ball nestled into the cup. And he couldn’t even estimate the distance.

“Call it 75, 80 or 100 feet. I have no idea,” he said.

Sauers has two tour victories that were the result of winning chip shots.

“That was a hard way to lose,” Sauers said. “I played as solid as I have all week on the four playoff holes.”

Cook is no stranger to playoffs, winning three and losing three, including a loss in the Hope tournament to Donnie Hammond in 1986.

“In some other playoffs, I was just happy to be there,” Cook said. “This one I wanted to win bad--badly.”

Cook has been on the tour since 1980, and he said he has been a “very disappointed” player. He had only three victories until Sunday.

As it was, he had to scramble to make the playoff. His second shot on the final hole of the regulation tournament found the water near the 18th green.

“After the ball went in, I said I had to make a par somehow,” he said.

After taking a drop, his nine-iron shot of 135 yards nicked the pin, and he made a four-foot putt to save par on the par-five hole and advance to the playoff.

Kite, who was seemingly out of contention Saturday, six strokes behind fourth-round leader O’Meara, got into the playoff by shooting a nine-under-par 63, tying the course record.

O’Meara was erratic but managed to get into the playoff with a birdie putt at the 18th hole.

The playoff began on the par-five, 538-yard first hole. O’Meara was eliminated after his tee shot hit a tree and he couldn’t make his birdie putt.

Kite, who had had birdied 15, 16 and 17 to get in the playoff, then had a lapse when he pushed three-foot birdie putt to the right. Par wasn’t good enough, so he was eliminated.

Fehr fell by the wayside on the second playoff hole, No. 18, when he missed an eight-foot birdie putt, while Cook and Sauers were making shorter putts for birdies.

So the competition had dwindled to two players, and Cook’s climactic chip shots proved decisive.

It was a disappointing loss for O’Meara, who had lost in a playoff here last year to Corey Pavin, who also had a chip-in for his victory.

“I couldn’t ask for any more than to have a chance, and I had a chance,” O’Meara said. “Last year was tougher to handle than this year. This was a crapshoot, with five guys in a playoff.”

It was definitely a shootout on warm, clear day in the desert.

Cook said that he when he was of the tour for a year and a half following hand surgery, he learned to putt with some help from O’Meara.

But his chips shots were of his own design Sunday--even the one he called a fluke.