O’Meara Knows His Lead Isn’t Very Safe

A four-shot lead with 18 holes to play?

Hey, you can count on it, even at La Costa, where mud baths meet herbal wraps and the only thing more certain to set you free than a complete facial is a four-shot lead going into the final round of the Mercedes Championships on the course down the driveway from all the massages.

Or maybe not.

“I realize that golf is kind of a silly game,” Mark O’Meara said.

Now that’s the real certainty, although there was nothing funny about the way O’Meara constructed a third-round 66 Saturday for a 13-under par 203 that leads Nick Faldo by one shot and four others by two.

O’Meara needed only 26 putts to tour La Costa, made four birdie putts of 10 feet or longer and then started worrying about getting chased.

“My concerns are obviously with myself,” O’Meara said. “I can’t coast.”

Faldo is the closest to O’Meara after finishing with a 68 and he vows to follow a game plan: Make birdies.

“I just want to get close to him as quickly as possible,” Faldo said.

It’s the same plan that Corey Pavin, Jim Gallagher Jr., Scott Hoch and Lee Janzen are going to follow. They’re all five shots off O’Meara’s lead.

Pavin picked up three shots in the last eight holes after he learned to read better.

“I knew I’d eventually read a putt right,” Pavin said. “It just took a while.”

He quickly took stock of his situation: Down five shots with 18 holes to play. How do you react?

“It’s not even close to being insurmountable,” he said.

Pavin probably is right. Last year, Steve Elkington was seven shots behind leader John Huston going into the fourth round and still won. Huston shot 77 in a round lowlighted by No. 7 when he putted off the green into a lake.

But there is also the O’Meara La Costa factor to consider. In his five other appearances here, O’Meara made the top 10 each time. Besides that, O’Meara has played the West Coast well enough to win at Pebble Beach four times.

If only he knew why.

“Maybe I’m more eager, maybe I’m more refreshed, maybe it’s a combination,” O’Meara said.

Maybe it’s just a coincidence. Whatever it is, Faldo has to hope he gets closer to O’Meara than last year at the Honda when O’Meara held him off to win.

“That’s good incentive,” Faldo said. “That’s the direction I want.”

*

John Daly finished the third round in less than three hours and would have been done sooner if he didn’t need to wait for someone to replace the tee markers that were missing at No. 15.

Daly is in last place at eight-over par 228. He said he isn’t feeling up to par because of a bad back and a fever.

“I’m going straight to bed,” Daly said after shooting 73.

Daly was feeling bad enough that he considered withdrawing from the Mercedes and may not play next week at Tucson. If he doesn’t, Daly’s West Coast PGA Tour stops would be just one, this one.

“The courses just don’t suit me,” he said. “The way I look at it, I don’t really want to play somewhere I don’t play good. Of course, right now I’m not playing good anywhere.”

Daly apparently feels all right about the West Coast of Australia. He will play in three Australian PGA events beginning Jan. 25-28, in addition to one in Singapore. The others are in Perth, Queensland and Melbourne.