[Dr Winston O Boogie jr]

I've been around a lot of tour players in my life and I have to say that Phil Mickelson is one of the nicest people that I've ever met.

That being said, as a golfer, he's just dumb. Sorry, but there is no other way to put it. He makes many bad decisions on the golf course. Some of them work out in his favor and some of them don't. Looking at Phil's record and realizing that he played through the prime of the Tiger Woods era, it's truly remarkable. If not for Tiger he would have been the best player in the world in many years.

But if had made better decisions on the golf course his record would have been even better and would have included at least one US Open and possibly a few more.

The final hole at Winged Foot in 2006 was the worst decision making I have ever witnessed on a golf course. He made some pretty dumb plays on 16 and 17 as well, but there were several bad choices on the 18th. First was the driver off the tee. The most important thing on that hole was to get the ball on the fairway. A 3 wood or long iron would have been the correct play. Then one he got lucky and got a great bounce off the hospitality tent, he got even dumber in trying to play a shot to the green through a tree. Phil has one of the best short games in history and needs to learn to depend on it more. The play should have been to punch something low up in front of the green again, getting it on some short grass. From there he would have had a very good chance of getting it up and down for a win. At worst, he would have made bogey and tied.

An example of a dumb shot that worked out was the one from behind the tree on the thirteenth hole of The Masters. He pulled off the shot and made birdie, But he would have had an excellent chance to make birdie if he has punched it out down the fairway to a good number. Again, although he has a truly great short game, he didn't trust it. The shot worked out but if it hadn't it could have been a disaster.

He made some bad decisions on the final few holes at Pinehurst as well. but they didn't stand out like Winged Foot and Augusta.

And these are just the shots that we know about because they came a crucial times in majors. He's made many dumb shots in early rounds of other tournaments to shoot himself out of contention early.

Like I said, Phil is one of the nicest and most talented guys on tour but he needs to make better decisions.