DATE: Monday, October 13, 1997              TAG: 9710130149

SECTION: SPORTS                  PAGE: C1   EDITION: FINAL 

SOURCE: TOM ROBINSON

DATELINE: WILLIAMSBURG                      LENGTH:   73 lines

FOLKS AT KINGSMILL HAVE LEFT THEMSELVES A TOUGH ACT TO FOLLOW

The people who run the Michelob Championship at Kingsmill have a problem. Maybe they don't know it yet, but it's there, and they'll find that dealing with it won't be the simplest thing in the world.

Their problem is their entire tournament. It was too perfect. And the trouble with near perfection is you need to be too, well, perfect to repeat it.

Think about the weather, sunny and warm and wonderfully autumn. Think about the crowds, the record-setting four-day total of nearly 143,000 fans. Think about the field, featuring half of this year's top 50 money winners. Think about the drama, the three-way playoff won by first-time winner David Duval.

Perfect.

Behind the scenes, who knows? The Michelob people might have been like proverbial ducks, calm on top, paddling like crazy beneath the surface. It didn't show. Practically everything about the course and the tournament turned up golden, captured by CBS cameras, to boot.

Yeah, traffic flow wasn't the best, which was to be expected. And the drunks with the air horn, lounging in the James River, were sort of a pain, deliberately distracting golfers in mid-swing on the 17th green and 18th tee. That wasn't so perfect.

Actually, though, said playoff participant Duffy Waldorf, ``I think I've seen them a lot worse. I think they're worse when it's hotter.''

He could say that again. This whole thing was worse when it was hotter. The perennially stinkin' hot July week in which the tournament was always held, the middling-to-who-cares-field playing for a mediocre purse, was never as much fun as this first October, which brought $1.55 million in prize money and an increased profile.

What used to take your breath away at Kingsmill was the ungodly humidity. What did it this year was the view from the 18th green, the rippling James reflecting the descending sun in a clear, blue sky, the armies of people lining the fairway and sitting on the hill bearing the course logo built out of yellow flowers.

``This is the most people we've ever, ever, ever had,'' gushed tournament director Johnnie Bender, surveying the scene as the leaders came home in regulation. ``We've never had anybody over there by the logo. I said it would be an awesome sight, and it is.''

An awesome sight, an awesome fight. At one point Sunday, five players were tied for the lead at 11-under par. But Fred Funk's consistency, he parred the final 12 holes, couldn't keep him in it. Ditto for defending champion Scott Hoch, whose putter, then his 5-iron on 17, betrayed him.

It was left for Duval to eagle 15 and go up by three, and for him then to bogey 16 as Waldorf and Grant Waite birdied 15 and 16, creating the three-way tie that stood after 72 holes.

It was the 17-year-old tourney's first playoff since 1991. Its first three-way playoff since 1989. And for the TV audience, its first look at a tour playoff in five months.

Waldorf, the leader after each of the first three days, was the first to fold on the playoff hole, the victim of a wild tee shot. Waite was next, leaving his iron to the green well below the elevated pin while Duval nailed his hole-high to 10 feet.

Waite, pursuing only his second tour victory, stayed alive with a putt that stopped inches from the hole. Duval, a 25-year-old Floridian courting his first victory in five years as a pro, did better than that, ending the suspense by drilling his putt to claim a tidy check for $279,000.

``This is for my granddaddy,'' Duval announced to the crowd, choking out the words, ``whose last wish was to see me play on the tour.''

Perfect.

``We're still soaking this in,'' Bender said when it was all done. ``It was over the top.''

Never mind the World Series. A Fall Classic has come and gone. ILLUSTRATION: Color photo

NHAT MEYER/The Virginian-Pilot

Payne Stewart was just one of the big-name Tour players whose

appearance helped draw record crowds to Kingsmill.

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