Paul Lewis: Finchie's 68 has message for Campbell

Losing your mojo is one of the greater tragedies of sport. It can afflict any sport and athlete and it can be a pitiful sight.

That's what makes the 68 shot by the popular Australian golfer Ian Baker-Finch in this week's Crowne Plaza Invitational such a buzz.

It also brings to mind a New Zealand sporting icon - Michael Campbell who, if he hasn't lost his mojo, is giving a very good impression of doing so. Maybe there is hope.

Golf is one of the most visible sports when it comes to dropping your bundle and Baker-Finch, the colourful Aussie who used to be called 'Cooker-Sparrow' by his irreverent compatriots, dropped it more dramatically than most.

There are other examples. Jonah Lomu's brave rugby comeback made it obvious to most he was only a small percentage of his former self.

Former All Black Jerry Collins is still playing but apparently nowhere near the level that made him a feared and respected figure.

There are plenty of examples of cricketers, once graceful with the bat, reduced to shuffling, nicking batsmen; players who made light of the pace and venom of fast bowlers unable to track the ball as well as they used to.

Golf remains the cruellest sport when talent starts to swirl down the sewer with gurgling noises. It's because much of what makes a golfer outstanding, as opposed to the merely good, can be an indefinable, intangible, mental thing; the player believes he or she only needs to play more to tap once again into the stream of whatever it was that made them special.

Remember Seve Ballesteros? An undisputed golfing genius, he was reduced to a hacking, swearing, figure of frustration as he refused to give in to his inadequacies in search of the genius that no longer shone.

Germany's Bernhard Langer had the putting yips so bad that his putter used to jerk around like he had a puppy on a lead.

David Duval - once figured as a rival for Tiger Woods - had such a massive downfall that the only woods he was bothering were the ones his ball flew into.

It was the same with Baker-Finch. He won the 1991 British Open and 14 other leading tournaments besides but it was his biggest win that led to his biggest fall.

The story goes that Baker-Finch held up his claret jug on the flight home to Australia and told his caddy that it was a burden; that it would put a lot of pressure on him.

It did. It was his last big win. He suffered injuries, tried to change his swing and travelled round the world playing; worse and worse.

Sound familiar? Campbell in 2005 won the US Open and the world matchplay championship in the same year but has managed little since. His form has suffered terribly. Lately, there have been injuries - shoulder and back - swing changes and withdrawals.

Campbell's last eight rounds read: 80, 75, 82, 79, 76, 72, 80, 75. He has not finished higher than a tie for 90th in the seven tournaments he has entered this year and has not made a single cut. He has earned the grand total of €7499.99 since November.

Baker-Finch endured a similar - but much longer - sad streak. He gave it away after carding 78 and 84 to miss the cut at the British Open at Royal Lytham in 1995.

He could play just fine for fun, but when the pressure came on, "Finchie" folded. That was it - until he was persuaded by friends who had seen his no-pressure form, to have another go at the Open at Royal Troon in 1997.

He hit 92 in a wind that blew chill and nasty, gusting upwards of 80km/h. Before that, the most tragic sight was Baker-Finch's tee shot at the first hole at St Andrews in the Open of 1995. It was a wild, excruciating, fizzing hook which sent the ball across both the first and the 18th fairways, two of the widest holes in all of golf.

Campbell's exemption - the right he has to enter major tournaments after winning the US Open - will expire in 2010. Now ranked 249th in the world, he will not even be able to play in US tournaments unless he gets into the top 125.

Baker-Finch has a job as a popular CBS golf commentator - and many thought he was mad to abandon the microphone for the tee and yet more embarrassment. That thought was maybe confirmed after he shot a wobbly 78 in the second round and missed the cut at the Colonial course, 22 shots off the lead. So maybe it was a flawed comeback.

But, 12 years after he last raised a competitive club, Baker-Finch's first round showed that he somehow recovered at least a measure of the intangible; the unmeasurable; the uncontrollable.

His 68 came when many golfers in that field shot low scores. Few will have faced the demons he did.

It may be unfair to equate Campbell's struggles with those of the Australian's - yet. But there are enough similarities to hope that, one day soon, Campbell can do the same thing. Consistently.