Montgomerie Likes Net Worth of Skins

Colin Montgomerie, struggling for much of the Skins Game, won $415,000 and the title by making two routine pars, including one Sunday for a playoff victory over Fred Couples at Indio.

Playing the skins format for the first time, Montgomerie won the event when he earned $340,000 on the third and final playoff hole at Landmark Golf Club.

Couples, the defending champion and all-time Skins Game money-winner, finally ran out of luck and shots on that hole.

He drove into a fairway bunker, then his second shot bounced off the lip, hit a first-aid cart and landed in a bush. It only got worse. Couples’ third shot bounced into the water in front of the green.

“As Freddie said when we started this event, there is a lot of luck involved,” said Montgomerie, who earned $75,000 the first day of the two-day event. “I didn’t actually play very well. I ended up very fortunate.”

Montgomerie wrapped it up with a rather anticlimactic tap-in on the third playoff hole, the par-five, 563-yard No. 18. Vijay Singh, the runner-up with $260,000, and Sergio Garcia, who earned $200,000, were eliminated on the first playoff hole.

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Aaron Baddeley became only the second player in the 100-year history of the Australian Open to win the tournament one year as an amateur and the next as a pro.

He shot a par-72 to finish at 10-under 278 at Melbourne, giving him a two-stroke victory in only his second tournament as a professional and a winner’s check of $117,000. Last year, at Royal Sydney, the 19-year-old Baddeley became the youngest player to win the Australian Open.