Taylor is suited for bigger, better things

It's one thing to win a PGA Tour event. It's another thing to win it so well, the biggest thing you have to worry about is not losing it.

Augusta's Vaughn Taylor passed the ultimate tour test of strength on Sunday.

Taylor didn't just defend his previously lone PGA Tour title at the Reno-Tahoe Open. He didn't just shatter every tournament scoring record in the seven-year-old event. He didn't just go wire-to-wire.

It's one other thing Taylor didn't do that will resonate most for the rest of his professional career.

Taylor didn't give in to the demons that can make holding a six-shot lead seem like clearing Lake Tahoe in a single bound.

As foiled chaser Jesper Parnevik put so succinctly Saturday night, "He has to do something bad."

Taylor did something good instead. When the pressure mounted, Taylor stayed within himself and avoided the bad stuff. He made as many pars Sunday (16) as he had made in the previous two rounds combined, and he dared anyone to go low enough to catch him.

They couldn't.

Taylor felt the pinch quickly Sunday. Six holes into the round, his six-shot cushion had already been trimmed to an uncomfortable three by a field that was going low. But the 29-year-old from Hephzibah and Augusta State didn't panic or let doubt overwhelm him. On the par-5 ninth he made up for his only bogey with his only birdie. All it took was parring home.

That would seem simple, considering how Taylor was

cruising through three rounds. He had more kick-in birdies than he's ever remembered. He had more birdies in the first three rounds (24) than he'd ever had in any full tournament.

That's when everything naturally got much harder.

"I never felt like it was mine," Taylor said. "You never know what's going to happen. I'm glad it's over."

A veteran winner such as Parnevik - who started the final round in third place seven strokes back - knows how tough to is to sleep on a lead and how much tougher it is to wake up and hold it. His first victory in Sweden started with a seven-shot lead in the final round.

"I couldn't sleep all night and it felt like I won the tournament and the only thing I can do is mess up really badly," Parnevik said of his experience. "That's pretty much the only two options I had."

As much as you want to block those thoughts out and do all of the same things that took you to such a commanding advantage in the first place, it's impossible not to imagine the potential of "messing up really badly."

It happens to the best. World No. 6 Sergio Garcia coughed up a six-stroke lead in this year's Wachovia Championship in Charlotte and eventually lost in a playoff. Justin Leonard, a 10-time winner including a British Open, spit up seven of his eight-shot lead and needed a nerve-wracking bogey at the last to escape with victory at the FedEx St. Jude Classic in Memphis.

Sometimes a big lead is the worst thing a golfer has to deal with. Ask Greg Norman.

"When you get a huge lead all of a sudden, sometimes you start to play a little bit safer and all of a sudden you let some guys catch up," Parnevik said.

Taylor played safe enough that nobody could catch him. He is now a two-time winner on tour - one more than fellow Augustan Charles Howell and halfway to Larry Mize's career total. Some might quibble that winning an opposite event lacking any of the top 50-ranked players in the world is like the winning the NIT.

Let them quibble.

Winning anywhere on the PGA Tour is an accomplishment - period. Cynics ought to take a good look at the names Taylor beat - eight major winners, two other WGC winners, dozens of PGA Tour champions and proven veterans. It would have been nice to see some of the other players who believe they're too good to play in Reno show up and make it look as easy as Taylor made it look.

It's not. Taylor knows that. He's the first person to ever return to Reno to defend his title, and he made it count.

"My goal is to play in the Masters next year," he said. "This was huge."

If Taylor can stay out of his own way and play the kind of golf he's again proven himself capable of, his future is bright. The top-40 money list invitation to his hometown Masters Tournament is within reach (he's currently 45th).

"I'm trying to take it as it comes," Taylor said Saturday, before his second win was in the books. "But sometimes you can't help look ahead a little bit."

Reach Scott Michaux at (706) 823-3219 or scott.michaux@augustachronicle.com.