Another Paddy meltdown

• By Randall Mell
• Aug 17, 2009 3:06 AM ET

CHASKA, Minn. – Padraig Harrington is known as having one of the best short games in golf.

Graeme McDowell raved Saturday about how he believed it was Harrington's short game that made him Tiger's most likely rival.

That’s what made Harrington's meltdown at the eighth hole Sunday at the PGA Championship, just a week after a similar meltdown at the WGC-Bridgestone, so shocking.

After knocking his tee shot right and into the water at Hazeltine National's 176-yard par 3, Harrington hit his third shot from the drop zone way left of the green. He then skulled a pitch over the green and back into the water, a similar shot to the one he hit into the water at the 16th hole at the WGC-Bridgestone. After taking another penalty and drop Sunday at Hazeltine, Harrington chunked a chip shot short of the green. With a quintuple-bogey 8, Harrington plummeted from a tie for second to a tie for 11th and never challenged after the miscue.

“I had been changing my chipping action a little,” Harrington said after tying for 10th. “I probably was more into what I was doing, rather than trying to get the ball up and down, and I hit a bad shot. So these things happen.”