With late stumble, Johnson falls back into tie for third in Memphis

Dustin Johnson let a good round get away on Friday at the FedEx St. Jude Classic.

Through 16 holes, Johnson was 4 under on the round and alone in second place behind 36-hole leader Daniel Berger. Then Johnson found the greenside bunker with his approach into No. 17, leading to a bogey. On the finishing hole at TPC Southwind, Johnson again couldn’t find the green with his approach, this time three-putting from 7 feet to end with a crushing double-bogey 6.

What could have been a 66 that meant a date in the final pairing turned into a 1-under 69 that has Johnson tied for third at 5-under 135 with Brooks Koepka and Phil Mickelson.

“It’s kind of like yesterday, just I played a lot better than my score,” Johnson said. “I was playing pretty well. I mean making bogey and double on last two holes from the middle of the fairway is not a very good finish. Just bad swings.”

And that’s all it really comes down to this weekend. Johnson has to minimize mistakes, either tactical or technical.

Another good example? Johnson made bogey on the par-4 10th when he pumped his drive too far down the hole, finding a fairway-adjacent water hazard in trying to cut off too much of the dogleg. An iron would have been a fine play, but Johnson hit the fairway wood longer than he expected. Some more sound counsel from his brother-slash-caddie, Austin, can fix that. But brother can’t stop him from making bad scores from benign situations.

“I mean you’re going to make some bogeys out here,” he said. “But from the fairway you shouldn’t be making bogeys.”

Ryan Ballengee is a Yahoo Sports contributor. Find him on Facebook and Twitter.

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