Why did Mickelson layup on the 72nd hole?

The most talked about shot from Phil Mickelson’s round will undoubtedly be the one he didn’t hit — before Bubba Watson even attempted what would ultimately become his winning birdie putt, Mickelson chose to lay up from the rough rather than go for it on the par-5 18th hole.

The lie for Mickelson wasn’t exactly good and ultimately he trusted his wedge more than whatever his ball would have done coming out of the rough from the 227 yards he had to carry to clear the water.

“If I hit a hybrid, the ball would have come out dead,” said Mickelson, who shot a final-round 69. “I couldn’t have made it over the water. But the way my 3‑wood is, the ball would have come out hot and it would have went screaming over. So I didn’t really have a shot to get it on the green. I felt like I had a better chance to make a three from the fairway trying to use that bank and bringing the ball back or flying it in.”

And Mickelson did nearly that, hitting a 64-degree wedge to just a few feet behind the hole from 72 yards out.

Knowing he needed to make the shot, Mickelson even took the extra precaution of scouting the green and having his caddie tend the flag.

“About 10, 12, 14 times a year I ended up hitting the pin with a wedge, and it ricochets all over the place and I didn’t want that to happen,” Mickelson said. “I wanted to fly it in, possibly, or I wanted it to skip past it and maybe bring it back and give it a second chance to go in and the pin would only get in the way of that.”

Mickelson didn’t make the shot, but he was more than pleased with his performance in his PGA TOUR season debut. The runner-up was his best result since finishing second at the Wells Fargo Championship a year ago. Mickelson had three more top-10s the rest of 2010, but he never threatened to win — until Sunday.

“I’ve really missed being in contention,” said Mickelson, who had four birdies on the back nine in the final round. “I’m excited because I can tell that my game’s coming around.

“I think it’s important to try to get a W sometime here in the next few weeks, because I need a little bit of momentum heading into Augusta.”

Without any major changes to his game and with Mickelson and his wife both healthy, Mickelson expects to have the kind of year this year that he expected last season — a big one.

”I’m kind of done making changes in my game and I’m trying to hit shots now,” Mickelson said. “I’m trying to hit draws, hit hooks, hit slices, hit fades, maneuver the ball and see if I can get it close. I’m excited because of that.”