U.S. Open leaderboard 2016: Bubba Watson takes a tumble late in 2nd round

OAKMONT, Pa. – Bubba Watson entered the back nine of his Saturday second round at this U.S. Open at 1-under and within striking distance of 4-under leader Dustin Johnson. But Watson fell hard between No. 2 and No. 5, dropping four strokes and falling from the top six of the leaderboard to a tie for 35th, eight shots off the lead.

Watson’s misery started on Oakmont Country Club’s par-4, 337-yard 2nd hole, which he bogeyed after a poor approach shot. He made par on the his next hole, and then Watson came to the 619-yard par-5 4th.

There, Watson blasted a 329-yard drive down the left side of the fairway. So far, so good. But then he needed three shots to reach the green from just 279 yards away, and then he three-putted to make double-bogey 7 on what’s otherwise been playing as the fifth-easiest hole on the golf course.

It was a meltdown hole, the likes of which can’t happen for players with aspirations of winning U.S. Opens.

Watson then bogeyed both No. 5 and No. 6, giving him four over-par holes out of six played on the nine.

Watson is still likely to make a 5-over cut, but he’s effectively taken himself out of contention barring a dramatic run of birdies sometime soon. Given the difficulty of Oakmont’s increasingly dry course layout, that’s a tall order.

Johnson leads by himself, because previous co-leader Gregory Bourdy made double-bogey on No. 18 after flubbing a third-shot chip near the green. Bourdy had tied Johnson at 4-under before dropping two shots.

First-round leader Andrew Landry fell from 4-under to 1-under by shooting a front-nine 39 but rebounded nicely with a back-nine 32 to stay a shot back.

Scott Piercy, Sergio Garcia, Daniel Summerhays, Andy Sullivan, Jim Furyk, Shane Lowry and Zach Johnson are all shooting in the red.