Louisville, Ky. ? Tom Watson had stood over putts like this pressure-packed three-footer at the Senior PGA Championship for most of his adult life.

Why dawdle?

“I didn’t take much time with the putt,” he said with that famous toothy grin. “I took one practice stroke and figured, ‘Let’s get this over with.”‘

Watson summoned up some of his old major magic, holing the short birdie putt on the first playoff hole to beat David Eger on Sunday.

The 61-year-old Watson, down a shot with four holes left in regulation, became the oldest player to win a major since the senior tour was created in 1980. He also became the second-oldest winner of the Senior PGA, behind only Jock Hutchison, who was 62 in 1947.

“If this is the last tournament I ever win, it’s not a bad one,” Watson said. “I’m kind of on borrowed time out here at 61.”

Watson became the third-oldest winner of a Champions Tour event. The victory came 10 years, 2 days after he won his other Senior PGA Championship at Ridgewood Country Club in 2001.

Watson may be well past his prime, but there have been very few players in history as good at sealing the deal with the outcome teetering on the brink.

Few realize that more than Eger, who worked closely with Watson and the other giants of the game in the 1980s and 1990s as a rules official.