According to laser technology, the putt traveled 48 feet. Maybe 50.

According to my sense of direction, the putt forced the change to 480 stories. Maybe 5,000.

Yes, sir. As Adam Scott stood over that improbable putt on the third playoff hole at Sunday’s EDS Byron Nelson Championship, the leads had pretty much been put in motion by media folks who gravitate to the easy clichés.

Pretty much, the consensus was going to be: “Adam Scott, a brilliant talent of just 27 years, failed once again to finish the job and continued to under-achieve yesterday when he squandered a lead and eventually lost in a playoff to Ryan Moore.”

Forget that there are serious flaws in that argument, it was going to be the direction in which some observers went — at least until that putt somehow, someway found the bottom of the hole and made Scott a stunning winner. “Drats,” so many of the typists must have shouted (at least, that’s the edited version) when they realized they had to change “Scott loses” to “Scott wins.”

One byproduct of Tiger Woods’ incomparable success has been the tendency for some to question the mettle of all those competitors who somehow aren’t consistently stepping up to halt the man’s dominance. It would make sense to credit the uncanny superiority of Woods, but it’s easier for some just to point fingers and throw out blanket statements of ridicule.

At one time or another, Davis Love, Ernie Els, Phil Mickelson, Vijay Singh, David Duval, Stuart Appleby, and Colin Montgomerie have all been accused of not standing up to Woods. Now, it is fashionable to direct that criticism toward the 26-to-30 year-olds, names like Charles Howell, Sean O’Hair, Luke Donald, Aaron Baddeley, Paul Casey, Justin Rose, Ian Poulter, Sergio Garcia, and Scott.

Now, some valid points are delivered. Howell, O’Hair, Donald, and Baddeley probably should have more than the two PGA Tour wins they each have; Casey, Rose, and Poulter have yet to win; and Garcia is certainly an intriguing study. But Scott? Please.

To initiate any sort of talk that he is an under-achiever is gross carelessness. There seems to be a school of thought that he cannot “finish the job,” which strikes me as strange because he has now held a 54-hole lead seven times on the PGA Tour and he’s gone on to win five of those events. From where I sit, that’s a pretty good percentage, as is the fact that his scoring average in those seven final rounds is 69.57.

Furthermore, Scott has now teed it up in 115 PGA Tour events and he’s won seven times.

(As a clarification, let me say that the PGA Tour credits him with six wins, ignoring the 2005 Nissan Open because it went just 36 holes. They say it’s “unofficial,” I say, “rubbish.” Scott was presented the winner’s check for $864,000 and so far as I know, it was “official” money. He wasn’t paid in Monopoly paper. The trophy was “official” crystal, not some sort of plastic figurine. Everyone knew that rain-plagued event was going to lucky to even go 36 holes and when Scott teed it up in the playoff against Chad Campbell, the pressure was as real as if they had played 90 holes, so phooey to those PGA Tour semantics. You get official money, you get an official win in my record book. Now, let’s return to the discussion at hand.)

Scott’s 7-for-115 batting average compares handsomely against what some other illustrious names have done in a similar time frame. For instance: Phil Mickelson won 11 times in his first 115 starts (including once as an amateur), Ernie Els seven times, Garcia six, Retief Goosen six, Vijay Singh five, Justin Leonard four, Jim Furyk twice, and Davis Love just once.

What about Tiger Woods, you ask? Ah, there’s the rub. In his first 115 PGA Tour starts as a pro, the behemoth chalked up 30 victories. He dwarfs the competition, of course, and nothing has changed. Good for him, but bad for his colleagues, because they catch flak for being mere mortals, not immortal.

Brush to the side everything related to Woods — his 30 wins in his first 115 starts, his 13 majors, his career winning percentage of .289 — and don’t use any of it as a benchmark for what others have done or are doing. If you do so, I submit that Scott is doing some impressive stuff. He’s got at least one win in each of his six seasons; his stash includes a Players Championship and a Tour Championship; over his last 63 tournaments he’s missed just five cuts; he owns 14 wins worldwide, including this year’s Qatar Masters in which he closed with a blistering 61 on a day when the next-best score was 65.

Pretty stout, but if there is a disconcerting slice to Scott it is this: His efforts in the major championships have lacked punch. Oh, he’s made the cut in 14 of his last 15 starts, but even with three top 10s in that period, he truly hasn’t contended. There have been 28 major starts without a win, but again, that’s not out of the ordinary. Singh won the first of his three majors in his 27th start, Mickelson the first of his three in his 47th, Greg Norman didn’t prevail until his 27th try, Love in his 39th, Jose Maria Olazabal his 30th, and Jim Furyk his 32nd.

Scott will not shy away from his major efforts. He knows greatness is judged by such standards. But he also knows that he’s 27 and rare are the players who win major championship at the age. Rarer still is a man named Woods, so the fair thing to do is to not hold Scott up to his standards.

“I certainly don’t think I’ve overachieved,” said Scott earlier this year at the WGC-CA Championship. “But I haven’t done too badly. I think expectations obviously have been set high since Tiger succeeded so young and there’s a lot more expected out of young players who make it out here. It’s simply not as easy as Tiger made it look.”

If in 10 years we’re still talking about a resume that doesn’t include a major championship, then feel free to re-visit the issue, but for now, discard any talk of Scott being an underachiever. Worry not for the personable young Aussie with the polished demeanor and brilliant game. He’s got a career in motion that is to be admired, not ridiculed, so if you’ve questions about where Scott is at, may I suggest you direct them instead toward the precocious Garcia, now 28 and in his ninth PGA Tour season.

Now there’s a perplexing case study for you. Winless anywhere in the world since 2005, he’s also missed the cut in four of his last five starts in the majors and there’s good reason to think he’s still an emotional wreck over the British Open title that cruelly slipped from his grasp last July. Yes, he should have won, but the fact that he handled that playoff defeat with an immaturity in line with his rookie youthfulness and not his veteran status shows you how far he hasn’t come.

It’s a sad sign when a player in his 20s switches to the belly putter out of desperation and an even sadder sign when he appears to be drained of the work ethic that is required to maintain a world-class talent. His short game in disrepair and his attitude a perfect match, Garcia needs to re-focus, because the “underachiever” whispers are buzzing around him, too.

Only unlike Scott, they might just stick to him if he doesn’t fix things in a hurry.