When Jim “Bones” Mackay left the booth (NBC Sports and Golf Channel) to caddie for Justin Thomas in 2021, it was for moments like Sunday’s final round of the PGA Championship.

• Related: Justin Thomas’ winning WITB: 2022 PGA Championship

After Thomas’ disappointing 74 on Saturday, he found himself seven shots back of Mito Pereira. It was Mackay who provided the necessary pep talk to get Thomas refocused on winning the tournament before his Sunday charge.

• Related: Biographer claims this is the shock real reason why Mickelson and caddie Bones split

“I’m fully confident in saying that I wouldn’t be standing here if he didn’t give me that, wasn’t necessarily a speech, but a talk, if you will,” Thomas said. “I just needed to let some steam out. I didn’t need to bring my frustration and anger home with me. I didn’t need to leave the golf course in a negative frame of mind. I just went down, ‘I played pretty well yesterday for shooting 4-over, and I felt like I’d played terrible.’ And he was just like, ‘Dude, you’ve got to be stop being so hard on yourself. You’re in contention every single week we’re playing.”

Bones explained how important it was for Thomas to remain positive and not expect perfection.

Bones continued: “It’s a major championship. You don’t have to be perfect. Just don’t be hard on yourself. Just kind of let stuff happen, and everything is trending in the right direction. So just keep staying positive so that good stuff can happen.”

“I left here in an awesome frame of mind,” Thomas said.

After all was said and done, Golf Channel’s Brandel Chamblee speculated via Twitter whether Mackay may be the greatest caddie of all time.

We love to debate who the greatest player is of all time but seldom debate who the greatest caddie is of all time, but it may well be Bones… easily one of, if not the brightest person in golf. His conversation with Justin last night on the range and on the 72nd tee were gold!!!

— Brandel Chamblee (@chambleebrandel) May 23, 2022

“Bones did an unbelievable job of keeping me in the moment,” Thomas said.

The win with Justin Thomas was Mackay’s sixth major championship victory as a caddie. However, this was the first time he was able to take a trophy with him.

Traditionally, the winning flag goes to the caddie as a trophy and token of appreciation. When Bones was on Mickelson’s bag, he hadn’t had an opportunity to receive one.

Mickelson had a tradition where he gave his winning flag from 18 to his grandfather, a former Pebble Beach caddie. The flags would be hung on his kitchen wall, with Mickelson’s first major flag from the 2004 Masters going there, four months after his death.

According to Alan Shipnuck, as detailed in his new book, “Phil: The Rip-Roaring (and unauthorized) Biography of Golf’s Most Colorful Superstar,” those close to Mackay took that as a sign of disrespect.

“Mackay understood and respected that gesture, but 19 more Tour victories would follow, including four majors and he never got to keep a single flag,” Shipnuck wrote.

“That’s a giant f*** you to a caddie,” Shipnuck quotes a person very close to Mackay. “When Phil wins the Masters, he gets the green jacket, the trophy, the big check, all the glory. He had to take the flags, too? For Phil not to follow the tradition was hugely disrespectful.”

After Mackay and Mickelson split in 2017, Phil finally sent the flags to Bones.

“But Phil autographed them in comically large letters, which Mackay felt disfigured the keepsakes,” Shipnuck reported and noted that Bones never displayed them on the walls of his home.

It seems Mackay is finally going to get to put one of those flags up in his home, and it’s certainly well deserved.

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