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Golf’s Storylines for 2011: Tiger’s Major Rebound, PGA Tour’s Health in the Mix

January 03, 2011   Mick Elliott   No comments

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Back from a short winter nap, the PGA Tour returns to Hawaii this week to start another season, bringing with it an assorted shopping list of questions, needs and challenges.

After play begins Thursday at the Hyundai Tournament of Champions in Kapalua, the new season will drag out for more than 11 full months. If history tells us anything, the long grind will produce new chapters to old stories, fresh faces, surprise winners, disappointing losers, great shots, miserable meltdowns and a fair share of ambivalence.

And when it is finally over, there will be a handful of stories, players and issues that shape the year and impact 2011′s place in golf’s history book.

Here’s 11 for ’11.

1. Tiger Woods — Old news or a new start?

Woods went winless in 2010, the first shutout of his professional career, because of a number of reasons — including bad golf.

The swing can be rebuilt. He’s done it before. The work with new coach Sean Foley, which began in August, should be ready to pay dividends by the time Woods makes his season debut (probably late this month in San Diego).

But can Woods, who turned 35 last week (Dec. 30), again show the mental toughness and confidence that distinguished him on the way to 14 major championships and almost six consecutive years as the world’s No. 1 player?

Woods remains four behind Jack Nicklaus’ all-time record of 18 major championships and the march that once seemed destined now makes for a good debate.

 

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Rickie Fowler Wins Rookie of the Year; Lee Westwood Rants on Twitter

December 07, 2010   Mick Elliott   No comments

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Rickie Fowler did not win on the PGA Tour this year. He did have seven top 10 finishes.

Rory McIlroy had one victory, and five top 10s — two of them, however, runner-up finishes in majors.

Fowler finished 32nd on the PGA Tour money list. McIlroy 36th. Both played in the Ryder Cup — Fowler for the U.S. and Northern Ireland’s McIlroy for Europe.

And on Saturday Fowler was named PGA Tour Rookie of the Year.

You have a problem with that?

A number of people do. Among them world No. 1 Lee Westwood who went off on Twitter. We cleaned up the abbreviations to make it more readable, but even if not, Westwood’s message was clear.

“Sorry 140 letters is not going to be enough for this rant!” he ranted. “Just seen Rickie Fowler has been given rookie of the year! Yes he’s had a good year but Rory McIlroy third in two majors and an absolute demolition of the field at Quail Hollow! Oh yes and on the winning Ryder cup team! Please! Is this yet another case of protectionism by the PGA Tour or are they so desperate to win something! Wouldn’t have something to do with Rory not joining the tour next year?”

 

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Golf Notebook: Fred Couples Cashing In

October 26, 2010   Mick Elliott   No comments

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You know all about Fred Couples.

You recall that he’s a former No. 1 ranked player in the world, winner of 15 PGA Tour events, including a Masters. He’s a two-time Player of the Year, five-time Ryder Cup player and recent Presidents Cup captain.

But this is going to shock you: this year as a Champions Tour rookie Couples has won $2,271,894, the most he’s ever earned in any season as a professional. And you still want to make jokes about “geezer golf?”

Sunday afternoon at The Woodlands outside Houston, Couples won his fourth senior title of the year.

In the Administaff Small Business Classic, he shot a tournament-record, final-round 63 that included a double bogey to finish seven shots in front of runner-up Mark Wiebe. After beginning the day two shots out of the lead, Couples finished with a back-nine 29. Along the way he used only 24 putts.

 

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Monday Movers: Jonathan Byrd Makes History in Las Vegas

October 25, 2010   B.J. George   No comments

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Jonathan ByrdEach week, Monday Movers will look back on the previous week in the golf world to see whose stock is rising and who will likely be heading back to the range.

On the Rise

PGA Fall Series — The final leg of the PGA season goes relatively unnoticed to the casual golf fan, but two of the year’s best finishes have occurred in successive weeks. Last week, Rocco Mediate holed out for eagle on 17 and followed with a birdie on 18 to win the Frys.com Open and secure his PGA exempt status. This week’s finish at the Justin Timberlake Shriners Hospitals Open was even more improbable.

Standing on the tee at the 17 with sunlight nearly gone, Jonathan Byrd, Martin Laird, and Cameron Percy discussed whether they could finish the fourth playoff hole. They agreed to one more, but it turned out to finish quicker than they expected. In the most dramatic of fashions, Byrd, pictured right, stepped up first and aced the 204-yard par 3 for the walk-off win. Not even Vegas could have established odds for the PGA’s first ever hole-in-one on a final shot to win.

 

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Monday Movers: Jonathan Byrd Makes History in Las Vegas

October 25, 2010   B.J. George   No comments

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Jonathan ByrdEach week, Monday Movers will look back on the previous week in the golf world to see whose stock is rising and who will likely be heading back to the range.

On the Rise

PGA Fall Series — The final leg of the PGA season goes relatively unnoticed to the casual golf fan, but two of the year’s best finishes have occurred in successive weeks. Last week, Rocco Mediate holed out for eagle on 17 and followed with a birdie on 18 to win the Frys.com Open and secure his PGA exempt status. This week’s finish at the Justin Timberlake Shriners Hospitals Open was even more improbable.

Standing on the tee at the 17 with sunlight nearly gone, Jonathan Byrd, Martin Laird, and Cameron Percy discussed whether they could finish the fourth playoff hole. They agreed to one more, but it turned out to finish quicker than they expected. In the most dramatic of fashions, Byrd, pictured right, stepped up first and aced the 204-yard par 3 for the walk-off win. Not even Vegas could have established odds for the PGA’s first ever hole-in-one on a final shot to win.

 

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Breaking Down Corey Pavin’s Most Likely Ryder Cup Picks

September 03, 2010   Mick Elliott   No comments

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Flick the lights. It’s last call.

Tuesday in New York, one day after this week’s Deutsche Bank Championship is scheduled to be completed, U.S. Ryder Cup team captain Corey Pavin announces his four at-large picks for the October matches in Wales.

Eight players — Phil Mickelson, Hunter Mahan, Bubba Watson, Steve Stricker, Jim Furyk, Jeff Overton, Dustin Johnson, and Matt Kuchar — already have secured spots on the team off a two-year points system.

Now Pavin gets the chance to put his lasting fingerprints on the team that will be a heavy underdog at Celtic Manor.

Only Mickelson (seven), Mahan (one), Stricker (one) and Furyk (six) have Ryder Cup experience.

“I am excited at the mix of youth, experience, aggressiveness and consistency of these players,” Pavin has said.

But the team’s success will inevitably be determined by Pavin’s four captain’s picks.

 

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Around the Links: Can the Real Player of the Year Please Step Up?

July 26, 2010   Mick Elliott   No comments

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The PGA Tour season is steaming hard toward the home stretch and there’s something noticeably missing. Namely, a player of the year.

With the majors down to only next month’s PGA Championship, the 2010 season is looking very much like an interesting story with no ending.

Phil Mickelson won the Masters and has done little else.

Relatively unknown Graeme McDowell won the U.S. Open and Louis Oosthuizen was an even bigger surprise in the British, but what else have they done?

Ernie Els, Jim Furyk, Justin Rose and Steve Stricker are the season’s only multiple winners, all with two titles — but none of them majors.

 

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Lehman Last Man Standing in Senior PGA

May 30, 2010   Mick Elliott   No comments

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By no fault of his own, Tom Lehman got cheated Sunday.

Don’t worry, he’ll get over it.

After all, Lehman did win the Senior PGA Championship along with a high-rise condo-sized trophy and $360,000 check that goes with it. He shot a final-round 71 — the only player in the field to break par all four days — to finish 7 under at Colorado Golf Club outside Denver and wrapped things up by besting Fred Couples (69) and David Frost (67) on the first playoff hole.

Sounds exciting.

It was — up until the point where it should have really started to get interesting.

Senior golf was looking just like it wants to be seen. The back didn’t ache. There is not a hint of bursitis. No sign of bunions.

The stars had come out.

Then they fell down.

Senior golf is its best when on a first-name basis — and talk about names you know by heart: Along with Lehman, Couples and Frost, the leaderboard had Mark O’Meara and Nick Price.

 

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Tom Lehman Wins Senior PGA Championship in Playoff

May 30, 2010   FanHouse Newswire   No comments

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Tom LehmanPARKER, Colo. (AP) — Tom Lehman won the 71st Senior PGA Championship on Sunday with a par on the first playoff hole, where Fred Couples and David Frost were done in by bad tee shots and double-bogeyed.

After Lehman began the sudden death playoff on No. 18 with a solid shot down the fairway, Couples’ only bad tee shot of the tournament veered left into the shrubs, forcing him to take a drop.

Frost’s tee shot ended up in the left bunker and he pulled his second shot left of the gallery. He cleared out dozens of pine cones in between him and the green before striking his ball, which was nestled in a shrub, across the green.

Frost and Couples finished with 6s before Lehman’s birdie putt from 12 feet came up a quarter roll short. He smiled, tapped it from there, pumped his right fist and cradled the silver trophy.

Lehman’s first individual Champions Tour triumph — he teamed with Bernhard Langer to win the 2009 Liberty Mutual Legends of Golf — was worth $360,000.

Since turning the requisite 50 years old in October, Couples has energized the Champions Tour, winning half of the six events he entered before coming to Colorado, where the thin air favored his strong drives — but not in sudden death.

 

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Tom Tires of Tiger Mania; Couples Back Better Than Ever

April 20, 2010   Mick Elliott   No comments

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This week’s Golf Notebook takes a look back on a week of notes, quotes and golf gossip.

When Tiger Woods committed eight days early for next week’s Quail Hollow Championship in Charlotte, N.C., he — at least for now — honored an earlier pledge to be more cooperative and respectful to the game.

The old Tiger always waited until the final tick of the clock before the 5 PM cutoff on Friday prior to tournament week before confirming his intentions, a power-play that did little to benefit sponsors trying to sell advance tickets.

At least it’s a start toward re-shaping his image. And by most measuring sticks, Woods came out of his return to golf at The Masters, where he finished five shots behind winner Phil Mickelson, in good form.

But no less a critic than hall-of-famer Tom Watson still isn’t sure.

“Tiger is a great player,” Watson said last week during a Champions Tour event in Tampa. “That’s what he is: He’s a great player. But Phil’s victory was special and emotional and real feel-good. It certainly was a counterbalance to the rest of the week with all the Tiger mania that was going on.”

Is that saying Watson has had his fill of Tiger mania?

“Yeah,” he said. “Yeah. It’s a shame to see Woods out on the putting green with I don’t know how many security people around him, 30, 40, 50 security people around the green. That’s not golf. That’s not the way we should project ourselves.”

 

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