Could 2011 have ended any better for golf fans?
All signs point to a thrilling 2012, and beyond, as the stars aligned in spectacular fashion during the latter stages of this season. Here just a few recent developments that signal a looming golden age:
- Tiger Woods regains winning form at the Chevron World Challenge.
- Luke Donald cements No. 1 ranking by topping the U.S. and European money lists.
- Wunderkind Rory McIlroy follows up his U.S. Open triumph with another victory (Hong Kong Open) and six top-sixes in his last eight starts.
- Sergio Garcia claims two titles in his native Spain.
- Young Americans Webb Simpson, Dustin Johnson and Bill Haas dominate the FedEx Cup playoffs.
- Jim Furyk goes 5-0 to pace the U.S. Presidents Cup effort.
Luke Donald aims to keep his No. 1 ranking.
I could go on, but you get the picture. Professional golf is flush with great players in or entering their prime, aging stars with gas left in the tank, and emerging lads with big games and matching personalities.
Never has golf’s international talent pool been this deep or wide. For proof, here’s a breakdown of current standouts by age group:
Young guns (under 30): Rory McIlroy, Dustin Johnson, Jason Day, Alvaro Quiros, Rickie Fowler, Webb Simpson, Martin Kaymer, Charl Schwartzel, Nick Watney, Hunter Mahan, Keegan Bradley, Bill Haas, Ryo Ishikawa, Matteo Manassero
Prime-timers (30-somethings): Tiger Woods, Luke Donald, Sergio Garcia, Lee Westwood, Adam Scott, Matt Kuchar, Graeme McDowell, Justin Rose, Ian Poulter, Bubba Watson, Zach Johnson, Geoff Ogilvy, Aaron Baddeley
Elder statesmen (40-plus): Steve Stricker, Phil Mickelson, Jim Furyk, David Toms, K.J. Choi, Thomas Bjorn, Miguel Angel Jimenez
Getting excited yet? Me too.
Tough stuff
Grrrr... The Ocean Course at Kiawah Island.
Back in the day, Golf Digest’s list of America’s toughest courses was its de facto list of the country’s top courses. When folks stopped equating difficulty with quality, the magazine introduced new criteria – like design balance and shot values – and changed the rankings to America’s best courses.
Now it’s doing both. Golf Digest is out with an updated list of the 75 toughest tracks in America, and it is indeed a Murderers Row.
No. 1 is the Ocean Course at Kiawah Island, and I can vouch for its nastiness firsthand. Unfortunately, I can’t say the same about the remainder of the top five: 2. Pine Valley GC (N.J.) 3. Oakmont CC (Pa.) 4. Spyglass Hill (Calif.) 5. Bethpage Park, Black Course (N.Y.)
Others of note include TPC Sawgrass (7), Pinehurst No. 2 (10), Pebble Beach (14) and Augusta National (31).
Of course, tackling any of these courses is even tougher when you’re paired with one of Golf Digest’s 18 Most Annoying Golf Partners, whose aggravating ranks include our personal No. 1, the Cart Girl Schmoozer.
If the cart girls at these places are as mean as the courses, methinks our buddy would incur a rather harsh penalty.
Tags: Augusta National, Dustin Johnson, Justin Rose, Luke Donald, Pebble Beach, PGA Tour, Phil Mickelson, Rory McIlroy, Sergio Garcia, Tiger Woods, Webb Simpson
Justin Rose was the ultimate driving machine in winning the BMW Championship. Well, at least for one round.
Justin Rose
The Englishman hauled off the hardware on the strength of a first-round 63 in which he hit every fairway while averaging 304 yards per poke. Rose’s driving stats slipped, but his willpower never wavered; he won by two with a gutsy Sunday finish.
Rose and 29 of his PGA Tour brethren now pack their bags for Atlanta and the Tour Championship, where the 2011 FedEx Cup will be decided. Those in position to cash the $10 million winner’s check include Rose, Dustin Johnson, Webb Simpson, Luke Donald and Matt Kuchar.
On with this week’s cheers and jeers…
Golf Claps
Justin Rose: Ah, the sweet smell of success. It has come all too infrequently for Rose, a wondrous talent who won for just the third time in his Tour career with a 13-under total at Chicago’s Cog Hill Golf Club. Clearly the class of a 70-man field, Rose stumbled down the stretch before a chip-in birdie on the 71st hole provided a two-shot cushion.
Rose’s rock-solid par on the tough 18th may be a sign of newfound toughness. For now, the finish puts to rest doubts about Rose’s ability to close out a big tourney.
The Aussies: John Senden and Geoff Ogilvy needed stellar performances just to make the Tour Championship. The Australian pair delivered, placing second and third, respectively, to punch their tickets to Hot-lanta.
Good on ya, mates.
Lexi Thompson: We’d be remiss without a detour to the women’s side, where a girl made history over the weekend. Lexi Thompson, age 16, didn’t just win the Navistar LPGA Classic. She shredded the field by five shots, showing monster talent and a killer instinct that marks her as the golfer Michelle was supposed to be by now.
Of course, Thompson has to become a full-fledged LPGA Tour member before she can set about dominating the game. Golf blogger Stephanie Wei has the details.
Silent Treatment
Dustin Johnson: The defending BMW champ was riding high entering this year’s event, but went off track in a T65 performance. Still Johnson maintained his second-place standing in the FedEx Cup race and stands a good chance of winning it all – provided he can turn things around in a hurry after leading the BMW field in bogeys (23).
Rees Jones: Phil Mickelson’s not the only one who wants to sue the “Open Doctor” for malpractice. Jones’ remodeling of Cog Hill’s revered No. 4 course was panned by the mild-mannered likes of Steve Stricker, who said the owners “need to get their money back” from the veteran architect.
While fans often dismiss players’ course criticisms as mere whining, that’s not the case here. Mickelson, Stricker and others routinely deride Jones’ work for its one-dimensionality, saying his style – marked by over-abundant bunkering and multi-fingered greens -- sucks all strategy from the game.
The operative word being “sucks.”
In all honesty, football has captured a sizeable chunk of our meager attention span. We’re still focused intently on golf, though, as the PGA Tour season slips away faster than Tiger Woods’ world ranking points.
A few topics we’ve been pondering of late:
- Will the FedEx Cup deliver a worthy champion?
- What’s the best golf city in America?
- Which college golf courses pass Golfweek’s ratings test?
Luckily, we’ve already got the answers. Read on to find out for yourself:
Two down, two to go: Who’s the FedEx favorite? Is it current points leader Webb “Don’t Call Me Homer” Simpson? Uber-bomber Dustin Johnson? Steady-as-she-goes Luke Donald or Matt Kuchar?
They’re all in the mix, along with Brandt Snedeker, Jason Day, Nick Watney, even Phil Mickelson and his belly putter. While Tiger Woods is sorely missed, his absence has created quite a scrum for the title. And say this for the much-maligned Cup: It’s brought the cream to the top.
The race to the finish starts Thursday at Cog Hill GC outside Chicago, where 70 players will compete to advance to the final 30 and the Tour Championship. Based on the list of contenders, the Cup should indeed produce a champ to be proud of.
Dallas-Ft. Worth tops Golf Digest rankings: Great, just what DFW needed – another reason to puff out its chest.
Golf Digest recently surveyed America’s metro areas and determined that Dallas-Ft. Worth beats all comers for outstanding public golf. Criteria included climate as well as the cost and quality of public golf, and while DFW didn’t rank higher than seventh in any category, it scored well in all of them.
More surprising were some of the cities ranked right behind the Big D. For example, Pittsburgh and Cincinnati held down spot Nos. 2 and 3, and Tampa (T4 with Los Angeles) bested golf hotbed Orlando, which tied with Seattle – yes, Seattle -- for No. 6.
Having lived in Seattle pre-Chambers Bay, we can vouch for its public-golf bona fides. What we can’t understand, though, is the Emerald City’s ranking of No. 6 for climate. Was the survey conducted by rain frogs?
These college courses have class: While we’re on the subject of course rankings, Golfweek just published its list of the country’s top 30 college tracks. And the winner is… the Course at Yale, designed by the iconic pair of Charles Blair Macdonald and Seth Raynor.
The rundown features a nice blend of old and new. Behind Yale (circa 1926) comes Taconic GC in Williamstown, Mass., a 1927 gem that serves as the home course of Williams College. A pair of underclassmen follow: The Rawls Course at Texas Tech (2003) and Palouse Ridge GC (2008), headquarters for the Washington State golf teams.
Like any reputable course ranking, Golfweek’s is a who’s-who of architects. Alister MacKenzie, Donald Ross, William S. Flynn, Robert Trent Jones Sr., Pete Dye, Tom Fazio Tom Doak and Bill Coore/Ben Crenshaw are among the honorees.
With the FedEx Cup playoffs on hiatus this week, we considered taking a breather, too. Hey, if there’s one thing more taxing than playing golf for a living, it’s writing about it.
David Law
Yeah, not really. Besides, there’s still plenty of golf goings-on to discuss, such as:
Scottish amateur lays down the Law
How’s this for an in-your-face response: Snubbed for a spot on the Great Britain & Ireland Walker Cup team, David Law went out and won last week’s Northern Open. A professional tournament.
Law, who must watch GB&I take on the United States from the sidelines of the very links where he won the 2009 Scottish boys championship, posted a four-round total of -14 to become the first amateur to win the event in 40 years.
For good measure, he took the high road afterward. “The timing of this is more important to other people,” he said, “than it is to me.”
Law is actually the first alternate for GB&I should one of its 10 players become incapacitated. Could make for a real Hollywood ending.
New Bjorn identity
From 1996-2006, Thomas Bjorn was a mainstay on the European golf scene. The burly Dane earned a pair of Ryder Cup berths, regularly contended in major championships, and never finished worse than 21st on the European Tour money list.
Over the next three years, Bjorn’s scores soared and his world ranking plummeted – all the way to 250th by the end of 2009. His swing and passion seemed to vanish overnight.
Bjorn began showing signs of renewal in 2010, when he won the Portuguese Open, then returned to genuine prominence by claiming the Qatar Masters in June of this year. His back-to-back victories at the Johnnie Walker Championship and Omega European Masters completed Bjorn’s rousing comeback story at age 40.
Yet more proof that golf is, despite appearances to the contrary, a forgiving game.
A couple more takes on golf’s hot topics:
- Mickelson adds sports psychologist to team: Julie Elion joins Phil’s phalanx of on-call gurus, featuring Dave Pelz (short game), Dave Stockton (putting), Butch Harmon (full swing) and Sean Cochran (fitness). Next thing you know, Mickelson’s hair stylist will be joining him at Tour stops.
- Faldo says Tiger won’t catch Nicklaus: Sir Nick claims Tiger is too distracted to win four more majors. And we thought his shredded knee, shattered ego, dozens of young challengers and re-re-reconstructed swing were the big obstacles.
Who’s the fresh-faced fellow winning another golf tournament every time you turn around?
Webb Simpson
That’s Webb Simpson, an emerging young talent on the PGA Tour. (Not a drone from sector 7G.)
Simpson, eh?
Yep, Webb Simpson claimed his second victory in three weeks by outlasting a stellar cast at the Deutsche Bank Championship. The guy’s developing an appetite for trophies to rival Homer Simpson’s (no relation) taste for donuts.
Simpson’s recurring theme is one of several that keep popping up week after week. (See: Els, Ernie; putter, long.) Herewith, our Golf Clap winners and Silent Treatment losers from the Deutsche Bank:
Golf Claps
- Webb Simpson: More like thunderous applause for the genteel North Carolinian. With a final-round 65, Simpson zipped past the likes of Luke Donald, Jason Day and Adam Scott, then took out Chez Reavie in a playoff at TPC Boston. Simpson is now the unlikely leader of the FedEx Cup race heading into the final two events.
As for the gratuitous Simpsons reference each time Webb wins… Get used to it. It’s all the excuse we need to flog our all-time favorite show.
- Ernie Els: Once again, the Big Easy was staring at FedEx Cup elimination. Once again, he survived to play another week, his 72nd-hole birdie securing spot No. 68 in the 70-man BMW Championship two weeks hence. If he keeps living on the edge, Els’ nickname may get revoked.
- The long putter: Simpson’s wand of choice added another feather to its cap; four of the past five Tour winners have wielded extra-long putters. This week, ever-experimenting Phil Mickleson joined the belly brigade en route to a 10th-place tie – and proving that you really never know what Phil will do next.
- Thomas Bjorn: A shout-out across the pond to the 40-year-old Dane, who won for the second week in a row on the European Tour. Considering he’d all but disappeared a few years back, you might say Thomas has been Bjorn again.
Silent treatment
- Bubba Watson: The big lefty spit the bit on Monday, stumbling to a 74 after leading through three rounds. A two-time winner in 2011, Watson made seven bogeys before redeeming himself with an eagle on the last. He wasn’t alone among faltering leaders. Scott started hot, then staggered home with a par-free 37 on the final nine.
- Nick Watney: No one sank further than Watney, whose 11 on the par-5 second hole was the centerpiece of a closing 80 – and a 49-spot tumble down the board. That’s gotta hoit.
First, let’s get this week’s Tiger-related headlines out of the way:
- “Couples picks Woods for Presidents Cup squad”
- “Tiger to tee it up at Frys.com Open”
- “Mediate rips Woods’ former, current coaches”
- “Haney hammers Mediate: ‘Absurd’”
- “Woods may not qualify for own tournament”
- “Tiger still searching for full-time caddie"
Whew! Did we miss anything?
Michelle Wie
No matter, that’s all the time were spending on El Tigre today. Other topics are top of mind, including an even more controversial pick for a U.S. team, eye-opening comments from women’s golf’s former queen about its would-be ruler, and Lefty’s flirtation with – you guessed it – the belly putter.
Onward!
Walker Cup choice a head-scratcher
You may remember John Peterson as the over-enthusiastic collegian who, after finishing second to fellow amateur Harris English in a summer Nationwide Tour event, claimed that “the top guys in college, the top 20 or 30 guys, can beat the top 20, 30 guys on the PGA Tour.”
Now Peterson has a new claim to fame – he’s the golfer who was inexplicably stiffed by America’s Walker Cup selection committee. (FYI -- The Walker Cup pits 10 top U.S. ams against their counterparts from Great Britain and Ireland.)
The snub is simply shocking, given Peterson’s current ranking as the world’s No. 7 amateur. He also won the individual title at this year’s NCAA Championship and, yes, outplayed every pro in that Nationwide tourney.
No one is saying for sure why Peterson was passed over in favor of Blayne Barber, a fine but far less accomplished player. But the lesson may be that if you want to stay on the good side of golf’s high-and-mighty, it’s best to keep your mouth shut.
Sorenstam’s remarks a Wie bit off base
Speaking of, well, speaking out of turn, Annika Sorenstam recently chastised Michelle Wie for prioritizing her education – her Stanford education, at that. “I think her focus, in my opinion, should be more on golf,” Sorenstam said redundantly.
Our take: Let’s applaud Wie for pursuing not only her degree, but all the knowledge that comes with it. It’s refreshing to see a young person who treats college as something more than an inconvenient stepping stone to a professional career (athletic or otherwise).
By the way, Wie finished second last weekend at the Canadian Women’s Open. If only she’d studied a little less…
Our two cents on a few more topics:
- Keegan Bradley tosses first pitch at Sox-Yankees game: His goal – throw it at least as far as his 71st-hole birdie putt at the PGA.
- Rory McIlroy opens with 65 in Switzerland: The wrist is fine. Any questions?
- Phil Mickelson tries belly putter in Deutsche Bank practice round: His set makeup – four drivers, six wedges, three putters and a rescue club.
Have the rest of you noticed how far the ball is going these days? It’s no longer just with the driver but every club in the bag. I think even putters are being used from 100 yards out.
Sure distances have been creeping up over the years. But the last few years have wrought extraordinary damage to the game as we know it. We all recognize that some of this new found machismo is the result of better conditioned athletes. But most of it can be attributed to new technologies.
The PGA Championship 2011
Were you watching the recent 2011 version of the PGA Championship? Did you happen to notice the course was over 7400 yards AND was only a Par 70? I wager this is nearly 1000 yards longer than the courses most of us play while also being 2 strokes less than the typical Par 72’s. Did you happen to watch Phil Mickelson play a 450 yard Par 4 by hitting 5 iron and 5 iron? That’s right! He hit 5 iron off the tee of a 450 yard hole. Ridiculous.
There was a time when the professional game had some relation to the game the rest of us play. We might have hit a 7 iron 150 yards and the pros would do the same with an eight. Now they hit a sand wedge 150 yards while we maybe hit an eight. The average golfer can no longer relate in any way to the game the pros are playing.
How long will it be before more storied courses such as Pebble Beach, Spyglass Hill, Shinnecock Hills, etc are no longer considered suitable for tournament play because they do not have the room to lengthen them to keep up with today’s technology? What about the great golf course in your own area that has become outdated only because of their inability to add length?
Caddies Agree
I just finished watching the David Feherty show and his guests were caddies “Fluff” Cowan and Jim
“Bones” Mackay. Fluff is a lifelong caddie having carried for Peter Jacobsen, Tiger Woods and now Jim Furyk. Mackay has been on Phil Mickelson’s bag for Phil’s entire career. Both of these legendary caddies took note of their players being 3 – 5 clubs longer since they began their careers as caddies.
It is time to de-tune the equipment. We need to keep the professional game relevant to the amateur game. We need to stop the demise of the classic courses that have been sacrificed to modern technology before it is too late. Hitting 5 iron – 5 iron to a 450 yard hole benefits no one and in fact only serves to drive the proverbial wedge between the pros and the rest of the game.
Pat Bradley’s nephew, Keegan, claimed the 93rd PGA Championship Sunday with a stirring playoff victory at Atlanta Athletic Club.
Who’s Pat Bradley, you ask?
An LPGA Hall-of-Famer who won six majors and 31 tournaments from 1976-1995. But enough about her.
Sunday was all about Keegan, author of a remarkable comeback after a triple-bogey on the 15th hole. The lanky rookie from Vermont outlasted Jason Dufner to become just the second player since Francis Ouimet in 1913 to win a major on his first try.
When the name Francis Ouimet is invoked, you’re talking serious history.
Like Ouimet’s U.S. Open victory over Harry Vardon and Ted Ray, Bradley’s was big for the U.S. of A., snapping a six-major drought for Americans.
Before we get to this week’s Golf Claps and Silent Treatment, a quick look at how our darkhorse picks fared. The verdict: meh. While four of five made the cut, none finished better than T56 (Ricky Barnes). Hey, there’s a reason they were darkhorses.
On with the awards…
Golf Claps
- Keegan Bradley: Can you say “baby-faced assassin”? Bradley’s chances appeared to drown when he skulled a chip into the water on par-3 15th. But he rebounded with birdies on the next two holes, made a gutsy par on 18, then bettered Dufner by a shot in the three-hole playoff. Bravo, Mr. Bradley.
- Jason Dufner: Having missed four consecutive cuts and being, well, Jason Dufner, the 34-year-old journeyman was farther under the radar than a burrowing mole. But Dufner’s unerring driver and cucumber-cool demeanor served him well until back-to-back-to-back bogeys dropped him into a playoff. Still, golf gained a new appreciation for this tobacco-chewing, college-football-loving everyman from Auburn. War Eagle, indeed.
- The long putter: It pains us to say, but the darn thing done good. Again. A week after delivering a win for Steve Williams, er, Adam Scott, the long putter was a flat-out weapon for Bradley, whose birdie bomb on the 71st hole will live forever in highlights.
- Atlanta Athletic Club: Abused by players and pundits for its penal, strategy-killing design, the course got the last laugh by producing Sunday’s high drama. That wasn’t enough, though, to keep us from giving it the…
Silent Treatment
- Atlanta Athletic Club: With fairways and greens hemmed in by water and sand, the course gave golfers two options for each shot – straight and straighter. The antithesis of strategic golf and worthy of the scorn it received from Phil Mickelson, among others.
- Tiger Woods: Actually, Woods gave galleries a lot to cheer about in the form of eight birdies. Unfortunately, he nixed those with five double-bogeys and exited after rounds of 77-73. See ya next year, Tiger.
- Rory McIlroy: He gets more of an under-the-breath ouch than stone silence, but it’s hard to imagine what the U.S. Open champ was thinking Thursday when he took a full whack at his ball against a tree root. Since the resulting wrist strain prevented McIlroy from contending, let’s hope young Rory isn’t in for a career full of injurious setbacks like a certain someone else we know…
Golf may lack a dominant player at the moment, but the favorites for this week’s PGA Championship are pretty obvious. Take the world top 10, add sexy picks like Bubba Watson and Rickie Fowler, toss in Tiger Woods and Phil Mickelson and voila – a solid batch of down-the-middle selections.
We’ll go the less traveled route, veering off the beaten path to find a handful of darkhorses to win the season’s final major. Here are five guys who might surprise at Atlanta Athletic Club starting Thursday:
- Zach Johnson: Not the darkest of horses, mind you. But the diminutive Iowan flies only one way – below the radar – making him a perennial darkhorse in our eyes. Why this week? For starters, Johnson enters on good form (T16 or better in his last three events) and claimed top-10 finishes in the last two PGA’s. Plus, three of his seven career wins have come in the state of Georgia, including two in Hot-lanta itself.
- Ricky Barnes: All he does is play well in majors (and other tournaments on tough courses). His recent performances offer little promise, and his swing hasn’t held up so great under the gun. Still, we like him to sneak into the top 10 by week’s end.
- Stewart Cink: Let’s see, Cink has no momentum to speak of, missed the cut at this year’s Masters and U.S. Open, and placed a distant T59 when the PGA was held at the AAC in 2001. Nope, we’re banking on the hometown vibe and Cink’s history of solid play in the majors to carry him into contention.
- Y.E. Yang: The 2009 PGA champion is a bulldog, the kind of grinder who can survive the AAC’s length (7,467 yards at par 70) and sweltering ATL heat. He’s had a solid if hardly spectacular year, highlighted by a T3 at the U.S. Open and four top-10’s in 13 events.
- Steve Williams: Easily the most accomplished player in the field with 145 career wins, Williams is coming off a week he called the best of his life – a resounding four-shot victory at the WGC-Bridgestone Invitational. Despite all that – and his four career PGA titles – no one is picking Williams. Sounds like a classic darkhorse to us.
What’s that? Williams is just a caddie? But he said... Oh, nevermind. Guess we’ll have to look elsewhere for our final pick. How about:
- Davis Love III: Another former PGA winner, DLIII has enjoyed a resurgence in 2011. His T11 at the U.S. Open and T9 at the British bode well for his chances in Atlanta, where he contended in 2001 before fading with a final-round 77.
Callaway Golf announced the limited release of the Odyssey pro type 82 putter, inspired by the putter Phil Mickelson used to win the 2010 Masters. The pro type 82 features a sleek, blade-like design with a single sight-line running from the face to the back of the flange, as well as Odyssey’s latest insert technology, White Ice. Less than 3000 putters are available through authorized Callaway retailers in the United States; international locations likewise have limited quantities.
“It’s great to get feedback from our Tour Professionals, in this case Phil Mickelson, and turn that direct input into products for our consumers, with our latest inserts,” said Austie Rollinson, Principal Designer for Odyssey. “From a consumer standpoint, there is always demand for the putter designs that Tour Pros use and we are constantly speaking with golfers to see what they are most interested in. We’re thrilled to deliver these pro type replica models to the golfing public.”
Along with the sight line, the PT 82 Putter boasts a milled tungsten insert, which has been placed behind the face to ensure precise weight and feel. The putter is cast out of stainless steel with a PVD finish. It also features a PT pistol grip.
The new pt 82 putter is available now at a retail price of $349.
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