Weekend Wrap

There's a major storm brewing her i n the Wasatch for my grand send-off, though it looks like just rain for the time being....

Day Dominates - When last we visited, I had these pearls of wisdom for you:

• No weatherman required to see that Jordan, Zach and Patrick were on their games;
• Zach has the easiest path forward;
• Watch out for Kooch coming up on the outside;
• Jason Day will be better off losing Saturday morning.

I know, it's just a gift....And for The masters I like....I know, avert your gaze.

Steve DoMeglio with the arc of Day's last few weeks:

AUSTIN — Two weeks ago Jason Day’s game was AWOL. Then last week he won the

Arnold Palmer Invitational.

On Wednesday his back was out of whack and his future was in doubt. Then on Saturday he became No. 1 in the world. 

And on Easter Sunday, he won his second consecutive tournament, capturing the World Golf Championships-Dell Match Championship at Austin Country Club. Day first defeated No. 3 and defending champion Rory McIlroy in a heavyweight tussle Sunday morning in the semifinals, 1 up, and then beat down Louis Oosthuizen in the final, 5 and 4. 

Now he’s a big favorite to win the Masters in two weeks.

I don't know about you folks, but I tend to tune out when people speak of "big favorites" in our sport, because you know how that typically turns out.  But this was a dominating performance demonstrating the full range of skills necessary to win at the highest level.  And he doesn't intend to back off:

"... I can’t get complacent with how I’m playing right now. ... I am looking forward to (the Masters). It’s one tournament that I’ve always wanted to win. It’s one tournament that I’ve always wanted to put the jacket on and go back every year. So the motivation and the want is there.

"I think the biggest thing to me is to get the rest and recovery. Take the first part of this week off, go down (to Augusta) Thursday, start prepping Friday and go through that whole stage of getting ready for the tournament."

Fair enough, though I'd let Colin or others deal with the luggage before April 7th.  Our friendly Confidentialistas took on the issue of whether Day is the best in the world, and here's a couple of sample responses:

Alan Shipnuck: We need the Masters to help sort it out. Day has clearly been the best player over the last eight months, but it's not fair to discount what Spieth did the first half of last year. Of course, Day did blow him away on Sunday at Whistling Straits. If they tussle again at the Masters the victor is the undisputed heavyweight champ. Failing that, we need to let this season play out and then make the call.

Cameron Morfit: I've got to go with Day right now, given what I saw at the Dell. He seems to have more self-belief than the other two guys, and self-belief is so huge. He seems to have total trust in his short game, which sees him through the good and bad ball-striking days. And when he's on he's going to beat most of the field in strokes-gained tee to green. It's a potent combination.

He's certainly the hottest player on the planet.... and since he's indisputably one of the 2-3 most talented players in the world, and thus on a hot streak will look unbeatable.

Will the hot streak continue for two more weeks?  Why would you ask me, I'm the guy that told you to keep an eye on Kooch.

The TC panel unfortunately lumps the venue and format into one up or down question, and predictably the guys are all over the place:

Shipnuck: The course is great for match play and on TV and had a much livelier atmosphere than that track Finchem found in the wilds of Tucson. It's great to see so much more golf in with the pool but the first day has been rendered mostly meaningless and by Friday more than a third of the field were lame ducks. Most damning is that the win-or-go-home urgency has been lost. So, put the old format back in play but keep the event in Austin and it's a home run.

Ritter: Didn't enjoy seeing all those halved matches on Wednesday-Sunday. Can we at least go to sudden death and get a winner each day? The new format has watered down the event, and I miss the old blood-and-guts, single-elimination setup. Agree that Austin CC was a worthy venue, especially that driveable par-4 13th, where bombers banked it off the grandstands (or found the lake) while others laid up. Perfect hole for this event.

I'm going to go with unqualified praise for the venue.... Pete Dye just screams match play, and the tributes to Harvey Penick were quite the bonus.  Most of the talk was about the driveable-but-not-holdable 13th, but I enjoyed watching the boys figure out the short finishing hole as well.

The format is a hole 'nother can of worms, which I'll now dwell too long on.  Instinct is the compare this to March Madness, but our game is far fickler..... No doubt Wednesday intensity has lessened, but Thursday and Friday benefit thereby....  And in a large sense it's all moot, because this was the compromise necessary to land the el primo sponsor.

In addition to awe at Day's performance (and remember that I was in Scotland during the PGA, so only absorbed that through second-hand smoke), I found Rory and Jordan's weekends to be quite curious.  Rory remains capable of inspiring Day-like awe, but equally capable of missing far too many four-footers to win.  

There's a surprising lack of ink spilled on Jordan's bizarre Saturday match against King Louis... no doubt you heard his post-match interview to the effect that he showed up on the range and was hitting weak fades.  WTF Jordan, that's kinda weird at this level....

You Ko, Girl - Speaking of top players rounding into form before the first major of the season:

CARLSBAD, Calif. (AP) -- Lydia Ko won the Kia Classic on Sunday at Aviara, reaffirming her position as the top player in the world heading into the first major championship of the season.

Ko birdied the final three holes for her third straight 5-under 67 and a four-stroke victory over second-ranked Inbee Park.

"I just kind of peeked at the leaderboard and saw Inbee was making a lot of birdies - Inbee doing her Inbee things," Ko said. "I knew that I needed to focus up until the last moment and fortunately I made some birdies down the stretch." 

A week after finishing second in Phoenix in the Founders Cup, the 18-year-old New Zealander headed to Rancho Mirage for the ANA Inspiration with her first LPGA Tour victory of the year and 11th overall. She also won the Ladies European Tour's New Zealand Women's Open in February.

I'm not overly optimistic about her chances at the Dinah Shore Kraft Nabisco ANA Inspiration, as it's a long golf course for the ladies.  And our Lydia is still a growing girl...

Say It Ain't So, Joe - It looks like we won't have Nurse Ratched to kick around much longer:

AUSTIN, Texas -- PGA Tour commissioner Tim Finchem said Sunday he will likely step 

down by the end of 2016 after announcing that his contract has been renewed for an extra year through June 1, 2017.

Jay Monahan, who was named deputy commissioner in 2014, is expected to take over, pending approval by the PGA Tour's policy board.

"For every organization there is a time,'' said Finchem, 68, who began his tenure in 1994 and is just the third commissioner in the PGA Tour's history. "I could probably go on another five or six years. But I don't think that is best for the organization. I don't consider myself old. But I'm getting old.''

Excuse me, I need a moment to go curl up in the corner with my blankie.... 

This is so sudden and I haven't even begun to consider a nom de blog for the Monahan fellow...

Life can be so cruel.  Not sure if he's throwing me a bone here:

"The only remaining thing, candidly, when we named him two years ago was relationships, honestly, because relationships take a while to transfer,” Finchem said of Monahan’s professional development upon being named deputy commissioner. “So we've been working hard on that for a couple of years. You all know Jay. Making a relationship is a slam dunk for him.”

He needs a minimum of a few years to work on those relationships....

Note To Readers - Don't expect to see much of me until the end of the week.  Not only is there that storm for me to chase, but it's time to close down things here in Park City.  I fly home Thursday and have much to jam into lockers and suitcases, so I'll recharge the blogging batteries and be back in full snark mode to guide you through the Masters.

Sweet Sixteen

I watched it all yesterday, from Phil's Phlop to Patton's Kizzire Under the Elm.... Yeah, been waiting to use that and, reader alert, I've got more.

Let's lead with Shack's take on Group play:

Finding a perfect match play format for the WGC event appears to be an ongoing saga

with another tweak needed, but it's the imperfection of the event that in so many ways makes it such a joy.

For instance, I watched a good portion of the Bill Haas-Adam Scott match Friday either via PGA Tour Live or with my eyeballs from the 7th green on, and the battle was quite captivating. The body language, the strategic decisions, the constant lead changes, the talent of the combatants and the desire of both to win made for great viewing. And then after the match, we learned both wished the quality of play was sharper, yet as a fan I was never bored because of the passionate head-to-head battle. 

And mercifully Haas won, otherwise they would have waited at least 90 minutes to play-off the match due to a strange decision to make finished matches wait for their 19th hole instead of doing what they've done in previous WGC's: head right to the #1 tee no matter who was there.

I'd be extremely interested in knowing Geoff's thoughts on how to tweak the format, other than that bit in the last 'graph with which I heartily agree.  With all the talk of the players needing to adjust for this week's format (Smylie, we're talking about you), perhaps the announcers need a tutorial as well.

Admittedly they got off to a rocky start on Wednesday... Have you seen that series of graphics to explain the complex format?  You know, the one with 64 heads to explicate the number of players, because the number "64" isn't adequately demonstrative...So they go through that on Wednesday and in all their chatter it's not until the first match reaches the final match reaches the last hole that they manage to inform of a rather significant format change, to wit, that they will not play each match to a winner.

It's the only change from the prior year, yet they're too busy trying to explain match play or the profound strategy behind putt concessions to convey actual information.  As anyone with a two-digit IQ can intuit, the guy watching Wednesday coverage probably is familiar with the profound complexity of the format.  And then they really pissed me off when they removed the aforementioned graphic while I was still counting heads....

Yesterday's commentary suffered from a related affliction, the television equivalent of a speaker that feels the need to read every word off a background graphic.  The concept that a win is one point and a halve is....I'm sorry, what would that be?  The math is canine level, the far more difficult part of the process is to remember who's in each group and where the other match in the group stands... and there they had nothing to help us.  And yes, I remember that it's the points in the right-hand column that matter....

OK, but about the golf?  Jim McCabe captures the wackiness of the event:

You think it’s nuts that nine guys who went 2-1 have been eliminated, but two guys who went 1-0-2 are still alive? 

You find it curious that the world No. 1, Jordan Spieth, goes 3-0 and has to play the formidable Louis Oosthuizen, also 3-0, in Saturday’s Round of 16, while guys ranked 47th (Ryan Moore) and 65th (Patton Kizzire) have a game of similar stature? 

You shake your head at a guy, Brooks Koepka, who gets whipped, 4 and 3, by Danny Willett, but advances, while a guy who makes five birdies and plays 19 bogey-free holes against Rory McIlroy is sent packing? 

There’s probably more, and more, and more, but yet there is always this: It’s not only match-play golf, it’s round-robin, match-play golf, so forget the inequities and accept the WGC-Dell Match Play at Austin Country Club for what it has been for three days.

Jim, that's a feature, not a bug.... Look, maybe you're new to this golf thing, but eighteen holes between top-ranked players, even No. 1 vs. No. 64 in the old format, is a virtual crap-shoot.  In fact he's so busy looking for anomalies, that he's buried the lede, the amazing extent to which form held.  Obviously the Big Three all survived Group play, but half the top seeds did, which I'd guess is something of a high-water mark.

Sean Martin captures the disparity in the Big Three's experiences in group play:

Jordan Spieth, Jason Day and Rory McIlroy will enter the single-elimination Round of

16 without a loss on their record. They may be undefeated, but they’ve also had very different experiences during the Match Play’s first three days. 

Spieth was dominant in his return to his college town. Day’s opening rounds were defined by physical maladies, and not just his own. McIlroy had to overcome a back-nine deficit in each of his three matches.

Rory and Jason are quite lucky to be alive, though for obviously different reasons.  Rory is still looking for his game, whereas Day is obviously fragile.  If I'm Jason's agent/caddie/mother, I think I'm hoping that he loses the Snedeker this morning.  There's just too much golf to be played in the next two days for those that advance... In fact, i can feel a twinge in my lower back just typing about how much golf they have to play.

In the "You Don't Need a Weatherman" mode, it's pretty obvious that Jordan, Patrick and Zach are the three guys most in control of their golf balls and making everything.  These are not the longest of hitters, but are guys that can think their way around a course and can hole some putts.  I'm gonna go with Zach at this point, mostly because of the draw.  Jordan and Patrick will play this afternoon if they both win, and Rory smells like he's ripe for a fall.

I also like Kooch from that bottom half of the draw, though your mileage may vary.

Alex Myers takes a crack at the format with this non-starter:

I think the Match Play is on the right track (love round-robin play and that the groups are determined during a live selection show), but it needs to go one step farther to get even better. Have two players advance from each group. That will lesson the amount of meaningless matches and also give each player a chance to find his rhythm before the knockout stage. It might make for a tougher sell to players by adding a potential extra match (maybe there's a way to give certain group winners a bye?), but it would improve the overall product.

Why don't we just have all 64 players advance?  Really, the one thing you can't fit in is another round of golf....The guys that make it to Sunday afternoon will play seven rounds...

Udder Stuff - Shack beat me to this obvious riposte:

I guess what is said at the Champions Dinner doesn’t always stay at the Champions Dinner.

 Only fair since the subject is his item at The Loop:

“As he said to me at Augusta, ‘I’m confused.’ He said to me, ‘I have sleep deprivation. I only sleep three hours a night.’ So these things have a lot to do with it. Nothing to do with his body.” 

Player evidently learned this after speaking to Woods during the 2015 Masters Champions Dinner. 

“If he never had a lesson after he’d won the U.S. Open by 15 shots, Player told Cowherd, “I believe he’d have won 22 majors. Twenty two!” 

Woods has said he will attend this year’s Champions Dinner. Here’s guessing he’ll be avoiding Gary Player!

Here's the video:

Tiger always appreciates unsolicited suggestions.....

Click Repellant - According to the authoritative wordhippo.com, there is no word that functions as the opposite of clickbait, though this header seems to qualify:

Masters: 6 Ways to Make the Masters Even Better in the Coming Years

I know, keep your damn hands off my Masters, but give it a read, as it's actually an amusing take on Masters traditions.  For instance, this upgrade:

"Pimento cheese sandwiches are everywhere in the South, so I like the notion of giving the Masters' version its own identity," Devillier says. "With the pimento cheese, you have creamy, fatty sharpness, like a sharp cheddar. My idea is to add a nice salty ham to balance out that flavor, and to finish it with chowchow [a pickled relish], another Southern tradition, to bring in that sweet-and-sour component. And of course, I'll keep it on white bread." 

The ham he recommends is a domestic version of aged Spanish serrano, made by Edwards Virginia Ham Shoppe, in Surrey, Va., but any good-quality salt-cured Southern ham will do. Devillier's chowchow is made with cabbage, green tomatoes, onions, mustard seeds, vinegar and sugar. "It's cooked down to a loose relish," he says. "It's not soppy, so it will stand up for a long time on the course and not bleed into the bread."

 You'd still have to waterboard me to get me to swallow, but this does at least look better:

As you're no doubt aware, your humble blogger was born with a dominant insufferable purist gene, which might lead you to conclude that I'd recoil in horror at changing anything about the Masters.  But you'd be wrong.....

I don't feel particularly strongly about it, but I'd do away with Butler Cabin in a heartbeat.  That awkward awards ceremony is painful, but doesn't mercifully affect what comes previously.

But the one place that the powers that be should be taken to the woodshed (Note to self: Possible repurposing of Butler Cabin), is their nineteenth century limitations on the broadcasts.  It's amazing how many people don't realize it, but while they limit commercials and otherwise provide for the viewer, they proscribe blimp coverage and on-course reporters.  

I typically use the Bubba miracle shot in the playoff a few years back as an example, where at the time he hit the shot the viewer had no information as to distance and line.  It was only in the aftermath that we got a sense of how far he drew that gap wedge.  Think a blimp shot might have looked cool?  

Think they'll allow the effective wind graphic that NBC has been using these last few weeks?  Might separate anemometers on the 11th green and 12th tee might be cool?  Don't go there, as if it didn't exist in Bobby Jones' day, it wouldn't be prudent....

So, I can live with the boxy green jacket and Queen Anne chairs in Butler Cabin, just give us a damn blimp!

Day Two And Other Loose Ends

Giving myslef a day off from skiing, so let's do this:

Day 2 - Huh? -  There must be something in that Austin water supply, 'cause things got weird.  First the Mickelson-Daniel Berger match, as per the header:

Daniel Berger whiffs, loses to Phil Mickelson, and gets hurt in one odd sequence

I beg to differ.... He most certainly did not whiff, as he made solid contact....with the rock, that is.   Video is here....

"I don’t even know what happened,” Berger said after. “I thought I had a full swing. I was shocked I hit the rock coming down and the club came out of my hand."

“Hopefully, I’m alright and I can play tomorrow,” added Berger, who fell to 0-2 for the week. 

Mickelson, whose record went to 2-0, will definitely be playing on Friday. The five-time major champ has a showdown with Patrick Reed, with the winner advancing to the round of 16. What will Phil -- or his opponent -- do next? We'll have to wait until his 2 p.m. tee time.

 After the strange denouement, the two were quite palsy-walsy, despite this from earlier in the match.  I do hope Suzann Pettersen was taking notes.... You don't have to concede anything and you can still be friendly, you just can't you know, not concede the putt from the next tee.

But that Phil-Patrick match should be one of Friday's high points.  Have your popcorn ready...

Strange item the second... Submitted for your approval, is one Jason Day.  Last seen writhing in pain at the conclusion of his fist round match, he warmed up unsure of whether he would play.  But a moment before we get to the point of the matter, we've all heard of Jason's increasingly close relationship with that Woods fellow... see if this answer couldn't have come from the man himself:

Q. Describe the way you feel right now.

JASON DAY: It's not too bad. Yesterday it was definitely sore. I had a pull. It's a disk, when it gets inflamed the facet joints lock up, and then everything kind of goes into spasm and I can't really move. And it's really difficult to play golf.

I did a lot of therapy yesterday and made sure I did protocals every hour and felt pretty good. I felt pretty good last night. And came out today not really knowing if I was going to play or not. I warmed up very nicely on the range and decided to give it a shot. And I stretched pretty much on every hole. 

Q. Jason, yesterday when we saw you after your victory on 16, you didn't know if you were going to play today. You not only played, you have blown Thongchai Jaidee off the map, what was it, an eagle and five or six birdies?

JASON DAY: Yeah, I didn't really know if I was going to obviously play today. It was kind of up in the air how I felt. It's the same old things that usually happens to me when my back locks up like that, the facet joints, everything gets inflamed, the facet joints lock up and I can't really swing. I got some good therapy last night. And then doing my protocols every hour and slept pretty good. I woke up and I'm on a Dose Pack right now, which is the steroid to try to get the inflammation out. A little pain, but for the most part pretty good. I came out during the first hole and that was pretty good there.

But Jason, did your glutes activate?  Have you had enough reps to get back your golf feels...It's Tiger Mad-Lib day here at Unplayable Lies...

So Jason goes about his warm-up routine, waiting to see how his back feels before committing to play....  And who can blame him, as it's an awkward situation.  The Masters starts in two weeks and if you make it deep into the Match Play you'll be required to play an unconscionable amount of golf....

So, golfer with gimpy back steps to the first tee and takes an iron and steers one into the fairway.... yeah, right!  This guys has only one gear:

Back woes are not foreign to golf. Stars like Seve Ballesteros, Fred Couples and, most recently, Tiger Woods have suffered from them, as have many an amateur player. Jason Day has fallen into this unfortunate category, noticeably aggravating his bulging disc during Wednesday's WGC-Dell Match Play. 

However, unlike the rest of his bad-back brethren, Day, playing in pain, was able to nuke a 381-yard drive on his first hole of the day:

Beware the injured golfer indeed, as he made the eagle putt and rolled Thongchai Jaidee, 5 and 3. 

For our third bit of strangeness, I can't find any coverage....  But Smylie Kaufman put his ball in the hazard on the Par-3 17th and shook hands rather than trying to, you know, halve the match.  Rory had a difficult bunker shot so I'll try to recreate the post-round interview:

Roger Maltbie:  Smylie, tell me about the decision to concede.  You didn't want to try to chip in and Hope Rory couldn't get up-and-down? 

Smylie:  Oh?

Well, as long as he carefully considered his options at that point.... Smylie Kaufman, not just another pretty face.

No doubt many are disappointed that the one match out of the 96 matches in pool play that had everyone salivating Monday night has lost a bit of its luster, though welcome to the vagaries of match play.  Though clearly Jordan gets it:

Spieth is undefeated so far but will play against his close friend Justin Thomas in a match that means just a bit more than bragging rights. Though Thomas (0-2) has already been eliminated, Spieth is guaranteed at least a head-to-head playoff regardless of the outcome. To advance, all he needs is to tie Thomas. 

“But even if he’s out of it, he’ll still want to beat me,” Spieth said. “That’s kind of who we are. As much as I just want to halve the match and stay in tomorrow and practice, I don’t think he’s going to want that to be the case. I’m going to have to bring my A game.”

True that.  And props to the Tour social media guys for digging this photo from circa 2007 out:

Whatever became of those cute kids?

Today should provide peak intensity.... I hope the winds plays its part.

Masters Stuff - To your himble blogger, this is truly the best time of year, as it's all in front of us.  Nothing more so than that annual get together in Georgia....

Because they can?  David Own continues his Masters Countdown with this question:

Masters Countdown: Why does Augusta National have two head pros?

Here per David are the original requirements for the job as per Bobby Jones:

The club’s original pro was Ed Dudley, who was Bobby Jones’s first choice for the job. 

Dudley's shop at the 1940 Masters, with Lloyd Mangrum (r).

(His second and third choices were Macdonald Smith and Willie MacFarlane.) Jones explained his criteria to Clifford Roberts, the club's co-founder and chairman, before the two of them approached Dudley: “First of all I want a gentleman. Next, I feel we should select a pro who likes to teach. And, finally, I believe we want someone who is a good player.”

A fourth requirement was that the new pro be willing to work without a salary, since there was no money to pay him. Dudley at first had to get by on what he could earn from lessons and his minimally stocked golf shop -- a tough proposition, considering how few golfers played the course in the early years.

No doubt that fourth item will surprise folks, but this was Depression-era America.   There are few rules on this blog, but one is that you read everything of David Owen to which I link, as he'll inform or amuse you, and sometimes both.

I just purchased his history of The Masters which will await me when I arrive home.  Hope there's time to get through it before April 7th, though I suspect that means that the Donald Ross documentary will remain cellophane-encased.

Another thing that surprises folks is the claustrophobic nature of the ANGC clubhouse.  It was, after all, built as a private home... You'll enjoy this slideshow from inside the building:

Also known as Bobby Jones’s attic, the Crow’s Nest at Augusta National is a top-floor bunkhouse with five beds and a sitting area. Traditionally, it houses amateurs during the tournament.

Does anyone recognize any of these names?

But this from Jake Nichols is just bizarre:

Why Chris DiMarco’s 2005 Loss to Tiger Woods Was the Biggest Masters Heartbreak Ever

OK, before I reject it out-of-hand, explain yourself:

A narrow loss at the Masters might be the most painful experience in professional golf. 

And it might sting the most for Chris DiMarco. In 2005, he erased a three-shot final-round deficit against Tiger Woods (a two-time winner already that season) and took him to a playoff while beating the field average by more than 18 strokes over four rounds. In fact, it took Tiger's miracle chip on the 16th hole in the final round to match DiMarco in regulation. DiMarco turned in the sixth-best Masters performance by anyone since 1970, but it wasn't enough. He fell to Woods on the first playoff hole.

OK, now I see your point, Jake, and agree that it was the greatest Masters heartbreak ever, at least for members of the DiMarco family.  For the rest of us, it doesn't make the top ten.

What Jake doesn't note is that Tiger's 16th hole chip-in gave him a two-shot lead, and then he proceeded to butcher the last two to let Chris back in it.

Masters heartbreak?  I start with Craig Wood who had the second installment of the Augusta Invitation won, before that Sarazan guy hit arguably the most famous shot in golf history.

DiMarco did have an ability to play Tiger tough, but he really wasn't that good of a player that his failure to win a Masters or major even qualifies.  No doubt the proper list would have to start with Greg Norman, but I'd add Ernie Els (who played Phil so tough in '04), Weiskopf and Miller from that great '75 Masters, Ken Venturi who was victimized by Arnie's embedded ball and The King himself from '61.

And a list of Masters heartbreak that omits Roberto?  Get real!

Thursday Thoughts

Sorry for the blogging hiatus yesterday, but we had 11" of the white stuff over the last two days and your humble blogger had a new pair of skis to point down the hill.... and it was pretty great.

So, where were we?

Dateline: Austin - I watched a couple of hours of the golf, and liked what I saw of ACC.  A driveable Par-4 (almost) for a finisher is a cool idea, especially in match play.  The local hero had a nice day:

Navigating the windy, undulating Texas Hill Country course he frequently played during

his year and a half at the University of Texas, Spieth heard plenty of ''Hook'em Horns!'' cheers and high-fived a toddler in the home crowd excited to the see the 22-year-old return to familiar ground. 

''It's fantastic,'' Spieth said about his return to his college town. ''I'm in love with Austin. It's maybe my favorite city in the world.''

He looked very much in control all day, though he of course was the only guy in the field that had seen the joint before Monday.  In fact, all of the Big-3 won, though huge question marks attach to the other two.  Day channeled his Inner Tiger:

Jason Day was cruising along at 3-up over Graeme McDowell when he informed caddie Colin Swatton on the 15th tee that something was wrong. 

“He grabbed his back and said, ‘Oh, I just tweaked it,’” Swatton said outside the clubhouse after Day limped in to an impressive 3-up win in the WGC-Dell Match Play Championship. 

Day dropped his driver upon finishing an aggressive 16th tee swing, leaving Swatton to pick the club up as the world No. 2 clutched his lower back in obvious pain. Day, who won last week's Arnold Palmer Invitational, gingerly strode down the fairway before attempting to walk down a steep, 12-foot deep bunker face. He avoided further injury and carded a match-ending par.

He was lucky to close the match out early and get to the physio...Kudos to Graeme MCdowell for not only conceding a short putt, but also picking up Day's golf ball for him.  

As for the final member of the triumvirate, he got some unexpected help from his opponent:

Yet through 13 holes, Olesen was in line to pull off the upset of the day: McIlroy, 2 down at the time, was struggling with approach shots in the Texas wind. 

But McIlroy battled back with consecutive birdies on the 14th and 15th to erase the deficit. Both men parred the next two holes, sending the match to the 18th.

It was here that Olesen, one of the better short-game players in Europe, hit a shot usually foreign to the pros: 

The dreaded shank.

I do hope Rory said shank you. 

The most interesting story of the day might have happened off-camera, as per this Shack post:

Even better, the match play already had more energy on day one than it's seen any day when played at previous venues. On Friday with the Spieth-Thomas match late and the forecast good, it should be downright sizzling! 

But the tournament operators, PGA Tour's Championship Management, adore saving a few bucks for their sponsor by not allowing the public on grounds for practice rounds. As longtime readers know, I feel this deprives aspiring players and dreamers the chance for more informal encounters with their golfing heroes.

It also deprives shuttle drivers, volunteers, security, planners and other important operational folks a chance for a casual dry run-through. A practice round, if you will.

Yeah, I agree with Geoff on both points, as I enjoy practice rounds far more than competition rounds for the reasons he describes, as well as the fact that one can't follow the progress of the tourney on-site.  But a practice round with spectators makes all the sense in the world for a new venue, and you'd think the Tour would be smart enough to require it, especially here where the early rounds are so important.

Dateline: St. Louis - My feelings on Olympic Golf are be now well-known to you, as showcasing our came with a dreadfully dull format will result in a lost opportunity.  And you know who apparently agrees with me?  Al Lambert, that's who.....of course, Al is no longer with us:

The only known Olympic gold medal in golf.

In 1900, the Paris games had two golf competitions: a 36-hole stroke-play event for men and a nine-hole event for women. A grand total of 22 players from the United States, France, Great Britain and Greece competed. Americans Charles Sands and Margaret Abbott won their respective events. 

There was also a third event in Paris, played with handicaps. It didn't count as an official Olympic event, but St. Louis businessman Al Lambert won it. Lambert, founder of Listerine-maker Lambert Pharmacal Co., was overseas on a business visit to his company's Paris office. Lambert returned to the United States and told his story to father-in-law Colonel George McGrew, who was founder and president of Glen Echo Country Club in St. Louis. In Fall 1902, McGrew announced he intended to host a world championship at his club, one of the finest 18-hole facilities in the U.S. at the time, in 1904. 

In 1903, St. Louis landed the Olympics. McGrew decided to turn his world championship idea into the Olympic golf tournament.

1904 was even better:

The team contest started the program, with three, 10-player teams competing over 36 holes. However, Day 1 didn't count toward the Olympic contest. Rather, it was a money match. The Trans-Mississippi Golf Association team bested the Western Golf Association and the United States Golf Association teams to win the day's Nassau.

A team Nassau....way cool.  But that's not even the best part:

Right after the end of the team competition, Glen Echo hosted a driving contest in front of the club, adjacent to the 18th green. There's some conflict as to whether or not it was a long-drive contest.

Lyon, who was a cricket star before taking up golf when prodded why he didn't play a "man's sport", made it all the way to the final, meeting up with Egan, who, at barely 21 years old, was the star of the week.

Yanno, Long Drive would make a good Olympic event, maybe even better than real golf.  But note how more then a century ago they instinctively knew how to make the event fun, whereas today's honchos provide a soul-numbing 72-holes stroke play event.

Dateline: Never-Never Land -  Not gonna ever happen, but people won't let it go:

TIGER WOODS has been told he only needs to pick up the phone and the man who 

The couple in a more innocent time.

made him the greatest player in golf is willing to help get him back into the game.

Butch Harmon first took Woods under his wing in 1993 when the young prodigy was only 17 years old and over the next nine years moulded him into the greatest force the sport has even known, winning eight Majors in five years - two more than Woods has managed in the 14 years since the pair split, somewhat acrimoniously, after a disappointing US PGA tournament in 2002. 

Since then the pair have returned to nodding terms and have regularly passed each other on the driving ranges of the world tour.

If there's a man that made Tiger the greatest, his name was Earl, taking nothing away from Butch's contribution.  It's worth a read for Butch's thoughts on Tiger and the game, but that's a dime that will stay lodged in Tiger's pocket.... He doesn't go back, just ask Fluff or Stevie.

Dateline: Kissimmee, Fl - I don't which is odder, the underlying story or that fact that the Mackenzie Tour, d/b/a The PGA Tour-Canada, holds its Q-School in Florida.  I know, it's a six week season up there, but still...

Anyway, here's the story:

The scorecard shows what the Tour's Twitter account bemusedly referred to as "the ol' quintuple bogey-albatross here at Q-School." Johnston recorded an 8 on a par-3 and then immediately followed it with an albatross on the next hole. If nothing else, this amateur clearly has mettle. In the end, he battled back and ended Tuesday tied for 13th. His play was a bit more even-keeled on Wednesday, but he's currently tied for 27th. There may be something to the wild rollercoaster style of golf.

Yeah, not so much....He was still 2-over for the two holes, and that can't help.  here's his rainbow coalition front-nine scorecard:

No word on how a professional makes an eight on a Par-3...

Dateline: Harrison, NY - More specific GPS coordinates would lead to your humble blogger's personal mancave, for this auction item that Shack calls "dreamy":

It was discarded by Augusta National many decades ago, but was (thankfully) saved by an Augusta, Georgia resident. That original owner didn't understand its value to the collecting community until he briefly posted it on eBay six years ago. That auction sent collectors into a flurry (and we would know, we immediately heard about it and had every intention of buying it), but the sign was quickly pulled from auction and quietly sold to a collector that made a substantial offer. Though we missed out on this historic sign in 2010, we are overwhelmed with the opportunity of finally offering it for public auction.

Not hard to visualize how that would spruce up mt own personal ecosystem.... But back here on Planet Earth, the item is currently at $17, 261.00 at Green Jacket Auctions, so I'll leave it for better-endowed readers....

Dateline: Pinehurst, NC - It's the fifth birthday of the dramatic restoration of Pinehurst No. 2, and Lee Pace was lucky enough to walk the course with Bill Coore.  Here are a couple of interesting excerpts from his piece:

Slipping beneath the radar, though, was the 5-year anniversary of the course’s reopening on March 3. The restoration project was never about adjusting Donald Ross’s No. 2 course for the U.S. Open. The purpose simply was to restore the width and bounciness of the fairways and remove the “bermuda creep” of four decades and return the perimeters of the holes to the native hardpan sand, wire grass and pine needles that reflected the look Ross left upon his death in 1948.

I love the term "Bermuda creep" and will no doubt claim it as my own.... it's a perfect term for the sorry state of No. 2 when I first played it in the early aughts.  There were simply no lines visible off the tee, just a vast expanse of green.  And this:

Indeed, there were plenty of cynics early on. Members and resort guests in 2010 in the backwash of the 2008 financial collapse simply thought Pinehurst didn’t have the money to maintain the course. Some in the design and maintenance business said you might get an interesting look out of the gate, but the vintage aesthetics would be difficult to maintain. All were wrong. 

“Five years is a long time,” Coore says, gazing at the jagged bunker outlines up near the ninth green. “Look at those bunker edges, some people said they wouldn’t hold up. I’d say they’ve held up pretty well. The biggest fear we had was it would not be maintainable. Some people said the bunkers would fall in, you can’t maintain them. I guess it worked. They’re still there.

It seems such a simple concept.... if you build a golf course in the beautiful sand hills of North Carolina, why wouldn't you want that rustic feel evident in the golf course.  Donald Ross certainly felt that way, but his successors got sold a bill of goods.  

And do yourself the favor of watching this short video on the restoration:

Memo to Self:  Since you bought this video documentary of Donald Ross, you might want to watch it.  Of course, that's not gonna happen during Match Play week.

Udder Stuff

We dealt with the Match-Play in the prior post, so let's close a few browser windows as well...

Anchoring Detritus - Golf Digest Equipment Editor Mike Stachura followed-up with his course-raters and yielded this result:

But it appears a small percentage of clubs and courses already have begun or have plans

to look the other way when it comes to the ban on anchoring. Golf Digest contacted members of its 100 Greatest Courses ratings panel of low-handicap amateurs and club professionals, and after 283 responses, 6 percent indicated anchoring would be allowed where they play. 

It’s not clear such action is being done out of ignorance, or even because there’s a belief that allowing anchoring is a harmless way to maintain enthusiasm for the game.

This is probably much ado about nothing for a number of reasons.  First, 6% is a fairly diminimous proportion to begin with, especially in the year of the rule-change.  But the more you dive in, the more you see the fault lines forming:

Others seem caught in the middle, which by USGA standards is no less an acceptable place than creating a local rule. Said one, “My clubs allow anchoring for daily play but do not allow it for tournament play and the ‘majors’—club championship, member-member, couples championship, senior championship, match-play championship, etc. Most of our players who play in the majors have converted to non-anchoring. The ‘old farts’ stay with anchoring because they only play recreationally.”

I don't even understand the concept of a club allowing it for "recreational play", as I've never encountered a club official on the first tee.  The ultimate authority for all things recreational is the guys (or gals) with whom you play... 

But on any subject people will devolve naturally to madness, such as this:

“Many people go to the long putter after trying everything else, and it's sad to see it being taken away,” Knoetze said. “One issue with people moving back and forth between the anchored stroke and regular stroke may be resolved by allowing us to have two handicaps—one for each putter stroke. This way we will always have a fair handicap tied to the putter stroke we use. We could use the long one at home if we have a local rule and could use the short one, with our higher handicap, for competitive events and clubs that don't have a local rule.”

Yeah, two handicaps, that's the ticket! 

Captain Obsessive - Oliver Holt files an interesting profile of Euro Ryder Cup captain Darren Clarke, including this important detail about his closet:

It does not reveal the man who cheerfully admits he has Obsessive Compulsive Disorder. Take the clothes in his wardrobe, for instance. Because his weight fluctuates, they are hung in size order and meticulously arranged in a line going from dark to light. ‘It’s completely messed up,’ says Clarke, laughing. Which is another way of saying it is obsessively ordered. 

If being organised can be measured on a sliding scale that runs from ‘Relaxed’ to ‘Bernhard Langer’, Clarke says he is much closer to the Langer end of the spectrum. Langer was the epitome of micro-control at Oakland Hills in 2004 and Clarke is already routinely studying data sent back to him from every tournament, recording prospective team members’ performances on par threes and par fives. Nothing will be left to chance.

But the gist of the piece is this:

Clarke knows he will face tough choices. Others have already wondered aloud whether he might be tempted to offer preferential treatment to old pals like Lee Westwood and Ian Poulter if they fail to qualify automatically for Hazeltine and need to rely on being among Clarke’s three wildcard picks. Clarke snorts with contempt about that idea.

‘An old pals’ act?’ he says. ‘How could I possibly do that? The Ryder Cup is much, much more important than an old pals’ act. That does not happen. Under no circumstances would I let myself... that’s not going to happen. No chance.

And the inevitable comparison to that paragon of European captainhood:

It is unlikely the 2011 Open champion will be scribbling potential pairings on scraps of paper during practice and trying to pass them off as a sandwich order, as Sir Nick Faldo did at Valhalla in 2008. Clarke will have a Plan A, a Plan B and a Plan C. He will organise. He will be involved. He will man-manage. He will know the characters of each of his players inside-out.

OK, that's completely unfair to Clarke, as Sir Nick had no need to worry about losing friends...

Masters Countdown - David Owen literally wrote the book on the Masters, and treats us to some stories from the early years of the event this time of year.  Who knew, for instance, that the man that hit the shot that made the tournament took a pass on the first one?

Gene Sarazen hit "the shot heard round the world" -- his epochal double-eagle on

Augusta's fifteenth hole -- in 1935, during the final round of the second Augusta National Invitation Tournament (as the Masters was officially known until 1939). He hadn't played the year before. Why?

Sarazen himself often said, years later, that he skipped the first Masters because the invitation came from Clifford Roberts, the club's co-founder and chairman, "and what the hell do I want to play in a tournament sponsored by a Wall Street broker?" -- as he told me in a telephone interview in 1997. He also said that he threw out the first invitation because it had a Wall Street return address, and he figured it must be some kind of financial promotion. 

Funny stories -- but they aren't true. His invitation came not from Roberts but from Alfred Bourne, who was the club's vice president and principal financial backer, and Sarazen responded in February with a nice letter in which he told Bourne that he was "very glad to accept." He backed out shortly before the tournament, though, because he realized that he had a conflicting commitment with Joe Kirkwood, an Australian professional and trick-shot expert (who had also been invited).

As a smart man once said, trust but verify....David also includes this great image:

The event wasn't officially called The Masters (which Bobby Jones deemed presumptuous) until 1939, but I didn't realize the colloquial usage dated this far back.

Wither Rory - The Tour Confidential gang addressed Rory's desultory play, but I'll suggest you skip the excerpt below if you're in the middle of lunch, or plan to eat again someday:

3. Rory McIlroy had six double-bogeys at the API—the most he's ever had in a PGA Tour event—and was 10 strokes better on Sunday (65) than he was on Thursday and Saturday. Is it officially time to start worrying about McIlroy? 

Shipnuck: That time was a while ago, actually. Rory has always been streaky, and he can have a great season with one hot stretch at the right time, as we saw in 2014. So it's far too soon to call this a lost year or anything of that sort. What's alarming to me is it doesn't seem like he's having much fun out there. He's always played with such an admirable insouciance and lately he's looked more dour than Jim Furyk with a raging hemorrhoid.

Thanks, Alan....It'll be a while be fore I get over that image... 

March Madness

If you watched any of the bracket selection show on Golf Channel last night, you know what this event wants to be when it grows up....  It's not and it won't be, but let's not be so bitter that we can't enjoy one week of match play.

Shack unsurprisingly devotes his Forward Press column to teeing up the event:

Everything will change in dramatic fashion this week with Dell rescuing the WGC

Match Play Championship and putting a strong Austin bent on the proceedings, like free Uber rides and plenty of parties. Whether all of Austin's fun and tech industry energy masks the uneasy feeling players have about match play two weeks before the Masters remains to be seen. But so far, so good. 

"If the difficulty to get a ticket is an indication it is going to be fantastic,” says Austin resident and now-retired PGA Tour pro Joe Ogilvie. “Austin Country Club has embraced the event and they have driven the success.”

No question that the Tour landed a first-rate sponsor and an appropriate venue.  I don't know the track, but the buzz seems to be that it will work quite well for match play with their nines reversed.  Now, about that date.....

The groups brackets can be viewed here and opening round match-ups here..  Apologies, but attampts to embed the first-day tee times created formatting havoc.  Not many of these matches jump off the page at you, with the Fowler-Duf-Daddy pairing perhaps the most interesting...

You remember the format I'm sure, three days of round-robin play with the sixteen group winners moving on.  The format is sub-optimal, sacrificing the urgency of single elimination that created an upside-down tournament, with the first day being the most interesting.  But the compromise was reasonable to keep the players happy and entice the new sponsor, and we recapture some of that urgency on Thursday and Friday.

It's also true that we know-it-alls sometimes don't know as much as it seems....For instance, my favorite moment from last year's event was the Friday Keegan Bradley-Miguel Angel Jiminez cage match in which both players were 0-2 and had no hopes of moving on.  Of course we couldn't anticipate Keegs acting like a five-year old, or could we?

Joel Beall has the horse right here:

What To Watch: Jason Day, coming off a win at the Arnold Palmer Invitational, has a strong record in match play events...Jordan Spieth failed to make it out of pool play in 2015, and hasn't placed inside the top 15 since his win at Kapalua on January 10. However, the No. 1 player in the world will have the crowd in his favor, as he returns to his college town...Though his six double-bogeys at Bay Hill have people talking, the fact that McIlroy was 16-under on his other 66 holes makes him a formidable match-play opponent...With a premium on shotmaking, look for approach savants like Hideki Matsuyama, Patrick Reed and Brendan Grace to be tough outs.

Bet with your head, not over it....

Back to Shack on the venue:

The event fittingly lands at ACC, which dates to 1899 and is now at its third site. The

wild Pete Dye design that figures to provide a turbulent setting for match play golf. A 1984 design that features two distinct nines that have been flipped for this week’s event, ACC’s closing lakeside stretch will play a more prominent (and fan friendlier) role than just about any course to have hosted the WGC Match Play. 

Austin CC was the home club of legendary instructor Harvey Penick, whose Little Red Book became the biggest selling golf instruction book of all time and spawned two sequels with author Bud Shrake. Penick worked most of his instruction magic with Ben Crenshaw, Tom Kite and Betsy Rawls at a site since developed, but did oversee the club’s transition to the site of this week’s event. 

“Folks are beyond excited,” says Kevin Robbins, the former Austin American Statesman golf writer who is the author of the new biography on Penick. “They want to see Jason Day and Adam Scott and Rory McIlroy and Jordan Spieth and Phil Mickelson.”

The great thing about the week is the focus on Harvey Penick, who's gone but no forgotten.  Don't miss this Shack Q&A with Kevin Robbins, author of a forthcoming bio of the great man,  Here's his thoughtful take on the venue:

GS: How do you think Austin CC will work as a tournament venue? 

KR: Great question. I've played ACC a number of times, but not until the 2012 Texas Mid-Amateur qualifier did I truly learn how to score on it. It isn’t a bomber’s golf course. You have to hit spots with tee shots — sometimes in order to avoid losing a ball in Lake Austin or in a canyon on what will play in the Dell as the front nine. It’s Texas, so you play in wind. It’s a spectacular second-shot course. 

I think it favors players who excel with wedges. It’s a short course, so even with fairway metals and long irons from the tee, these players will have many approaches of 120 yards or less. Three of the par-five holes, and maybe four (I don’t know which tee they’ll play on No. 16), are reachable, so little scrambling chips and pitches will be crucial. 

It will be cozy. The club isn’t easy to get to, or to walk. It’s bound in many places by the lake, the canyons or, to a lesser extent, neighborhoods houses mansions. It’s not roomy like, say, an Oakmont or Augusta National. Think Colonial, only up-and-down like Augusta — with less space for spectators.

It's a difficult week for the networks and players, and the best stuff often comes early in the week.  Those caveats aside, it's great to see the intensity of mano-a-mano combat...  needless to say, it's not for everyone.  But a big part of the fun is seeing how they react when removed from their safe spaces.....  More like this, please.

Weekend Wrap

Employee No. 2 is boarding her flight East and, where were we?

Day's Day - Jason Day took an extended break over the winter to welcome his second child and take time out to have his wife flattened by Lebron James.  he looked clueless for a bit upon his return to competitive golf, but I'm thinking he'll have more in the tank than certain others (coughJordancough) as we get into the heart of the schedule,  Here's VanCynical's take:

You know it's a new era of golf when the tournament winners admit that their boyhood

golf idol was … Tiger Woods. That's Day, a 28-year-old Australian, and that's why he's so enthused about his position in the game and his friendly relationship with Woods.

They've been texting on a regular basis. Woods sent Day texts Saturday night and again Sunday morning. "It's just the same stuff," Day said. "He always says things like, 'Just be yourself' and for some reason it means so much more. It gives me so much confidence that a person like him would believe in me, especially as I was idolizing him ever since I was a kid and watched him in the '97 Masters and now I’m playing the tour and pretty close with him now."

Just keep the talk on the golf, Jason, as you seem to have a pretty stable family....  Elie....Elin...no, let's not even think along those lines.

Gary called Day's win scratchy, which is a scary thought for the other guys.  We've seen him run and hide from the field, but if he realizes that he can win while scraping it around, turn out the lights.

The Tour Confidential mob sorted through whether Day is now the Masters fave, and here's the yin and the yang of their responses:

Alan Shipnuck: I loved his resiliency on Sunday. He made some costly mistakes early in the round but never stopped battling, and then he did what he had to do down the stretch to get the win. We know Day is a momentum player and when he has his A game he's going to cruise to victories. If he learns to grind out wins with his B game on Sundays that's a very potent player. Given Bubba's back and Jordan's funks, there is no clear Masters favorite, which makes it more fun. I fully expect Day to be in the mix on the back nine on Sunday.

Joe Passov: I'm with Josh on this one, in that it's hard to bet against Adam Scott. He owns a pretty stellar Masters record in his own right, and with two wins and a runner-up already this year, that's pretty strong stuff heading to Augusta. Of course Augusta's greens aren't regular tour greens. Maybe that's where Scott stumbles. All credit to Jason Day, however. I chided him last week for being MIA as a Big Three member and then he does this. To close in this fashion, when he hadn't been in the hunt in what feels like ages, is impressive.

It's really very simple.... Day is the odds-on favorite, at least until we see how he fares in his first round match this week. In the process of winning, guys often look like they can't lose.  Problem is, they only win infrequently...

As for Rory, I wouldn't be betting the house:

About the only thing you could say for certain right now regarding Rory McIlroy's tilt at completing the career Grand Slam at the Masters next month is it will not be dull. 

In terms of rounds with a card in his hand, McIlroy finished off his preparations on Sunday by recording an adventurous final-round 65 at the Arnold Palmer Invitational that included two eagles, a holed 60ft putt on the 18th and, on the other side of the equation, yet another double bogey. 

That made it two 75s and two rounds from near the top drawer to complete a rollercoaster event.

Two 75's and I believe six doubles....but he's upbeat, with lipstick at the ready:

At least this fine round left him in good spirits for the defence of his WGC-Match Play Championship in Texas this week. 'I'm playing perfect golf for that event, given I can only lose a hole for each double bogey, and I'm making bags of birdies,' he commented wryly.

That's great Rors, your game is perfectly suited to one week on the calendar.  But don't be expecting anything outside a foot to be conceded....

That early morning pairing I touted yesterday seems to have worked for both the young men:

ORLANDO, Fla. – Amateur Bryson DeChambeau may still be a little uncomfortable

playing PGA Tour events, but that didn’t show Sunday during his round with World No. 2 Rory McIlroy. 

The pair fed off of each other during the final round of the Arnold Palmer Invitational at Bay Hill Club & Lodge, going toe-to-toe as McIlroy carded 7-under 65 and DeChambeau notched a 6 under. 

“I was hitting great shots, he was making some great chip shots as well,” DeChambeau said. “… He’s a great player, and, shoot, it was a lot of fun getting to play with him, get some great experience.”

With all the talk about the Class of '11 and all, DeChambeau is going to be a hoot to watch.  

Martin Kaufmann notes some disjointed moments in Johnny Miller's commentary, though the only surprise should be that it comes as a surprise:

I found it odd that Johnny Miller posed this question to Roger Maltbie on Saturday:

“Does Jason (Day) work the ball much, Roger, or is it pretty straight?” 

Maltbie informed him “there’s not a lot of curvature in his ball flight.” 

Given that Day has been playing on Tour for a decade and was ranked No. 3 in the world at the time, Miller shouldn’t need to ask anyone about Day’s ball flight. He should know it because he is presented to viewers as NBC’s foremost authority on the PGA Tour.

Yeah, but these days he's working like six weeks a year... 

Johnny has always been a stream-of-consciousness commentator, and I've always thought Dan Hicks was therefore underrated.  The problem is that as he's gotten older, and perhaps his hearing isn't what it was, it's become increasingly obvious.  I'll still take him over the smug Sir Nick any day, but as Tiger recently reminded us, Father Time is undefeated.

Did You Sei Young Kim? - I doubt anyone did, what with March Madness and the like.  But the young lady went way low:

PHOENIX (AP) Sei Young Kim turned an anticipated Sunday shootout into a record-tying blowout. 

The 23-year-old South Korean player matched Annika Sorenstam's LPGA Tour scoring record of 27 under, closing with a 10-under 62 at Desert Ridge for a five-stroke victory in the JTBC Founders Cup.

Sorenstam set the mark in 2001 at nearby Moon Valley, shooting a record 59 in the second round. Kim also matched the tournament record of 62 set Thursday by Mi Hyang Lee. 

Kim missed a chance to break the marks when her 18-foot birdie try on the par-4 18th slid left.

Here's all you need to know:  Lydia shot 22 under and lost by five.

Aquaman Soars - The artist formerly known as the Woodman had a good week:

TUCSON, Ariz. (AP) Woody Austin holed out for eagle from a greenside bunker on the

par-5 15th and held on to win the Tucson Conquistadores Classic on Sunday for his first PGA Tour Champions title. 

''The greatest bunker week of my career, no question,'' Austin said.

The 52-year-old Austin bogeyed the par-4 final hole after driving left into the water and ended up beating Jim Carter by a stroke on Omni Tucson National's Catalina Course.

OK, but I'm pretty angry at this point... A Google image search reveals the absence of the obligatory silly hat photo, like this one of Marco Dawson last year:

Some things are just wrong...

Udder Stuff - Trick-shot artiste Wesley Bryan proved he's more than a one-trick pony:

BROUSSARD, La. – Wesley Bryan fired a final-round, 3-under-par 68 to come from one stroke back and win the 25th annual Chitimacha Louisiana Open presented by NACHER, the largest victory of his professional career. 

Bryan elevated himself to the top of a crowded leaderboard when he drained a 15-foot putt for birdie on the par-4 17th hole. 

“Coming into the season, I felt like I was really in good form,” said Bryan, after he collected a first-prize check worth $99,000. “I felt like I was playing really well. I felt really good coming down here.”

His brother and trick-shot partner was on the bag.... Shack called it vindication on Morning Drive, but Bryan was a very good collegiate player at South Carolina....

And how about that Tim Hart?  Never heard of him?  And you call yourself a golf fan....He started the week as the No. 918 ranked player in the world....  here's the set-up:

Standing on the final hole at the Coca-Cola Queensland PGA, Hart not only had his first PGA Tour of Australasia title within his reach, but also a glorious chance to break 60. Unfortunately, neither happened.

So he needs a par to shoot 58.....You know how this will end, as the lad goes full-Van de Velde: 

Hart hit his drive out-of-bounds left on No. 18 at Toowoomba's City Golf Club. Incredibly, though, he still had a chance at both milestones until his second drive went right and into the trees. The resulting triple bogey forced him to settle for a 61 and dropped him into a playoff, which he eventually lost to David Klein. 

“It was a rollercoaster . . . after hitting the driver so well I put the worst swing of the week on it right there,” Hart, 26, told reporters after the round. 

If by "rollercoaster" Hart meant an exhilarating ride all the way to the top of the world's tallest rollercoaster before one swift fall, then yes, it was a rollercoaster. Check out this incredible scorecard for his back nine in which he was nine under through eight holes (After a 30 on the par-33 front nine) before the disastrous finish:

Note to readers:  You never want to go full-Van de Velde.  Here's that colorful scorecard: