PGA Tour: FedEx Finale: Notes from the Ballwasher

1).Still not sure PGA Tour Towers has got this notion of a totally blank week right. Three exciting tournaments in the books at Bethpage, TPC Boston and Crooked Stick and . . . . . then what? A bit like building up a four-Test Ashes Series to an eagerly awaited Fifth Test winner-take-all finale . . . . . . . which is delayed for a month. Completely agree the players could use a break - would much rather see it betwen Rounds 2 and 3.

2).Dear PGA Of America,
Thank you for giving golf fans something for fans to be interested in with all the chat about the Ryder Cup.
Love,
Timmy F

3).And there's been lots of rhetoric about the Ryder Cup, Davis's "picks", the Medinah course, etc, etc. Some of it on here of course, with conflicting views about golfing stereotypes by Continent, usually about American bombers, European chipping and pitching prowess versus American flop-shots.
According to Jaime Diaz in GolfWorld, Medinah's rough has been been given a haircut, widening fairways and making wayward drives less heavily punished, allegedly a la Azinger's Valhalla set-up in 2008.

4).Not sure if I subscribe to the notion that Dustin Johnson and Bubba Watson are significantly longer than Colsaerts and McIlroy; would have thought it would be more relevant to consider who might actually be playing the most matches. Still, Davis promises a US Open course with a PGA Tour set up, fast greens and birdies a-plenty.

5).Woods and Stricker, Mickelson and Bradley, Simpson and Watson are suggested as likely opening pairings, but reality is that each team depends heavily on its best players; in particular, I would suggest that if Garcia and Westwood play in ten days' time as they did at Valhalla, the European goose will be cooked. Long-range projections of key players: How about Jason Dufner and Peter Hanson?
And, if I was Jose-Maria, I'd be tempted to bring the wildly entertaining Pablo Larrazabal to drive my cart. That would warm up the Chicago crowd.

6).But this week will be all about FedEx's $10 million! Sure part of Rory feels as if he's already done enough to deserve the jackpot but blame Vijay Singh (and his two-tournament walkabout in 2008 with the winnings already secured) for the changes that mean he has to earn the FedEx Cup all over again. In reality, one would bet that if he can finish ahead of Woods, Watney, Mickelson and Snedeker the rest will look after itself and he'll be $10M richer.
To quote Alf Ramsey: "You've won it once, go and do it again."

7).A $10M FedEx bonus would lift Rory to the top of the list of European bonus beneficiaries during the six years of FedEx fun. This list currently looks like:
1).Luke Donald: $4,410K + 2012 winnings, at least $175K
2).Sergio Garcia: $2,757K + at least $175K
3).Rose: $1,637.5K + at least $175K
4).Harrington: $1,293K
5).Casey: $1,027K
6).Pettersson: $619K + at least $175K
7).Laird: $717K
8).Poulter: $692K
9).Jacobson: $676K
10).Davis: $$625K

8).The media wags are tonguing that Rory may be invincible "every time the Tour goes to a big, long golfcourse that plays wet and soft with no wind". That's the caveat du jour (articulated by Gary Van Sickle but seemingly widely held) when comparing McIlroy's run with Tiger in his prime. I'll be interested in comparisons when Rors has played at this pace for at least five years, but it's nice to see credit offered to a Number One after the disparagement accorded to Donald and Westwood.
And East Lake might just fit the Rory bill; hopefully he's kept his swing nicely tuned during the week off and it's good for another two weeks.

9).In the absence of Tour excitement this past week I watched some web.com action from Idaho and a salutary reminder that last week's rising star can just as easily be this week's car crash. Aberdeen's Michael Sim and one-time hotshot Jamie Lovemark were both among the alternates who were unable to gain entry into the field. While last year's flavour of the month (June anyway) and newly-minted pro, Patrick Cantlay, failed to make the cut. Luke Guthrie took home first prize and he'll grace the PGA Tour with his presence in 2013. Anyone's guess whether he'll be any more successful than Sim or Lovemark, though.
This week's web.com field in West Texas (Midland, Friday Night Lights country, the business home of Dubya and by all accounts a good place for him) includes Gary Christian and Russell Knox as well as Sweden's David Lingmerth and Colwyn Bay's Ben Briscoe.

10).While the Seniors were in Hawaii where Willie Wood's fairy tale summer continued when Bionic Bill Glasson (he of the 22 surgeries - so far) capitulated and his 18th hole bogey was trumped by Willie's 18th hole bird. There's been speculation about Europeans flocking over to PGA Tour Q-School (entries have to be in by Sept 26th), but I hope that one or two Seniors also wade in to Champions Tour qualifying; Barry Lane and Forsbrand were among those trying last year and it would be good to see at least one of them following in the recent footsteps of Langer and Roger Chapman, both of whom are still in the running for the Champions Tour year-end bonus.

But this week is all about the PGA Tour's rich getting richer.

Wonderful summation.

You earn your way to the tour, enter and play well in enough events, and you will be rewarded. Tim's Fed Ex cup delivering on all counts. Plus, with the RC in these United States, even less of a problem for the top Euro's to be in Atlanta this weekend. Same scenario, fast forward two years? Not so sure.

This is an exciting week with someone going to win 10m but it is a fairly artificial type of excitement. In theory, a player could win all four Majors, three WGCs, Players Championship, the first three FedEx events, finish second in the Tour Championship and still not win the FedEx Cup.

That's how it is, so fair enough. It's just hard to take seriously the notion of the playoffs and the regular season as far as golf is concerned. Unlike other sports, the events everyone will remember took place in the regular season and nobody will have had this week as their biggest goal for the year.

Shotrock wrote:

You earn your way to the tour, enter and play well in enough events, and you will be rewarded.

There's a lot of truth in that statement SR...

With another ET tournament falling by the wayside last week, a few people mentioned the effect that would have on Q-school and Challenge Tour grads trying to retain their cards. And we've all been debating for months whether the PGA Tour is restricting entry and becoming more of a "closed shop" with its Q-school overhaul. But ultimately "earning a card" is just empty words unless it helps you get a foothold on tour. Last year 34 players came through Euro q-school, but only 5 finished high enough on the money list to avoid having to return, and two (Wakefield and Quiros) couldn't retain their cards even with playoff losses, in Austria and SA respectively. Whereas 9 of the 29 PGA graduates kept hold of their cards, and probably more importantly, only 2 of those played fewer than 20 events (Gordon and Strickler, both right at the fag-end of the exemption standings, and both playing 19). It looks like being a similar story this year... ultimately we can moan about the PGA Tour protecting its own, but once you do follow the system, it's pretty accommodating to its new players. If anything, the ET is becoming as hard or even harder for new talent to break into: not because of any obvious policy, a la Finchem, but just long-term neglect causing fewer and fewer opportunities.

Anyway, as for this week, all I can do is agree with Kwini's point #1. Having a week of last week doesn't make the slightest bit of sense to me. The building excitement of the playoffs (such as there is) has been dampened by having a fallow week, and as a result the supposedly flagship Tour Championship is being roundly overshadowed, on twitter feeds, in the media and in everyone's minds, by the RC coming so soon after it. Two obviously better options: either have the week off in the middle of the playoffs, between Deutsche Bank and BMW - the logical place for a break, halfway through, which gives a better feel to proceedings for both players and fans, and lets things build to more of a climax. Or have all four back-to-back, call it brutal endurance golf or whatever, and then have a week off for everyone to get their breath back before the RyderMania begins. Either one would be far more sensible.

Ned,
I really don't pay much attention to the Far East and SAF European Tour events, at least until the weekend.
But: Wouldn't it be true to say Europe has far more events with a limited field and in faraway (expensive to get to and subsist in) locations?
And many of the full field tournaments in Europe are at the low end of the prize-money totem pole.

One thing you can certainly say about the PGA Tour is that it's meritocratic (is that a word?); the better you play, and the more often your reshuffling position allows you to play, the more you'll prosper. Quite honestly, some of the nuances take some time to fully comprehend - hate to bring up Kenneth Ferrie as one who made a mess of his schedule, but would say he's the poster child for someone who never figured things out and made himself miserable in the process.

And little things compound difficulties, especially niggling injuries a la Anders Hansen and Jeev Milkha Singh. By the time you figure everything out you're in the Fall Series (though not from next year on of course) and you might not get in to all the tournaments.

Lots of credit to guys like Greg Owen and Laird who are proven survivors, hopefully Cejka too.

Great read kwini. Totally agree re the week off. It would possibly stop players like duffner and Sergio taking a rest week in the first 2 events. Is this event likely to play long wet and into rorys hands? I don't know much about the course or it's likely setup.

This is new today; without having seen the full 2013 schedule, it looks as if some late year, especially the Albertsons Boise tournament, are going to be stiffed:

http://www.pgatour.com/2012/h/09/18/finals-announcement/index.html

It's going to be fascinating how all this works out; some tournament directors' noses are going to be severely out of joint I should imagine but, again, without seeing the full picture, it's tough to be sure.

Thanks hend0,
Not sure how East Lake will play; it looks as if the recent storms in the South have not created the havoc in Atlanta that other places have suffered. Assume East Lake would have got a soaking today, but should have plenty of time to dry up during the coming few days.

Typically favours the player driving really well - would think Westwood and Sergio should like the conditions, but Rory's form is such that you'd figure he'll at least be very competitive.

Motor Mouth;
Colin Montgomerie confirmed as a commentator on NBC's Ryder Cup broadcasts.
For some reason NBC very seldom use anyone other than an American commentator but used Faldo very early in his broadcasting career.

Anyway, they probably feel Montgomerie will have something to say about everything, including his unimpeachable playing record, so he's a natural.

Monty??? Oh dear. You have my sympathies!

That's great news - assuming it means we won't have to put up with him on Sky.

Quite looking forward to this week's action. Rooting for a Rory win but wouldn't be too disappointed if Tiger wins it. Fingers crossed for it being very close on Sunday's back 9.

I'd be surprised if Monty isn't part of the Sky commentary team seeing as he and Butch are fronting the marketing campaign for it. Maybe he's doing a dual role.

Big week for me to try and hold on to the top spot in the 606v2 Yahoo League. With a field of only 30 I think I'll stick to choosing the tried and trusted players to see me through.

I find the FedEx Cup slightly strange that you can have almost double (80% more) the points of the next challenger and then be reset so that you only have 11% more. Also to win two of four and still not win seems odd but then I guess the whole thing is contrived to produce a spectacle so I will have to go with Alf Ramsey I guess.

They all know the score before hand and without all of this the big prize that FedEx are willing to put up would not be there.

What I will give it is that it does make for an exciting build up so credit where its due.

Hi Kwini,

The ballwasher is always a good read but I particularly enjoyed this edition. Thanks.


I agree that the break last week has lost some of the momentum but I will never agree that a PGA tour player really needs a week off. Of course they cant play every week of the year but playing all the play-offs consecutively should not be an issue.


It would be rather silly of DL3 to think his long hitters can out hit europes long hitters. Maybe in actual driving yardage (although like kwini I doubt it) but if DJ and R-mac both have 4 irons left on a long par 5 I know who will end up closer more often than not. Anyway, this whole stereotyping of playing stills based on nationality is hogwash. Those in form will win.


If rory can keep this pace for five years I will be very surprised, but Tiger seems to be offering rory some respect so maybe he knows that Rory can emulate him? There was a story on Geoff Shacklefords blog sharing a tale of Rory and Tiger indulging in some banter about ones height and the others lack of hair. I reckon you have to be damn good to be in tigers in crowd.

And lets be clear. Rory is a real number 1. Not like the Mr Consistency number 1’s of Donald and Westwood. You have to be able to blow the field away at moments notice to be considered better than everyone else, and true number 1.

Is that what it says in the Rankings statute Mac? Must have missed that.

You can't argue that Donald wasn't the best player in the world during his world number 1 tenure, unless you can provide evidence of who was better, and I wouldn't put it past him to get back there.
Hopefully ahead of that ghastly bald nine chinned man sausage.

Any friendship that may exist between Tiger & Rory has been made possible mainly by the age difference. Tiger never made much of an effort to be friendly with anyone who posed even the smallest threat over the years.

While Rory certainly has the potential to be better than Ernie, Phil, Vijay, etc, I don't believe for one second that he and Tiger would have been friendly if they were the same age. Tiger knows that any rivalry he may have with Rory will be a relatively short one. Plus, Tiger is no longer the No 1 so his relationship with other players is bound to have changed somewhat.

Tin - Who knows - but you certainly could be right.

And Tiger not being friends with Phil or Vijay certainly wasn't all Tiger. Phil's massive ego absolutely felt threatened when Tiger arrived on "his" scene. Vijay's just a bit weird - from my personal observation. (He played in a pro-am with a friend of mine and walked as far from the group as possible. Pleasant enough, I was told, but extremely distant.)

I imagine being a pro in a pro am would be a terribly boring thing. More exciting for the "am" then the "pro".

I'm sure some pro's are very good at it, but there's only so much enthusiasm you can put into "where are you from, what do you do, where do you play etc"
everytime you tee it up in one of these events.

As an individual sport, it's probably inevitable that those who make it to the very top have pretty big egos. It goes with the territory and always has done.

I read an interview with Peter Thomson where he said that Jack Nicklaus has a bigger ego than anyone he has ever met. He refused to elaborate on the issue. Looking at him on tv, I can probably see what he means. Nobody questions Jack's view about anything and if they do, they get put in their place fairly quickly. Gary Player's ego is probably a lot more obvious. I've never heard him talk about any subject without getting several eulogies about himself into the conversation somehow.

Super - Of course you can argue Lukey wasn't the best player in the world during the time he held the World #1 title. He was number one for much of 2012, but Tiger and Rory were clearly stronger even when Lukey held the paper title.

Tiger was the #1 player in the world for much of 2010 - but did anyone really think he was the best player in the world at that time? Not me.

I certainly didn't think Woods was for the final year of his tenure, not even top 40, and the system surely has a flaw in that respect but I think Donald was consistently brilliant during 80-90% of his, only caught up by tremendous periods from the cockend Woods and McIlroy and now rightfully passed into 3rd place.

Super - Some people (mostly high ranking corporate types) do a lot of pro-ams. One of my clients is one of those people (3 or 4 a year, none at his expense, and they ARE expensive). Among those people who do a lot, there's definitely a POV of who is good or not good to play along side.

I'm sure it's tiring for a top touring pro like Tiger, Vijay, Ernie, Lukey ... but NONE of them have to do it. It's entirely voluntary (consequences notwithstanding).

Surely there is a bit of commercial pressure for some of them to do it depending on who sponsors the event, e.g Donald with RBS. Mickelson with Barclays. Woods with eh...... no one anymore

Anyway, by all accounts Singh is a bit of a misery guts so his distance isn't too surprising, especially if your client is a woman.

For all the misery guts there are some players out there who are good to play with in a ProAm. I remember people at my club talking about Thomas Levet being fantastic. This was just after his Open playoff so was at the top of his game.

Ultimately these guys are paid a lot of money by these companies so if I was paying them I would expect them to be friendly. They don't have to take the money.

As for the world rankings they are not about the best ever or the best that week, they reward the best player over a period of time. Rather like a football league. You may be playing appalling football at the end but if you are the best over the season you win the league.

There are some problems with them but they aren't bad. I think we all agree that there was not much between Donald, Westwood, McIlroy (Kaymer) over the last two years and their ranking points showed that with the lead flipping between them but now McIlroy has come good on all the promise consistently, he is now well ahead.

Shotrock wrote:
I'm sure it's tiring for a top touring pro like Tiger, Vijay, Ernie, Lukey ... but NONE of them have to do it. It's entirely voluntary (consequences notwithstanding).

as far as i am aware they are mandatory to some degree. ie you have to do a certain amount. isnt this why Jim Furyk wasnt allowed compete in one of the 2010 fed ex events? he missed his tee time in the pro-am.

http://sports.espn.go.com/golf/news/story?id=5495576

They ARE mandatory to a "degree", controversy a few years ago when Phil avoided one in Dallas.

Some pros clearly embrace the Pro-am experience though, several stories out there about guys relishing the opportunity to rub shoulders and niblicks with captains of industry.

Hend/Kwini - Correct. Miss your pro-am, no tournament start. That's the consequence I was referring to ... but why some professionals treat it like a nuisance seems odd when it's clearly what you VOLUNTARILY signed up for.

nicely backtracked SR, I think you got away with it.

Super - No backtrack at all! My point all along ... It's part of the job if you want to play on the US tour (and I assume similar for the ET).

Last year I played in a rare "Monday" pro-am, which was a lot less expensive and not mandatory.

A Wednesday pro am can easily cost $10k - $15k per head. Generally the "Selection" party the evening before (no professionals in required attendance), breakfast or lunch (no professionals in required attendance) ... so it's no wonder to me why these industry top dogs want some friendly banter.

A close buddy of mine played (on a Wednesday) with Robert Allenby -- who, he said, could not have been nicer.

Shotrock wrote:Super - Of course you can argue Lukey wasn't the best player in the world during the time he held the World #1 title. He was number one for much of 2012, but Tiger and Rory were clearly stronger even when Lukey held the paper title.

6 wins in just over a year makes you a paper no.1? When rory was playing well early seen he was deservedly briefly no.1, but not when he was missing cuts over the summer.

Fred Couples elected into the World Golf Hall Of Fame.
Presumably popularity is his second Major . . . . . .
Not sure that having Loren Roberts on the ballot enhanced the standing of this particular induction, but astonishing that no room has been found yet for Ken Venturi.

On the subject of the rivalry between Rory & Tiger and thinking about the egos of the top players, I was interested to read the views of Greg Norman today. This is what he had to say;

"What I'm seeing is that Tiger is really intimidated by Rory. When have you ever seen him intimidated by another player? Never. These things tend to go in 15-year cycles. Jack took it from Arnold. I took it from Jack, Tiger from me and now it looks like Rory's taking it from Tiger. You've got to beat the guy you're taking over from to feel that you're the top guy and Rory's doing that".

I'm not denying that Greg was a great player but I wonder what fans of Tom Watson, Seve Ballesteros & Nick Faldo would make of the above. Utterly bizarre in my opinion.

One of the longest lists in golf is the number of players in Majors of the 80's and 90's who were never intimidated by Greg Norman.

Media in overdrive right now trying to establish rivalry between Rory and Tiger. Hopefully Rors will say as little as possible and let his clubs do the talking.

Kwini, Since Aberdeen gets to claim Michael Sim, does JoBurg get to claim Justin Rose?

And New Hampshire claim Aaron Baddeley?

So long as Germany get to lay claim to John McEnroe!

We've had a long-standing wind-up about Michael Sim, often identify him like that to differentiate from Michael Sims.

Superb forecast for this week in Hotlanta, plenty of sun, not too much wind and mostly warm enough for the ball to fly.
Piercy and Senden open the batting at 11.35 EDT.

Wallace Booth off to a fine start in Prelim Q-School in Brunswick, GA.

kwinigolfer wrote:Fred Couples elected into the World Golf Hall Of Fame.
Presumably popularity is his second Major . . . . . .
Not sure that having Loren Roberts on the ballot enhanced the standing of this particular induction, but astonishing that no room has been found yet for Ken Venturi.

Time they stopped doing that to 'still to retire' golfers or at least until they are well into their senior status. The ceremony this year was great for the likes of Allis and Hollis Stacy. For Phil it was just awkward. Not the correct way to celebrate his career, which is what it should be. What happens if he wins another 2 or 3 majors then romps it on the seniors tour? Do they do it again?

An induction every 3 or 4 years would sort it.
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Rory and Tiger playing the whole thing down. Norman's remarks speaks volumes - seems like he was/is always thinking about those around him, instead of taking care of things himself.
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Kwini, good to hear about Booth. I try to keep an eye on his sisters career as well... Carly... who incidentally is seeing Tano Goya - the lucky devil

Greg Norman's ego is truly boundless.

You could really tell how much Faldo was intimidated by him.

Good write up as always Kwini... Always enjoy reading your weekly post.

Really looking forward to this tournament and of course the Ryder Cup the week after.

Great field this week so counting down the minutes to watch it tonight on Sky from 6.

Thanks Sand,
Weather should be mostly fine all four days, perhaps a little cooler on Sunday though, so different wind direction.
Rory already the moral winner of the FedEx, hopefully the $10M winner as well. Fingers crossed.

kwinigolfer wrote:Wallace Booth off to a fine start in Prelim Q-School in Brunswick, GA.

Would be nice if Wallace could get through Q-School to gain at the least, a Web.com card for 2013.

Beggars belief that people enter Q-School and can shoot scores of 94, not one but 2 people managed it!!

http://pgatq.bluegolf.com/bluegolf/pgatq12/event/pgatq121/contest/1/leaderboard.htm

They were 96's Emm, 24(Twenty Four) over par.

That is appalling.

Oh aye, my mistake, had +24 in my head too whilst trying to type 96 and confused the two numbers.

96 is hopeless, really hopeless.

I don't care how hard it is, guys at that level should not be shooting 96's under any circumstances should they?

They sound like that hacker who blagged his way into Open qualifying, can't remember his name but he was notorious for it. I think even he shot better than that.

super_realist wrote:I don't care how hard it is, guys at that level should not be shooting 96's under any circumstances should they?

They sound like that hacker who blagged his way into Open qualifying, can't remember his name but he was notorious for it. I think even he shot better than that.

Maurice Flitcroft. I have his book, it's quite amusing.

Right, am I right in saying that no one outside the top 5 can win the $11m bonus pot? Does that mean should Louis Oosthuizen win the Tour Championship he can't amass enough points to pass any of the current top 5 should they finish 26th - 30th eg, collection the lowest amount of points on offer?

As i understand it, there is the Tour Championship title to play for and then a mini tournament with the Top 5 to see who is the FedEx Champion.

Just need to get my head around it before I watch it

I thought it was just a sliding scale of probability. In other words, for the player in 30th (Scott Piercy) to win, he has to win the tournament, Rory has to come last, Tiger 2nd last etc. In other words you have to beat the players by as many places as they're ahead of you in the standings. Hope that's right but I don't really know.

Think its along those lines Smithers... As last year Bill Haas was 24th coming into the week and won everything. Basically the top 5 have it in their hands to win the Fed Ex, the others need to win and have to hope that all the others in the top 5 basically dont do well enough.

It's ok, I've found this handy explanation on the PGA website which seems to make it a bit clearer to me.

http://www.pgatour.com/2012/fedexcup/09/10/winning-scenarios/index.html

Anyone can still win the FedEx but if one of the Top 5 wins the Tour Champ then they will win the FedEx regardless of where anyone else finishes. The other 25 players will need certain scenarios for them to have a chance of the FedEx should they win the Tour Champ. Fully understood now!!