OWGR - Week #49

Tough out there this week, with players facing the grimm choice of being swept away by heavy rain, by high winds or by... Super Man Schwartzel!

It's turning out to be a great end of the season for some of the top pros who have been somewhat struggling and were due a win for a while: McDowell and Kaymer last week, and Schwartzel this week, with Tim Clark coming very close to doing the same in South Africa...

First of all, congratulations to Charl Schwartzel for a most impressive 11-shot win in Thailand (worth 36 pts to the winner in the end), even though the owgr impact is rather limited by comparisson, jumping up only 4 places to #23. Masters' 2011 winner beat Masters' 2012 winner, but good showing for Bubba, who is enjoying a similar 4-place jump up, back inside the top 10 at #8. And a good 4th place for Sergio Garcia who moves back just inside the top 20.

A rather odd finishing day in Australia, where the gale force winds completely changed the look of the leaderboard and brought a fantastic win, albeit totally unexpected, for the veteran Peter Senior, who becomes the oldest ever winner of the Aussie open at 53-years old. And the 32 points earned are propelling him all the way up inside the top 180!! I haven't checked it properly, but I'd be very surprised if there was an older folk higher ranked than him at this stage. Excellent runner-up place for the 'Japanese' Brendan Jones, which translates into a great leap of 32 places back inside the top 100, at #72. Tough finish for Rose, but it's a decent T4 result that consolidates his 4th spot in the rankings, although Oosthuizen is still in position to overtake him if he recovers from his illness and plays next week in South Africa, as planned.

A rather anticlimactic start in the end for the 2013 European Tour season, and you'd have to feel sorry for the organisers of the first Nelson Mandela Championship being so unlucky with the weather. Tim Clark threw away in the end a great chance to join the growing ranks of those who were well due a win. But it's a good week nevertheless for him, as he manages at least to postpone, hopefully for a long time, his inevitable slide outside the top 100, as he moves now back up to #91. But no matter the circumstances, Scott Jamieson's maiden win will still taste very sweet, deservedly winning after a 3-way playoff and a memorable 57 on his card in today's round. With 25% of the points wiped out, he should move just outside the top 125 in the rankings and will have the top 100 in his sight if he plays as well next week. Otherwise, as we've been saying, not too much exciting stuff to talk about, apart from the long list of pseudo-records that it generated, including the two 57's in today's round...

Some missed opportunities for Fraser, Ogilvy and a few others to move inside the top 50, but they'll get another last chance next week. And finally, we'll have to say bye-bye to Robert Rock who unfortunately has left the top 100 after a dismal season, following that amazing win over TW in Abu Dhabi in January...
The OWGR table after week #49 should look like this:

1 Rory McIlroy
2 Luke Donald
3 Tiger Woods
4 Justin Rose
5 Louis Oosthuizen
6 Lee Westwood
7 Adam Scott
8 Bubba Watson
9 Jason Dufner
10 Brandt Snedeker
-----------------------
11 Webb Simpson
12 Keegan Bradley
13 Ian Poulter
14 Graeme McDowell
15 Phil Mickelson
16 Steve Stricker
17 Nick Watney
18 Peter Hanson
19 Matt Kuchar
20 Sergio Garcia
21 Dustin Johnson
22 Bo Van Pelt
23 Charl Schwartzel
24 Ernie Els
25 Zach Johnson
26 Hunter Mahan
27 Jim Furyk
28 Martin Kaymer
29 Paul Lawrie
30 Francesco Molinari
31 Rickie Fowler
32 Carl Pettersson
33 Gonzalo Fdez-C.
34 Bill Haas
35 Nicolas Colsaerts
36 Branden Grace
37 Jason Day
38 John Senden
39 Robert Garrigus
40 Ryan Moore
41 David Toms
42 Scott Piercy
43 Hiroyuki Fujita
44 Matteo Manassero
45 Thomas Bjorn
46 David Lynn
47 Jamie Donaldson
48 K.J. Choi
49 George Coetzee
50 Thorbjorn Olesen
---------------------------
51 Alexander Noren
52 Miguel A. Jimenez
53 Richie Ramsay
54 Rafael Cabrerra-Bello
55 Shane Lowry
56 Geoff Ogilvy
57 Anders Hansen
58 Fredrik Jacobson
59 Marcus Fraser
60 Henrik Stenson
61 Padraig Harrington
62 Marcel Siem
63 Simon Dyson
64 Martin Laird
-----------------------
65 Greg Chalmers
66 Kevin Na
67 Bae Sang-Moon
68 Bernd Wiesberger
69 Bud Cauley
70 John Huh
71 Kim Kyung-Tae
72 Brendan Jones
73 Thaworn Wiratchant
74 Kyle Stanley
75 Aaron Baddeley
76 Jonas Blixt
77 Ryo Ishikawa
78 Toru Taniguchi
79 Vijay Singh
80 Ben Crane
81 Brendan de Jonge
82 Ben Curtis
83 Pablo Larazabal
84 Alvaro Quiros
85 Jonathan Byrd
86 Michael Thompson
87 Fredrik A. Hed
88 Gaganjeet Bhullar
89 Mark Leishman
90 Mark Wilson
91 Tim Clark
92 Noh Seung-Yul
93 Ross Fisher
94 Jeev Milkha Singh
95 Thongchai Jaidee
96 Stephen Gallacher
97 Danny Willett
98 Jeff Overton
99 Y.E. Yang
100 Koumei Oda
--------------------
101 Robert Rock
102 Yuta Ikeda
103 Toshinori Muto
...

That's just showing off

Apparently Peter Senior first won the Aussie Open 23 years ago. Probably using a long putter then too.

princedracula wrote:And the 32 points earned are propelling him all the way up inside the top 180!! I haven't checked it properly, but I'd be very surprised if there was an older folk higher ranked than him at this stage.

How soon we forget Tom Watson who nearly cracked the top 100 (at age 59) after his 2nd place in the 2009 Open Championship, and then once again after an 8th place finish in Dubai in February 2010.

Nobody forgets that GPB, and I'm pretty sure there are other examples as well, I was just refering to the present rankings...

But what worries me much more this morning is how/why the OWGR establishment seems to 'forget' their own rules sometimes:

Points are reduced by 25% for tournaments curtailed to 36 holes because of inclement weather or other reasons

...says on the OWGR website, yet, Scott Jamieson received the full 20 points after his win last week, which means he's up at #115, instead of #126. Hopefully an explanation will surface for this later on...

Maybe we need to write them an letter of complaint.

Dear sir, I am disgusted... unfair advantage... reprehensible behaviour... public enquiry etc etc.

Something along those lines.

I would guess that the Tour Minimum subsidy would take precedence over the 25% discount for 36 hole tournaments.

Yeah, I thought about that as well, but it wouldn't be a very smart thing to do at all...

Assuming for the sake of the argument that this week's event in South Africa would be worth 22 pts (should be a bit more in reality) and if the weather will play havoc again with it and they cut it down to 36-holes, that means the winner will get only 16.5 points, compared to Jamieson's 20, and just because it is 2 points above the co-sanctioned minimum. Doesn't make sense at all... And I can think of many other examples that would work against it...

Having said that, I wouldn't be surprised at all if that's the actual reason...

This week's Alfred Dunhill Tournament is also co-sanctioned btwn the EuroT and SunshineT so it should be subsidized to a 20 minimum.

So if the hypothetical 22 pt event only plays 36 holes, then it would be reduced to 20 pts, not 16.5.

FWIW: Would not the hypothetical discount value 16.5 points being rounded up to 18?

Whatever way they do it, the thing is that the way the rules are given on the official site in this respect are very unclear and lacking all the necessary details. We can only guess here what the reality really is....

Very unclear? I wouldn't go that far. Have you seen the how the Womens Rolex Rankings are calculated?

Was refering in respect to this particular issue... Sometimes it's better not to give details at all rather than giving something incomplete that could be interpreted in many ways...

Apart from this, bottom line is that a 36-hole event should receive a discounted award in ANY case, no matter if it is a weaker event or not. On the contrary, most events on a minimum no. of points are probably subsidised anyway, so why 'reward' them even more in this case...?

Early Count for this week:

- Alfred Dunhill @ ~28 pts (up from 20 pts last year)
- Johor Open @ ~20 pts (down from 24pts last year)
- Aussie PGA @ ~18 pts (down from 34 pts last year)

Oosthuyzen needs a solo 2nd to finish the year at #4 in the world.
Fraser, Ogilvy, Chalmers, Na, Thaworn W. and Larrazabal still with a chance to reach the top 50...

Overlooked Brendan Jones who also has a chance (with a win) to squeeze in the top 50. Not a great start today though, so looks unlikely to happen...

BTW, the field strengths given above are final...

This is how things stand around the top 50 cutline (end of the year projection) with only one round to go of this year's official golf:

49. Olesen
50. Coetzee
51. Lowry
52. Fraser
53. Ogilvy

Unless he breaks both legs and one arm during sleep tonight, Schwartzel should finish the year at #14...

Good stuff pd,

What's the likelihood of any change in the top 50 after tomorrow's rounds? Could be some Masters exemptions dependent on it... how far would Fraser need to go to leapfrog Olesen, and likewise Coetzee?

It's official now, Coetzee and Olesen will finish 2012 inside the top 50, regardless of what happens at the Alfred Dunhill. Ogilvy just missing out, even though he will move temporarily above the cutline after this week. Shane Lowry will finish #52...

Sergio up to 16th.

Lowry must be cursing that bug that forced him to miss Dubai.............still plenty of time to make Augusta