Category: PGA

The 2005 Masters invitations have been sent out, and we know who should be checking their mailboxes. Players qualify for the Masters in one or more of seventeen unique ways. Though technically an “invitation-only” tournament, The Masters has published the criteria it uses for determining who should get an “invitation” for the past 20 or more years.

For example, if you win the Masters you’re welcome to come back and play as long as you’re alive. Winning another major earns you five years of invitations, and winning The Players Championship nets three yearly passes to Augusta. The current US Amateur, the runner-up, the British Amateur, the US PubLinks, and the US Mid-Amateur champion are all invited, along with the top 16, 8, 4, and 4 players from the previous year’s Masters, US Open, British Open, and PGA Championship, respectively. The final spots are reserved for folks who are ranked highly on money lists or Official World Golf Rankings.

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With the first major of 2005 looming, the players coming to the BellSouth Classic are hoping not only to win the golf tournament but also to get one last boost of confidence before The Masters! The top three ranked golfers in the world are not in the field this week, but that does not mean there aren’t any guys in the field that can’t get the job done. Phil Mickelson and Retief Goosen, ranked fourth and fifth in the world respectively, have both won this tournament in the past five years. Mickelson won here in 2000 and Goosen won here in 2002. They’ll be teeing it up come Thursday.

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The Tavistock Cup went 21 holes and ended in a tie. The excitement was palpable as Tiger Woods and Lee Janzen, representing Isleworth, battled in extra holes against South Africans Ernie Els and Retief Goosen of Lake Nona. The 8½ to 8½ tie is the first in the short history of the event and follows Isleworth’s 14½ – 9½ victory at Lake Nona last year.

Tiger Woods earned low medalist honors with a -6 (66) which included two sixes on the front-nine par fives but an incoming 31.

Continue reading “Tavistock Tie”

Now that The Players Championship is finally over, it’s time to move onto another week in the golf world. But this week is somewhat unique, as many of the world’s elite golfers will head to Orlando instead of Atlanta to play in the 2005 Tavistock Cup. This year is special because the world’s second-best player, Tiger Woods, will participate! As a matter of fact, three of the top five players in the world rankings (Woods, Ernie Els, and Retief Goosen) will be playing alongside the best female golfer in the world, Annika Sorenstam.

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The funky weather led to a Funky winner: Fred Funk may have gone backwards in the final round, three-putting three times, but his efforts were good enough to secure a one-stroke victory in the funkiest Players Championship ever.

The former Maryland Terrapin golf coach birdied the par-5 sixteenth, landed his ball safely on the island green at the seventeenth, and got up and down from a greenside bunker – only yards away from the water – on the last hole, holing a five-footer for the save and the victory.

Continue reading “A Funky Monday Finish at The Players Championship”

We wrote a preview of The Players Championship nearly a week ago. Players have yet to complete even 40 holes. The TPC at Sawgrass has seen a lot of weather and fans have seen very little golf. Even a Monday finish seems unlikely – we may be looking at a Tuesday finish before a champion is crowned.

Luke Donald, currently leading at -11, played all of nine holes on Sunday: six to complete his second round, and three more in his third before the all-too-familiar horn blew, signalling the end of play. He shares the 39-ish hole lead with journeyman Joe Durant. Tim Herron, defending champ Adam Scott, Lee Westwood, and Zach Johnson sit one stroke back.

Continue reading “The Tournament that Would Not End”

The Players Championship started much as it did Friday, with play delayed shortly after it had started. Thankfully the weather cleared up enough for play to resume for a while until interrupted by darkness. Among those delayed by the coming of night was first round leader Steve Jones who finished the day tied for first after nine holes. Seventy one players will show up at 7:30am Sunday morning to complete round two.

Among the best performances of the day came from Joe Durant who finished with seven birdies and an eagle to finish tied for first. He dropped strokes on holes one and five but finished with a seven-under 65. Durant’s favorite hole of the day might well have been the par-five 11th where he posted eagled on an 11-foot putt. Co-leader Lee Westwood looked like he was feeling confident as he finished his day with a 69. That was good enough to nudge him into a tie for first with Joe Durant and first round leader Steve Jones.

Continue reading “Joe Durant Shines After Rain On Saturday”

Only thirty golfers or so had a chance to make it off the first tee on Friday morning. After 44 minutes, the siren forced players back to the locker rooms as play was postponed. There was early hope that the golfers would be able to get back on the course Friday afternoon, but all of that ended as rain continued to pour down on the TPC course at Sawgrass. Late in the day officials made the decision to call the second round off completely and try to resume at 7am Saturday morning.

Continue reading “Rain Washes Away Second Round at the Players Championship”

Though I doubt Steve Jones will be around this weekend, he’s put himself in a pretty good spot to prove me wrong. The man who won the 1996 U.S. Open (and hasn’t been heard from since) escaped the mudballs, made some fine putts, and shot a blistering 64 at the TPC at Sawgrass. He leads The Players Championship over Fred Funk, Zach Johnson, and Lee Westwood, all of whom shot 65s, and a cast of others a few strokes back.

Of the big four – Vijay Singh, Tiger Woods, Ernie Els, and Phil Mickelson – only Vijay managed a great showing, carding a 67 that puts him in a tie for eighth at -5. Ernie struggled to a 1-under 71 (T51), while Phil and Tiger both carded 70s, putting them six back and tied for 29th. Phil and Tiger’s rounds couldn’t have been too different: Tiger plodded along, making pars, and tallied two bogeys and four birdies. Mickelson carded seven birdies, a double-bogey on the par-3 eighth, and three bogeys, including a splashed 3-wood from the 18th tee.

Continue reading “Oldy Jones Leads at the Players”