The Players Championship will be played later this week for likely the last time in the calendar month of March. As usual, “The Players” will draw a top field and be contested on a famous, testing course. But The Players is richer than that, and for years, the debate has raged: “is it golf’s fifth major?” The answer, unfortunately, is quite simple: NO.
The U.S. Open, PGA Championship, and British Open all began no later than 1916 with the oldest, “The Open,” dating back to 1860. The Players began in 1974 (or, for the more cynical, 1988). Even the Masters – which was instituted by a guy that won all four of golf’s then-major championships – came into existence more than two generations prior to The Players Championship.
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Tiger Woods exploded onto the scene nearly a decade ago and proved early and often that he was a force to be reckoned with on the PGA Tour. A few years later, Sergio Garcia stole the hearts of golf fans worldwide en route to stamping his claim as a young up-and-comer. Adam Scott and Luke Donald soon followed Garcia, quickly placing their names into the hat of “young guns.”
I’m also a fan of statistics, charts, and graphs. The image to the right was taken from a 
Less than two years ago, Jason Mischel was an avid golfer who owned a thriving mail-order pet supply company. His biggest golf-related concern was probably trying to decide whether he wanted to buy a new driver.
It was between passing out and downing my last gulp of green ale this past weekend when I thought about all the memories I’ve had on the golf course. The game of golf is synonymous with history, legends, and lore. It’s one of the reasons why I love the game so much.
Australian Rod Pampling proved to be just lucky enough this St. Patrick’s Day weekend to overcome a two-shot deficit with two holes to play. He started the day with a substantial four-shot lead, but quickly saw that lead collapse after carding a double-bogey six on the par-four 13th hole after shoving his drive out-of-bounds. He thought that he had handed the tournament to Greg Owen on a silver platter, the two-shot lead seemed too great to overcome in just two holes. However, Owen would take three putts to get down from 40 inches on the 17th green and would drop another stroke after a putt that looked center-cut agonizingly lipped out on the 72nd hole. “I can’t believe it missed,” he said afterward. “I cannot believe it missed.”
Greg Norman and Sean Connery go after Tim Finchem and Sherwood Country Club, the South Korean Prime Minister quits in a “golf scandal,” the odds on Tiger winning the Grand Slam in 2006 are a measly 30:1, and a little Phil Mickelson news: being dumped by Ford and holding out on hybrids. This and a whole lot more in this week’s Golf Talk Podcast.
Donald Ross (1872-1948) was born at Dornoch in Scotland. He grew up playing the famous Royal Dornoch golf links and apprenticed under “Old” Tom Morris for a year at St. Andrews. Ross’ name has become synonymous with golf and as a testament to his genius, there are nine of his courses on Golf Digest’s list of 
I thought I could use an “edge” when playing golf to maximize my performance on the course. I was running out of steam and a bit achy at the end of a round of golf. I figured that exercise alone just wasn’t enhancing my performance in spite of the fact that all the tour pros insist that using weight training equipment and stretching would help me achieve that par score that is so evasive to me.