PGA Tour: RBC Canadian Open: Notes from the Ballwasher

First topic message reminder :

1).To this long-time sports fan(atic), Darren Clarke's win was the best moment in sport for at least twenty years. Just as Team Europe did, in my all-time fave 1987 Ryder Cup victory at Muirfield Village, Darren Clarke succeeded in outplaying and outthinking the opposition, grabbed a lead and held the advantage for most of two full days.

2).9th, 38th, 38th, 38th, 44th, 48th, 54th, 70th, 72nd and worse.
No, not Portsmouth F.C.'s finishes in the Football League during its 1950's and 1960's descent from 1940's glory. But the top English pro finishers on home turf in The Open. Congratulations to Simon Dyson, second consecutive Major top twelve finish.

3).No word of PGA Tour Commissioner Tim Finchem's comments after DC's triumph, probably not fit to be tweeted. But Timmy must surely be under increasing pressure to open up opportunities on the PGA Tour to non-members. I wasn't sure that Chubby Chandler hadn't overplayed his hand in dealing with the Tour last winter, but perhaps he was the only one who knew the quality of the cards he was holding, trumps in every tournament. Over to you Mr.Commissioner.
(The rumour since Rory's US Open victory had been that "affiliate members" with certain pre-defined qualifications might be permitted to play up to twelve PGA Tour events, regardless of whether they had prior Tour membership or not. If such membership came without FedEx Play-Off status, I think even the most anti-"international"-player among the Tour's rank and file might go for that.)

4).Congrat's to Thomas Bjorn for earning a return trip to the 2012 Masters, and to Messrs Bjorn, Campbell, Kim, Fowler, Love, Jacquelin and Dyson for earning trips to Lytham next July for which they might otherwise not have been qualified.

5).Nice to see Davis Love prominent among those hanging round to congratulate DC, bet DLIII loved every moment of it. But would like to have seen Rory there also. Perhaps he was, but perhaps he was playing tennis with young Caroline? "Your Major for my Number One"? Or vice versa??

6).Eight time zones to the west of the Kent coast, and light years culturally from the Mississippi site of last week's Viking Classic won by Chris Kirk - most likely the first win of many - the PGA Tour lands in Vancouver, BC, at Shaughnessy Golf and Country Club. One hundred years old, Shaughnessy has hosted the RBC Canadian Open four times before, most recently in 2005 when Mark Calcavecchia was the winner. Calc will be spending much of this week in the pubs of Greater London, where Walton Heath hosts the Senior Open Championship, but Ben Crane and Ryan Moore (who were joint runners up), Kelly, Ames, Atwal, Kuchar, Pernice and Baird survive from the 2005 top ten.

7).Kudos to Messrs Campbell, Casey, Fowler, Frazar, Furyk, Kim, Levin, Moore, Oosthuizen, Schwartzel and Van Pelt for playing Sunday at RStG and making the long trek. In a surprising tactical move, Donald, Els, Mahan and some others led a breakaway from Kent last Friday and will presumably have got a jump on coping with jet lag.

8).And Notah Begay has announced that Tiger Woods will be playing on August 31st at Turning Stone in the Notah Begay III Foundation Challenge. While Tiger's pr is seemingly run by the same people who advise Rupert Murdoch, there has been no official tweet from Florida confirming this date; however, it would be surpising for Tiger to play at Turning Stone if he didn't earlier compete in the Bridgestone and the PGA Championship, at the very least. (If Tiger were to miss Bridgestone and the PGA, he would presumably be foregoing any opportunity to qualify for the FedEx Play-Offs.)

9).Congratulations to Inverness's Russell Knox, winner of the Nationwide tournament in Ohio; Knox is now 5th in the N'wide moneylist (top 25 earn PGA Tour cards for 2012), and has risen to a world ranking of 316. Though he is listed on the owgr site as American, Knox joins a group of other promising young Scots; Laird, Ramsay, Jamieson, Whiteford and some I've undoubtedly missed.

10).Lastly, this week's Senior Open Championship will provide another litmus test as to the quality of European Senior Golf as opposed to it's American counterparts. Great to see this Championship growing stronger by the year, but wouldn't it be nice to see it return to Northern Ireland as a test drive for an Open Championship?


PS: Public Service warning. Don't know if any of you have had to renew your British Passport recently but what a shambles it is in the USA. Sent my application in eight weeks ago, my credit card was charged over two weeks ago, and still nothing. No way available to monitor or expedite it as the telephone help line one is offered hangs up after five minutes, and the email help contact directs one to the telephone help line. A friend of mine in England is experiencing similar difficulties. Meanwhile, I am unable to travel fifty miles north of here. Stranded!

Scores in the 80's and Steven Webster's 93 in Stockholm. Are conditions really awful?

Weather forecast to be perfect all day for the RBC Canadian Open final round. No-one has been able to sustain consistently good scoring, but there are clearly good scores out there and you'd think an early 64 or 65 from as low as the plus twos (e.g. Glover, Fowler) would give Bo Van Pelt, Hadwin etc something to think about.

Lots of the leaders have undoubted ability; hardly any of them have shown they can close a tournament out, not recently anyway. No-one's got less to lose than John Daly and strange things have happened in his career; stranger than a win today though?

Pretty windy in Sweden, but nothing more than that really... Doesn't quite justify those terrible scores today. Edfors for example, finished 6-over today but he's up 8 places from yesterday!

Well done to Mr. Kim who finished it off in Japan, with Ryo runner-up and they're provisionally moving to #23 and #49 respectively. Mr. Bo could jump as high as #18 if he wins in Canada...

K-t Kim pretty much sews up an automatic Pres Cup berth with this result; Greg Norman must be scratching his head as, apart from Day, KJ and Schwartzel, his top ten players are full of the infirm (Els, Goosen, Clark), the out of form (Scott, Oosthuizen, Yang) and the unknown, Kim.

Not to wish ill on anyone else, but Shark really needs Ogilvy to bring it with some good results, starting today.

As for Ryo, he travels about as well as Jumbo Ozaki, not sure that he's achieved anything better than 20th place in a stroke play event outside Asia. All flash and pr so far.

(Thought Robert Karlsson was going to earn a decent finish for a while, but after maintaining the Status Quo for his front nine, now he's going Down the Dustpipe. Sorry.)

Frederik Anderson-Hed shot a 90 today in Sweden, including a 9 on the par 5 13th and a 12 on the par 3 17th... #meltdown!

Ai Miyazato wins the Evian Masters

Forget the gusty winds and the high scores, those were wonderful scenes in Sweden, really happy for Noren. Great talent backed by lots of very hard work and a great work ethic, the future looks very bright for him! And he very generously provides me a second win for my ET fantasy team this season, that's what I call good value. And well done to the two US stars for a very good show all week, hope they'll come back in Europe soon...

Hi NB,
Pretty sad state of affairs for the LPGA when one of their flag events receive very little fanfare. A brief look at the leaderboard would appear to be represented by only a handful of countries. Unless one follows the sport, nobody has a clue as to who these ladies are. Probably the worst managed sport organization in the world. Worst than beach volleyball.

Golfer of the day so far: Richard Finch. The only number under par in Stockholm. Only one within 3 strokes and just a handful 4 and 5 out. Seems like Bubba's big bending shots don't fair very well in the wind. Needs to reconsider things to become an ace.

kwini,
Not sure your Calcavecchia pick is going to be the winning mount in Surrey. Has had numerous opportunities to move the gap. Cochran, Frost, Rinker and Lane have good chances each with more than 10 holes to play.

Amateur Patrick Cantlay is tied for 17th going into the final round today. Can he withstand the pressure of turning pro even though he wants to finish the next three years on the UCLA golf team? How much is a college degree worth?

Well done Mark Cavendish. Even greater for Cadel Evans and Aussieland.

venice,
Cavendish's lead-out train at 75 kph must be one of the things of beauty in all of sport. Wonderful spectacle.

Congrat's to Noren, steadily moving towards the very top rank of European golf. Would think Bubba and Dustin will be pleased to get home; won't be looking for them to play well at Firestone.

Calc might have thrown away his chance at Walton Heath; can Russ Cochran hold on? Looking forward to watching the back nine in a moment.

Would have loved Suzann Pettersen to have won the Evian . . . . . . . Team GB&I nowhere. (Not quite sure why lpga.com gives Melissa Reid a Union Jack but Stupples and Davies cross of SG. As you say, the LPGA having a hard time coming out of their own way.)

kwini,

Tried a search on Russ Cochran's recent results. Only played 2 tourneys per the last 2 years? This is his first tournament of year? If so, that's one heck of a feat. What does he do during the rest of the year? Forgotten that he was a lefty until he appeared on the broadcast this weekend.

Perfect description is your Cavendish = Lead-Out Train. He defines the word: locomotive. That thing of beauty is almost all-power.

I don't know how Corey Pavin manages to consistently be near the top of the leaderboard. Watching him, a number of us could probably relate to his physical stature, run-of-the-mill swing and limited length of club shots. He is still competing at a very decent level and the majority of his fairway swings done with the metal hybrid woods. I don't have a single one in my bag but will have to reconsider. One thing that's deterred me is 2 friends who have predominantly switched to these type of clubs have not noticeably improved their games. Still, just may buy a rescue/hybrid club this month. What will my 2 iron think?

venice,
I think your reference source on Russ Cochran is a little out of date. He came on the Champo Tour a couple of years ago without any "status", but quickly qualified for some events and started making money:
2009: $900K
2010: $1.7M with two wins.
2011: $600K in eight events, but has been out injured for a while. Looks pretty healthy now though, his health and his bank account prospects.

Was a good player on the PGA Tour for a while, won a Western Open when Greg Norman threw away a chance, but sort of faded away. Always a good putter.
(This faux tape delay on ESPN is driving me crazy.)

Stranger things have happened, indeed.
Luke Donald with four birdies in his first eleven holes is all of a sudden in 12th place, just four off 2nd, just six off BVP's lead.
Without wishing ill on anyone, it's not inconceivable that Donald might post a score others find it difficult to Duck under.

Luke probably just getting over the jetlag. Great rally, an eagle at the next par 5 would be nice, and then anything is possible. Looks like a good finish for the tournament in prospect...

jinxed him....

Luke Donald hit his first twelve (of fourteen) fairways today. Short and wild for his last two, bogey, bogey, and that's cost him yet another top ten.
And round of the day for Ernie Els, 66. That's encouraging.

One after another they're taking turns at the top spot... Daly and Romero still to have a go at it...

So just how good is cantlay? Just heard the commentator say he has finished in the top 25 in all the pga tour events he has played this year, and that includes the US open.

21st, 24th, 20th and currently 9th for Cantlay on the PGA Tour. That's lots of dollars left on the table, probably about $350K.

Is it just me blinking at the wrong time or are CBS deliverately avoiding John Daly. Perhaps not to upset any anti-smoking sensitivities? Doon The Water will be relieved.

Seems like Ogilvy's not fully engaged in this, some terrible putts. Perhaps Romero's aggression might be suitably rewarded?

Shotrock's enjoying an event at Aronomink this weekend; as Sean O'Hair's a member there, one imagines O'Hair's bar bill is exploding right now.

Big surprise for O'Hair, first top fifteen finish of the year.

Perhaps fitting for the tournament that the playoff is won with a bogey.

Well done Sean O'Hair. Am I the only one who finds it ironic that he's one of the more hursuit members of the PGA Tour, under the cap at least?

Kwin - Indeed! Good win for a good guy. At this level, not much difference sometimes between a winner and an also ran.

(All Uticans made it through 18 at Aronimink without wilting. A hearty breed those Mohawk Valley guys. The fact that there was unlimited beer at the golf deck didn't hurt either!)

A very humble winner, Shotrock, glad you had a great weekend.

Never know what to make of him, but on balance one is pleased to see the Young Americans harvest some wins.
Kostis was making a big point about O'Hair looking as if he was spending too much time preparing for a good golf swing instead of a good golf shot. But today he had the last laugh. Perhaps he'll have some tickets for Aronomink members for Augusta?

Kwini,
Only got to read your article now.......following DC for so long, i never believed he had the capability mentally or the putting to win a major.................heading to Killarney early on friday for the Irish Open. really looking forward to cheering on the Us Open and Open champions (among others). Hoping to see padraig put in a big week.......................................

Hi John,
I think DC has had some bad luck in the past, and that's been exacerbated by poor physical fitness with perhaps mental mistakes creeping in as a result. Last week he was in the zone! Long may it last. He's had good results at Firestone in the past so perhaps he can get the cobwebs out this week and carry on where he left off at the Bridgestone.
Have a good time at Killarney, say Hi! to princedracula for me. And maybe Be_The_Ball as well?