#25 Paul Goydos

Paul Goydos' daughters: Chelsea and Courtney

Hold your applause, he says. He agrees his situation is analogous to Bobby Jones deflecting praise for calling a penalty on himself, equating it to praising a man for not robbing a bank. "I can't imagine a parent who's financially able to do it who wouldn't do it," Goydos says. "If they wouldn't, that says volumes about our society and where we need to go."

Goydos, 44, played in only two events in '04 (after averaging 29 starts his first 11 seasons), earning $19,366. Still, he says it was the best year of his career, better than '07, when he earned $1.2 million, or '08, when he earned $1.6 million. The returns on his investment of time were manifold. He helped out in his kids' classrooms; he took them to the mall to buy clothes. "All the stuff you take for granted," he says.

"The downside to my job is that you do some absentee parenting," he says. "But at the end of that year, not only had I gotten to know my kids better, they had gotten to know me a little better. They got to see a different side of Dad, not just Dad home from work."

Goydos laments only that their mother largely has been unable to be there for them as well. "There's a reason why we have two parents, not just biological reasons," he says. "It's having two perspectives. I'm not right all the time, as much as I want to think I am. Having two people who are committed, that's good for your kids. My kids only have one parent to an extent. I can't do as good a job as two people can do."

That said, his has not been a solo journey. "Single is an interesting word," he says, debunking the phrase "single parent." Goydos has had extensive help from his ex-wife's family, including his former mother-in-law, who when Goydos is traveling stays at his home in Coto de Caza, Calif., and looks after the girls. "The reality is, I've got a sister-in-law and brother-in-law and grandmother that, without them, we wouldn't be having this conversation."

His daughters travel with him occasionally. He took them to Las Vegas for the Justin Timberlake Shriners Hospitals for Children Open, though they were more interested in Timberlake's concert than Dad's golf. Each brought a friend, too. "Four teenage girls in the room next to me for two days," Goydos says. "Good thing I missed the cut. They had a great time. They are already looking forward to going again next year. Great. My kids want to go to Vegas. Isn't that terrific?"

An instant affinity to Sin City notwithstanding, "They're doing great, all things considered," says Patrick Burke, a former PGA Tour player who lives near Goydos and is among his closest friends. Chelsea is a freshman at Saddleback College near the family's home, while Courtney is a high school junior already pondering college choices.

"We used to talk about that, family first," Burke says. "Golf is a miserable life for a family. We both agreed, if our families couldn't take it, we'd quit."

Trying times are not reflected in Goydos' performance; his most lucrative years, and some of his better golf, have all come post-divorce. In his last event of 2006, he finished T-2 to jump from 160th to 97th on the money list, giving him a full exemption in 2007. He won the Sony Open in Hawaii at the outset of '07, and then, of course, nearly won the Players this year.

"I don't know how he did it," Burke says. "I went through a few things, very minor, but it took so much of my focus away. He has an amazing ability to set it aside and go out and play."

Goydos' greatest asset is his ability to harness what talent he has and squeeze it dry. He was 19th in driving accuracy in 2008, but otherwise his statistics argue that he ought to find another line of work: 190th in driving distance, 151st in greens in regulation, 116th in putting.

"He's the real-estate broker in your office without a lot of flash," says his friend and long-time mentor Jamie Mulligan, a prominent teaching pro from Virginia CC in Long Beach, Calif. "But he's always closing more deals than anyone else. There's an intangible in playing, the ability to navigate yourself around the golf course with what you've got that day to work with. Paul had that when he was 15."