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The Grind: Match play madness, Oscars observations, and Honda Classic picks

Tue, 26 Feb 2013 16:05:00 GMT

Yeah, this actually happened at a PGA Tour event. (Photo: Getty Images)

Welcome to another edition of The Grind, where we don't need a red carpet to be at our best. What a wild week it was in the desert. All four No. 1 seeds bowed out by the second round, yet Sunday still featured a pretty sexy final four. Well, if you're into ski hats. In fact, Al Gore's next documentary on global warming should just be a recap of the unpredictable weather the PGA Tour has encountered this year. But the next stop is the Sunshine State and hopefully, it will bring just that -- you know, because Florida is known for its predictable climate. In the meantime, here's what else has us talking:

WE'RE BUYING

Matt Kuchar. Gone are the days of viewing this guy as a glorified ATM. Don't let the smile fool you, Kuchar is a stone-cold competitor and he's getting closer and closer to being a major champion. In the past 10 months, he's won arguably the two biggest non-major events on tour. And with 11 one-putts in 17 holes during the final against Hunter Mahan, why don't more pros copy him and anchor the putter into their forearm rather than their belly or chest?

Ariya Juntanugarn. Sure, she choked away her first LPGA win by triple bogeying the final hole of regulation, but it was a pretty incredible effort considering it was her first LPGA event as a pro. Oh yeah, she's only 17, and her wild final round included an ace on the 12th hole that vaulted her back into the lead. She'll be fine. Just fire the caddie who let her go for the green in two on the closing par 5 and move on.

The West Coast Swing. If you're a fan of the PGA Tour, you couldn't have asked for anything more from this start to the season, which included wins by Tiger Woods, Phil Mickelson, Dustin Johnson, Brandt Snedeker and Kuchar. Oh yeah, this also gives me an opportunity to link to my latest slideshow recapping all the action from 2013 thus far.

WE'RE SELLING

The PGA Tour's rebel stance. The tour announced it would oppose the USGA's proposed ban on the anchoring of putters after many of its players (predictably) protested the new rule. So, let's get this straight. The tour will follow every other rule in the book set forth by the game's governing body, but not this? That's kind of like me saying I will follow all the rules of my office other than the one that says I can't take a nap after lunch. Wait, is that even an official rule? Hmm. . .

Rory McIlroy. Look, if McIlroy was a stock, there wouldn't be a more valuable long-term option out there. But right now, David Duval is doing as much to convince me to buy Nike equipment.

The Golf Club at Dove Mountain. Forget about the fact that the players hate this course, how about not having this event at a place that could have doubled as a ski resort? If a bunch of rain was enough to convince the USGA to stay away from another Bethpage Black U.S. Open, this snow storm in the desert should make the PGA Tour reconsider coming back to this Jack Nicklaus design. Days after the snow was cleared, there was Matt Kuchar (left) looking ridiculous wearing a pair of oven mitts to keep his hands warm. Move the tournament back to California and call it a day.

ON TAP

With its West Coast Swing in the books, the PGA Tour heads to Florida for the Honda Classic. Last year, Rory McIlroy held off a charging Tiger Woods, who shot a 62 in the final round. NBC probably wouldn't mind seeing that happen again. . .

Random tournament fact: Matt Kuchar won the only PGA Tour title of his pre-one-plane-swing era in 2002. It was also in the days before this event moved to PGA National, meaning he basically shouldn't even be listed as a former champ.

WEEKLY YAHOO! FANTASY LINEUP

Since the WGC Match Play wasn't a part of Yahoo!'s fantasy golf season, we're not counting them as official picks and forgetting we ever made them. Now that the tour is back to stroke play this week, here's how we see things playing out with this field loaded with international talent:

Starters -- (A-List): Tiger Woods. Despite a first-round loss to Charles Howell III at the Match Play, Tiger is still batting 1.000 in stroke play events in the U.S. this year.

(B-List): Louis Oosthuizen. The South African is making his 2013 stroke play debut in the U.S., but a hot stretch to close out 2012 and a win on the European Tour to start the year has him all the way to No. 5 in the Official World Golf Ranking.

(B-List): Fredrik Jacobson. The Swede's last two stroke play tournaments were a T-7 at Pebble Beach and a T-3 at Riviera. And despite the ugly missed putt that cost him a spot in a playoff there, Jacobson leads all golfers who have played at least 10 PGA Tour rounds in strokes gained/putting.

(C-List): Lee Westwood. The former World No. 1 finished fourth in this event last year and has been over par just once in his previous 10 rounds at PGA National.

Bench -- Graeme McDowell, Keegan Bradley, Justin Rose and Charl Schwartzel.

RANDOM PROP BETS OF THE WEEK

-- After an impressive display by Roger Maltbie during the snow delay, the Golf Channel will introduce a new reality series in 2014 in which the on-course analyst has snowball-throwing contests with other golf personalities: 10-to-1 odds

-- A player who competed in the Match Play will mistakenly tell a playing partner this week to "pick it up": 5-to-1 odds

-- The upcoming movie, Fast and Furious 6, will NOT win an Academy Award for Best Picture: LOCK

CELEBRITY/ATHLETE WE'D LIKE TO PLAY GOLF WITH

Jennifer Lawrence. OK, so I've never actually seen one of her movies (although I am looking forward to seeing "Silver Linings Playbook" whenever it finds its way onto network TV), but I did see this clip of her press conference after winning the Academy Award for best actress. Lawrence seems really funny and cool, especially when she notes that she took a shot of liquor before addressing the media. And despite her now famous fall on her way to accept her award, she must be a good athlete. Isn't that what that movie The Hunger Games was all about?

VIRAL VIDEO OF THE WEEK

We have NO idea what is being said in this, but it's still pretty creative/funny. Perhaps the PGA Tour should just make this the format for the next time it returns to Dove Mountain:

THIS AND THAT

Tiger and Rory played a friendly match on Sunday since both were feeling WGC-Accenture withdrawal. . . . Associate equipment editor Ashley Mayo won the Golf Digest Match Play bracket pool, despite picking Woods, an opening-round loser, to win it all. Yeah, the rest of the entries were so bad that my boss came up with this "formula" for filling out your bracket. It's really funny. And I'm not just saying that because he's my boss. . . . My friends and I bumped into Cuba Gooding Jr. (above), aka "Rod Tidwell" from the classic movie Jerry Maguire, at a NYC bar over the weekend. That's Steve hopefully not asking the Oscar winner to say "Show me the money!"

RANDOM QUESTIONS TO PONDER

When Tiger and Rory play a home and home, does the host actually have to pay a guest fee?

Whatever happened to Cuba Gooding Jr.?

-- Alex Myers is a contributing editor for GolfDigest.com. Feel free to email him and please follow him on Twitter since he has self-esteem issues.

How To Fill Out Your Match Play Bracket: A Refresher

Fri, 22 Feb 2013 15:08:00 GMT

By Sam Weinman

After so many upsets in the first round of the Accenture World Match Play Championship, you may think there's no rhyme or reason to who wins these things. Quite the contrary! There is in fact a formula for determining a match's outcome. It's just not the one you'd expect.

(Photo by Getty Images)

Below we provide our basic guidelines for the next time you fill out your bracket.

1. If there's a golfer you have never heard of before this week, he will likely win.

2. If a golfer comes into the week enjoying a "hot start to the season," he will lose.

3. The guy who is in worse physical condition is a lock.

4. Always take the guy with the belly putter. If it's two guys with a belly putter, take the guy in worse shape.

5. If at any point analysts cite a golfer's "impressive match play record," that guy will lose. Unless that guy is Ian Poulter.

6. If a guy was a late addition to the field by virtue of Phil Mickelson going on vacation with his kids, he will win at least one match.

7. Always take the plucky European player over the American. Unless he's a plucky European player with "an impressive match play record." Again, exceptions are made for Ian Poulter.

8. If it's two Americans, take the guy who is considered the worse putter.

9. Also, give the edge to a guy who has any of the following:

-- A hyphen in his last name.

-- The guy with the more garish assortment of logos on his shirt.

-- An inordinate number of vowels and/or consonants in his last name.

-- A painter's cap.

Follow @samweinman

The Grind: Riviera's riveting finish, Obama & Tiger tee it up & match play picks

Tue, 19 Feb 2013 16:18:00 GMT

By Alex Myers

Welcome to another edition of The Grind, where we'd like to take this time to issue a public service announcement: If you were listed in our PGA Tour "Sleepers To Watch in 2013" feature, watch your back. Literally. First, Blake Adams went down with a hip injury and now Spencer Levin's bum wrist will keep him out the rest of the regular season. Move over, "Madden Cover jinx." With a World Golf Championship event next up, most of the guys on the list have this week off. But that just means they should be extra careful when doing chores around the house. . .

WE'RE BUYING

John Merrick. Nice job by the former UCLA Bruin. Merrick won his first PGA Tour title right down the road from where he went to school and he timed it perfectly with us celebrating a provocative pic while he was an undergrad. Considering Merrick still has his first paycheck as a professional golfer (A $3,200 one for finishing T-3 at a Hooters Tour event) framed in his bedroom, we're pretty sure he'll save some memorabilia from this win. He'll have plenty of money to save as well, since his latest check has just a few more zeros in it.

Merrick came through in the clutch before celebrating with Mr. Clutch, Jerry West.

Barack Obama. Like his politics or not, if you are reading this, you probably like golf. And if that's the case, you have to like the fact that the president likes the game so much. After a day of working with Butch and Claude Harmon at The Floridian, Obama teed it up with Tiger Woods for the first time on Sunday. Not a bad weekend.

Daniela Holmqvist. I don't care if spider experts weighed in and said the situation for the LET rookie bitten by a Black Widow wasn't as dangerous as originally believed, the point is that she believed she was in danger, acted by cutting out the venom with a tee, and then played on and shot a respectable 74. Kinda makes that time you played through a blister on your hand seem a little less impressive, right?

WE'RE SELLING

Brandt Snedeker. Sore ribs? What, from laughing all the way to the bank? In any matter, the hottest player in the world won't be in the field this week (he would have been a No. 1 seed). It's bad news for his fans, but great news for everyone else in the field who now has a chance to win.

Riviera's 10th hole. Look, I'm not disputing it's a great hole, but I think that back-right pin position is a little ridiculous. No matter what players did off the tee, it was nearly impossible to play their approaches toward the hole and actually have the ball stay on the putting surface. There's a phrase for this, but I guess you only hear it about holes that aren't so famous: "Tricked up."

Fredrik Jacobson's pressure putting. Hey, the Swede had a great tournament and came close to his second PGA Tour win. His four-footer to get into a playoff, however, came about as close as the average tour player came to voting for the First Golfer this past fall. The 38-year-old's middle name is "Ulf." Perhaps we should make that the term for missing a short putt that badly, as in, what a poorly-timed ulf or he really ulfed that up.

ON TAP

The PGA Tour heads to Arizona for the WGC Match Play. Last year, Hunter Mahan knocked off Rory McIlroy to keep him from taking over the top spot in the world rankings. The young lad from Northern Ireland would never recover. Wait, never mind. . .

Random tournament fact: This is the only official tour event in which match play is the format. OK, so you probably knew that already.

WEEKLY FANTASY PICKS

With no opposite-field event going on this week, and with Yahoo!'s inability to figure out a way to award points for match play, most fantasy golf leagues are dormant this week. That doesn't mean you shouldn't fill out a match-play bracket and wager a few bucks with co-workers, though. Here's our stab at a final four:

Keegan Bradley, Jason Dufner, Graeme McDowell, and Luke Donald, with G-Mac topping Dufsanity in the championship match. Of course, our gut is to go with Woods, but in this event above all, going with your gut probably isn't the wisest move. Plus, he might have to face noted Tiger tamer Gonzalo Fernandez-Castano in the second round. . .

RANDOM PROP BETS OF THE WEEK

-- Phil Mickelson's kids will imitate him falling on the rocks if his family goes to the beach during their vacation: 2-to-1 odds

Related: Golf's Most Provocative Photos

-- TV viewers will hear the phrase "the vagaries of match play" ad nauseum: LOCK

-- The phrase "tearing up my bracket" will be said/written even more: Also a LOCK

CELEBRITY/ATHLETE WE'D LIKE TO PLAY GOLF WITH

Chris Paul. As a Wake Forest alum, Sunday was quite a roller coaster ride. First, I had to suffer through 2004 classmate Bill Haas' letdown at Riviera, but CP3's NBA All-Star Game MVP performance made me extremely proud to be a Demon Deacon once again. It seems the only thing the Clippers' point guard likes doing as much as picking apart opposing defenses is playing/watching golf. I could also see him distributing food and drinks at the turn like he dishes out passes on the court. Chris, I know you're busy leading a historically-pathetic franchise to its best season ever, but I'll gladly save you a summer tee time.

STAT OF THE WEEK

Fred Couples played in his 31st Northern Trust Open and found his way on the leader board for much of the first two days. Just think, he's played in the same tournament 31 times. Crazy. I don't think I've even eaten at the same Chili's that many times. OK, so that's a lie. . .

VIRAL VIDEO OF THE WEEK

In this week's edition of "How out of touch with the youngsters can a 30-year-old be?" I admit that I still don't understand the "Harlem Shake" phenomenon. That being said, here's the Villanova men's golf team doing it -- whatever "it" is:

THIS AND THAT

Bernhard Langer won his 15th event on the Champions Tour. He better learn how to putt without anchoring because the 55-year-old looks like he has another decade of dominating the old guys in him. . . . There was a kangaroo delay during the Women's Australian Open. It's too bad the LPGA doesn't always have this excuse for why its rounds take so long. . . . I attended a wedding reception over the weekend at which the bride and groom were introduced by coming up through the floor encased in a glass box (above). It's good to see the phrase "coming over the top" can still apply to more than the golf swing.

RANDOM QUESTIONS TO PONDER

Did Obama and Tiger drink Arnold Palmers at the turn?

After a good start to the season, why did Dustin Johnson change putters? Is Paulina Gretzky just an Odyssey spy working undercover?

Did we really just go an entire column without referring to a picture of an attractive female?

-- Alex Myers is a contributing editor for GolfDigest.com. Feel free to email him and please follow him on Twitter since he has self-esteem issues.

NCAA men eyeing 72 holes again to crown indy winner

Ryan Herrington — Wed, 12 Dec 2012 00:30:00 GMT

By Ryan HerringtonLAS VEGAS—Love it or hate it, the match-play component of the men's NCAA Championship will be around for the foreseeable future. So said San Jose State men's coach John Kennaday and Georgia Southern's...

Ask Stina: All's Fair In Love And Golf

Stina Sternberg — Tue, 20 Nov 2012 05:00:00 GMT

Male vs. female matches, plus winterizing your game.

Police officer earns praise for delivering McIlroy to Medinah in time

Tue, 02 Oct 2012 14:02:00 GMT

By Stephen Hennessey

Instead of the Miracle at Medinah, would we be talking about the Catnap in Chicago?

If a Chicago police officer had delivered the World No. 1 golfer to Medinah a couple minutes later, the British tabloid headlines would've exploded with the story of Rory McIlroy missing his tee time and forfeiting his match to the U.S.' Keegan Bradley.

Rory McIlroy arrived to the first tee to a chorus of applause from the crowd, just on time for one of the day's marquee matches. Photo: David Cannon/Getty Images.

The Chicago Sun-Times has the story on the officer who helped a sleepy McIlroy get to the course in time to win a crucial point against Bradley to secure a crucial point for the Europeans.

Patrick Rollins, a deputy police chief in Lombard, Ill., sat in the driver's seat as a bewildered McIlroy opened the door to the passenger's seat.

"He looked stunned, anxious and looked like a lot was going through his mind like I would have been," Rollins told Michael Sneed of the Sun-Times. "So I asked him if he'd be okay with me driving because of the possibility of motion sickness."

McIlroy, thanks to his police escort from the team hotel in Lombard, made it to the course in time for his marquee match with Bradley, and defeated the fiery American without any practice time, 2 & 1. It was the third in five-straight wins for the Euros to open up Sunday's unlikely comeback.

If it wasn't for Rollins, it's fair to predict the Euros would've really struggled to overcome that sort of momentum-changing forfeit.

And McIlroy would've struggled to ever shed the tag as the golfer who slept the Ryder Cup away.

Follow @s_hennesseyGD

Weekend Tip: Winning at match play

Roger Schiffman — Sat, 28 Jul 2012 05:00:00 GMT

Head to head. Mano a mano. You against me. However you put it, July and August are traditionally the months for match-play tournaments. Many club championships are contested at match play, as are most member-guests....

Final thoughts from Men's NCAAs

Ryan Herrington — Wed, 06 Jun 2012 19:30:00 GMT

BEVERLY HILLS, CALIF.--After filing my story about Texas' dramatic victory over Alabama at the NCAA Championship for this week's issue of Golf World on Monday morning, I followed up with my customary phone call about...

Pettersen looks to defend at Sybase Match Play

Alex Myers — Wed, 16 May 2012 19:33:00 GMT

GLADSTONE, N.J. -- Everyone knows about Yani Tseng's 13 tournament titles last year, but one of 2011's most underrated feats in women's golf was Suzann Pettersen's dominant match-play record. Across the continent last year...

Trending: Westwood pulls a Mickelson

Mon, 27 Feb 2012 14:52:00 GMT

The chances of hitting a golf ball up a spectator's shorts can only be matched by hitting one down the shirt of another. Which is just what Lee Westwood did yesterday in his semifinal round match-up against Rory McIlroy.

It's hard to imagine a more improbable shot than Phil Mickelson's "shot up a man's shorts," but Westwood might have outdone him with this delicately placed tee shot on the par-5 13th hole at the Accenture Match Play Championship. Lee also one-upped Phil with his wistful commentary when, after approaching the woman he just plunked, suggested she walk 250-yards further up the fairway.

-- Derek Evers
Follow @DerekEvers