World Ranking: Jordan Spieth’s return to No. 1 is a head scratcher, 'as bizarre as it has ever been'

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Jordan Spieth became the first player in the history of the World Ranking to ascend to No. 1 by missing the cut. “The battle for No. 1 in the Official World Golf Ranking is so confounding that no one is complaining about all the points and projections of the FedEx Cup,” Doug Ferguson of the Associated Press writes. “Give it time. The FedEx Cup still has two tournaments left before it awards $10 million to a player who might not have had the best year. Or might not win at all. The world ranking? That will be cleared up soon enough. For the moment, this is as bizarre as it has ever been.”

Phil Mickelson struck many as a curious choice by U.S. Presidents Cup captain Jay Haas. “Could Mickelson's pick to be part of the U.S. Presidents Cup team be a form of validation, a nod to what Lefty did last September at Gleneagles, when he shockingly spoke his mind and questioned the captaincy of Tom Watson, as well as the direction the PGA of America was going as it related to the Ryder Cup?” ESPN’s Bob Harig writes.

“Rickie Fowler has that lucrative Cobra-Puma endorsement. Rickie has those wild orange outfits and those signature caps. Rickie has the Leonardo DiCaprio looks. Rickie has swimsuit model Alexis Randcock as his girlfriend,” columnist Jeff Jacobs of the Hartford Courant writes. “Yes, Rickie has lots of things. What he doesn't have is the last name Spieth. Or McIlroy. Or Day. On Sunday, he admitted that it motivated him.”

The headline, “Golf, Sex, and Death: Why they Don’t Get Along,” is an intriguing one, and the story, by Robert Krulwich at National Geographic, is at least an amusing one. “A golf course, [biology professor David Haskell] declares, ruthlessly erases two rhythms fundamental to the natural world: death and sex,” Krulwich writes. “Botanically, I guess, Haskell is right. Evidence of aging and sex is suppressed at the golf course. But that’s also true of baseball diamonds and football fields.”