Pick of the Week: Crowne Plaza Invitational at Colonial

This week the PGA Tour visits Colonial Country Club for the Crowne Plaza Invitational, past champions on this course are Sergio Garcia, Kenny Perry, Zach Johnson, even legends like Tom Watson. For this event my pick is Stewart Cink, with great finishes in the past two events, building up momentum coming into this week. Last year at Colonial, he fired over 3 rounds in the 60s, good enough for a top 25. This guy has game, this might be the week to reveal whats cooking in the bag. Hopefully Cink can pull through for me, allowing me to gain a larger lead. The gap between the points is getting pretty large, me and jj might have to use some of our engineering techniques, to make use of such great space. Some notable players to watch this week are: Sergio Garcia, Hunter Mahan, and David Toms. Garcia was able to achieve a T12 with a impressive final round 65, another example of momentum coming into this week. David Toms, veteran player, was firing on all pistols last week at TPC Sawgrass, but was not able to seal the deal Sunday afternoon, but expect a great finish. Hunter Mahan doesn’t have a great record here, but I believe he will pull through this week, finishing in the top 25. 

Dazed and Confused

Another tournament, another question, another controversy. This has been the ongoing timeline of what the current state that Tiger Woods has with his golf game. As you may have heard, after shooting a front-nine 42 earlier on Thursday last week, Tiger decided to withdraw from THE PLAYERS, citing his achilles and leg injuries as the reason. Many noted that he was also clearly limping throughout the day, so he chose to not make a bad situation any worse. As a Tiger fan, this only makes me feel worse for the guy. Karma obviously isn't done with him yet, as he continues to have this run of bad luck with the injuries and sub-par play. This can only raise more questions of "Is Tiger Done?" and "When will he return?" and most importantly: "When will he, if ever, win again?". Although these questions have been continually been asked ever since post-Thanksgiving of 2009, this WD at THE PLAYERS will only bring more of questions like these at possibly an alarming rate. It's defintely just going to get worse.

Even though many haters continue to relish the "cheetah's" demise, a majority of the golf contingent are rooting for him now. The math is simple; Tiger+Tiger Win+Big Tournament= $$$. The PGA Tour and the television networks need the guy. Their ratings go up, and their finances increase. The fans also become happier because the man is such a polarizing figure it creates a lot of buzz whenever he can do something like that. This recent setback can only hurt the TOUR even more.

I think the thing we all have to do now is just stay patient for the man. He needs to get healthy and not rush this injury, or we will be back to square one quickly. If we give Mr. Woods patience, space, and time to get his life, golf game, and health back together, I think he can return back to his winning ways. If he can do that, the PGA Tour will soar, because not only will he be back to normal, but since we have a huge amount of players playing great golf right now, we can see how they all stack up with one another. But for now, we just can only hope and believe as golf fans. The greatest golfer of our generation, at one point heralded as our Superman, has at some point been stuck with Kryptonite for about a year and a half now. Faith is needed for our fallen star to get back to normal, and its needed now more than ever. There's no doubt that he still has the potential to bring his game back to form for good. But until then, get well soon, Tiger Woods. I'll be rooting for you like never before.

Pick of the Week: THE PLAYERS Championship

Here we are ladies and gentlemen- THE PLAYERS Championship, aka the 5th major!! The tournament with the biggest purse, the deepest field, and the course that nobody owns. Famed TPC Sawgrass in Florida favors no particular golfer, as nobody here has collected more than 2 wins on this course (and the list of two-time winners is small as well). The one thing that can be said about Sawgrass is this: you better be in excellent form the whole week with your golf game, and you better be mentally tough, or you will get eaten alive. Not having those components usually spells disaster. Generally, another rule of thumb around Sawgrass is you must be accurate and be able to putt on Sunday. Watch out for these things as the tournament rolls on. Also, watch out for a few notable story lines this week, such as how Tiger does and how his injury impacts him (or not), if Luke Donald can back up a great season with a great win, if Martin Kaymer can show people he is World No. 2 worthy, and if Sergio Garcia can continue to find his form to continue his streak of majors played at next month's U.S. Open. Now, off to my choice for this week. I'm going to go with Aussie Adam Scott. The 2004 Champion obviously knows what it takes to win here, capturing that aforementioned win with a clutch putt on the 18th hole en route to his victory. He's been in good form this year too, posting a runner-up finish at the Masters with a sprinkle of other top-10's as well as he continues to roll with the long putter. Adam has arguably the best swing in golf, so once he figured out how to putt well again, his form has returned. I expect good things out of the still young 30 year-old, and a good finish to this tournament to boot.

P.O.W. Re-Cap: Last week things got a bit confusing in our Pick of the Week standings. Bernardo's pick Rory McIlroy missed the halfways cut, while my pick Anthony Kim just made it in. Yet, with the new two-cut policy the TOUR can apply to tournaments nowadays, Kim was cut after the third round. After talking to Bernardo I decided that this should be a tie, since neither of our playing techiniallly finished the required 72 holes last week to post a number. So it sits at Bernardo-6, JJ-3.

Already used- Phil Mickelson, Geoff Ogilvy, Rickie Fowler, Aaron Baddeley, Hunter Mahan, Ricky Barnes, Luke Donald, Justin Rose, Anthony Kim.

Adam before the tournament action this week:

photo source: telegraph.co.uk