1st of the season

[Felix]

fuck, this place is deader than my 4 year old Pro-V's

So I'm entered in our annual golf pool, entry fee is $50, rules are you pick a player for each tournament, but you can only use a player one time.....starts with the Sony Open...I did this in about 5 minutes this morning.....it usually ends up being about 40 in the field and pays first fifteen places.....I've finished as high as fourth

here's my picks....thoughts?

1 Sony Open Ryan Palmer
2 Bob Hope Classic Tim Clark
3 Farmers Insurance Open Ben Crane
4 Waste Mgt Phoenix Open Hunter Mahan
5 AT&T Pebble Beach National Pro-Am Dustin Johnson
6 Northern Trust Open Steve Stricker
7 WGC Match Play Ian Poulter
8 The Honda Classic Ernie Els
9 WGC - CA Championship Camilo Villegas
10 Transitions Championship Retief Goosen
11 Arnold Palmer Invitational Edoardo Molinari
12 Shell Houston Open Anthony Kim
13 Masters Phil Mickelson
14 Valero Texas Open Adam Scott
15 The Heritage Luke Donald
16 Zurich Classic of New Orleans Jeff Overton
17 Wells Fargo Championship Rory McIlroy
18 The Players Championship Robert Allenby
19 Crown Plaza Invitational Zach Johnson
20 HP Byron Nelson Champ Brian Gay
21 Memorial Tournament Justin Rose
22 FedEx St. Jude Classic Lee Westwood
23 US Open Tiger Woods
24 Travelers Championship Bubba Watson
25 AT&T National Ryan Moore
26 John Deere Classic Paul Goydos
27 British Open Graeme McDowell
28 Canadian Open Mike Weir
29 Greenbrier Classic Stuart Appleby
30 WGC-Bridgestone Invitational Sean O'Hair
31 PGA Championship Martin Kaymer
32 Wyndham Championship Arjun Atwal
33 Barclays Classic Matt Kuchar
34 Deutsche Bank Championship Charley Hoffman
35 BMW Championship Paul Casey
36 The Tour Championship Jim Furyk

New equipment added this year.....



Loft : 4°
Lie : 71°
Length : 33
Headweight : 360g

Shorter than my old Newport, and about 20g heavier.....putted a few times toward the end of the season, and love the control, especially on long putts on fast greens.

[BSmack]

You picked two guys to defend majors. WTF are you thinking?

[Felix]

You picked two guys to defend majors. WTF are you thinking?

fucking Kaymer is probably one of the best players in the world that nobody has heard of, and Mickelson always plays well at Augusta

if you look at it, you'll see lots of defending champions picked for each respective tournament.....the one thing you're almost guaranteed, is that the defending champion will always show up....

I got killed last year on "no-shows", guys who played well in a tournament the year before then don't show up for that tournament

my "no show" list from last year reads like a who's who
Charles Howell III
K.J. Choi
Justin Leonard
Lee Westwood
and three others who's names I can't recall
fuck, if those fuckwits would have shown up and just finished in the money, I could have finished second or third (which is generally worth somewhere around $400 and $350 respectively

[BSmack]

You picked two guys to defend majors. WTF are you thinking?

fucking Kaymer is probably one of the best players in the world that nobody has heard of, and Mickelson always plays well at Augusta

if you look at it, you'll see lots of defending champions picked for each respective tournament.....the one thing you're almost guaranteed, is that the defending champion will always show up....

I see your logic working. And it makes absolute sense for the mid card jobbers like the St. Jude and Sony Opens to pick a defender. You'll hit with 1 or two of them. But we all know who's showing up for the majors. And we also know that there has never been a case of two different players defending major titles in the same year. Which means you've automatically lost one out the gate.

[Felix]

Which means you've automatically lost one out the gate.

[Felix]

2 Bob Hope Classic Tim Clark

Clark withdrew.......

you just made the list buddy

/s/

[Dinsdale]

1 Sony Open Ryan Palmer
2 Bob Hope Classic Tim Clark
3 Farmers Insurance Open Ben Crane
4 Waste Mgt Phoenix Open Hunter Mahan

How's that working out for you?

5 AT&T Pebble Beach National Pro-Am Dustin Johnson

Working off memory, wouldn't that be a threepeat?


My intial reaction was "Huh?," but the course(s) ssem tailored to his game. A young'un dominating a big-name event twice in his first 3 years ain't fucking around.


Although I've had this weird feeling that Las Gatos is going to break out, and DJ hasn't quite taken the deed to Pebble away from its owner yet.

6 Northern Trust Open Steve Stricker

He'll win more than 1 this year -- picking the 1+ is the issue.

8 The Honda Classic Ernie Els

A little melty so far, but he'll log one... refer to non-witty comments about Stricker.

9 WGC - CA Championship Camilo Villegas

Depends when they give him his steroid test. If he's got a couplefew weeks to recycle, then probably.

10 Transitions Championship Retief Goosen

One of my all-time faves is playing better this year, but that long-in-the-tooth thing is kicking in.


Speaking of... Vijay is looking fairly sharp so far, which is impressive for a 102 year old (OK, 47). The God of Old Man Golf is going to notch one this year, maybe -- at least top 2 (close at the Frost Management).

11 Arnold Palmer Invitational Edoardo Molinari

No idea -- is it just me and bad memory, or does it always always always pour rain on this one? Nice weather. I was about to say "Fuck this event, cancel/move it"... then Mr Brain kicked in and I remembered who and what it was about. Fuggit, play Arnie's shit in Fairbanks in winter, for all I care.

13 Masters Phil Mickelson

The others were flukes. Fat Fuck is hitting it maybe better than ever right now, though.

But I'll go with some weird shit -- Freddy, or O'Meara, or some stupid pick -- we're about due. Or better yet, piss of those brown-haters (sup, you loved them 90's, didnt'cha, Hooty?), and have Johnny Fucking Vegas dirty up Augusta. You know how they dig the Mud People. Maybe he can subsidize Conoco and we'll all get cheaper gas.


More later -- it's getting to be spring, the body feels halfway decent, and Imma gonna get me some pretty soon. Weatherwas nice a couple of weeks ago, but I had shit going on when my bud hit me up, and we still ain't exactly getting the long daylight hours yet (since I'm farther north than all the non-Phibes), which puts some limits on playing times (cracking that 45th paralell makes a big difference, but it sure rocks in June/July, when we play til damn-near 10PM*)


* -- I'll share my old old old golf buddy's introduction into golf one of these days -- it involves growing up in Alaska

[Felix]

1 Sony Open Ryan Palmer
2 Bob Hope Classic Tim Clark
3 Farmers Insurance Open Ben Crane
4 Waste Mgt Phoenix Open Hunter Mahan

How's that working out for you?

er, not so good....neither did Johnson at Pebble, but the good thing is that nobody in our pool finished higher than 5th place in that tourney

6 Northern Trust Open Steve Stricker

He'll win more than 1 this year -- picking the 1+ is the issue.

Stricker just owns that course

10 Transitions Championship Retief Goosen

One of my all-time faves is playing better this year, but that long-in-the-tooth thing is kicking in.

Retief has one of the best swings out there....if I was going to teach a kid how to play, I'd take videos of either Retief's or Ernie's swings and tell the kid "swing like him"

But I'll go with some weird shit -- Freddy, or O'Meara, or some stupid pick -- we're about due. Or better yet, piss of those brown-haters (sup, you loved them 90's, didnt'cha, Hooty?), and have Johnny Fucking Vegas dirty up Augusta. You know how they dig the Mud People. Maybe he can subsidize Conoco and we'll all get cheaper gas.

freddy-maybe, O'Meara-no fucking way...the guy just doesn't have the length to compete on most of the PGA tourstop courses.....I anticipate that before I hang my sticks up, we'll see an 8,000 yard course for a tour stop...