Singh a song of $10 million

Sunday, September 7, 2008
Writing from Town and Country, Mo.

Vijay Singh flew under the radar this week.

The leader in the PGA Tour's playoff point standings finished tied for 44th at even-par 280. That was just good enough to virtually guarantee him the title, to say nothing of the $10 million check sitting in the bowl of the FedEx Cup, no matter how he plays three weeks from now at East Lake Golf Club in Atlanta.

Singh has a 10,601-point lead on Camilo Villegas, who jumped from 25th to second by winning the 105th Western Open. The Tour Championship at East Lake offers 12,500 points to the winner, but 30th place is worth 2,000 points. So Singh just has to play and not withdraw or get disqualified to earn the ransom, even if Villegas wins in Atlanta.

"I'm going to practice hard and get ready," Singh said, looking forward to two weeks off after six straight tournaments.

Bellerive turned out not to be to his liking, and it may have been his outlook that brought about that reality.

"The greens got really slow," Singh said. "They're not my favorite greens. Rees Jones' greens are not my favorite. I don't think they're too many players' favorites, either.

"I thought I hit the ball from tee to green pretty good, but you've got to make the putts on these huge greens, and I just didn't putt like I did the last two weeks. My attitude was really good, and they're just very slow."

Singh said winning the first two installments of the playoffs, in New Jersey and Boston, didn't have an effect on his game this week.

"I was pretty focused this week, tried pretty hard and never gave up," Singh said. "After you keep grinding for three days, sooner or later it's going to get to you, and I think at the end it was getting to everybody that wasn't in contention."

Dudley did right: Dudley Hart's second place finish not only netted him $756,000, but jumped him 53 places into 14th in the points. That got him a ticket to East Lake.

"I'm not a mathematician, so I didn't know exactly, but I was guessing I needed to finish solo fourth or better to make it to the Tour Championship," Hart said. "I didn't think about it every shot, but it was in the back of my mind all week."

Hart started the final round tied for sixth, so the final round of 5-under 65 came at the right time. As did the birdie putts at the last two holes, from distances of 13 and 31 feet.

The birdie on the 18th came with Hart knowing that he absolutely, positively needed it for a shot at the Tour Championship.

"I had an idea where I was, but on the green, I looked over (at the scoreboard) and saw me tied for third," Hart said. "I told my caddie, 'Birdie or bogey. Let's try to give this thing a run.' It was one of those things where I was going to give it a run and hit the best putt I could, and fortunately it went in."

The numbers game: The field beat Bellerive for the fourth straight round, averaging 69.529 strokes on a course that measured 7,231 yards in the final round, 155 less than the advertised distance of 7,386. For the week, the field averaged 69.370 strokes, the lowest average ever.

That the course is a par 70 had something to do with that, but not everything, for the 10th hole, 519 yards on Sunday, was a par 4 for the Western but is played as a par 5 by the members (and averaged 4.194 strokes). Credit the quality of the field, plus the weather which made the greens dartboards, for the red numbers.

The low round of the day was a 65, posted five times: Hart, Fredrik Jacobson, Ben Curtis, Bubba Watson and Brian Davis.

For the week, the par-4 18th hole played toughest, at 4.194 strokes, while the par-5 eighth was the easiest, at 4.667 strokes.

The last time the Western was played at Bellerive, at the old site in St. Louis in 1953, the field averaged 76.777 strokes, the second-highest average since 1940.

Around Bellerive: The week's Caddyshack moment came early on Sunday evening, over two hours after play had concluded. Bellerive members were gathered on the veranda, looking over the scene as some workers began to tear down the tournament trappings. A combo was playing bland dinner music. All that was missing was Rodney Dangerfield throwing the band a handful of C-notes to liven the place up. … Attendance for the three days of the tournament was around 100,000, if estimates of 25,000 on Friday, 35,000 on Saturday, and 40,000 on Sunday are correct. … Next year's Western, the 106th in a series dating to 1899, will be played at Cog Hill in Lemont, on the revitalized Dubsdread course. The precise weekend is still in flux, pending the PGA Tour's finalizing the schedule.

– Tim Cronin

Villegas drives away with Western

Sunday, September 7, 2008
Writing from Town and Country, Mo.

Camilo Villegas captured the 105th Western Open on Sunday at Bellerive Country Club, taking the lead for good when Jim Furyk bogeyed the ninth hole, and secured his advantage without doubt with back-to-back birdies on the 13th and 14th holes. For Villegas, it's his first victory on the PGA Tour, and brings him the winner's share of $1.26 million from the $7 million purse, along with a handshake from BMW executives.

Villegas scored 2-under-par 68 in the final round for a total of 15-under-par 265.

Dudley Hart finished second at 13-under 267 thanks to a finishing 5-under 65. Anthony Kim was tied with Hart after 71 holes, but airmailed his approach on the 18th hole three rows into the bleachers, and had to settle for a third-place tie with Furyk at 12-under 268.

Villegas also moves to second in the PGA Tour point standings, behind leader Vijay Singh, who never challenged at Bellerive. He finished tied for 43rd.

A full report will follow.

– Tim Cronin

It all begins on ...

Sunday, September 7, 2008
Writing from Town and Country, Mo.

… the back nine on Sunday, or so Dan Jenkins said about The Masters decades ago. It's also true in the Western Open, where the leader or co-leader has gone on to win 32 times in the last 50 years, or 64 percent of the time.

The last sole leader at the turn not to win was Steve Lowery, who was overhauled by Stephen Ames on the back nine of Cog Hill's Dubsdread course in 2004. Since then, Jim Furyk, Trevor Immelman and Tiger Woods have led, either solo or as part of a group, and gone on to win.

Furyk's chasing this time. Camilo Villegas holds the solo lead in the 105th Western Open, a.k.a. the BMW Championship, with nine holes remaining at Bellerive Country Club. Furyk bogeyed the ninth hole to fall to 12-under-par. He'd been the lone leader after Villegas bogeyed the fifth and sixth holes, but was rejoined by Villegas in the lead when the Columbian birdied the par-5 eighth, eliciting a roar from the huge gallery on hand.

The leaders, then, as the back nine beckons:

-13: Camilo Villegas (9)
-12: Jim Furyk (9)
-11: Dudley Hart (10), K.J. Choi (9), Anthony Kim (9)
-10: Stephen Ames (11), D.J. Trahan (10)

Wonder of wonders, the sun came out almost on NBC's cue.

– Tim Cronin

Villegas takes over

Sunday, September 7, 2008
Writing from Town and Country, Mo.

Camilo Villegas slept so well holding a share of the lead in the 105th Western Open, he went and took the other half of it from Jim Furyk on Sunday morning.

Villegas, who had five holes remaining after play was suspended by darkness on Saturday evening, birdied the par-4 eighth hole, the 17th of his round, to move to 13 under par. He parred the par-4 ninth to complete a 4-under-par 66, finishing at 13-under 197, a stroke ahead of Furyk.

And it could have been better. He followed his curling 11-foot birdie on the eighth by nearly making a 54-footer for a bird on the ninth. The ball missed the cup by two inches.

As the leaders tee off for the final round of the retitled BMW Championship, they stand this way:

-13: Camilo Villegas
-12: Jim Furyk
-9: Anthony Kim, Tim Clark
-8: K.J. Choi, D.J. Trahan, Aaron Baddeley, Dudley Hart
-7: Stephen Ames

And Vijay Singh, the leader in the PGA Tour's playoff point standings, opened the final round tied for 48th, at 1-over par 211. However, there's an outside chance he can clinch the points title, and the $10 million sitting in the bowl of the FedEx Cup, today. That's not what the mammoth crowd on hand – there may be 40,000 here, including those fans using their tickets from Thursday, to see the final round – is looking for. Singh started on No. 10, well away from the leaders. It should be played under overcast skies after an early morning rain.

Updates as warranted; a complete report after the round.

– Tim Cronin

Bryant, Laird spared disqualification

Saturday, September 6, 2008
Writing from Town and Country, Mo.

Bart Bryant and Martin Laird avoided disqualification from the Western Open, a.k.a. the BMW Championship, on Saturday, all because of a conversation about a pitch mark.

Laird's tee shot hit the fringe on the par 3 16th hole, and finished close to the hole. Bryant's shot stopped in the rough. The pitch mark of Laird's shot was between Bryant's ball and the cup, and Laird repaired it, tapping it with his putter.

Before that, they talked about it. That opened a can of golf rule worms.

After discussions with the players and checking with the United States Golf Association, PGA Tour tournament director Slugger White ruled that there was no intent by Laird to improve Bryant's line of play. However, because Laird and Bryant talked about the pitch mark, however innocently, Bryant was slapped with a two-stroke penalty for violating Rule 13-2, which covers improving the line of play.

The really sticky part: Laird's side of the story wasn't heard until after he'd signed his scorecard for an even-par 70. Had he been penalized two strokes after the fact, he'd have been disqualified for signing an incorrect scorecard.

"That was my main concern," Bryant said. "I would have felt very miserable for him playing in a tournament that there's not even a cut and then he gets disqualified.

"I didn't even think about it until the middle of the next hole, and I went, 'Something just doesn't feel right.' "

Bryant decided not to sign his card until he spoke to a rules official, but didn't think it would involve Laird.

"That's what was really hard for me, (that) talking to the rules official is going to affect somebody else when they really hadn't done anything. It was a struggle."

Bryant said he could have prevented the entire episode by telling Laird not to fix the pitch mark.

"I just didn't think about it," Bryant said.

Bryant is eight strokes off the pace set by Jim Furyk and Camilo Villegas entering the final round, while Laird is 17 strokes in arrears.

Double eagles: That's not an Albatross, as the double eagle is nicknamed, but two eagles on the same hole by consecutive players in the same group. Believed to be a first in Western Open history, Bubba Watson and Billy Mayfair holed out from the fairway on the par 4 seventh hole within a minute of each other in the third round.

Watson did so first, from 128 yards, and then Mayfair did so from what the PGA Tour's ShotLink system said was the same distance.

Neither finished their round. With two holes remaining, Mayfair stands 3 under, Watson 2 over.

The numbers game: Bellerive played marginally easier in Round 2 than it did in Round 1, even though players could no longer put the ball in their hands. The average for the par 70 course was 69.250 strokes, under the 69.725 strokes of the first round.

The par-4 fourth hole was the most difficult, at 4.235 strokes, while the par-5 17th was the easiest in relation to par, averaging 4.588 strokes, even though it played at 600 yards in the second round.

The third round is showing more of the same. To this point, the average is 69.156, which, if it holds up, would be the second-lowest average round in Western history. Only last year's finale at Cog Hill, where the 65-player field averaged 69.138 strokes on a par-71 layout, is lower.

The best player number belongs to Jim Furyk. He hit 26 of 28 fairways on Saturday, including 24 straight.

Around Bellerive: Fans arrived early and stayed late. While only 25,000 season ticket booklets were sold, Thursday's washed out round prompted WGA officials to permit the use of Thursday tickets either Saturday or Sunday. That brought out approximately 10,000 extra spectators. Even at 7:30 p.m., when the last putts were sunk – play had been called because of darkness at 7:18 p.m., with players allowed to finish the hole they were on – upwards of a thousand people from the complete cast of about 35,000 were still on the course. … Sunday's television coverage begins on NBC at 1 p.m. and runs until play concludes. The Golf Channel provided five hours of extra coverage of Round 3 on Saturday afternoon, but there's no plan to air the finish of the round on Sunday morning, when the cable network has live European Tour golf slated.

– Tim Cronin