PGA Golf Talk

Perhaps you didn’t think that there were any tickets left to see the US Open in a couple weeks. But your wrong. You can get your US Open golf tickets today and get a chance to see the best golfers in the world battle it out on one of the most difficult courses in the majors! As you might know, there are a lot of difficult golf courses on the tour, but this one is especially difficult, with hills, hazards and sand traps all over the place. This year is also a wide open field. With Mickelson out for the foreseeable future helping out his wife, and Tiger not playing completely like Tiger, we’ll have to watch carefully to see which of the second-tier stars can take it. Who knows, maybe Tiger will get it. No matter how it works out, it will be an exciting time out on the course, so make sure to get your tickets now!

When John Daly returns in about 2 weeks, he will be playing his first PGA Tour Tournament in more than half a year. He was suspended back at the end of last year for an incident that happened when he was intoxicated. There are indications that he is finally taking charge of himself and his difficulties again and might be good to go for the time being. We’ll have to see how well he gets through in the next few months, but after a long road of difficulties for him, people seem confident that he can settle down a little bit. He is a very talented golfer, though he doesn’t usually end up as high on the leaderboard as he might like. Keep an eye on him, though, because he’s had several months to train and practice!

Phil Mickelson will be out of the PGA Tour for the foreseeable future, because his wife is ill with breast caner. It wasn’t reported specifically how serious her condition is, but they will be doing everything they can for her and he will be right with her. He will most likely miss the next few tournaments and probably will miss the US Open in a four weeks. But this is a good reason to miss some competition time. Tiger Woods and his wife quickly sent their sympathies and wished the Mickelsons the best as they move forward. It is sad, but hopefully the situation will improve soon and Phil can get back to golfing soon.

The Texas Open went into “sudden death” yesterday, with Zach Johnson and James Driscoll sitting at the same score after the usual rounds had been played. So, of course, they had to go to the playoff round in order to actually decide the winner. Zach Johnson has been one of the biggest new names in golf this year, with several wins and a lot of other impressive tournaments. He’s been consistently in the hunt for wins. Yesterday, he did not disappoint. He jumped up, teed off well. The crowd was clear about what had happened. He had hit it to about 10 feet from the hole. All he had to do was sink a simple putt and that was it. He won and Driscoll didn’t have much of a chance after all.

John Daly was suspended in October when he was arrested for intoxication. The pictures that were accidentally released were the main reasons for the suspension. He has been playing in various other parts of the world and in lower level tournaments for the most part since then, although he’s still had some trouble winning. He made his first top-10 performance just lately and he probably wont be winning. But he seems to be one of the characters that people expect to see during the tour everytime. He’ll be back in June to take on Tiger and all the other great golfers. He has also made some big changes, because he understands that this might be a “last chance” and such. He’s lost weight and changed his clothing style and golf swing. Perhaps he’ll be a really talented golfer again!

As we were talking about last week, the Players Championship was slated for this weekend and it didn’t lack for exciting moments and great storylines. One of the ones that we discussed last week was that of Tiger Woods, trying to really complete his comeback from his injury. But while he was 2nd in the overnight standings, he had several frustrating holes, dropping him down to 8th overall. Instead he was beaten by Henrik Stenson from Sweden, who kept his cool and pushed on through the field. This is the second year in a row that a European has won this championship, with a Spanish player winning last season. There will be some exciting golf coming up over the course of the rest of the year, so keep your mind on it!

There is a little analysis of Tiger Wood’s swing style on Huffington Post. It’s a very interesting discussion of how he doesn’t really have a swing. There are other golfers who are very good and have a particular swinging style that you can point to and see him do it everytime. But Woods, even as an amateur a long time ago, seemed to take on a variety of different swings. It’s kind of ever-changing for him and it’s a little bit confusing to see him do it, because you never know what he’s aiming for. Based on what this person writes, one can imagine that it would be hard for him to keep playing consistently well if he doesn’t have a singular swing that gets him through the day. Anyway, he’s still expected to do well in the Players Championship coming up.

It’s not clear why, but it appears that Tiger Woods is the oddsmakers choice for the Players Championship this coming week. Woods was in trouble last week at Quail Hollow. He was right on course to win the competition, but he was unable to push forward and win it, missing several birdies. As a result, it’s kind of a mystery why he’s such a heavy favorite for the Players over Phil Mickelson. It’s going to be an amazing battle, as you can imagine, because these two have really been closely matched over the last few competitions. Woods has been doing decently since he returned from his rehab this year, but he’s coming back to strength and looking better and better.

At the Quail Hollow Championship, the big men have stepped it up once again. It’s been a long time since we saw this battle taking shape, but with Tiger Woods back at full steam and Phil Mickelson battling it out just as strong as before. It’s going to be a great battle, because right now Tiger has a 2 shot lead. He was at 7-under at the end of yesterday. He’s looking forward to winning his second victory in 5 events this year following his injury last June. This is a good close match and we’re going to have a lot of fun watching them battle it out into the weekend down there in North Carolina. Get ready for an old school kind of competition!