JUST A FEW OBSERVATIONS...

Here's a few quickies and then I've gotta run...

Phil has finally broken thru it would appear. He is leading in the first 16 holes of the 1st round of the Northern Trust at -8. Let's watch and see if he can hold up. He had a bad start this year. Hopefully this mean it is turned around.

Veej is back after knee surgery the first part of January. Last week, he didn't look quite ready. But you know the Big Fijian! Expect him to look much better this week.

Kim will be playing. He played Malaysia last week and started slow and ended low. But we will see how his shoulder holds up. If it is under control, expect him to make a move.

Retief is showing pretty good form. He has been working out and slimmed down a bit. The new sunglasses may be a benefit also.

Marion

BACK TO GOLF...

Would you like to see a pic of the new addition to the Tiger's lair? Here's Charlie.

Well, I'm finally back and ready to jump into the 2009 season. I will do some recap, but first let's look at the question everyone is asking. What is happening with the Number One player? Here's what his caddy had to say yesterday:

Tiger Woods is closing in on a return to the PGA Tour, according to his caddie Steve Williams.

Woods has been out of competitive action since winning the US Open in June last year after having reconstructive surgery on the anterior cruciate ligament in his left knee the following week.

"He is ready to go anytime in the next few weeks," Williams told Television New Zealand. "He is about 90% but he won't play unless he is 100%."

He added: "He has had to modify his swing a little bit to accommodate his knee but it is a matter of getting back into the groove."

Woods, who earlier this month celebrated the birth of his second child with wife Elin, has won 14 Major golf championships and needs five more to set a new record for the most Major wins.

And Williams believes that even if Woods is a little rusty upon his return the American will have the mental strength to remain the world's leading player.

"I've said it before, the best quote I have heard about him is that 'they haven't operated on his head and you haven't operated on his heart', which are his two best components," he added.

"Maybe his game is not as good but if he is mentally stronger - we all know that he is the mentally toughest player to play the game so that in itself is a big factor."

I never expected him to play the Accenture. That is a grueling test. First of all it is a five day affair with far too many holes to play on a new knee. March 12 at Doral WGC-CA is much more realistic. Place your bets!

Marion

Spider Man Wins BMW and Assures Fed Ex Cup for Veej

A spectacular performance by Camillo Villegas at the BMW third event in the Fed Ex series gave him his very first career tour win. In the process, he secured the Fed Ex Cup $10M purse to Vijay Singh. All that remains for Veej (as a result of winning the first two events) is to show up in two weeks for the final event - Coca Cola - and play 72 rounds to collect the trophy and the $10 million. I think he owes Camillo... don't you.

This is the third year on Tour for the 26-year-old Colombian and he goes home with $1.26 million. Not bad for 3 years of thrills and excitement. Anthony Kim, Dudley Hart and Jim Furyk gave him a run but Camillo kept his cool and sailed to a decisive victory. Keep your eyes on this guy and Kim for the near future. Oh, and don't forget Sergio. Maybe they can make some history before the Tiger returns.

Marion

Gosh -- It's Been Awhile - Now Back to Golf

Let's play Catch Up ...

We're at the Fed Ex now. Veej has just won the first of four -- the Barclays. Coming off a win for WGC-Bridgestone, he is confident and hot.

But Sergio gave him a run... Serg is cookin' and it looks like he is due for at least one win here.

How did we get here? Stewie Cink won the Travelers. Then Kenny Perry pulled off two great wins -- Buick Open and the John Deere.

Anthony Kim picked up one at the AT&T National (hosted by Tiger). Next we had Richard Johnson at the Milwaulkee US Bank. Paddy Harrington wowed the golfing world by lifting the Claret Jug and then went on the win the PGA Championship.

With Tiger absent from the Fed Ex, anyone can jump in and win it. But what happens if there's a different winner for each event? Well, let's just sit back and watch. This is sooo cool. If the next three are as thrilling as the first, this is going to be some run of Golf!!

Marion

Tiger Woods Undergoes Successful Reconstructive Surgery June 24, 2008

Tiger Woods announced that reconstructive surgery has been performed. He made this statement:

"It was important to me to have the surgery as soon as possible so that I could begin the rehabilitation process," Woods said in a statement. "I am very appreciative of Dr. Rosenberg and Dr. Cooley and his staff's guidance and look forward to working with them through the necessary rehabilitation and training.

"I look forward to working hard at my rehabilitation over the coming months and returning to the PGA Tour healthy next year."

His doctors say they were confident going in and are pleased with the results.

"There were no surprises during the procedure, and as we have said, with the proper rehabilitation and training, it is highly unlikely that Mr. Woods will have any long-term effects as it relates to his career."

Good news for Tiger.

In the meantime, Stewart Cink has moved up in the Fedex standings:

Rank	Player	Events	Points
1	Tiger Woods	6	22,695
2	Phil Mickelson	14	15,940
3	Stewart Cink	15	15,039
4	Justin Leonard	16	11,902
5	Kenny Perry	17	11,433

Look out Phil ...

Additional Comments on Tiger's Injuries

I thought you might like a little more detail so I just picked this up at ESPN. This is sort of a copy and paste. But Hank Haney was with Tiger when his doctors told him he should not play so here is Hank's take on it.

Hank Haney, Woods' swing coach, said Wednesday that the world's No. 1-ranked golfer defied his doctor's advice and even predicted he'd win the Open.

"The week of Memorial [two weeks before the Open], I thought there was no chance he could play," Haney said in a telephone interview from his home in Texas. "The doctors told him he needed to be on crutches for three weeks and then three more weeks of inactivity, and then you start rehabbing.

"But Tiger looked the guy in the eye and said, 'I'm playing in the U.S. Open and I'm going to win.' "

"And then he started putting on his shoes," Haney recalled. "He looked at me and said, 'Come on, Hank. We'll just putt today.' Every night, I kept thinking there was no chance he's going to play. He had to stop in his tracks for 30 seconds walking from the dining room table to the refrigerator.

"He was not going to miss the U.S. Open at Torrey Pines. There just wasn't any discussion."

Haney said the extent of Woods' preparation for the U.S. Open was hitting four or five practice balls at a time before heading back to a golf cart.

"He couldn't walk," Haney said. "The 50 balls I'm talking about him hitting included the first 15 warm-up wedges. You're talking about 30 full swings a day."

"Tiger has such an incredible pain tolerance," Haney said. "When he said he was going to play, I knew he was going to play. The thing that concerned me most was, was he going to be able to walk? Was it just going to deteriorate so much that he wasn't going to be able to swing at all?

"And that didn't take into account the issue that he hadn't had any preparation. He didn't get to play. He didn't get to do anything. That was the concern. But Tiger has such an incredible pain tolerance.

"In my mind, I honestly thought he was just going to give it his best effort, his 100 percent best effort all the way up until the tournament. I knew he wasn't going to bag it two weeks before. He was going to hope for a miracle until the last possible point that he couldn't make it. In my mind, that was the most likely scenario: He just would try until the end and then come to the realization that he couldn't go. When he canceled out of the Memorial, he was in real bad shape then. He couldn't have played in the U.S. Open then. He couldn't even move."

Haney believes Woods had no choice but to go through with surgery now. And that, in the long run, he'll be better off.

"Why wouldn't he? I expect him to be much better than ever," Haney said. "He's going to have a strong leg and a structurally sound knee. He hasn't had that in years. There is no reason that he won't be better than he's ever been. He's going to have all this time to think about the improvements that he's going to make in his golf swing and everything else.

"It's just incredible he accomplished what he did. I'm so proud of him. I can't believe it. The guy's heart and his toughness ... wow. It really is just wow. I don't know what more you can say than that."

Well, there you have it.

Tiger Wins 2008 US Open Ending His 2008 Season

By now everyone knows the outcome of probably the most amazing US Open in the history of the game. The world watched as a wounded Tiger played through the pain for 91 holes and willed his way to his 14th Major.

We knew about the knee ... it was so obvious. But we didn't know he was playing with a double stress fracture of the left tibia. Tiger said nothing about it. It happened just before the Memorial. But he was determined to play in the Open and win.

The doctors tell Tiger that the stress fractures will heal with time. How much time will be required is unknown. Tiger says the fractures were the source of his greatest pain during the game.

He is finished for the year, but not without that one last major victory that capped off a painful 10 months.

What we didn't know was that he has had a torn ligament in the knee since last July. So surgery was not optional. But he delayed it. He wanted to go for his 14th and maybe get in some more majors before going under the knife.

He says he tore the ACL while jogging at home after the British Open last July. He chose not to have surgery at that time and continued on to win seven consecutive victories, including the Dubai Desert Classic in Europe and his Target World Challenge, an unofficial event.

He had arthroscopic surgery April 15 to clean out cartilage in his left knee, bypassing ACL surgery with hopes it could get him through the 2008 season. But going 91 holes for his 14th career major made it impossible to play any longer.

Here's a quote: "Although I will miss the rest of the 2008 season, I'm thrilled with the fact that last week was such a special tournament."

Well, to sum it up, he misses a major for the first time this year and will not be in the Ryder Cup.

He has played seven times worldwide this year and won five of them. In retrospect, his performance at Torrey Pines was even more than spectacular. It was more like miraculous.

This was the Tiger's disclosure statement:

"I know much was made of my knee throughout the last week and it was important to me that I disclose my condition publicly at an appropriate time. I wanted to be very respectful of the USGA and their incredibly hard work and make sure the focus was on the US Open.

"Now it is clear that the right thing to do is to listen to my doctors, follow through with this surgery and focus my attention on rehabilitating my knee."

Prayers for complete recovery, Tiger.

by
Marion