Wednesday, July 12, 2000
Another first for Tiger: Playing
the week before a major
By DOUG FERGUSON
AP Golf Writer
Tiger Woods prefers to take the week off
before a major championship. This year, he's making an exception.
Woods will play the Buick Open in Michigan
next month, the week before he defends his title in the PGA Championship
at Valhalla, outside Louisville, Ky.
That's sure to raise speculation that Woods
is contractually obliged to play a certain number of PGA Tour
events sponsored by Buick, with whom he signed a $30 million deal
at the end of last year.
“It is absolutely not in his contract,”
his agent, Mark Steinberg, said Tuesday. “If we had a contractual
situation, I'm sure Buick would have wanted him in the New York
area (Buick Classic in June), and Tiger didn't play there.”
Tony Derhake, brand manager of golf for
Buick, also said there was nothing in Woods' contract that required
him to play, although “he does recognize that his tie to
us is very important.”
Steinberg attributes Woods' decision to
play the week before a major to good scheduling. The Buick will
be the first of three in a row — the NEC Invitational is
after the PGA — followed by seven weeks until The Presidents
Cup.
Woods likely will play only once during
those weeks.
“He needs to get in some events,”
Steinberg said. “He feels like he's got to get into a rhythm.”
Woods has played the Buick Open twice at
Warwick Hills in Grand Blanc. He tied for fourth in 1998 and tied
for eighth in 1997. The defending champion is Tom Pernice Jr.,
who doesn't mind having the world's No. 1 player in the field.
“You should be excited to have Tiger
coming here,” Pernice said. “It's a major, major thing.
He can bump ticket sales right away by 20 percent.”
SORENSTAM STEPS UP: All of a sudden, the
LPGA Tour has a race on its hands — and perhaps a rivalry,
too.
While Karrie Webb won four of her first
five tournaments this year to set off Tiger Woods-like alarms,
her last victory was the Nabisco Championship in late March. Since
then, Annika Sorenstam has caught her with four victories, and
trails by about $102,000 on the money list.
Each player has beaten the other in a playoff,
and each player has won twice when the other wasn't in the field.
So, who's No. 1?
“Well, Karrie, according to the rankings,”
Sorenstam said. “But I know inside, I'm pretty good. She's
still leading player-of-the-year and the money rankings, but I'm
happy the gap is getting smaller. There are a lot of tournaments
coming up.”
Both are in the JAL Big Apple Classic this
week, followed by the U.S. Open and its whopping $1.75 million
purse.
RESTLESS FRED: A few months shy of turning
41, easygoing Fred Couples has been shaken by the reality that
he hasn't won in two years and probably won't until he starts
devoting more time to golf.
“To come out here and beat these guys
is not easy. But I've done it for a long time,” he said.
“So what happens is you just get out there and a year goes
by and you don't win and then you say, `Well, geez, I'll just
play and maybe it's going to happen.' And it's not going to just
happen.”
It used to happen as easily as pushing the
buttons on the remote. Couples won 14 times during a 16-year stretch,
including the '92 Masters and The Players Championship twice.
His last victory was the '98 Memorial, and he really hasn't come
close since.
Couples attributes that to lack of play
— only 16 tournaments last year.
“If I don't make another dime on the
PGA Tour, it's not going to affect me. But if I keep playing the
way I'm playing, it's going to affect me,” he said. “And
that's my point. I want to play better and I need to play a little
more.
“Otherwise, I should just make a decision.
It's not worth my while to travel around and finish 12th or 18th
or 30th. I've been doing this too long.”
One incentive to play well is The Presidents
Cup. U.S. captain Ken Venturi would love to be able to pick Couples,
but he has to at least get into the top 20 for consideration.
Couples' longtime coach, Paul Marchand, is the assistant this
year.
BACK TO ORLANDO: The LPGA Tour can expect
a strong start to its 2001 season — a new tournament with
a $1 million purse and a return to one of the best courses on
tour.
The JCPenney Classic, formerly a mixed team
event until the company decided to align itself only with the
LPGA Tour, will make its debut Jan. 12-14 at Grand Cypress Resort
in Orlando.
Television coverage for the 54-hole event
will be announced later.
Grand Cypress played host to the season
opener in 1998 and 1999 until HealthSouth backed out as a title
sponsor, and the event was canceled this year to give Penney time
to make the transition from a mixed team event to the LPGA Tour.
Commissioner Ty Votaw isn't the only one
excited about the return to Grand Cypress. Kelly Robbins won there
two straight years before the hiatus.
DIVOTS: While Callaway Golf has signed Arnold
Palmer to a 12-year deal, no television commercials are planned
until late fall and early next year. Palmer will be used primarily
to promote the Callaway ball, which he started using in January.
... This week marks the one-year anniversary of Tiger Woods regaining
the No. 1 position in the world ranking from David Duval. He remains
No. 1, by the largest margin in the history of the rankings. ...
Duke junior Beth Bauer could be the next player to turn pro. “I
really enjoy college a lot, but I don't think my game will ever
reach its peak in college golf,” she said at the ShopRite
LPGA Classic. ... Woods extended his streak to 15 rounds of par
or better on the PGA Tour, the longest of his career. ... Charles
Howell, the NCAA champion from Oklahoma State who turned pro two
weeks ago, has signed with Hambric Sports Management. ... In a
Golf Digest survey of 1,000 instructors, David Leadbetter was
voted No. 1 among the 50 greatest teachers, followed by Butch
Harmon.
STAT OF THE WEEK: Through 28 tournaments,
there already have been six multiple winners on the PGA Tour.
At this time last year, only three players had won at least twice.
FINAL WORD: “Jack was my idol. Tiger
never played with Jack when he was truly great, so he has no real
point of reference with Nicklaus. He never stood on the first
tee when he was the best. I did, and he was beyond compare.”
— Hal Sutton.
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