Allenby: American players have it too easy

Poor Robert Allenby. He knows his outspoken ways can get him in trouble, yet he just can't stop speaking his mind. Fans of golf should appreciate the guy; we don't have many players like him. At the Dubai World Championship, a reporter asked Allenby why more American players don't play international events. You can almost hear the angel and devil arguing across his shoulders.

"You know what, I've got to word this right so I don't get into trouble, because I'm good at getting myself into trouble," Allenby said.

Did he word it right? Sure, if he meant to say that American players are spoiled and that PGA Tour courses are dull. Common enough opinions, but not usually heard from a Tour pro. Here's his answer:

"You know, Americans play for so much money, and when you've got a purse where $1 million, a million plus, is first prize, not to say that they are spoiled, but it's a little bit that way. It's like, well, why would I want to travel, when I can make a million bucks instead of going to Europe and only making $500,000 or $600,000?"

"The reason why I want to travel and play elsewhere is because I want my game to get better, and always, even at the age of 38, I want to get better. And the only way you can get better is to play different golf courses. If you're playing the same golf course every week, every year that you come back to, it just gets a little boring. For me, that's what I've found. I've got a little bit bored playing in America. I'll still play there full time, but I'm still going to try to play more tournaments in Europe at the same time and combine the two together."

"But I just think, you know, they have got it a little bit too easy. It's just everything is handed to them on a silver plate. And not to be rude or anything like that, because I'm very respectful for the amount of money that we do play for in America. We are very lucky and very fortunate. But I think the money that we play for in America, that's the reason why you don't see a lot of Americans or a lot more international players coming over and playing in Europe. They are in a comfort zone, and I think that's pretty much what it is."

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Harrington: Golfers don't cheat (unlike French soccer players)

Padraig Harrington is an Irishman and a sportsman, so it's no surprise he has an opinion on France's controversial win over Ireland in the final World Cup qualifying match this week.

(If you haven't seen it yet, France's Thierry Henry used his hand to set up the deciding goal in extra time. With the goal, France earned a 1-1 tie, enough to get them into next year's World Cup and eliminate the Irish. You can see a particularly damning picture of Henry's handball here.)

At the Euro Tour's Dubai World Championship finale, reporters asked Harrington how he felt about Henry's handball considering Harrington plays a sport where players routinely call penalties on themselves.

"Golf has a different attitude," Harrington said. "If somebody makes a mistake and ... putting your hand out as a reaction is a mistake, the great thing in golf is if we do do something wrong, we hold our hand up and say, 'Hey, hang on a second, didn't mean to do that, sorry.' You go back and you take your penalty."

Soccer is obviously a different sport and Harrington said he understood that players don't call penalties on themselves. (Although Henry did say a rematch would be "the fairest solution" to the controversy.) It was what happened after the game that really irked him.

"Celebration of the cheating was particularly galling, and that's as far as it goes," Harrington said.

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USGA offers special offer on 2010 U.S. Open tickets

If you've been thinking about buying tickets to next year's U.S. Open, to be played at Pebble Beach in June, now might be the time to act. If you make a purchase by Dec. 14, the USGA will throw in a commemorative ball marker and divot-repair tool. You can learn more about the offer and buy tickets at usga.org.

Why is Ernie Els dead last after two rounds in Dubai?

It's no surprise that Ernie Els is dead last after two rounds of the European tour's season-ending big-money bonanza, the Dubai World Championship. Els, whose four-over 148 (74-74) leaves him 15 shots off the lead, must be wiped out from globetrotting, which may also be a big reason why he's been majorless since taking the 2002 British Open and winless for five years on the PGA Tour.

Most big-time pros routinely crisscross the globe in search of trophies and dollars, but Els logs so many thousands of miles that his travel schedule stands out even among his peers. Take Els's November as an example. Two weeks ago, he played in China at the HSBC Champions before jetting to his home outside London to work on the redesign at Wentworth and see his wife and two children. (They were there on holiday from their new home base in Florida.) Now Els is in Dubai; he must feel like a zombie.

I often read the weekly diary entries at Els's website, and it's amazing to read about his travels. He's like Marco Polo for most of the year, hopschotching between tournaments, course-development projects and sponsor outings. I can't fault him; Els knows what he's doing. I might perpetually be on the road too if I could earn money like he does. Still, I would not expect Els to return to the old Ernie, the one who consistently contended in majors and won Tour events, until he dramatically scales back his travel schedule.

Tiger 101? College prof explains the 'Woods effect'

Top players play worse against Tiger Woods. You can measure it, which is what Northwestern professor Jennifer Brown did. Her conclusion, related in Jonah Lehrer's Frontal Cortex blog, is that players don't believe they can win when Woods is in the field, resulting in worse performance.

Despite the individualistic nature of the sport, the presence of Woods in the tournament had a powerful effect. Interestingly, Brown found that playing against Woods resulted in significantly decreased performance. When the superstar entered a tournament, every other golfer took, on average, 0.8 more strokes. This effect was even more pronounced when Woods was playing well. Based on this data, Brown calculated that the superstar effect boosted Woods' PGA earnings by nearly five million dollars.

Brown argues that this phenomenon is caused when "competitors scale back their effort in events where they believe Woods will surely win." After all, why waste energy and angst on an impossible contest?

Lehrer, whose Frontal Cortex blog is one of the best out there, has a different take on the Woods effect. Instead of giving up, Lehrer believes pros playing against Woods have the opposite problem.

I'd argue that the superstar effect has more to do with "paralysis by analysis" than with decreased motivation. I'd bet that playing with Tiger Woods makes golfers extra self-conscious, and that such self-consciousness leads to choking and decreased performance. The problem, then, isn't that golfers aren't trying hard enough when playing against Tiger -- it's that they're trying too hard.

Another guy who thinks this? PGA Championship winner Y.E. Yang. After he outlasted Woods at Hazeltine in August, a reporter asked Yang how he was able to wrestle a major from Woods when so many others had failed. Yang's response jibes completely with Lehrer's explanation of the Woods effect: "I think that the good players, the great names that you've mentioned, when they tee off with Tiger, they try to -- their competitive juices sort of flow out and they go head to head and try and win. For me, I don't consider myself as a great golfer. I'm still more of the lower than average PGA tour players. So my goal was today to just hit at least even, not go over par. I think probably that's the different mind-set that I had."

Alan Shipnuck's Mailbag: Paula Creamer, Tiger's club throwing and U.S. Open venues

"Now that Wie is getting all the attention again, I am wondering why Paula Creamer gets such short shrift? She is young, gorgeous, a winner, and from all accounts a fun and well-liked person. But Wie wins one tournament and she is viewed as the savior of the game? Is it just because she hits it further? I really do like the LPGA, and hope to see the two of them go head-to-head often. That to me is what will bring in attention, not if Wie repeats of Annika's dominance. Your thoughts?"

I like Paula Creamer as much as the next guy, but I think a couple of things are keeping her from a larger crossover stardom. She hasn't won a tournament in 14 months, so there's that. Not only has she failed to win a major in her otherwise excellent career, but she's also shown a distressing habit of coming apart mentally when she's had a chance. She let the Lorena Ochoa Invitational get away and it was irritating to watch Paula pout about it between the ropes. I think she still needs to grow up a little bit. Wie may be younger but she's been through so much drama I think she's tougher. You definitely diagnosed one factor in the more widespread interest surrounding Wie: Creamer is a short hitter who plays a pretty boring percentage game. Nancy Lopez once told me that for an LPGA player to become a superstar she has to look like a woman but hit the ball like a man. That's Wie, not Creamer. But each of these talented, telegenic players can push the other to greater heights. There hasn't been a really great LPGA rivalry since Annika-Karrie around the turn of the century. Wie-Creamer potentially has a lot more to offer.

"Alan - any comment on the Tiger club-throwing incident? He threw it into a crowd and could have injured someone. If this goes away quietly, it will prove it's still a society for the privileged."

My colleague Michael Walker has a hilarious take on this episode that I wish I had written. Obviously Tiger screwed up, but he didn't mean to tomahawk his club into the gallery, it just slipped out of his hand during a more conventional bit of pique. I think most of us would like to see Woods stop dropping f-bombs and slamming clubs – it's unbecoming and a little tacky. But you can't have it both ways. What makes Tiger the greatest winner in all of sports is how hot he burns on the inside, and it his ferocious competitiveness that produces such riveting theater. He's got his flaws, but Woods is a class act and we're all lucky to have him in our sport. (Imagine if Allen Iverson was the world's top golfer.) So I can live with Tiger's occasional lapses, even at the risk of being mocked by Michael Walker.

Still no sponsor for PGA Tour event at Torrey Pines

When Buick ended its sponsorship of PGA Tour events last summer, the organizers of the Buick Invitational at Torrey Pines were optimistic about finding another sponsor. After all, the Buick Invitational is one of the Tour's marquee regular season events. Tiger Woods wrote the most stirring chapter of his legend at the photogenic course at the 2008 U.S. Open and always plays the regular season event, and the TV ratings are excellent. Maybe more marginal Tour events would have trouble attracting new sponsors, but not Torrey Pines. You'd think they'd be lining up, right?

Not exactly, says Tod Leonard of The San Diego Union-Tribune. Leonard checks in with the Century Club, the group that runs the Torrey Pines tournament, and finds that even the high-profile Tour events aren't enough to attract sponsorship dollars in this poor economy.

Yet here the Century Club stands, a suitor spurned by numerous possible brides over the past three months. Not because the former Buick Invitational isn't handsome or worthy, but because Dad doesn't have enough money to pay for the wedding.

This is a dilemma far more dire than the concerns of the Century Club, and if the PGA Tour was slow in realizing that — and it's very clear now that it has been — the suits in the headquarters in Ponte Vedra, Fla., — and the players — are starting to come around.

“I've seen it in the last 90 days. The PGA Tour is completely aware the world has changed,” said Tom Wornham, the chairman of the Century Club, who along with tournament director Tom Wilson has been entrusted with finding a new sponsor.

The Century Club has pledged to host the 2010 tournament in January with or without a sponsor, but the implications for other Tour events are ominous. Leonard crunches the numbers and can only think of one way to bring in more sponsors: lower purses.

Now look at it from the PGA Tour's perspective. Over the next two years, the tour has around a dozen events that need to re-up with sponsors. If one of its premier events in San Diego is having so much trouble, what does that mean for everyone else?

It means the model will have to change. In a setup unique to major American sports, the golfers are their own bosses, and they're going to have to decide to take a pay cut, because the only way deals are going to get done is if the sponsors are paying less.

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Doug Barron appeal denied, but he will fight on

Doug Barron, who last week sued the PGA Tour for reinstatement after becoming the first player to be suspended under the Tour's anti-doping policy, has had his motion for a temporary restraining order denied. According to the AP,  U.S. Magistrate Judge Tu Pham ruled on Monday in Memphis that  Barron did not show a likelihood that he would win on his claims argued in a hearing last Friday. Barron was suspended for a year after testing positive at last June's St. Jude Classic for beta-blockers and testosterone, both of which he has claimed should be allowed under a medical-necessity exemption. Had Barron been successful in receiving the restraining order, he would have entered a Q school tournament in Houston later this week. 

After the ruling, Barron spoke exclusively to Golf.com's Cameron Morfit in Houston and said that he is planning his next legal move. "I thought that regardless of the ultimate outcome that they'd let me compete in Q school," the 40-year-old Barron told Morfit. "I've got to find a way to provide for my family in the next year. I don't think this will be the end of it."

Cink bunker decision part of USGA's Rules revisions

The USGA released revisions to the "Decisions on the Rules of Golf" on Monday which will take effect on Jan. 1. The 2010-2011 edition will include 28 new Decisions, 51 revisions and one withdrawn Decision. USGA Rules committee chairman Jim Bunch described the number of changes as "fairly typical" for the two-year cycle during which revisions to the Decisions are made. (The Rules of Golf are revised every four years).

While the Rules of Golf is the svelte little book that fits handily into the top pocket of your golf bag, the "Decisions on the Rules of Golf" is a manifesto of more than 1,200 entries, which deal with the various situations that the Rules do not specifically cover. Bunch doesn't believe that any of next year's changes qualify as "earth-shattering news," but instead described the process as fine-tuning.

One area that the USGA covers in the new edition is Decisions surrounding raking the bunker. One such Decision was actually foreshadowed last March, when Stewart Cink was disqualified from the Zurich Classic. Cink unknowingly incurred a penalty for "testing the condition of a bunker" in a bizarre sequence of events. After hitting a drive near a bunker, he was forced to take a stance in the bunker to hit the shot. After he hit his shot, his caddie raked the bunker. The problem? Cink's shot landed in a greenside bunker. Because his caddie had raked a similar bunker, Cink had violated the Rule against testing the conditions of a bunker.  He was disqualified after signing his scorecard. The new Decision reflects the position that the USGA took almost immediately after the tournament: While the Rule was interpreted correctly as written at the time, such an action should not be considered a violation of the Rules.

The process for amending the Decisions (as with the Rules themselves) is a tag-team effort between the USGA and the Royal and Ancient. Proposed changes are presented to both the USGA Rules committee and the R&A Rules committee, where they are debated separately and together in a joint Rules committee.

"The people on the committee are all very well versed on the Rules, so you'd think the decisions would be easy," Bunch said. "But we have some very serious debates about which way the Rules should go." Once the joint Rules committee has decided it wants to pursue a change, it sends the proposal to the executive committee of the USGA and the R&A General committee. On top of the volunteer committee members, most of the major bodies of the game (including the PGA, LPGA, Nationwide Tour and NCAA) have a seat on the USGA committee, ensuring that a variety of voices are heard. If both the USGA and the R&A agree that a change or addition is in order, only then will it become an official Rule or Decision.

Though most proposed changes arise from the questions of Rules officials, recreational players have a place in the process. Bunch estimated that about 20,000 people call the USGA every year looking for help with a Rules-related query. "Some of the answers are just quick interpretations right from the Rules, but if USGA staff come to us and say, ‘We keep getting this question over and over again,' then the committee can make a change or put out a guideline," Bunch said.

The USGA and The R&A also issued a joint statement dealing with electronic devices, specifically rangefinders that have the ability to measure more than just distance (including slope, temperature and wind speed). The USGA and R&A reaffirmed their early decision that such equipment can only be used to measure distance, and that any other measurement would be in violation of the Rules.

For a complete look at the Rules of Golf and Decisions on the Rules of Golf, check out usga.org.

Alan Shipnuck's Mailbag: Send in your questions

With Michelle Wie's breakthrough, another win for Tiger Woods and the final tournament of the PGA Tour season, there's plenty for Alan Shipnuck to address in his mailbag. Submit a question below and come back Tuesday to see his answers.

Wie tweaks Woods in post-round comments

For Michelle Wie, 2009 has been a breakout year in a few different ways. She won the respect of her peers by earning her Tour card at Q school and she's played well all year, especially at the Solheim Cup where she posted a 3-0-1 record.

What's more, she's grown more comfortable with showing her personality in public through her artistic blog and her quirky Twitter feed. Wie's off-beat sense of humor was on display after her 2-under round Saturday at the Lorena Ochoa Invitational in Mexico. Asked about her sore ankle at a press conference, Wie had some fun with the favorite phrase of her fellow Stanford Cardinal Tiger Woods.

Q. On the first tee, I saw you with the ankle, you looked like you were limping, how much does it impinge on your game?
MICHELLE WIE: Well, I don't know how to answer that question. It is what it is. (Laughing).

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Lefthander Flesch gives clubs away after Friday's round at Disney

ORALANDO, Fla. -- This is the kind of thing that only happens in the last tournament of the year. Lefthander Steve Flesch finished his round on the Palm Course at the Children's Miracle Network Classic here Friday morning with a 73, leaving him at one over par and almost certain to miss the cut.

Flesch came out of the scoring room, walked over to his bag, grabbed all of his irons and took them back into the room. When he came out again, his hands were empty. Yes, he had just given away his complete set of irons to a friend whose son was a lefthanded golfer.

"With the new rules on grooves next year, I'm never going to be able to use them again anyway, so I might as well give them to someone who can," said Flesch, who lives near Cincinnati in Union, Ky.

What if scores in the afternoon round balloon in the wind and one over makes the cut? Flesch chuckled and said, "I'm pretty sure that can't happen."

Rickie Fowler dating Olin Browne's daughter

One member of Rickie Fowler’s inner circle is undaunted by his new life in the spotlight -- his 18-year-old girlfriend, Alexandra Browne, daughter of PGA Tour player Olin. “She’s used to it,” Fowler said. “It’s nothing new to her, and it’s nice to have someone around like that.”
 
Fowler has made the transition from amateur play to Tour-level competition look easy, tying for seventh and second in his first two events as a professional. But he’s not worried about getting a big head—his mother and father are making sure his attitude stays in check. “My parents, they’re not people to get caught up in the attention and stuff,” Fowler said. “They keep me grounded and always have.”

If Fowler can manage to finish in the top 10 at this weekend's Children’s Miracle Network Classic in Lake Buena Vista, Fla., he’ll be the first player since Ryan Moore to gain exemption on the PGA Tour without having to go through Q school, and only the seventh player since 1980.

Aussie fans rip no-show Allenby

Anthony Kim must love these guys.

In the midst of Tigermania at the Australian Masters, Peter Hanlon of The Age newspaper found "Robbie Rousers," a group of fans who come to cheer the golf and heckle Australian player Robert Allenby, who withdrew from this year's event. It's a must-read. Here's Hanlon's description of the shirts:

Beneath a pair of clinking beer tankards* on the left breast, their mission was writ large: ''Robert Allenby Cheer-Up Squad.'' On the back, Allenby's face was superimposed onto a large image of the elusive children's book character in the red and white hoops, Wally, carrying a giant dummy under the reworked slogan, ''Where's Robbie?''

Allenby got under Kim's skin after this year's Presidents Cup when he accused Kim of partying until 4 a.m. the night before their match. (Kim won easily.) The guys in the Robert Allenby Cheer-up Squad have a similar beef with Allenby, according to Hanlon.

Their testy relationship with Allenby goes back to The Vines a couple of years ago. ''He just came over to us on one hole and said, 'How's the beers working out for you boys?''' one of the Colins said. ''We were like, 'Yeah, good thanks.' Next hole he comes over and has another crack: 'Jealousy's a wonderful thing, isn't it boys?' We all blew up. We followed him for the rest of the round just giving it to him. My brother's said to him on the par three, 'Robert! Water on the right mate! Water on the right!' Sure enough, he's hit it in the piss. Next hole he's walking up the fairway flipping us [the bird]. His caddie's come over and had a go at us. He got security involved in the end. We actually didn't say too much to him, apart from just giving him a bit of heckling after he started into us. We saw him in the bar afterwards and said, 'Come and have a beer, Rob'. Nah, he was filthy at us. He's just a miserable so-and-so. Am I allowed to say that?''

*Tankards just means beer mugs. I had to look it up too.

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Adam Scott: Girlfriend didn't cause slump

Back home in Australia for Tigerpalooza (the event formerly known as the Australian Masters) and coming off a T3 finish at the Barclays Singapore Open, Adam Scott sounds like he's ready to put his 2009 slump behind him. Scott's still not sure what caused his drop from 3rd to 62nd in the world rankings, but he's sure it wasn't his relationship with tennis player Ana Ivanovic as some commentators suggested, according to The Sydney Morning Herald.

However, while Scott said he paid no heed to the speculation - partly because he had not been home since March - he is adamant his relationship with Ivanovic, who is with him in Melbourne this week, had played no part in a form slump during which he twice felt like taking a long break from the game.

''I don't know how to respond to that,'' Scott told the Herald of talk golf had not been his main priority. ''Should I not have a girlfriend? I tried to do everything that I felt was 100 per cent right for me this year. I wasn't working on the right things for a period of time and it took a long time to work out what was right again.''

Fellow Tour Player Retief Goosen believes that Scott's game will return to form, but he's got other ideas about what caused his slump. "Scotty's still young and he has a lot of hot chicks on his mind," Goosen said in the November issue of Golf Magazine. "I'm sure once he gets over that his game will be back."

Photo: Quinn Rooney/Getty Images

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NBC planning prime-time coverage for 2010 U.S. Open at Pebble Beach

NBC is hoping for a rerun of its smashing evening ratings from the 2008 U.S. Open, which Tiger Woods won in dramatic fashion at Torrey Pines. The network will aim to air a portion of its weekend 2010 Open coverage from Pebble Beach in prime time (7-10 p.m. Eastern), including the Sunday finish. As reported by Jon Show of SportsBusiness Journal, the network and the USGA "have also discussed moving coming U.S. Opens in the Pacific time zone to prime time in the East. That includes the '12 U.S. Open at Olympic Club in San Francisco and the '15 U.S. Open at Chambers Bay outside Tacoma."

The news comes on the heels of the HSBC Champions tournament from Shangai, which Golf Channel featured in live telecasts that began at 10:30 p.m. Eastern and serendipitously featured among the contenders not only Woods but also wunderkind Rory McIlroy, a rebounding Ernie Els and a resurgent Phil Mickelson, who proved a wildly popular winner. Bet NBC would lock in that foursome for Pebble right now!

No Nessie, but tons of golf balls found in Loch Ness

Researchers in Scotland were searching for evidence of the Loch Ness Monster when they came across something they didn't expect—hundreds of thousands of golf balls. Evidently the lake has been used by tourists and locals as a driving range for many years. The anecdote about Loch Ness was reported by cnn.com as part of a story about the environmental impact of lost and discarded balls. 

Rickie Fowler needs good finish at Disney to skip Q school

Tour phenom Rickie Fowler already skipped his last two years of college at Oklahoma State — maybe he can skip Q school, too.

Fowler's first two Tour outings since turning pro this fall earned him $553,700. Not bad for a couple of weeks, but that tally is currently 10 spots and about $70,000 shy of the coveted top 125 on the money list, who are exempt from Q school for the 2010 season. The Viking Classic rainout hurt Fowler's earning potential, leaving him only one more event, next week's Children's Miracle Network Classic in Lake Buena Vista, Fla., to make up the difference.

"You know, I'm in a great spot right now," Fowler said. "Getting in the [Children's Miracle Network Classic], having a chance to get my card that way, if not, go to [the] final stage [of Q school]. I'd definitely take the win because it gives me status, and you'd be a past champion. But I'm happy with where I'm at right now as well."

The 20-year-old from Murrieta, Calif., wouldn't be thinking about Q school if he had won the Frys.com Open in Scottsdale in October. Fowler posted rounds of 65-64-69-64 to finish in a three-way playoff, which he lost to Troy Matteson on the second playoff hole. Fowler was undaunted about coming up short in the playoff.

"Troy hit a great shot into 17, the second playoff hole, to a foot and a half, so it was out of my hands," Fowler said. "I couldn't do anything about it."

With a purse of $4.7 million up for grabs at Disney, Fowler will likely have to finish in the top 15 to have any hope of skipping Q school and cruising onto the Tour next year. Doing so would put him in rarefied air: the short list of guys who made it to the Tour without having to go through Q school includes Phil Mickelson, Justin Leonard and Tiger Woods — enviable company, indeed.

Photo: Fowler at the Frys.com Open (Christian Petersen/Getty Images)

Alan Shipnuck's Mailbag: Drugs in golf, Tiger, Phil, Stricker and more

"Drug Barron, sorry, Doug Barron hasn't made a cut all year on the Nationwide Tour. What the heck was he taking? Mogadon?" -- Paul Mahoney

That's a funny line, but I know Tim Finchem isn't laughing. I, for one, am glad someone finally got caught, which is proof that the Tour's drug-testing program works. Of course there are pro golfers taking performance-enhancing drugs. They cheat on their wives and their taxes, but they're not going to indulge in a little chemistry that could significantly boost their careers, just because it's a game of honor, etc.? I never bought that argument.

The most interesting aspect of the Barron suspension has been the reaction of other players and various Tour apologists. They have offered Barron's pudgy physique as proof that he couldn't possibly have been using PEDs. This is so silly. A lot of baseball players who were juicing were pitchers. They didn't want to get yoked; they wanted to help their bodies recover. Might a golfer who hits 500 balls a day be looking for the same help? PEDs don't necessarily make you bigger and more muscular, they just provide extra endurance.

If that means more 400-pound bench presses, then yes, you're gonna wind up looking like Barry Bonds. But if all that athlete is doing is hitting a bunch of golf balls, then he can still look like Doug Barron, even while breaking the rules.

"Does Tiger have a set tradition after winning a tourney? Is there champagne on the plane...does he give his wife $100k? What goes on after a win?" — Mitchell Page

Yes, there is a tradition. He goes to sleep, wakes up the next morning at 5 a.m. and begins practicing for the next tournament. The 2007 PGA Championship is instructive. The week before, Tiger won at Firestone, in Akron, Ohio. By the time he finished all the interviews and ceremonies it was after 7 p.m. The next morning at dawn he was on the first tee at Southern Hills in Tulsa, about a thousand miles away. That's the kind of dedication that makes him Tiger Woods.

"I live near Madison and want to know if Steve Stricker is that nice all the time or does he have a side of him that is a jokester or less serious than we see him on TV? I mean, come on, is he that humble all the time?" -- Stuart

Unfortunately, yes, which means there's nothing salacious or controversial to write about the guy. Stricker might be the nicest human being on the planet. The only group of people who are gossipier and cattier than Tour wives are Tour caddies, and I've never heard anyone from either of these tribes say a single bad thing about the guy. I think we're all gonna have to just accept that Stricker is the Mother Theresa of golf.

"Tiger and Lefty seem to be getting along better lately. Is this just my imagination or are they starting to respect each other more?"  -- Roy

You know what Tiger respects? Achievement. When Phil blew him away on Sunday at the Tour Championship, that definitely got Tiger's attention. But no question their bond has been strengthened this year. It began with Amy Mickelson. Don't forget that Woods lost his dad to cancer. After Amy's diagnosis, Tiger sent Phil a number of heartfelt text messages that touched the Mickelsons deeply. Throw in their co-starring roles at the Presidents Cup, and this year has definitely brought Tiger and Phil closer together.

"At one stage Stack and Tilt seemed to be all the rage on Tour. Lately it seems to be fading out, especially after they lost Aaron Baddeley (who happened to be on the cover of their expensive DVD). What's the verdict on Tour? Has it been exposed as just another silver-bullet gimmick or does it still have a devoted following?" -- Marc 

A little of both, actually. As noted by another reader, Mike Weir has also jumped off the bandwagon. He and Baddeley both struggled with the driver during their S 'n T days. It's a swing that promotes a pretty steep swing plane, which can lead to solid contact with irons but inconsistency with the big stick. Beyond that, you have to remember that Tour players are lemmings. As soon as something seems to work they'll all try it, whether it's the Claw or Twitter or saucy tennis players. Then something new comes along and many players move on. When Dean Wilson wins the Masters, S 'n T will surely enjoy a comeback.

"What are the chances that we can get a game together where we have all of these super young guns pitted against each other on live TV for some serious cash? I'm thinking 21 and under here so it would be Rory McIlroy, Ryo Ishikawa, Rickie Fowler, Danny Lee and Jamie Lovemark. It would be quite a show featuring the future of the sport. And just think of the potential ramifications—it could start a MUCH needed rivalry that golf needs to make itself more relevant." -- Michael

This is the best idea I've heard in a while. Maybe this batch of youngsters could bring the Skins Game back from the dead. The problem with golf is that the compelling head-to-head matchups we crave happen so rarely. With their varying home bases and exempt status, the above Fab Five will only be in the same field a handful of times next year. The chances of even a couple of them showing up on the same leaderboard is remote. The made-for-TV spectacles have always focused on the same tired big names, but someone—Golf Channel? Golf.com?—should organize a series of Wonderful World of Golf style matches with all these intriguing young talents. Will it happen? I doubt it, but we can dream.

"Same question I ask every week: Why does only Tiger and no other player wear bright red on Sunday? Happy for anyone to tell me. Must not be Alan." --  JC

JC, I was hoping you would take the hint, but apparently not. So once and for all: Tiger wears the red shirt because his mom, Tida, did some kind of Thai-style voodoo and discerned that red is Tiger's "power color" and therefore he should wear it on Sundays. Once he won a few times, a tradition was born. It is funny how he has taken ownership of the color. I remember when Luke Donald wore red on Sunday at the '06 PGA when he was paired with Tiger. Polo had scripted Donald's outfits weeks in advance and he chose not to deviate. A lot of folks took that as him being uppity, which is ridiculous—it's just a shirt! A funny post-script was the Monday playoff at Torrey, when Rocco busted out red, assuming that Tiger would wear his only on Sunday. Wrong. Woods wore red for a second day in a row, and when he saw Rocco at the range before the round he muttered, "Nice shirt." Only in Tiger's universe can you talk trash about a guy's sartorial selection.

Photo: Wireimage.com (Barron); Getty Images (Woods, Mickelson)

Want to lower your handicap? Cure that sleep apnea!

Sleep apnea patients who have been less than religious about their treatments now have a new motivation to comply with their doctors' orders: lower golf scores. 

A new study, featured in Scientific American, found that patients who regularly used their NPAP machines lowered their handicaps by up to three strokes. People with sleep apnea stop breathing for short periods of time multiple times a night. In severe cases, people can stop breathing up to 50 times an hour, according to health.com.

Twelve golfers with apnea received nasal positive airway pressure treatment, or NPAP. The researchers kept track of the subjects’ daytime tiredness, sleep and golf scores over 20 rounds. And handicaps improved by an average of a stroke-and-a-half per round. With the better golfers going in showing the most improvement. The scores on the medical tests also got better. A control group didn’t improve their game or their sleep.