"Why is it OK in one instance to sign for an incorrect score and not in another?"

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Alistair Tait reminds us of one other "inconsistency" in the rules of golf that he believes should be remedied after the latest DQ for signing an incorrect card, even though the player did not know it was an incorrect card at the time, nor did his playing partner know that. Because it wasn't!
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"Tiger's talk was golf's TV moment of the year, but he provided more highlights when he made his highly anticipated return to golf at the Masters."

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Gary Van Sickle reviews the stories of the year and concludes item No. 1 on Tiger with this:

ESPN's first-round Masters coverage averaged 4.9 million viewers, the biggest cable audience ever for a golf telecast. Woods played with Matt Kuchar and K.J. Choi and shot a stunning 68, the best first-round Masters score of his career. Woods stayed on the fringe of contention all week, thanks to a tournament record-tying four eagles, until a careless three-putt on the 14th green on Sunday killed his chances. He finished a remarkable fourth.

I'm not sure what's more amazing, Van Sickle using that much hyperbole or Tiger's T4. In hindsight, Tiger's performance at the Masters just gets better and better considering what we know now about the state of his game and life during the remainder of 2010.

Finchem: Everything's On The Uptick! Or Is That Uptake?

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I was unable to sit in on Tim Finchem's year-end press conference but all of the questions I would have wanted to ask came up. It's a fascinating, slightly shocking and at times mesmerizing script to wade through. It's also one that I think we'll look back on a year from now and think either,

A) the man really knew his partners, the corporate world and his "product" and its ability to lure the networks into a lucrative new deal

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The Ramifications of Sunday's Impressive Chevron Rating

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The most impressive thing about the Chevron final round 2.7 rating, a smidgen higher than this year's Open Championship: the event was up against the NFL.

The most unfortunate ramification: it underscores the power of Tiger, likely inspiring the PGA Tour to lean on his star power, without digging a little deeper to improve the "product" for the long term benefit of the tour and the game.

Wild Sunday Open Thread

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Geoff Ogilvy has already won the Australian Open but we can't see it here in the states because of a full line-up that includes a meaningful finale at the Chevron World Challenge for Tiger, the Nedbank in South Africa, the LPGA Tour Championship and the second-to-last round of PGA Tour Q-school. Let me know what you see.

"It made a significant difference in my mind."

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Interesting comments today at the Chevron World Challenge from Jim Furyk on the impact of grooves in 2010, particularly his view on the stats.

Q. We've had a full season now to see the new grooves in effect. What's your take on how it impacted play this year?

JIM FURYK: I think a lot of the stats have been misleading like the scoring average and the different things. I think the golf courses were set up -- because I think the golf courses were set up much differently this year. As a whole I think we saw a lot less rough in our setups, and I think we saw a lot less of that four- and five-inch rough and a lot more of the two- and three-.

So scoring averages probably stayed very similar, but I think it's misleading. I think what they were trying to do was provide lies so that you could get to the ball and advance it but because of the groove issue you'd have a hard time controlling the golf ball. I thought the TOUR did a pretty good job overall. There's events you can pick and choose where you wish the rough were higher, lower, but in the whole course of the season, the setups were changed.

But I think the groove issue made a pretty significant change. I would say -- I actually like the new groove probably more from about 160 yards out because I can move the ball so much farther now with a flier than I could before. I had lost my ability to hit the ball 190 or 200 yards because with the square groove the ball just wouldn't come out jumping and I couldn't get say a 5-iron on the ball anymore, and I can't hit a 6- or 7-iron that far. Now I get out from 200 yards with a 6- or 7-iron and make it jump, play it a little bit back, hit a shot I know will jump. It might not fly there, but I can run the ball up on greens.

I probably -- I think there's been a couple players that have done it, played kind of V-grooves from like a 6-iron up and square grooves from a 7-iron down. They were a little smarter than I was. But I probably like that groove from longer distances. But geez, from pitching wedge distance and in, 9-iron distance and in, it's a big, big difference, and you're nervous about catching that flier and knocking it over greens.

If you think about it, most of the trouble on golf courses, if you hit the ball five yards short of the green, you can usually play. Green is tilted towards you, you usually have an opportunity to get the ball up-and-down, but you start knocking the ball five and ten yards over the greens, it gets very difficult to get the ball up-and-down, and it's what we're all afraid of.

But it made a significant difference in my mind. But I don't think stats prove that. But I think the players would tell you.