-Potential multiplayer playoff involving big names like Tiger/Padraig/Stricker.
-Tiger missing a 6 foot putt on 18 for birdie (where are the "Tiger is finished/choked threads")

as i write this Slocum sinks his putt and wins the tournament

but still...doesn't this tournament deserve a chatter thread??? Cmon people

Potential for awesome playoff, Slocum pulls one out of behind and messed that up. Dang it.

--jason

I always enjoy watching Tiger lose. Maybe if it continues, they might stop riding his sack so hard. It's deplorable to listen to.

Congrats to Heath....great win!

Let's talk about the scoring of the Fedex cup. Are you kidding me, from 124th to 3rd. I know they made some changes to point system but thats rediculous. Guess they wanted a true playoff system with little weight to how you play during the year?

--jason

Tiger misses on 18 to get to 9 under....

Stricker and Slocum in bunkers off 18 tee....20 ft (Slocum) and 10 ft (Stricker) putts for par.

Slocum with his boom goes the dynamite moment and drains it, Stricker misses.

Man wish there was a 8 under playoff (Els, Tiger, Paddy, Slocum, Stricker) but oh well, great putt under pressure. Making the most of his opportunity goes from 120 something to 3rd in Fedex Cup rankings lol.

Edit: Forgot Paddy was 8 under....holy crap that would have been an awesome playoff lol.

I was pulling for EE and Strick, oh well.

--jason

i definitely didn't see the Slocum putt coming! I'm sure there are some tears in the CBS booth now. Potential Els, Paddy, Tiger, Stricker playoff foiled

what's next? Someone like YE Yang beating Tiger in a major??? hey wait a minute

Football season is upon us!

I was soo hoping for a playoff...That would have been awesome..

Well...every single playoff I've ever seen in other sports, give absolutely no weight whatsoever to season long performance...save for home field advantage, or the occasional bye week.

I love Jim Nantz' tone right now.....sounds like his whole family went over a cliff in a bus. Love it....

agree completely, then they wonder why players don't care about fedex cup points in june.

really with the new points system getting in at #125 isn't much different than getting in at #5....If they're going to make it this volatile at least don't let everyone with a tour card into the playoffs

You missed Paddy.

hey stop stealing my thunder man!

i just started this thread

http://www.golfwrx.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=295850

Congrats to Heath but I really wanted to see a big playoff.

lol we posted at exactly the same time.....hope the mods just merge

Rooting against someone is pretty classy. Good job.

I think they still need to get the right balance on the points thing. If a player sneeks in to the chase, they should be able to work there way into the mix but this jump is too much IMO. Im dissapointed the event is going to be at a different location next year, I think this course was beautiful.

--jason

anti-climatic with of those players yet to finish

BTW Marino just went fricken NUCLEAR once stuff started going bad. Bunch of missed putts and a topper will do that to you I guess.

So much for someone who respects the "gentleman's game" and "tradition" of golf. This isn't the NFL.

Congrats to Heath Slocum!!

124th to 3rd......great stuff.

My favorite golfer - glad he won and seeing all the long faces on CBS/driving range/scorers booth.


Long live the dark horse!

PS - nice sportsmanship from Strick - class act

I don't root for whom I dislike....period. Serge and Bowles....you're just upset your man came second. Don't cry about it.

Where did I say anyone is "my man". And I didn't say you had to root FOR them just don't be a poor sport and root against them. I'm not even sure why I bothered though, I can tell by your totally sweet use of capitalization you weren't too mature. Maybe try some XxXx in that name of yours as well?

+1
Whom I root for has no bearing on actively rooting against anyone. I'm not a Phil fan. I've never rooted against him or anyone else. So to actively do so just defines "class."

That was a great finish! Much more fun to watch then see someone walk away with it. Great win for Slocum. There were so many what if's and could've beens today.

I think the points system is good. It gives people lower in the points a chance to boost themselves through the playoffs with a good finish. Slocum prime example on that one. If you play decent during the regular season and get into the top 125 you're in. If you play awesome in the playoffs I don't see why you shouldn't have an oppotunity to win it all.

Its so important to his greatness Tiger blew this tournament doing things un Tiger like

Three putts and missing six footers on the last hole not birdieing parfives with three iron in your hand


This guy is incredible and always there then again today was and oopsssssssssssssssss



The question is did he choke?

i actually was hoping they'd keep showing him just so you could see how he responded, he looked PISSED. I topped a hybrid in my round today too, never fun. The guy is talented though and will win soon enough

Personally I wouldn't call shooting 4 under and T2 a choke. Sure he had an oppotunity to win/tie today, but so did a good number of other people. The leaderboard was all over the place today. He had the opportunity to win. If he keeps giving himself oppotunities he will win a lot of tournaments in the future and of course he will lose some too.

In similar fashion to what MtlJeff said below, every single playoff I've ever seen in other sports doesn't let you in for finishing 124th.

This was Slocum's lucky day. Hole one from the fairway one hole and the rake keeps the ball out of the water the next hole turning a 6 into a 4. Add to that the very low probability of Tiger missing a 3 footer and a 6 footer and it appears that Heath's lucky stars were all lined up in a row. --Jerry

Tiger had his lucky breaks too....

Slocum has been one of the most consistent players on tour.....this is his 8th year on tour & he's never finished worse than 80th on the money list....and this will be his 7th straight year that he's inside the top 54 in the ball-striking statistic....

Looking at the FedEx cup standing, 255 players scored points. The 125 players that qualified would represent 49% of the field. As a comparison, in the NHL 16 of the 30 teams are in, that's 53,3% of the teams in...

Anyway, back on topic, I'm hapy for Slocum, always great to see someone raising to the occasion. He had solid nerves to sink in that very important put. Great win!!

I agree with those that think the points thing is stupid.

Obviously you need to accumulate points in the regular season so you can establish a field of playoff teams (individuals). Once you get to the "post season", everything should be re-set. After the first event, top x get in to week 2. From there, top x get in to week 3 and from there they cut to top 30 in the points (cumulative total for the playoffs) for the Tour Championship. If you want the players to play in the playoff events, that's the only way to do it.

However, do that and you sacrifice regular season "spark" of the fed ex cup.

Personall, glad for Slocum that he got a "big" (debatable) event win. He seems like a classy guy and I always like seeing those guys do well. However, the fed ex cup is still stupid.

-mini

One thing that kinda blew my mind was Ernie Els laying up on #16. He had a birdie round 1, eagle round 2, and a par round 3. He's one shot down with 2 fairly difficult par 4's in 17,18 coming up and he lays up to 100yards on the 320yrd par 4?!?! What was he thinking?

Pretty ridiculous. There's a backstory though. Finchim was pissed because in the first year, some of the big guys didn't even bother to play all four events. Tiger didn't even kiss the cup. Regardless of the commercials ... the FedEx Cup is simply not as big of a deal as the four majors are. Never will be.

So the rules got changed ... Finchim's Fantasy required the players to be forced to play in all four events. They delibrately designed the point system to be much more volitile. Which leads to this positively bizarre scenerio in which some B level player can have a good week, and go from 124th to 3rd.

I really can't wait until Finchim is gone. I think for the money he makes, the PGA Tour could do a lot better.

I disagree with your opinion on this. Making the playoff events worth 5x what the regular season events are offsets a large lead and IMO basically resets the stats excluding players with multiple wins during the season.

Me too ... a five way playoff would have been really cool.

It's a good day to know me! 2 long time friends are winners. Heath and Gary Christian on the Nationwide Tour.

How do you spell C...H...O...K...E.........????????

They talked to him after the round...he caved the face of his driver in the round yesterday and it was replaced with another one. He mentioned that the shaft was different and he wasn't as comfortable with it. Not sure if it was the same shaft or a completely different shaft regardless he sounded less than confident about it.

It's not a continuation of the regular season, it's the POST season.

When the Yankees play ___ in the playoffs, do they start the game up 5-0?

-mini

I'm glad for Slocum, I just wonder it Tiger had walked outside the scoring tent his shadow would have been cast over the green and Slocum would not have made the putt because he could see the shadow of "El Tigre"!

I see your point, but if the Yankees come into the post season as the last seed they are at a disadvantage in the playoffs. They have to play the best team in their division and do not have homefield advantage thus the regular season has an effect on the POST season.

You don't have home field advantage in golf. Everyone plays the same course.

-mini

I know. It was an example of how playing well in the regular season puts you in a better position in the playoffs for most if not all sports. You brought the baseball comprison in and I'm just expanding on it.

A 5 way playoff would have been sweeeet..... It would look like a small game of Wolf.

Tiger by finishing #1 in Fed-Ex points, pretty much assured himself of remaining there through the 1st round, save for completely falling apart. Sounds like a decent advantage there. It's setup so the Top 30 or so will be around for awhile. That in itself sounds like a reward for playing well in the regular season to me.

there is an advantage to being ranked high in the FEDEX points entering the playoffs....

It gives you a margin for error should you have a bad week or even miss a cut....

two examples:

1) Cabrera misses the cut....but he's still in the field next week & in decent position for the week after that

2) Villegas WD's with an injury....he can still tee it up next week if he's healthy

....in the mean time, a guy like Adam Scott barely made the top 125 in points....he missed the cut & now he's gonzo....which is fair since he didn't accumulate enough points throughout the season

FEDEX is throwing around huge $$$$ for these playoffs....in return they want ratings & they're not going to get them if Tiger & Phil choose to sit out tournaments....therefore this point system works for me

To compare this "playoff" to another sports playoff is crazy. The only real similarity is that they are both called playoffs. In football, baseball, basketball etc home field advantage is HUGE and makes the regular season more valuable. Do you think Green Bay has an advantage playing in sub zero temperatures, when they are used to it compared to Tampa (and same works in the other direction at that time of year)?

Not to mention the fan being the extra player for the home team is huge. And on the flip side, a complete underdog has a shot to win it if they can overcome more obstacles than the favorite (golf is different because every player plays the same course, same conditions, etc).

I am not saying they should do this, but it would be more like a playoff if the top 1/4 of the field got to use 14 clubs, then next 1/4 got 12 clubs, then 10 then 8. At least then season long work would give you an actual advantage in the playoff event, not just a contrived mathematical advantage that all gets erased anyway.

Unless they setup a match play format that went from 128 people to 1 and matched them up in a bracket format, it isnt a true playoff (for better or worse).

Great win for heath tho, I would have liked to see the 5 man playoff (although how would that have even worked? all at the same time?)