Another Sunday afternoon, another golf tournament dominated by the duo of Tiger Woods and Phil Mickelson.
That's what golf fans watched this past weekend, as Mickelson shot an impressive final-round 65 to defeat Tiger Woods by three strokes at the Tour Championship, the concluding tournament of the PGA Tour's playoff system known as the FedEx Cup. However, Mickelson's victory only moved him up to second place in the Cup standings; it was not enough to pass Woods, who won the Cup by over 1,000 points after dominating the regular season.
On top of the $810,000 he won for four days of work (a measly $202,500 per day), Woods also collected a lucrative $10 million check that came along with the Cup victory. For his stellar play on Sunday, Mickelson took home $1.35 million. Ultimately, like so many others this decade, the 2009 year ended with Woods and Mickelson on top.
But that doesn't mean anybody is getting bored, as this year's trip to the top was as atypical as any in recent memory. The season opened on a rough note for both golfers; Woods had undergone season-ending knee surgery after the U.S. Open last summer and was trying to find his game after a long hiatus, while Mickelson was looking to get his life back in order after significant family adversity.
In mid-May, Mickelson's wife, Amy, was diagnosed with breast cancer. Six weeks later, his mother was diagnosed with it as well. Consequently, Mickelson played in only two tournaments between May 10 and Aug. 6. It was a trying year for the man known as "Lefty," and no one would have blamed him for not returning at all.
As the middle of the season rolled around, these early distractions took their toll on both Woods' and Mickelson's performances in majors. At the Masters, neither one managed to break the top four. At the British Open, in which Mickelson did not participate, Woods missed the cut for the first time since the 2006 U.S. Open, which took place shortly after the passing of his father. But perhaps the most shocking occurrence was Woods' final-round collapse in the PGA Championship.
Woods held both the 36- and 54-hole leads, which he had never blown at a major in his career. He was paired up on Sunday with Y.E. Yang, a little-known Korean player who had won his first PGA Tour event in March.
While the world expected to see "Sunday Tiger" aggressively protect his two-stroke lead, it instead watched him shoot a three-over 75 in the final round and lose to Yang by three strokes. Even his trusty putter let him down, as he missed a vital eight-foot putt late in the final round. For the first time in his career, Woods failed to deliver the clutch Sunday shots with which he has made his name.
Still, despite their difficulties, Woods and Mickelson both had strong years. Woods won six tournaments and finished in the top two in eight of his last 11 events. Phil finished second to Tiger in Tour wins, recording three of his own, and he finished in a tie for second at the U.S. Open. Woods is still No. 1 in the world rankings and will most likely be Player of the Year, while Mickelson has reclaimed his No. 2 spot in the rankings behind Tiger.
The year's final competition, the Tour Championship, seemed to be a microcosm of both players' tumultuous but successful seasons. Mickelson struggled early with a first-round 73, while Tiger's putter continued to abandon him. In the second round, Woods jumped out to a lead over Padraig Harrington and had consecutive four-foot birdie putt opportunities on the 15th and 16th holes — the type of situation that Tiger has capitalized on so many times over the past decade.
However, Woods could not sink either, marking only his eighth and ninth misses from five feet or less all year. The trend continued on Saturday, when Tiger missed six putts shorter than 15 feet.
But when Sunday came around, the two showed they were the cream of the crop yet again. Mickelson shot one of only eight under-par rounds in the field to jump into the lead, while Tiger hung around with a string of 11 straight pars and made big shots down the stretch to finish in second.
With players such as Harrington and Steve Stricker — who would have won the FedEx Cup if he had finished above Woods Sunday — nipping at their heels, Tiger and Phil will need to continue to play at their best to stay at the top. But for one more day, and one more year, the rest of the PGA is still looking up at golf's biggest names.
