FanHouse SteveStricker

SAN FRANCISCO -- Tiger Woods debuted this week as the first billion-dollar athlete. If that thought left you bemused, perplexed or angry, Woods showed Saturday why people throw money at him.

He's worth it.

Example No. 3,539 -- With the International team losing its grip on the Presidents Cup, he made a 24-foot putt to tie his match on the 17th hole. His next swing was a 229-yard laser that ended up 15 feet from the hole.

The International team of Mike Weir and Tim Clark literally surrendered.

Now that the Deutsche Bank Championship is in the books, we're at the halfway point of the FedEx Cup. The BMW Championship is up next, followed by the Tour Championship. But let's not get too far ahead of ourselves: unlike the Barclays, which played more like a pro-am than a playoff, the Deutsche Bank made for compelling viewing.

First things first: Tiger Woods, who tied for second last week, started Monday's round nine strokes behind the leaders, fired a 63 to move into third, before eventually finishing tied for 10th. Not bad for a guy who began the day in 30th place.

Heath Slocum was, by all accounts, the unlikeliest of golfers to win the Barclays. Sure, he had the lead late, but Tiger Woods was charging, Ernie Els was just a stroke back, Steve Stricker was matching him shot-for-shot and, most importantly, he had a lengthy par putt on 18 to secure, at worst, a playoff with Stricker.

But he buried the putt, Stricker missed and Slocum only had to avoid an eagle hole-out from Frederik Jacobson to win the Barclays -- his third tournament win ever -- in surprising fashion given his 72 and 70 in the second and third rounds, respectively.

Webb Simpson, who led the majority of the tournament, must have heard the proverbial footsteps that we talk about any time Tiger is just a few strokes behind the leaders heading into Sunday of a tournament. Either that or we can just chalk up Simpson's Sunday meltdown to inexperience.

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Earlier this week, fellow FanHouser Ryan Wilson put together a great piece ranking what major championship was best. He picked the British Open, the correct call, and wrote the following line -- "I have no idea what the bylaws stipulate in terms of who qualifies for the PGA Tour Player of the Year, but if 59-year-old Tom Watson had won the British Open they should have given him the award on the spot." So, it got me thinking ... is there any player out there that has a chance at taking POTY honors away from Mr. Woods? Watson would have been a good story, but I still don't think he snags it. Here are your candidates, including Tiger, and their '09 resumes.

Every Monday during the PGA Tour season, Monday Pin Placement will run as a wrap-up of the weekend's action. Basically, we'll focus on what you missed while you were out grinding on the putting green.

Stricker Uses Experience to Edge Others -- There were three golfers in the playoff at the Colonial on Sunday, but only one had hoisted a trophy on the PGA Tour. Steve Stricker, by all accounts, had struggled on Sunday. The man that relies on his putting to get it done on the golf course hit multiple lips on his way to the 17th hole after he came off a frustrating bogey on the par-3 16th.

A second shot from just over 150 yards on 17 was yanked a hair, and Stricker found himself over the green with a tricky little pitch out of some thick rough. It didn't matter for the 42-year-old. Pitch. Roll. Pin. Birdie. Reminiscent of Nick Watney's shot on the ninth hole at the WGC earlier this year, Stricker's birdie gave him a chance at a playoff.

Inexperience by the others got him in.

It was the fifth playoff on the PGA Tour this season, but the only one that gave us such incredible shots over just two holes.

Steve Stricker claimed the Colonial title on Sunday after dodging a birdie bullet by Tim Clark, who is still searching for his first win, and Steve Marino, who seems to have the game to claim a title on the PGA Tour but is still rough around the edges.

On Thursday afternoon, I made the short drive down the street to the local Subway sandwich shop to pick up my healthy fix before heading back to the computer. Parked outside Subway was an obnoxiously expensive car with the license plate "Stricker" personalized across the back of the shiny vehicle. On the phone with my Las Vegas buddy, who was busy losing the rest of his money, I joked "I wonder if Steve Stricker is grabbing a quick foot-long?"

He was not. Stricker was 1,000 miles away, beating up Colonial Country Club like the golf course owed him something. Colonial, the longest-running PGA Tour event at its original site, has never had someone do what Stricker did through 36 holes. Consecutive 63s have put the 42-year-old Stricker ahead of the pack at a windless Colonial, where he has made a birdie on 44 percent of the holes he's played this week.

If you expected the two major championship-leaders to come out a bit timid in the third round of the Masters, you probably weren't alone. Many times in big golf tournaments, names sneak up on the leaderboard that slowly fade as the weekend progresses.

Kenny Perry is 48 and skipped major championships last year to focus on his goal of making the Ryder Cup. Angel Cabrera hasn't been heard of since that '07 U.S. Open victory. Chad Campbell hasn't won on tour since 2007.

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In 2005, a municipal golf course in San Francisco was set to host the American Express Championship. The thing was, Harding Park wasn't ready. People, concerned with the conditions, questioned whether it would be ready to hold thousands of people set to watch the best players in the world duke it out.

As you might remember, the course turned out to be fantastic, hosting a battle between the spiffy clean Tiger Woods and his foe John Daly. Tiger ended up with the title, and Harding Park was on the map as a course that could handle the moment. Four years later, with the Presidents Cup coming to San Francisco, the same questions are arising. Is Harding Park going to be ready? Some golfers don't think so.

It was a tale of two Phil Mickelsons this week at Riviera Country Club. Two days, Thursday and Saturday, he had the game that won him three majors and 34 PGA Tour tournaments over his illustrious career. The other two days it seemed like anything could happen on any given hole.

The real Phil showed up at the end of Sunday's final round, with a stealth 9-iron on the 16th hole, a two-putt birdie on the 17th hole and a sneaky par putt that found the center of the cup for a par on the 18th and gave him his first win of 2009 at the Northern Trust Open.

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