FanHouse VijaySingh

SAN FRANCISCO -- Anything with the name Presidents Cup sounds like it is ripe for a Golf Czar appointment.

Are you qualified to rule over this week's PGA Tour team matches between the United States and an International squad of non-Europeans that tees off Thursday at Harding Park Golf Club?

Take this test and decide for yourself.

Vijay Singh is currently at 3-under, T49 early in the third round at the Travelers Championship. And as has been the case since January, he's sporting a visor emblazoned with Stanford Financial, one of his sponsors.

One problem: in February, the Securities and Exchange Commission charged Stanford with defrauding its customers out of $7 billion, and last week chairman Allen Stanford and three of his colleagues were charged.

Bail was set at $2 million and Singh, who continues to wear the Stanford logo despite the fact that he is no longer being paid to do so, offered to chip in a cool $500,000.

The argument has been tossed around since Tiger Woods fist-pumped his way to a 12-shot victory at Augusta National in 1997. Who is the best golfer to ever play the game, Tiger or Jack Nicklaus?

We aren't necessarily going to get the answer this Wednesday at Muirfield Village, but we will get to see Tiger and Jack compete against each other for just the second time ever in the same group. Woods agreed to compete in the Wednesday Skins Game at the Memorial Tournament with Jack, Stewart Cink and Kenny Perry. The other skins group will include Vijay Singh, Jim Furyk, Camilo Villegas and Padraig Harrington.

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.

Vijay Singh is 46 years old. He has won 34 PGA Tour events and the 2008 FedEx Cup and has three major championship to his credit. Arguments aside, he is the third most talented golfer during the Tiger Woods' era behind Swoosh himself and Phil Mickelson.

Knee surgery in January has plagued the Big Fijian, who has played 34 rounds this season and broke 70 only five times, a number fairly staggering for the former number one in the world. Things have changed a little since coming to the Lone Star State, as Singh finished t-16 at the HP Byron Nelson Championship with closing rounds of 67-69-66 and a 64 today in the opening round of the Colonial, his best score since September of last season.

It really is one of the strangest stories in golf. David Duval, the only golfer besides Vijay Singh to actually give Tiger Woods a run for his money since he came on the PGA Tour, wins the 2001 British Open and then drops completely from the headlines.

Don't look now, but Duval shot a 4-under 66 on Thursday at the Valero Texas Open and will tee off Friday in the top-20 of a PGA Tour event. The last time Duval shot a 66 was the first round of the Buick Invitational in 2007, and since that round Duval has bested 70 a ridiculous 16 out of 92 rounds, or just 17 percent of the time. He has missed his last six cuts, shooting in the 80s more times than he has broken par. His 4-under round at La Cantera, however, was solid, including just one bogey to his five birdies.

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TPC Sawgrass is supposed to be brutal. It's supposed to be nasty. For heaven's sake, it's supposed to be the fifth major! Well, unless the fairways and greens are soft and the wind doesn't blow.

Ben Crane, who started on the back nine in the first round of the Players Championship, turned at 3-under 33, but went on a tear from there, making five birdies in six holes on his way to a 7-under 65 and the first-round lead. Crane, who hasn't won on tour since 2005, noted after his round that the greens were perfect, "like putting on the hood of your car," and the low scores the first day indicated that.

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There is only one match play tournament a year on the PGA Tour, but it sure seems of late that Tiger Woods and Phil Mickelson are playing a little "whatever you can do, I can do better" game against each other. At Quail Hollow this week, you might as well forget all the other names. Mickelson's round of 67 after Tiger posted a 65 this morning was a tournament director's dream, and allowed the rest of the field to look up at the leaderboard and say, "Oh, them again."

Playing with defending champion Anthony Kim and Davis Love III, Mickelson birdied his first hole, followed that up with another on the 5th and then chipped in for eagle on the par-5 7th. At times, it seemed Mickelson's short game got too much credit, similar to veteran journalists ogling Brett Favre's arm when there were younger, faster quarterbacks in the league. That isn't the case this season with Phil. He was quoted as saying his short game is as good as it has ever been due to a short game clinic he put on in the offseason, and it is showing.

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Who knew Quail Hollow would be the site of one of the best fields in golf next week?

The Quail Hollow Championship (formerly the Wachovia Championship) committee chairs probably celebrated early Friday like they had won the dang golf tournament when Tiger Woods committed to playing next week. The week after Quail Hollow, Tiger committed to the Players Championship, making it the first time since his knee surgery that Woods will play back-to-back events.

It's moving day at the Masters. Join FanHouse as we document events as they unfold in real time. That's right, it's a little something we like to call a "live blog," old-school style. Fun starts after the jump.

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