FanHouse Geoff Ogilvy

For the last big event of the 2009 season, the Presidents Cup gave us more drama than the score might appear. A captain's pick failing to win a point (Gasp!). An 18-year-old rookie stealing the show for the losing team (Wow!). And, as you probably expected, the number one golfer in the world doing exactly what he does, week in and week out. So who left Harding Park a winner, and who will look back at this event wishing it never happened?

SAN FRANCISCO -- If there are three iron-clad certainties in golf, you have to figure close behind the balls having dimples and Tiger Woods having it all, comes the United States having its way in the Presidents Cup.

The Internationals came, they played, they got thumped.

Once more, without a lot of feeling.

Any drama a cold, gloomy-gray Sunday at Harding Park Golf Club hoped to generate, could not possibly have vanished any quicker.

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SAN FRANCISCO -- The greatest shots in Presidents Cup history? No, not a chance. All the same, Justin Leonard played them perfectly.

Let's talk shot making.

He drained them.

"It was knowing I needed to come out and play well today," he said.

Leonard teamed with Phil Mickelson for Friday's Presidents Cup second round and played top shelf. He birdied the first hole to get the American twosome going in the best-ball competition. He kept pounding until finally rolling in a 12-footer at No. 16 to finish off the International team of Retief Goosen and Adam Scott 3 and 2.

It was a performance instrumental in allowing the United State to lead 6½-5½ going into Saturday's third round.

SAN FRANCISCO -- The world's greatest golfers awoke Friday to news they can now be Olympians.

Somewhere the ancient Greeks are weeping. What's worse, somewhere the modern Chinese are working on a Human Golf Hormone drug.

Their orders are to seize any child who resembles Tiger Woods, pump him full of top-secret Birdie Juice and bring home the gold in 2016 from Rio de Janeiro.

Or else.

SAN FRANCISCO -- Ryo Ishikawa is the baby of this week's Presidents Cup, soft features, a shy presence and a floppy mop of unkempt hair.

Having only turned 18 in September, he smiles a lot in public, seemingly happy to remain chameleon quiet. At 5-foot-9 and 140 pounds, he does not demand physical attention. He says "Mr. Norman" when talking about Greg Norman, the International Team captain who handpicked Ishikawa for the competition that starts Thursday.

Back home in Japan, where Ishikawa has been treated like a rock star since winning a pro event at age 15, such deference and respectful demeanor has earned him the nickname "Bashful Prince." But here in America, after a few days at Harding Park Golf Club, the title almost seems a bit dated. Bashful or not, Ishikawa already has the power to rule.

SAN FRANCISCO -- The eighth Presidents Cup begins play Thursday afternoon at Harding Park Golf Club, but the action started Wednesday when team captains, American Fred Couples and International Greg Norman, matched twosomes for six first-round foursome matches.

The alternate-shot competition will begin at 12:10 p.m. PDT with the International pairing of Canadian Mike Weir and South African Tim Clark taking on Americans Anthony Kim and Phil Mickelson.

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Greg Norman will play hurt at next week's Presidents Cup.

OK, as captain of the International Team that is taking on the Americans at San Francisco's Harding Park Golf Club, Norman will not hit a shot, but no question he is ailing.

Captain Shark has his right arm in a sling, the result of arthroscopic shoulder surgery performed Wednesday.

"A bit of a surprise," Norman said Friday. "I was trying to delay it until January of next year, but the doctor said I needed to get it done now."

ATLANTA -- Tiger Woods is guaranteed to win the FedEx Cup and $10 million playoff bonus Sunday at East Lake Golf Club with a victory in the Tour Championship.

Considering he is two shots back of third-round leader Kenny Perry's 8 under, while both Sean O'Hair and Phil Mickelson are within two shots of Woods, that's not necessarily guaranteed. Also in the picture is Padraig Harrington, five shots back of Perry.

Possible scenarios for claiming the bonus:

Imagine you're throwing a birthday party for your 13-year-old daughter. You have pony's set to carry the lucky kids around the yard. A clown that is going to paint the faces of the children and tie balloon animals. And the cake is as delicious and frosted as anything you've ever placed in your rumbling stomach.

Now imagine the pony has a bad back. It carries children the same way it would carry an international Space Station. Poorly ... very poorly. The clown shows up, but he's drunk and keeps painting phallic symbols on the kids faces as he laughs into his flask. Oh, and that cake? Yeah, turns out yours got mixed up with one from a vegan party, and it tastes the same way Tara Reid's stomach looks ... not great.

That is what the Presidents Cup is currently facing at Harding Park in San Francisco. With just five weeks until the United States team hosts the International team in the seventh playing of the team event, the municipal golf course is still reeling from what is now being deemed Fertilizergate.