golf

The golf season was full of drama this year. Here is a chronological look at the top 10 events:

In 2000, Casey Martin found himself serving as grand marshal of a parade he wanted no part of.
On the PGA Tour that year, Martin was the guy in the golf cart.
He has a congenital circulation problem in his right leg that prevents him from walking a course, so he asked the PGA to allow him to ride in a cart. The PGA reacted as if Martin had asked to drive a Sherman tank.

Let's hope the gentlemen in green jackets saw the stories coming out of New Zealand over the weekend. That way, they immediately can begin arranging pairings for the opening round of the Masters on April 9, putting Tiger Woods and Phil Mickelson in the same group.

The ADT Championship in West Palm Beach capped the LPGA season two weeks ago. Ji-Yai Shin of South Korea won by one shot over Karrie Webb. It was Annika Sorenstam's last tournament on the LPGA Tour, for now.
But that was just one of many newsworthy events. Here is a look at some of the top stories from the LPGA season:

I was standing behind the first tee the other day wondering what my next article would be about, and I decided to focus on some of the major golf swing problems I witnessed there.I watched 30 people go through the first tee and here is what I saw:

As the PGA Tour season officially ends outside Orlando, there remains no debate about the story of the year. Not when Tiger Woods, while nursing torn knee ligaments and a stress fracture in his left leg, wins a riveting U.S. Open in a 19-hole playoff against Rocco Mediate.

Fred Funk has won two tournaments and nearly $1.8 million this year on the Champions Tour. He hangs out with players his age, navigates courses of realistic dimensions and begins each event without worrying about missing the cut -- because there is no cut.

LARGO, Fla. -- Anybody who has played golf long enough either has a hole-in-one story or knows somebody who has a hole-in-one story.There's the beginner who hits a 110-yard ground ball with a driver, bounces it off a sand trap rake and into the hole. Or there is the 93-year-old legally blind golfer who aces a hole on his first shot of the day.

The PGA Tour is three events into its Fall Series, a stretch of seven tournaments that has more meaning to players hovering near 150th on the money list than to those with higher rankings. The top 150 earn playing cards for 2009.

Paula Creamer was 16, a rising junior golfer with grand ambitions. She had grown up in Pleasanton, Calif. (before moving to Florida at 14) and was attending the Solheim Cup in September 2002. During one practice round, Creamer and some other members of the Junior Solheim Cup team hooked up with Hall of Famer Juli Inkster, another Northern Californian, on the 18th hole.