Monday, September 3, 2007

Mickelson Wins, Disses Finchem

Phil Mickelson won the Deutsche Bank Championship and moved to the top of the Fed Ex Cup point standings Sunday. It was pretty impressive victory for Mickelson, who historically does not play well in the late summer or fall. He held off Tiger Woods at the end, in part because he had only 23 putts for his round and did not miss a putt of under five feet the entire week. For a while, it looked like shades of last year’s U.S. Open when Mickelson took a huge gamble going for the green on the 12th hole and hit it in a hazard for a double bogey. But his short game wizardry saved him, especially on the last hole when he hit a great pitch from deep rough behind the green for an easy birdie.

In a post-round interview with NBC-TV, Mickelson hinted that he will not play in next week’s tournament in Chicago, noting that his kids start school on Wednesday and one of his daughters has her first soccer game next weekend. He said he owed it to the tour to play but said he tour commissioner Tim Finchem did not follow through on some suggestions Mickelson had. He did not elaborate. Interestingly enough, it was Tiger who skipped The Barclays event last week. The Tiger-Phil pairing made for great drama on Sunday and after both of them birdied the 17th hole, Johnny Miller said, “If you don’t like this, go watch tennis.”

Hitting range balls while wondering whatever happened to Deane Beaman.