PGA Championship preview: Overton to excel?
With three of the likeliest contenders either out of the frame or out of sorts, and Graeme McDowell and Louis Oosthuizen claiming victory in the year's other two majors, what are the odds that another of golf's relatively unsung heroes can stride into the limelight at Whistling Straits this week?
Lee Westwood is out of the tournament all together, a calf injury having put paid to his major hopes for another year, while Tiger Woods' recent performances suggest the world No. 1 would struggle to win a crazy golf tournament right now.
And Phil Mickelson's bafflingly haphazard game of late can be more readily understood with the news that the world No. 2 has succumbed to arthritis in recent months - though that news scarcely makes Mickelson an especially attractive bet, even if he is the market favourite.
Mickelson believes the condition is under control, and says he doesn't want to use the illness as an excuse for some shonky play. Even if we take that pledge at face value though, the four-time major winner has never managed to claim more than one of the big four in the same season. Mickelson won the Masters in April, but since then he's been understandably quiet.
True, a win or top-four finish here could result in him replacing Tiger Woods as the world No. 1 - but Mickelson has had other opportunities to reach that milestone, and under less testing circumstances than these.
Of the obvious candidates, that leaves Jim Furyk, who missed the cut here in 2004 by some distance; Steve Stricker, who won the John Deere Classic impressively earlier this year but has succumbed to the wobbles at every previous major in 2010; Padraig Harrington, who seems to have misplaced his winning touch, with no victories all season; and Rory McIlroy, perhaps the most capable on his day, but also the most mercurial of that four. None of them fill us with confidence, frankly.
Gambling on a less high-profile player may be a more profitable strategy, particularly given the tournament’s history; recent winners include such fleeting successes as Shaun Micheel and Rich Beem. Jeff Overton may fit the bill; since May, Overton has had five top five placings on the PGA Tour, and he finished tied for sixth place at last week's Bridgestone Invitational.
On the flipside, the 27-year-old is yet to win on the PGA Tour - but the same was true of Micheel when he bagged his PGA Championship win in 2003. Overton also made decent progress at the Open, finishing 11th, and he is surely worth at least an each-way nibble this week.
Similarly, Matt Kuchar is a name you may not be familiar with, but the 32-year-old has eight top-10 finishes this year on the PGA Tour, along with four top-five finishes. Kuchar has never previously made a cut at this tournament, it's true, but he is playing the best golf of his career right now and could conceivably trouble the top five.
More tried and tested fare is available, of course. South African golfers have punched above their weight in recent years, with Ernie Els, Retief Goosen, Trevor Immelman and of course Oosthuizen all succeeding in the last decade.
While Immelman is tipped by some as a man with the class to make a comeback from the wrist injury that has hampered his career, the 30-year-old is yet to record a top-10 finish this season. Goosen, on the other hand, has eight top-10 placings on the PGA tour in 2010; we liked the Goose for the Bridgestone Invitational last week, where he eventually finished third, and the 41-year-old is potentially capable of improving on that showing here.
And finally, in a year when the Englishmen have marauded into golf's top 10, how about Justin Rose? Rose looked to have found form in impressive style earlier this summer, winning twice in the space of a month on the PGA Tour.
He' s stumbled since then, missing the cut at the Open, but a final round of 67 at the Bridgestone Invitational, where he finished joint 19th, suggests the 30-year-old is on the up once more after a difficult week at St Andrews. Rose is worth a tickle for his first ever major win; if nothing else, it would be a h**l of a way to convince Colin Montgomerie that he really is worth a place at the Ryder Cup in October.
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