Duval has shot at Player of the Year
Posted: Friday November 13, 1998 06:56 PM
Tough decision. Although Mark O'Meara's major championship victories at the Masters and British Open have already decided the issue for some, David Duval still has a legitimate shot at being voted PGA Tour Player of the Year.
Duval had four victories on the year, and more than $2.5 million in official earnings, and very likely give him the Vardon Trophy. As much as the majors mean, those would be very difficult numbers to ignore.
In contrast, the race for the tour's comeback player of the year has plenty of candidates. No player overcame as much as Trevor Dodds, who beat testicular cancer and earned his first career victory at Greensboro.
Scott Verplank, whose 12 years on the tour have been marked by injury and illness, went from Q school to more than $1 million in earnings. Steve Stricker arose from a disastrous 1997 season to finish near the top of the money list and nearly win the PGA.
But the favorite for the award has to be John Huston, who after suffering wrist and shoulder injuries and losing his game last year cashed in a one-time exemption as a top 50 career money winner. With his back to the wall, Huston won twice, setting the all time 72-hole scoring record of 28 under par at Hawaii.
It's been a puzzling year for Tiger Woods. He won only once on the PGA Tour, and other than his third place at the British Open, was disappointing in the majors.
In 1998, Duval had four wins and over $2.5 million in earnings AP | |
Short putting emerged as his potential Achilles heel. But the soon-to-be 23 year old has chosen to look at the year as an important building block.
He believes that the glue is beginning to set permanently on the swing changes he began last year, a conclusion that is supported by his 13 top 10s in 19 events.
As for his putting, Woods is trying to be instinctive and less analytical, the way he was as an amateur. It's easy to find those who say Woods was overhyped, but smart money says the kid is on the verge of something big.
Score one for the proletariat. Journeyman Larry Rinker, one of the ringleaders of the Tournament Players Association that seeks to unionize the tour, jumped into the top 125 and retained his exempt status with a clutch 12th-place finish at Orlando last week.
Rinker has been the target of criticism by some of his peers since helping start the TPA in late July, but he has played his best golf while under siege, making nine of 11 cuts. "I've played with a little more tenacity," Rinker said.
Finally, Sunday in Atlanta will mark the end of a 12-year era in which the Tour Championship was the grand finale of the golf season. Next year, the American Express Championship, with a purse of $5 million and a winner's share of $1 million -- all of it official money -- will be played in Spain the week after the Tour Championship.
Sports Illustrated senior writer Jaime Diaz covers the golf beat and appears regularly on CNN/Sports Illustrated and CNN's Pro Golf Weekly.
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