Rory McIlroy puts Quail Hollow on 2010 schedule

With the Quail Hollow Championship still six months away, it's a little early to get into the question of who's coming and who isn't but one star has already put the event on his schedule.

Rory McIlroy, the young Irish star, said in Hong Kong on Wednesday that he has joined the PGA Tour and will add the Quail Hollow Championship to his schedule.

McIlroy will play eight straight events in the United States starting with the WGC-Accenture Match Play Champinship in March.

"The big fact in making this decision is that I want to play in the best tournaments in the world," McIlroy was quoted in the Irish Examiner. "I've already played in many of those (PGA Tour events) already and the only events new to me next year will be Bay Hill, Quail Hollow and the Memorial."

McIlroy is considered by many to be the game's next superstar and his 2009 performance strengthened those opinions. McIlroy finished tied for third at the PGA Championship, a fourth-place week at the HSBC Championship in Shanghai and a top-10 finish at the U.S. Open.

McIlroy said the European Tour will continue to be his home tour. He will play eight events in the States during the spring, return to Europe in the summer, then come back to the U.S. in advance of the PGA Championship to meet his 15-event minimum in the U.S.

Has it become Phil's show, not Tiger's?

Has Phil Mickelson supplanted Tiger Woods as the best golfer in the world?

I'm not ready to go that far.

But after the way Mickelson won The Tour Championship and how he left Tiger in his dust in Shanghai over the weekend, there's no question Lefty is right there.

This is the Mickelson we've seen in spurts, the Mickelson brimming with confidence and swagger. He stands over putts now expecting to make them, not hoping to make them and, if you've ever played golf, you know the difference is enormous.

When Dave Stockton tweaked Mickelson's putting stroke earlier in the fall, it was like polishing a diamond. He put Mickelson back where he was comfortable, the hole suddenly looked twice as big and the game became, relatively speaking, easier.

The only downside to Mickelson's resurgence is the timing. He's done now for the year, just as he's hit his peak. Usually, Phil has been long gone by this time of the year, ready for vacation. Now he probably wishes he had another few tournaments to play.

There may be a little rust when he comes back next year but I'm thinking this latest run has reinvigorated him. He posed with Tiger after the Tour Championship, having won that event, and his win in the HSBC event over the weekend was made more noteworthy by the way Tiger went backward on Sunday.

The question isn't whether Phil can beat Tiger right now.

It may be whether Tiger has lost something. He was a mess early in the final round, lipping out putts, hitting a shot in the water, chopping his way out of contention on a Sunday stacked with stars.

Maybe his edge has dulled just a little. It's easy to make too much of the fact that Tiger didn't win a major this year. That's going to happen from time to time but because everything he does is overanalyzed, it raised questions.

Where does Tiger go from here? My guess is he keeps doing what he's been doing, grinding to make himself better, sorting out the little things that kept him from winning this year. There will be calls for him to ditch Hank Haney but that seems unlikely.

He didn't play well on Sunday and it was striking because it so rarely happens. Throw in the fact he lost to Heath Slocum in a playoff event and didn't win at East Lake and eyebrows go up.

Tiger is playing again this week in Australia and everybody will be interested to see how that goes.

Maybe not everyone. It may not matter to Mickelson.

A red flag but what does it mean?

When it was announced recently that Doug Barron had earned the distinction of becoming the first PGA Tour player to test positive for performance-enhancing drugs, it drew an interesting reaction.

There wasn't much of one.

It's probably because only die-hard professional golf fans are familiar with Barron -- he hasn't spent many Sunday afternoons on camera -- and what's left of the golf season has been buried beneath the World Series, pro and college football and the ongoing angst surrounding the break-up of Jon and Kate.

Once the Tour and its players decided to have testing, it was inevitable someone would be red-flagged. That it was Barron, who didn't make a cut in four Nationwide and one PGA Tour start this year, came as a mild surprise. But given the tour's general insistence that there is no PED problem, it would be head-turning regardless of whose name first popped up.

Barron, if you don't know, is a 40-year old whose game has gone away. He's made less than $2,000 in his last 16 starts and breaking par has been as difficult for him as it is for the average 10-handicap.

The tour and Barron were suitably vague in announcing the positive test and the suspension that accompanies the result. No one's saying what Barron tested positive for and it's unlikely anyone will.

If you were expecting the drug testing policy to expose some muscle-bound bomber you're disappointed. Barron looks like a lot of 40-year old guys who haven't spent enough time in the gym.

He's had health problems, say people who know him. Maybe that factors into the positive test.

What does it say about professional golf? Not much. If someone wants to avoid detection, there are ways to do it.

If there's a problem with performance enhancing drugs in professional golf, I'd be surprised. Commissioner Tim Finchem initially wasn't for drug testing because he said, in essence, there was no need.

Barron's case doesn't necessarily validate the testing. It hardly moved the public opinion needle. It's the first positive test since the program began more than a year ago.

If it were someone else, the reaction would probably be different. So might the attention.

Ten years old, Carolina Invitational still strong

For 10 years, the Carolina Invitational four-ball tournament at Carolina Golf Club has been true to its mission.

The idea was to create a fall event that would feature many of the best players in the region, playing as two-man teams, on a golf course originally laid out by Donald Ross.

It isn't played with a lot of fanfare. It's more about the golf, the competition and the fun.

But if you can wrangle an invitation to the Carolina Invitational, bring your A game.

The 10th annual tournament Saturday and Sunday at Carolina is stacked with good players. The average team handicap -- yes, average -- is + .15. There's no room for choppers, unless you're former U.S. Amateur finalist David Strawn, whose nickname is Chopper.

Strawn is in the field along with defending champions Michael Teague and Robby Kirby. Joe Jaspers, one of the top players in the Charlotte area for years, is playing as is former pro Brett Boner and many others.

What began a decade ago as a tournament designed to bring together the best players in the area continues to do that.

In trouble? Pelz has the answer

Dave Pelz wants to get you out of trouble.

When Pelz, primarily known for his deep study of putting and the short game, launched a study on wedge play, he discovered something else along the way. It's usually two or three holes that ruin a round of golf.

Maybe that's not news but after logging in the hole-by-hole results from many thousands of rounds played at the World Amateur Handicap tournament at Myrtle Beach, Pelz was more convinced than ever that if golfers could eliminate the really big number on their cards, their handicaps would drop significantly.

In his latest book, 'Damage Control,' Pelz has a plan for helping everyone from tour players to the weekend golfer avoid -- or at least minimize -- the big blow-up.

"I found a pattern," Pelz said in a recent phone interview. "Almost always, golfers play below their handicap level for 13, 14, 15 holes a round. Then they screw it up.

"They throw disastrous scores in there. If they can just get rid of that, they can lower their handicaps by three to five shots without changing their golf swings."

As you might suspect, it involves practice. Not a lot but some. Pelz points out that everyone practices hitting shots from good lies on level land. The trouble comes when you're having to hack one out of the trees or chop it out of the cabbage and you try to do something you're not prepared to do.

Knowing what to do and how to do it, Pelz said, is the key.

"The first thing I found out is it's not the first shot that gets you into trouble," Pelz said. "Everybody does that. It's the shot that follows the first one. They often hit from the frying pan to the fire. It's the shot that goes from bad to worse that's the real problem."

Pros hit it in trouble, Pelz points out, but they're adept at minimizing the damage. They don't let a one-stroke mistake turn into a four-stroke penalty.

In his book, which includes an abundance of photos, charts and graphs, Pelz lays out a method to improving your damage control. He gives you a practice plan that doesn't require a lot of work. It's more about becoming familiar with shots you may face so you're more ready when the moment arrives.

He teaches you how to make ultra-flat swings, very upright swings, stop your swing quickly, play from severe sidehill lies and other challenges.

"I was always told I needed to work on my driving and keep (the ball) out of trouble," Pelz said. "I'd have been much better off learning how to get out of trouble first.

"If you got mediocre at damage control, (the big number) would go down to one every 10 rounds. A pro only has one every 27 rounds. That's a heckuva difference."

On another matter, Pelz said he's still working with Phil Mickelson, who credited a putting lesson from Dave Stockton with sparking his late-season resurgence. Pelz calls Stockton "one of my heroes" and expects Mickelson to be ready next year if his family's health issues continue to improve.

"I think once his short-game and putting get back to his standards, he's going to be a heckuva player."

Pinehurst No. 2 may get Coore-Crenshaw touch

Pinehurst officials are moving closer to hiring Ben Crenshaw and Bill Coore to handle a restoration of Course No. 2 before the 2014 men’s and women’s U.S. Opens are played there.

Tinkering with what is considered Donald Ross’ masterpiece is a delicate matter and Pinehurst president Don Padgett III is taking a careful approach.

He has consulted with Coore and Crenshaw as well as Mike Davis, senior director of rules and competitions for the USGA, who will oversee the set-up for the U.S. Opens.

“They are trying to develop a concept to restore the course to a lot of the original design criteria while, at the same time, have it be a championship venue for the Opens,” Padgett said this week.

Padgett said it is important for everyone – Pinehurst officials, Crenshaw, Coore and the USGA – to agree on any potential alterations to No. 2, which has hosted the 1999 and 2005 men’s U.S. Opens.

Any alterations would focus on restoring many of the strategic aspects to the layout and less on adding length.

The only significant lengthening would likely occur at the dogleg par-4 seventh hole where the tee could be moved back across a road, preventing players for trying to cut the corner as some did in the 2008 U.S. Amateur.

The main alterations would involve bringing back more of the sandy areas dotted with wire grass off the fairways, places where there is now rough. It would be similar, Padgett said, to how the course was in the 1930s and 1940s when Ross lived in the area and worked on it.

“What people expect of No. 2 has gone away,” Padgett said. “I think they (Coore and Crenshaw) plan to bring that back.”

Padgett said if the plan moves forward, it will be at least a year, maybe longer, before work is begun.

“I’m just glad to be headed in the right direction,” Padgett said.

Not falling for the Fall Series

The television was on in our den Sunday afternoon, I was sitting with my father and brother-in-law, both of whom are deep into golf and the closing stretch of the Justin Timberlake tournament in Las Vegas was on.

We watched for a few minutes, trying to tell George McNeill from Martin Laird from Chad Campbell when someone asked if we could turn back to the Buffalo-New York Jets game.

"Sure," one of the guests said.

Has the end of the PGA Tour season come to that?

Even Jim Furyk, moments after shooting a final-round 62, admitted he was watching football on a monitor while waiting to do a Golf Channel interview.

In case you haven't been paying attention, the Tour reaches the midpoint of its five-event Fall Series this week at the Frys.com Open in chic Scottsdale, Az. No doubt it will be splendid in Scottsdale this week with lovely weather, quick greens and a field full of pros with whom you're only vaguely familiar.

The Fall Series isn't designed for a big bang. That came with the Tour Championship in Atlanta a few weeks ago and it delivered with Phil Mickelson and Tiger Woods holding trophies and collecting big checks.

Still, I'm guessing the Tour hoped the closing events would be more compelling nationally than they have been. Unfortunately, they're buried under football season and the baseball playoffs.

The chase to make the top 125 money winners doesn't grab our attention anymore because it's not quite the end-all it used to be. Sure, it's nice for Martin Laird to secure his card for two years with a win in Las Vegas but it isn't exactly must-see TV.

The Tour got what it wanted with the way the FedEx Cup playoffs turned out this year, a credit to their tinkering with the system to make it better.

I'm guessing the Tour will continue to tinker with the schedule to get it right, too. With some holes popping open on the schedule (Milwaukee's gone, Reno may be next) and perhaps a couple more to come, maybe the Tour will try to roll its fall events into the 'regular-season' schedule.

That would make the fall events more meaningful, condense the season and give it a true conclusion.