This Isn’t Your Father’s PGA Tour
by AB on Monday, May 19th, 2008 at 07:58am
In other sports, things are fluid when generations turn over. At least more fluid. In golf, due to the ability to play well at ages well past competitive age in other sports, it’s not as fluid. When I really started getting into golf around 1992, Fred Couples was winning The Masters Tournament. Fred’s still playing, albeit on a limited schedule.
The same names have been popping up on the leaderboard for many, many years. Love III. Mickelson. Singh. Els. Then DL3 drops a bit. Singh hasn’t been contending. Els is trying to figure his game out. Mickelson still pretty much a factor every time he tees it up.
And then yesterday, Ryuji Imada defeats Kenny Perry in a playoff to win the AT&T Classic. A little symbolism there, when the guy in his early 30’s looking for his first win on Tour beats the guy in his late 40’s looking for his 10th tour title (Last week’s victory by Garcia doesn’t really qualify, because my all accounts he already has a more successful career than Paul Goydos). Imada isn’t as young as the 20-somethings who have recently won events on Tour (Anthony Kim, Garcia, Adam Scott, J.B. Holmes, Sean O’Hair), but maybe he’s part of the new generation.
He’s certainly not a part of the older generation. The game is changing. Try to keep up.