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By Mark Garrod Special to PA SportsTicker
It is so exciting, so different golf fans can hardly containthemselves.
Edge-of-the-seat stuff, gripping beyond belief, just what thesport needed - at least that is what those with a vestedinterest in the new FedEx Cup playoff series in America wouldlove to be the case.
The reality is that it has changed very little, other than tobring the climax to the US Tour season forward.
It is 72 holes of stroke play just like most other weeks. Andinstead of a money list race it is a points race, with even moremoney at the end of it.
The likeliest player to win the trophy - and sport''s biggestbonus of $10 million, controversially not available to themuntil they are 45 under an annuity scheme - is Tiger Woods. Nosurprise there.
Having skipped the first of the four-tournament playoffs -hardly a ringing endorsement of the Tour''s initiative - theworld No. 1 has finished second and first the last two weeks,nothing different about that.
Although he has no plans to, Woods could even skip theconcluding Tour Championship in Atlanta as well and possiblycome out top. Surely something is not quite right about thesystem if that can happen.
Only four players in the 30-strong field can deny him - SteveStricker, Phil Mickelson, Rory Sabbatini and K.J. Choi.
Sabbatini and Choi have to win on Sunday to have a chance,though, while Stricker could do it with a third-place finish andMickelson by being runner-up.
Not that the world number two seems to care an inordinate amountabout it - he did not bother playing in Chicago last week whenhe was the race leader.
If the players do not give their all to the idea from the offthen U.S. Tour commissioner Tim Finchem and his staff will havea problem selling it to the public.
Sports fans are used to winner-takes-all showdowns and this isnot that. You cannot have a showdown if one of the leadingparticipants does not even have to show up.
And that is not all, the East Lake course where this will all bedecided this week is in such a state because of the summerheatwave that officials have decided to all but close it untilthe first round on Thursday to protect what is left of thegreens.
Players will be allowed to hit tee shots at the par-4 and par-5holes on the practice days, but it is an odd way to go into whateveryone connected with it wants to be a roaring success.
Not that Woods is worried - either by what preparation he can orcannot do or, clearly, by what is required of him to become theinaugural FedEx Cup champion.
"You just go play," he said. "You try to win the golftournament. As I''ve always said, winning takes care ofeverything."
Not surprisingly, Stricker is rather more excited about thewhole thing. No wonder considering he did not have a US Tourcard two years ago and is now competing for riches beyond hiswildest dreams at that time.
Should he take the Tour Championship the 40-year-old will, evenif Woods is second, be FedEx Cup champion as well - and willhave to wait only five years to lay his hands on the fortunethat comes with it. If Mickelson wins Woods would have to besecond to stay top (by just 22 points with a total of 118,933).
If Sabbatini wins Woods must finish in the top 14 and if it isChoi then Woods has to be in the top 22, although Stricker andMickelson could influence things there as well.
But all that, of course, could well have been happening underthe old money list system. Revolutionary this isn''t.
In fact, the top 30 on the money list shows only four changesfrom the 30 who have come through this play-off format -Jonathan Byrd, Tim Clark, Camilo Villegas and Heath Slocum infor Luke Donald, Henrik Stenson, Jerry Kelly, David Toms.
And the only change in the top 10 is that Masters champion ZachJohnson is out and Adam Scott in.
Woods and Mickelson are not alone in missing events. Ernie Elssat out the second one, Padraig Harrington did not play lastweek.
And even Jack Nicklaus has had his say, not all of itcomplimentary.
"I don''t understand it, to be very honest with you," he said. "Ithink that the whole objective was to get the guys to play andthe first week Tiger skips, so I didn''t understand that at all.I think it''s great to have a season-ending playoff," Nicklaussaid. "My bet is that it''ll get tweaked after this year. I justdon''t know and frankly if I don''t know it and I''m involved inthe game of golf, how is Mr. Joe Public going to know it? That''sthe problem.
"To get the public interested, they have got to understandwhat''s going on. Very simple when you play a football game andyou''re in the playoffs, you''re a wild-card team and you''replaying the division leader, you win, you go on. You lose, yougo home. We don''t exactly have that here."
And without that the FedEx Cup is not doing what it says on thepacket.
"The PGA Tour playoffs for the FedEx Cup will change the way youwatch golf," states the Tour website.
Sorry, it doesn''t.
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