DJ joins Paulina at American Music Awards

Internet star Paulina Gretzky has elevated Dustin Johnson to new levels of celebrity – like the American Music Awards.

On Sunday night, Johnson posted a picture on his Instagram account of him and his fiancée, who was presenting an award for Favorite Male Artist (Soul/R&B) in Los Angeles. The award went to Justin Timberlake – former Vegas tournament host! – who spotted Johnson in the crowd and then mimicked a golf swing.

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Report: Augusta Nat. spends $8.3M for parking lot

Augusta National spares no expense to ensure that its tournament each April runs as smoothly as possible.

Even if it means spending $8.3 million for a parking lot.

Bloomberg News reported Tuesday that Augusta National has begun plans to demolish a 456-unit apartment complex – for which it paid $8.3 million, in February 2012 – and build a parking lot for the Masters.

A club spokesman told Bloomberg that the 9.8-acre site was to be used for parking and undisclosed support services, and that “any other commentary would be misleading and potentially create public speculation that is unnecessary.”

In the report, Bloomberg said that although the land might be used for parking in the next few years, it eventually could turn into a site for lodging or corporate-entertainment facilities.

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What I'll Remember About 2013: Tears, joy, laughter and everything in between

Rose takes U.S. Open trophy to New York City

Following his U.S. Open win Justin Rose spent the day in New York City making rounds to media outlets.

PGATOUR.COM asked its staffers and writers what they will remember about the 2013 season. For the archived list of essays and a complete review of the season,

I remember … Billy Horschel trying to show off to Tiger Woods by jumping on top of a cooler at Bay Hill, only to provide a good laugh when he wiped out in front of Woods and everyone else on the range. 

I remember … seeing Steve Williams give a nod to Adam Scott as if to say “it’s not over” as Angel Cabrera, playing in the group behind Scott, prepared to stuff his approach shot to 2 feet in a steady rain on the final hole of regulation at the Masters.

I remember … playing 36 holes -- 18 at Palmetto Golf Club and 18 at Belfair Country Club -- the day after the Masters with a colleague and friend and finishing in the dark with both of us bogeying the final hole to halve the back 9 (he won the rest of the match).

I remember … fighting back tears Sunday of THE PLAYERS Championship as I watched the 15-year anniversary piece on NBC about Len Mattiace and his ailing mother, seven months after losing my own mom to cancer.

I remember … Phil Mickelson using the word heartbreak to describe another U.S. Open runner-up, this one more painful than any of the previous five.

I remember … watching Justin Rose point skyward in memory of his late father after winning the U.S. Open, and wishing my dad, who passed away 10 years ago this past September, was around to see it. 

I remember … walking around the streets of New York City with Rose, trophy in his hand, and one passer-by asking, “What’d that guy win?”

I remember … the Travelers Championship surprising the media with 20 boxes of Pepe’s, the best pizza on the planet.

Phil Mickelson shot a final-round 66.

I remember … Mickelson calling his final-round 66 to win The Open the most memorable of his career, and everyone else agreeing.

I remember … Jason Dufner telling me he had to change his phone number three times in the month since winning the PGA Championship.

I remember … Brandt Snedeker recalling instantly how when he was 9 years old Helen Alfredsson blew off his autograph request and how he never forgot that moment when he turned pro.

I remember … Jonas Blixt wearing playing partner Rickie Fowler’s orange pants and orange shirt at The Barclays. Literally.

I remember … Henrik Stenson’s wife telling me that her FedExCup champion husband is such a jokester that he once donned a ski mask and dressed like a robber before jumping onto Carl Pettersson’s hotel balcony from the room next door.

I remember … Louis Oosthuizen and Charl Schwartzel showing up on the driving range at The Presidents Cup wearing wigs and looking like the band Spinal Tap only to see the International Team get beat again.

I remember … Mother Nature striking again … and again … and again.

I remember … Rory McIlroy looking dazed and confused a lot this season but still showing flashes of the brilliance that’s still deep inside him.

I remember … Woods winning five times, returning to No. 1 in the world, being named Player of the Year and being involved in three rules snafus along the way.

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What I'll Remember About 2013: McIlroy struggles to find his game

Interview: Rory McIlroy

Rory McIlroy talks about his struggles during the Deutsche Bank Championship.

PGATOUR.COM asked its staffers and writers what they will remember about the 2013 season. For the archived list of essays and a complete review of the season.

In 2013, Rory McIlroy proved that he's not a robot, even though he played against one on TV.

That's the irony of his year. It was a four-minute YouTube video in June, showing a smiling, laughing McIlroy in a spot promoting the European Tour, playing against something that is a polar opposite of McIlroy himself.

McIlroy's game is not about analytics or mechanics. He's the ultimate feel player in a game loaded with feel players, and when he's off, he can make some big numbers. He didn't win a tournament in 2013, and realistically, he never came close.

Oh, he finished second once, but that was his only finish in the top five in 16 tries. This came after a staggering 2012 season in which he finished in the top five eight times.

Yes, he changed equipment after the 2012 season, but it goes a lot deeper than that. He looked rusty from the start, and by the time the TOUR hit The Honda Classic, his game was a mess. The Honda Classic, played right near his new home in South Florida, was supposed to be HIS week. He was the defending champ, still ranked No. 1 in the world, but after an ugly 7 over start after eight holes in the second round he walked off the course. The very next week, at the no-cut World Golf Championships-Cadillac Championship, he finished with a 65 that gave him a top-10 finish.

That basically defined his year. When his swing felt OK, he looked more like himself and it took pressure off his putting, a skill that was exposed when his swing was off.

Even when he's playing his best, McIlroy is always going to be on the hook for some big numbers and wild shots. He simply made a lot more of them in 2013, and his slide was the surprise of the year.

The good news? He already looks a lot better early in the 2013-14 season. If he can avoid the distractions that plagued him in 2013, he will avoid the bogeys that invariably come along with them.

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What I'll Remember About 2013: Duke wins for first time in 187th start

Duke wins the Travelers Championship

Ken Duke birdies the second hole of a playoff with Chris Stroud to claim his first win on the PGA TOUR.

PGATOUR.COM asked its staffers and writers what they will remember about the 2013 season. For the archived list of essays and a complete review of the season,

Major victories by emerging stars, a superstar and a crowd pleaser with major upside – as well as five wins by the sport’s resurgent megastar – dominated golf’s 2013 headlines. But the worthy winner of the Travelers Championship should not be forgotten.

Here’s to Ken Duke, the pro from Hope, Ark., whose childhood scoliosis could have ended his career before it began. Instead, he fought back. And on his 187th try, at the age of 44, some 30 years after surgeons implanted a metal rod to straighten his severely twisted spine, Duke won for the first time on the PGA TOUR.

Mirroring his life in microcosm, Duke started two strokes back. He still trailed when his approach at No. 10 looked lost into the deep woods left. Came an audible “thwack” from a treetop, and the ball appeared 4 feet from the hole.

In a beginning rather than another end, Duke birdied the hole, pointed to the heavens, made three more birdies, saved par at the 18th and, one stroke clear at 12 under, waited in the clubhouse. It seemed he had won. But Chris Stroud birdied the 18th on a 50-foot pitch and, appropriately, a playoff ensued.

It might have shaken Duke in bygone days. But, recalling what his teacher, the legendary 87-year-old Bob Toski, had told him earlier in the day, he birdied the second playoff hole and promptly credited the man who had predicted the outcome.

“I owe a lot to Bob Toski,” he said. “He won his first tournament up here in '53 at Wethersfield. He called me this morning and said, ‘It’s your time, too.’”

Toski also told Duke, in his colorful way, not to bother teeing it up if he wasn’t ready to shoot a low score. Duke, who responded with a 66, showed his appreciation again months later by bringing the Travelers Championship trophy to St. Andrews Country Club in Boca Raton, Fla., where Toski still gives lessons.

“He deserved it,” said an appreciative Toski. “That's a milestone in my life as a teacher and his as a player.”

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Rory out to emulate Great White Shark

 

Rory McIlroy is hoping to "stamp his place" in the Australian Open history books by following in the footsteps of Greg Norman.

 

The 24-year-old heads to Royal Sydney this week looking for his maiden win of 2013, but he will be up against a formidable field that includes world number two Adam Scott and World Cup of Golf champion Jason Day.

He also doesn't have history on his side as Lee Westwood is the only European to have won the tournament.

McIlroy, though, is determined succeed Down Under and replicate the success of Australian Norman and other greats like Jack Nicklaus and Gary Player.

"Being a multiple major winner and a former world number one, the Great White Shark will forever be remembered in the game," he said of Norman.

"Aside from his great golfing achievements, Greg is a hugely successful businessman off the course. Not many golfers have successfully made that transition.

"I know Greg also has won the Australian Open many times and that is my goal this week.

"So to win the Australian Open would be huge for me. It would stamp my place in the history books of the Australian Open alongside people like Greg, Jack Nicklaus, Gary Player and so many other great players.

"And following in their footsteps would never be a bad thing."

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Oz Open: Scott? Day? McIlroy?

 

This week's Emirates Australian Open poses some highly intriguing question, a good few of them involving the nation's latest favourite golfing sons, Adam Scott and Jason Day.

Still fresh from last week's triumph at Royal Melbourne Golf Club where Day won the individual honours, Scott finished third and, between the two, they gave Australia a runaway victory in the 2013 ISPS Handa World Cup of Golf, the celebrated pair will each tee off at the Royal Sydney Golf Club this week with some major question marks hanging over their heads.

Can Day reignite the spark that carried him to victory in Victoria last week and whisk up a back-to-back win at the Australian Open in New South Wales just a week later? That's just one of those questions.

Another, and this one every bit as big as the first, is this.

Can Scott, the World No 2 and current Masters champion, hold on to his winning momentum in the midst of a great month of golf when has set himself up to clinch the Aussie triple crown?

If he pulls it off this will be a rare golfing trifecta achieved only once before by Robert Allenby in 2005.

But can he?

Yes, he did finish very strongly on the final day of the World Cup, it's true, but there are some who feel his mediocre early rounds at Royal Melbourne where tell-take signs that his dazzling Aussie run is beginning to lose steam.

And talking of losing steam; Northern Ireland's Rory McIlroy, who has gone from World No 1 to No 6 this year and is still without a victory as the year winds down, certainly did.

He is in the field this week and as keen as mustard to end his unhappy year with a win, but in his case, the question being asked is this: Has he built up a sufficiently effective new head of steam to break his year-long drought?

The bookmankers certainly seem to think so.

With odds of around 6/1, they have installed him as this second favourite behind Scott (11/4).

Day is in third place at 15/2, fellow Aussies John Senden fourth at 20/1 and Geoff Ogilvy, a former US Open champion, fifth at 25/1 and Americans Aaron Baddeley and Keven Streelman sixth at around 28/1, Streelman coming into this week's tournament fresh from the World Cup of golf where he and Matt Kuchar earned the United States second place behind Australia.

Royal Sydney Golf Club is a Par 72 course measuring a not overly-long 6,938 yards.

The bentgrass greens are firm and fast and can be tricky to read. The fairways are narrow in areas and the bunkers are well placed with several being pretty large in size.

The course is a combination of links style and parkland golf and has been designed if such a way so as to ensure that patience is a virtue and careful game plans an essential.

This is clearly evident when you look at the type of golfers who have won the Aussie Open on this course, Baddeley, Allenby, Tim Clark, Mark Calcavecchia and Gary Player being some of them.

THE BOOKMAKERS' TOP 20

Here were the top 20 favourites being quoted by Sky Bet on Tuesday morning*.

Adam Scott 11/4

 

Rory McIlroy 6/1

 

Jason Day 15/2

 

John Senden 25/1

 

Aaron Baddeley 28/1

 

Kevin Streelman 28/1

 

Geoff Ogilvy 25/1

 

Matt Jones 35/1

 

Greg Chalmers 28/1

 

Marcus Fraser 33/1

 

Mathew Goggin 40/1

 

Robert Allenby 40/1

 

Stuart Appleby 66/1

 

Aron Price 50/1

 

Steven Bowditch 66/

 

Cameron Percy 70/1

 

Richard Green 66/1

 

Nick Cullen 66/1

 

Peter Senior 66/1

 

Nick O Hern 80/1

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Jason Day eyeing Tiger's No.1 golf ranking

Jason Day has issued a friendly reminder to Adam Scott that the red-hot Masters champion isn't the only Australian golfer eyeing Tiger Woods' world No.1 ranking.

Setting the stage for an enthralling Australian Open at Royal Sydney, where the two big local hopes have been paired together in a marquee grouping on Thursday and Friday, Day on Tuesday spoke of his burning desire to reach the sport's summit.

World No.11 Day is oozing confidence after taking individual honours at the World Cup of Golf at Royal Melbourne on Sunday and also winning the team event with world No.2 Scott.

Thet 26-year-old Day admitted he was already four years behind schedule in his plan to be regarded as the world's best golfer.

The three-time major runner-up said he and his coach and caddy Col Swatton set a goal for Day to seize the top ranking by age 22 when he was just 12-years-old.

"We ended up getting to No.7 at 23, so we fell short," Day said. "But it's still on my mind to get to that No.1 spot.

"There's are a lot of tough competitors that I have to get past but, if I keep working hard and putting the dedication and time into my game, I think the sky's the limit as long as I stay hungry."

So hungry is he that he barely celebrated his World Cup triumph on Sunday.

"I didn't go out and drink. I didn't do any of that stuff," Day said.

"I had dinner with my family. I was in bed by 10. I had to wake up early the next morning to go to the gym so I was really trying to focus on preparing for this week.

"This week's huge for me. I didn't want to go out and waste a day on Monday after a big night."

With Day's grandmother, uncle and six cousins perishing in Typhoon Haiyan in the Philippines before the World Cup, the Queenslander conceded he was a mental and physical wreck afterwards and didn't even find time to reply to congratulatory text messages from Greg Norman and Shane Warne.

"It felt like a major playing last week," Day said.

But he arrived in Sydney refreshed and ready to thwart Scott's quest for Australian golf's Triple Crown and match the Masters champion's successful summer with his own winning double.

Snapping a three-year title drought since claiming his maiden title at the US PGA Tour's Byron Nelson Championship has given Day enormous belief.

"That first one sometimes can feel like a fluke," he said.

"What I learnt last week, you can't learn it any other way but to experience it.

"Hopefully I can take away what I learnt and bring it to this week and I'm really hungry to play well."

In his only previous tilts at the Australian Open's Stonehaven Cup, US-based Day finished equal 22nd as a 17-year-old in 2004 at The Australian, tied 51st in 2005 at Moonah Links and joint fourth in 2011 at The Lakes.

"It's one of the tournaments that I've always wanted to win. It's huge to an Australian," he said.

"So many great names have been through and won the trophy and to one day hopefully put my name on the trophy would be an amazing honour."

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