Justin Rose blooms all week at Colonial

Don't call it a West Coast Swing - that'll come around again as usual in January and February - but the PGA TOUR will be spending the next three weeks in the Pacific Time Zone nonetheless. The stretch begins familiarly with the Shriners Hospitals for Children Open, a fixture of the fall since 1990. Then, due to the COVID-19 pandemic, two of the three events on the canceled Asian Swing have been shifted temporarily to Nevada (THE CJ CUP @ SHADOW CREEK) and California (ZOZO CHAMPIONSHIP @ SHERWOOD). Of the trio, only the Shriners boasts a full field of 144 and includes a cut. The next two are 78-man invitationals with no cut. Scroll past the projected contenders for a breakdown of Kevin Na's improbable formula here last year, how TPC Summerlin sets up and more. RELATED: Inside the Field | Preview the course, storylines POWER RANKINGS: SHRINERS HOSPITALS FOR CHILDREN OPEN Jason Day, Rickie Fowler, Francesco Molinari, Sungjae Im and Will Zalatoris will be among the notables reviewed in Tuesday's Fantasy Insider Conventional wisdom and empirical data often collide at TPC Summerlin. As one of the most vulnerable par 71s on the schedule - it was the easiest of 10 par 71s last season and its scoring average of 68.859 was a record low since its debuted in 1992 - the game plan to hit greens and sink putts is as true here as it is anywhere. However, every worthy course makes available the possibility for the winner to have lapped the field with the putter. Kevin Na proved it before outlasting Patrick Cantlay in a playoff a year ago. TPC Summerlin tips at just 7,255 yards and the greens are on the larger size due to winds that often blow in these parts, but when they don't, the tournament develops into a putting contest due to the preponderance of scoring opportunities. Consider that Na averaged 13.5 GIR per round last year (to rank T46), and he was a hair under the field average for the week. Cue the flat stick, Na's primary weapon. En route to 23-under 261, he ranked second in putting: birdies-or-better and led the field in Strokes Gained: Putting, putts per GIR, fewest putts, total distance of putts converted, one-putt percentage and highest conversion percentage from outside 10 feet. Nine of the other 11 who finished inside the top 10 on the leaderboard ranked inside the top 10 in green hit, but only three cracked the top 10 in Strokes Gained: Putting. Scoring conditions will be favorable during the first two rounds this week before a cooling pattern arrives on the weekend. With it, the breezes will intensify from a prevailing direction out of the southwest, and then shift to push in from the north. Daytime highs will tumble from right around 90 degrees on Thursday to about 80 for the finale. No rain will fall. For the third straight year, the primary rough will be limited to two inches. (It previously was three inches.) The bentgrass greens are prepped to run at about 11-and-a-half feet on the Stimpmeter, further favoring aggressive putting. ROB BOLTON'S SCHEDULE PGATOUR.COM's Fantasy Insider Rob Bolton recaps and previews every tournament from numerous angles. Look for his following contributions as scheduled. MONDAY: Qualifiers, Reshuffle, Medical Extensions, Rookie Watch, Power Rankings TUESDAY*: Sleepers, Fantasy Insider * – Rob is a member of the panel for PGATOUR.COM's Expert Picks for PGA TOUR Fantasy Golf, which also publishes on Tuesday.

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On Sunday at the Tour Championship, five years removed from his last win and after multiple surgeries and scandals, Tiger Woods summoned his greatness one more time.

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Should there be 47 candles on the birthday cake when Tiger Woods greets the arrival of Dec. 30, we’ll assume few of us will be in attendance to see the glow. No worries, because to celebrate the golfer who has established an endless list of records and produced enough highlights to fill dozens of reels, there are countless ways to commemorate the occasion. May we suggest 47 noteworthy entries that speak to his brilliance: 1. It took Tiger just 291 days from his first round as a professional to rise to No. 1 in the Official World Golf Ranking, the quickest ascension to the top spot in OWGR history. 2. Tiger has been No. 1 a total of 683 weeks. Second-most is more than 350 week behind. The next four on the list combined for 669 weeks. 3. Who finished first the most in the 31 times Woods was a runner-up? That would be Phil Mickelson, five times. On three occasions it was Vijay Singh. Ernie Els, Jim Furyk, and Trevor Immelman had two each, then there were 17 players who did it once each. 4. In comparison to his 15 major titles, he has just seven runners-up in majors – three at the PGA, two in the U.S. Open, twice in the Masters – proving that he made the most of his opportunities. 5. His 82 PGA TOUR victories have been spread over seven countries – two each in England and Scotland, one each in Spain, Canada, Ireland, and Japan, and, of course, 74 in the Unites States. His domestic victories have come in 16 different states with Florida (16), California (14), and Ohio (13) his favorite playgrounds. 6. Tiger Woods was the winner of the first FedExCup, in 2007. He then became the first two-time winner of the Cup two years later. Rory McIlroy, who has a record three titles, is the only other multiple winner of the FedExCup. 7. Only once has Woods shot higher than 279 to win a major, that being the 283 he posted to win the 2008 U.S. Open. 8. Tiger Woods is a two-time winner of THE PLAYERS, and the only man to win the tournament in both March (2001) and May (2013). He also won the 1994 U.S. Amateur at TPC Sawgrass in August. 9. In his five Masters wins, Woods is just 17 under par in the first and final rounds. He’s a whopping 54 under in the middle two. His blueprint for winning at Augusta National? Start slow, finish modestly, but kick the field in the gut in Rounds 2 and 3. 10. In the stretch of 288 major championship holes that comprised the Tiger Slam, he made just one triple-bogey and one double-bogey and played four bogey-free rounds. 11. Jack Nicklaus has the higher total of major wins (18), but Woods’ average margin of victory in his 15 major wins is 4.13. Jack’s average margin of victory is 2.64. 12. If his career was just the 75 tournaments in which he played between 2005 and 2009, Woods’ 31 wins would leave him tied with Jimmy Demaret for 15th on the career list. 13. Ten times between 1997 and 2009 Tiger won the Jack Nicklaus Award for Player of the Year. 14. Tiger won the Byron Nelson Award for lowest scoring average nine times between 1999-2009. 15. Tiger won that first FedExCup in style, shooting the lowest 72-hole score of his career (257) to win the 2007 TOUR Championship by eight strokes. He shot 64-63-64 in the first three rounds, the lowest 54-hole score of his career, before closing with a 66. 16. So dominating was Woods that in three different seasons when he led the money list, he totaled more than what Nos. 2 and 3 had combined – 1999 (David Duval and Davis Love III were 2-3); 2000 (Phil Mickelson, Ernie Els); and 2007 (Mickelson and Vijay Singh). 17. One could suggest Woods won seven consecutive major championships (for his age group) – the U.S. Junior Amateur in 1991-93, the U.S. Amateur in 1994-96 and the Masters in 1997. 18. Tiger was all but unbeatable in match play in the summer of 1994, winning the Pacific Northwest Amateur, Western Amateur and U.S. Amateur. His bid to add the California Amateur that year ended in the semifinals, but that tournament was still won by another player named Woods, Steve Woods (no relation). 19. Tiger had an early taste of outplaying PGA Tour icons when he shot 77-74 to Johnny Miller’s 77-77 in a U.S. Open qualifier at Lake Merced in 1992. Neither player advanced, however. Miller was 45 years old and still had another PGA TOUR win in him, claiming the 1994 AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am. Tiger was just 16. 20. One of the first things he said he learned upon enrolling at Stanford in 1994 was that the circle of gifted and talented students – academically and athletically – was enormous. “In high school,” he told reporters, “I set the curve. Here, I follow it.” 21. The World Golf Championships debuted in 1999, Woods’ fourth year as a pro and he promptly took ownership. He won 16 of the first 33 WGCs and has 18 victories in all. 22. Were you to only count his triumphs at Arnold Palmer’s Bay Hill Club & Lodge, Torrey Pines, and Firestone (eight each), Tiger would equal Gary Player’s total of 24 PGA Tour wins. 23. Factor in his five wins at Augusta National, five more at Jack Nicklaus’ Muirfield Village, five at Cog Hill, and four at Doral and Woods has earned 52.4% of his 82 career wins at eight golf courses. 24. By age 6, Woods had already shared stages with three Hall of Famers. There was the well-chronicled appearance with Bob Hope (a member of the World Golf Hall of Fame) on the Mike Douglas Show in 1978; a 1981 appearance on “That’s Incredible” with host Fran Tarkenton (Pro Football Hall of Fame); and in 1982 he played two holes against Sam Snead (World Golf Hall of Fame) at the end of Snead’s outing. 25. Trips to San Diego for the Junior World Golf Championship were rather successful as Woods won five times in four different age divisions over four different courses. He won the 10-and-under division at Presidio in 1984; the 11-12 division in 1988 at Mission Bay; the 13-14 division at Balboa Park in 1989 and ’90; and the 15-17 division at Torrey Pines. 26. Tiger Woods’ win in the 2001 PLAYERS came just weeks before he won the Masters to complete the Tiger Slam, meaning he actually held golf’s five biggest titles simultaneously. 27. Away from the PGA TOUR spotlight, but truly an indicator of just what was about to be unleashed on the golf world grew out of the Johnnie Walker Classic in January of 1998. Tied for 18th and eight behind the 54-hole leader, Ernie Els, Tiger came home in 65 to tie Els (73) and then won in a playoff. 28. From the Buick Invitational at Torrey Pines in early February 1998 to the Wells Fargo Championship at Quail Hollow in May of 2006, Tiger played in 142 consecutive tournaments without missing a cut. And it wasn’t like he was just sneaking under the cutline on Friday afternoon; he won 37 of those 142, or 26%. 29. In 2000, from the second round of the Byron Nelson Classic (May 12) through the end of the season, Tiger was par or better in 47 consecutive rounds. He was 185 under par during this stretch and had a scoring average of 67.51. 30. The 1999 to 2003 stretch was epic: He won 32 of 101 tournaments, a winning percentage of 31.7, and captured seven majors. He won five of six majors from the 1999 PGA to the 2001 Masters – with a fifth-place finish at Augusta in 2000 the lone non-win. He won seven of 11 majors from the 1999 PGA to the 2002 U.S. Open. Bobby Jones, Gene Sarazen, Arnold Palmer and Sam Snead won seven majors in their careers. 31. Then again, 2005-2009 wasn’t too shabby, either: 31 wins in 75 starts, a clip of 41.3%, with six majors. 32. In those 10 seasons (1999-2003; 2005-09) Tiger’s longest winless drought was seven tournaments. His longest droughts in 2000 and 2009 were three tournaments. 33. Very few people saw one of the most impressive days of Tiger’s career. It was the first day of the 1996 Pac-10 Championship at Big Canyon. Woods shot 61-65 to open up a 14-shot lead on the field (the same margin by which he won). “Everybody was shell-shocked,” said Arizona State head coach Randy Lein. Both of Woods’ rounds broke the previous course record (66). “So far I’m low amateur,” joked the player in second. The lowest score that week by a player not named Tiger was 68. 34. The answer is: Nick O’Hern. The question: Who is the other lefthander to halt an impressive winning streak. Woods had won seven tournaments in a row (last six of 2006, first one in 2007) when O’Hern, an unheralded Aussie, beat Woods in 20 holes in Round 3 of the WGC-Dell Technologies Match Play at Dove Mountain outside of Tucson, Ariz. 35. Tiger is one of five players to win the career Grand Slam, but he did it more quickly (only 15 major starts as a professional) than Gene Sarazen, Ben Hogan, Gary Player, and Jack Nicklaus. 36. Only Tiger and Jack have won the career Grand Slam three times over. 37. The epic run of four straight major wins from the 2000 U.S. Open to the 2001 Masters produced these numbers: 67.7 scoring average for 16 rounds, 65 under par combined, and 15 of his 16 rounds were under par (and he was level par in the other). 38. Tiger did compile an impressive two-year collegiate resume – 11 victories in 26 tournaments and the NCAA individual championship in 1996. In that win, he was steamrolling the field so impressively that he closed with an 80 – and still won by four over Rory Sabbatini. 39. Prelude to the “Tiger Slam:” Seven down with seven holes, left, Tiger plays Nos. 12-18 in 5 under (including a hole-out eagle on the par-4 15th), shoots 31 on the back, and 64 in Round 4 to stun Matt Gogel in the 2000 AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am, his sixth straight win. “I was amazed, to be quite honest. I will not ever be amazed again,” said Gogel. 40. “Tiger Slam, Act 1:” Again at Pebble, Tiger closes with 67 for a 15-shot win in 2000 U.S. Open. “My words probably can’t describe it, so I’m not even going to try,” said Ernie Els. 41. “Tiger Slam, Act II:” Less dominating, but only by a little, Tiger wins The Open by eight at the Old Course. At 24, he completes the career Grand Slam. “He is the chosen one,” said Mark Calcavecchia. 42. “Tiger Slam, Act III:” Becoming only the second player (Ben Hogan, in 1953) to win three professional majors in a season, Woods beats Bob May in a playoff at the PGA Championship. “Hogan had tremendous focus and I think you’re seeing Tiger is now getting to that,” said Butch Harmon. 43. “Tiger Slam, Act IV:” An unprecedented fourth straight major win is completed at the 2001 Masters and it comes with a final-round 68 to win by two 44. Tiger was sidelined by knee surgery after winning the 2008 U.S. Open at Torrey Pines, halting a truly dominant stretch. The 2008 U.S. Open was his 17th win in his last 28 starts. Curtis Strange and Jim Furyk each had 17 wins in their entire careers. 45. That dominant 1999-2000 period? Tiger played 151 rounds and had at least a share of the lead after 50 of them. 46. On March 9, the day before the 2022 PLAYERS Championship began, Tiger was inducted into the World Golf Hall of Fame. He shared the mantra – “Train hard. Fight easy.” – that his father Earl used to guide him, and that Tiger now shares with his kids. “I made practicing so difficult, hurt so much, because I wanted to make sure that I was ready come game time,” Tiger said in his speech. “I hit thousands of balls, hands bleeding, aching, just so that I could play in a tournament.” 47. No tournament better exemplifies the new era of his career than the PNC Championship, which Tiger has now played with son Charlie for the past three years. Charlie, 13, is just beginning his own golf career. He hasn’t beaten his father but he has outdriven him. Tiger also serves as his son’s occasional caddie, including this year’s Notah Begay Junior Challenge. Said Tiger: “It’s hard to describe, because it’s so amazing to be able to be with Charlie out there and fight through it together and do it as a team. … Lots of lessons learned but I think overall the big picture is he thoroughly enjoyed it. It was a lot of fun for both of us.”

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