This article is part of our The Reshuffle List series.
Tiger Woods is still having a hard time wrapping his head around the PGA Tour's new wrap-around season, and so are golf fans. Consider this: the AT&T Pebble Beach National Pro-Am marked the quarter-point in the FedEx Cup regular season. Yes, really.
With that in mind, as we await the next Reshuffle we thought we'd look at some veterans who need to pick up the pace if they hope to make the FedEx Cup Playoffs.
Tiger Woods - There are basically two ways of looking at this. First is that Tiger is off to his worst season, that he entered the week 223rd (also known as a dead last) in FedEx standings with a grand total of ONE point, that he had the first MDF (Made Cut - Did Not Finish) of his career and that he is 1,782 points behind points leader Jimmy Walker.
Then there's reality: he's only played one event, and he has a long way to go in what Geoff Shackelford of Golf Digest calls the "Reset Cup." Put another way, as Tiger has mentioned so many times, all that really matters is that he's in the top five in points following the third playoff event, the BMW Championship. There the points reset, and the top five in standings control their own destiny.
Also remember that a win is worth 500 points (with majors and WGC events worth even more), and 1,000 points would put him fourth in the standings at the moment. But he will
Tiger Woods is still having a hard time wrapping his head around the PGA Tour's new wrap-around season, and so are golf fans. Consider this: the AT&T Pebble Beach National Pro-Am marked the quarter-point in the FedEx Cup regular season. Yes, really.
With that in mind, as we await the next Reshuffle we thought we'd look at some veterans who need to pick up the pace if they hope to make the FedEx Cup Playoffs.
Tiger Woods - There are basically two ways of looking at this. First is that Tiger is off to his worst season, that he entered the week 223rd (also known as a dead last) in FedEx standings with a grand total of ONE point, that he had the first MDF (Made Cut - Did Not Finish) of his career and that he is 1,782 points behind points leader Jimmy Walker.
Then there's reality: he's only played one event, and he has a long way to go in what Geoff Shackelford of Golf Digest calls the "Reset Cup." Put another way, as Tiger has mentioned so many times, all that really matters is that he's in the top five in points following the third playoff event, the BMW Championship. There the points reset, and the top five in standings control their own destiny.
Also remember that a win is worth 500 points (with majors and WGC events worth even more), and 1,000 points would put him fourth in the standings at the moment. But he will need to play well to reach that point.
Other members of this category are Jim Furyk, who is 147th with 77 points after two starts, and defending FedEx Cup champion Henrik Stenson and Luke Donald, who are both 180th after one start.
Stephen Ames - Ames, most known for calling out Tiger at the Accenture Match Play a number of years ago than anything else he's done, is 195th in the FedEx Cup points and has just 21 points in six starts.
Geoff Ogilvy - The 2006 U.S. Open champion and former King of Kapalua, Ogilvy's game has gone sour since his last win at what's now the Hyundai Tournament of Championships in 2010. He's played seven events and is 143rd in FedEx Cup points, with only 82. Now because of his 2010-and-before run of success he's not quite at risk for losing exempt status yet, but it is worth watching as it has been a surprise to not see his name contending.
Tommy Gainey - Gainey's PGA Tour card, on the other hand, does run out at the end of the 2013-14 season so he needs to pick it up. Entering the week 174th in points, he's played 10 events and has just 45 points, mostly via a T23 at the OHL Classic at Mayakoba. He's 149th in all-around ranking and is 157th in greens in regulation.
Derek Ernst - Ernst's victory at last year's Wells Fargo Championship over, among others, Phil Mickelson, may go down as one of the flukiest in PGA Tour history. He's done nothing since - and that's an understatement. He only made seven cuts last season - the win was his only top-40 finish! - and in the 2013-14 season has six missed cuts already in 10 starts, putting him 165th on the list with 53 points. Now to his credit he's exempt through 2015 and has $129K in the bank already (though about half of that is virtue of a toward-the-bottom finish at Kapalua), but we wouldn't be surprised to see Ernst off the tour in a couple years.
Johnson Wagner - Wagner's game has fallen on hard times, as he had just two top-10s last season (though one was a second at Greenbrier) and has missed five cuts this season in seven starts. That puts him 164th on the FedEx Cup points list with just 54 points. Part of the reason for the poor play: he's 139th in greens in regulation and 142nd in scoring average. That combination just will not work.
