Weird World of Sports: Golf in 2009

Likewise, the departure of Annika Sorenstam was expected to only increase the dominance of top-ranked Lorena Ochoa. With two wins in the first 10 events, her 2009 season has been only mezzo-mezzo. Long-hitting talent Brittany Lincicome broke through to win her first major by eagling the par-5 final hole at the Kraft-Nabisco, hitting a 210-yard approach to four feet. The shot of the year, however, belongs to Peter Hanson, who aced a 207-yard hole in a three-man playoff to earn a spot in the U.S. Open. On the Champions Tour, 50-year-old Michael Allen won its longest-running major championship, the Senior PGA, in his first-ever start on the geezer circuit -- he's yet to win in more than 330 PGA Tour events but now says he wants to be the first man to triumph first on the Champions Tour and then on the regular Tour. The way things are going this year it may well happen.

In golf, two words generally equate with bizarre: John Daly. After a series of high-profile incidents, none of them commendable, the two-time major champion was banned from the tour for six months in November. During this time, Daly underwent lap-band surgery and has already lost 50 pounds, began sporting an incredibly loud wardrobe, and even managed his best finish in four years with a second-place tie at the European Tour's Italian Open. His return to the PGA Tour, scheduled for the St. Jude Classic in Memphis, should only make an already interesting year all the more so.