A couple of recent letters suggest that there is still a great deal of confusion out there on the FedEx Cup, how it works and who deserves it.
Dear Editor, I follow golf ten times more than NASCAR on TV and the internet, but understand the Run for the Chase point format ten times better than I do the FedEx Cup point system. Paul Probst Canton, GA
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Dear Editor,>
Seeing as how it is unlikely that anyone will beat Tiger in the FedEx Cup let me be the first to nominate Steve Stricker for Sportsman of the Year.>
Bill McInturf>
Greenville, PA
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Hmm. Not sure where you're going with that, Bill, but Stricker is a heck of a player and, by all accounts in our magazines, a great guy. This kid Woods is pretty fair, too, though, and the contest right now is the FedEx Cup, like it, understand it or not.
To reader Probst and others who don't understand the system, let me suggest that part of the problem lies in referring to these as playoffs. In playoffs, someone wins and someone loses. As a team advances to the next round, no matter how dominating that team has been to that point, it's now on a level playing field with next team that it plays, no matter how narrowly that team squeaked by. Hence, a "wild card" can win the World Series. There has been a great deal of talk about the LPGA's ADT Championship format, which leaves eight finalists, from a field of 32, playing for all the money on the last day, number 8 having the same chance to win as number one. Would the Tour risk advancing 8 or 16 players to Sunday at East Lake and letting them have at it for most of that $10 million? I'm not hearing that.
For some lively debate on the FedEx Cup, check out geoffshackelford.com today.
--Bob Carney
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