Say this for Tiger Woods: the man knows gamesmanship.

Woods, sidelined by a troublesome knee injury, was scheduled to speak to the press in advance of the AT&T National Tuesday morning. And since the story of Woods' fall from golf's pinnacle is always the most significant story in golf, Woods knew he'd be getting barraged with questions about his health and his projected return. So, minutes before he was scheduled to begin the press conference, he tweeted this:

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Wow. That's taking media manipulation to a whole new level. Imagine if this catches on ... you'd have athletes offering a million bucks to charity if nobody asked them about allegations of cheating, or steroids, or that boneheaded play they made that cost their team the game. You'd have politicians promising to enrich orphans if nobody asked them about that embarrassing incident in the hotel room back in the '90s. This could warp journalism forever!

So would the media take the bait? Would they back down and not ask the only

b0524davisWe're in majors season now, and there's a mad scramble on for the final spots in the field. So congrats to Davis Love III, who's qualified for the British Open and thus will play in all four majors for the first time since 2007.

At a qualifier at Gleneagles Country Club, Davis Love III was one of several players who won a coveted spot at this year's Open Championship. Brian Davis won the qualifier; Chad Campbell was one stroke behind. Nathan Green, Spencer Levin, Chris Tidland and Bob Estes also made it into the field. And Jerry Kelly won a six-for-one playoff to get in the tournament.

The tournament will be at Royal St. George's, and it'll probably give Kelly a couple sleepless nights; he shot an 11 on the opening hole after hitting four shots that went a distance of about 15 feet in that classic British Open rough. He would go on to finish with an 86 and withdraw with a wrist injury.

On the low side of the qualifier was Sergio Garcia, who withdrew because of an infected fingernail.

bacon swinging2This article initially was published over at Yahoo!'s The Post Game, but we figured there might be some interest here. So here is Shane Bacon's recap of U.S. Open qualifying. You can follow Shane on Twitter right here for everything golf-y.

"Don't embarrass yourself."

That's the thought I had, standing on the first tee at Southern Dunes Golf Club on a windy Arizona Thursday for the U.S. Open qualifier. It's the thought I always have. I'm sure mental gurus like Dr. Bob Rotella would have a field day with that being my only thought, but it's true. It's the same thought I had when I was 16, teeing it up in my first AJGA tournament, and the same thought I had at Talking Stick, when I went after my first professional event. It isn't exactly Padraig-like focus, but it's what my mind says to me.

"Don't screw this up."

And I didn't. Paired with two guys I'd never seen and probably never will again, my tee ball launched off my shiny white driver and into a wind blowing in my face straight off

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Sizing up the TV coverage from the Crowne Plaza Invitational at Colonial ... and away we go.

Every tournament on the PGA Tour has a type of player that seems be best suited for the specific layout. At Colonial, one of the oldest stops on tour, ball-strikers have usually thrived on a course that was once home to one of the great ball-strikers in the game -- Ben Hogan.

On Sunday at the Colonial, another one added his name to the Wall of Champions, as David Toms wiped the memories of his playoff defeat at the Players away, and went on to win on one of his favorite courses.

"The last time he won was when he was 39, so he's never never won in his forties," said CBS's Jim Nantz, before going down Toms' resume. "This is a veteran U.S. player with great pedigree. He won ten years ago at Atlanta Athletic Club, where the PGA Championship will return this year. We're also talking three Presidents Cups, three Ryder Cup teams. You look at the pedigree of David Toms, and he really does fit the

Every golfer in their lifetime has probably called a shot and watched the ball disappear into the hole. But the difference between calling a chip-in from 30 yards off the green or a 60-foot double-breaker and what Jeff Morgan did is that you were actually close enough to the hole to call the shot, and feel confident about it.

Morgan, on the other hand, predicted a shot that no golfer feels confident of making, no matter how good you are: a hole-in-one. Let's be honest, the hole-in-one is the holy grail of golf shots. We hope to make one in our lifetime, but most, even ridiculously good golfers like our own Shane Bacon, have trouble making the elusive shot. To actually call a hole-in-one would be, well, one of the most insane things a golfer could do.

If that's the case, then Jeff Morgan is mentally insane. Playing with friends at Chamber Bay Golf Course in University Place, Wash., site of the 2015 U.S. Open, Morgan pulled off what equates to Babe Ruth pointing to the stands and

b0523ryoThe new Official World Golf Rankings are out. Let's start with the news that resonates with the majority of the sporting public: Tiger Woods is out of the top 10.

Coming in at No. 12, Woods falls out of the world top 10 for the first time since the week of April 6, 1997, the week before he won that fateful Masters. Back then, Woods was ranked 13th, and the guys at the top of the list were Greg Norman, Tom Lehman, Colin Montgomerie, Mark O'Meara and Ernie Els. Phil Mickelson was ninth, just for reference.

So, there you go. And Woods is likely to fall further because of the rankings' formula, which tracks players over a two-year period. (Spoiler: Woods' last two years have been remarkably Woods-victory-free.)

But let's discuss the element of the rankings that has a little more dramatic impact on players' lives: the top 50 cutoff for the U.S. Open. Players within the top 50 as of this past weekend got an exemption into the U.S. Open. The winner this week? Ryo Ishikawa, with fine play at

114148288 mahanFor the second time in three weeks, one of the top young golfers in the game is complaining about a venue being too hard to play. But unlike Bubba Watson at TPC Sawgrass, Hunter Mahan doesn't like TPC Las Colinas so much that he's skipping the event.

Mahan, a Dallas-born golfer, won't play in his hometown event because he doesn't think the course sets up for his game, and expressed that to the Dallas Morning News on Saturday.

"I don't like it tee to green," Mahan said. [...] "I don't like the way the fairways are shaped. It's hard to hit a fairway for me. I don't want to rip it up or rip up the tournament, but it's a place where I don't play well, it doesn't suit me, it's a pain in the butt to play." [...]

"I don't like the way they redid the greens," he said. "I just don't think they're very good. He [D.A. Weibring] couldn't do much. The course is what it is, and you can't really do much about it."

To me, this is the difference between guys like Mahan and the way Tiger Woods

The Crowne Plaza Invitational was a fine tournament, though sadly a bit lacking in exceptional shots. Still, we had a few, and we start with the winner. David Toms threw dagger after dagger this week, and one of the finest was this 83-yard eagle approach on No. 11:

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Some guy named Wayne Gretzky, playing at the 2011 BMW Charity Pro-Am, has a way with a flat stick. Maybe he's got a future in that.

Rickie Fowler knows his way around an approach shot, as with hole No. 5 here in the second round at the Crowne Plaza:

And finally, Kevin Stadler introduces pin to flag at the par-3 16th in the Crowne Plaza's opening round:

Congrats to all our shotmakers this week.