ShopRite Classic - Epilogue

Just over four years ago, Ai Miyazato started her LPGA career with rather high expectations.  At 20 years of age, she was already one of Japan's biggest stars and it was only a matter of time (everybody said) before that success would be realized on the world's biggest stage.  Funny thing about that phrase "only a matter of time".  As much as it gets used, we often forget its literal meaning.  The amount of time in question could be a week, a month or even more.  But when our internal clock tells us that the waiting period is over, it's OVER.  When Miyazato didn't win in her first 18 months on Tour (despite being among the Top 20 players) and faded from prominence after her leg injury, we kind of forgot about how good a golfer she was.  Some of us probably thought her failure to win in America right away invalidated her Japanese success to some extent.  It took two years to get her game back from the injury and over the last 12 months, Ai has won five LPGA events and yesterday took her first title on U.S. soil.  Today she will become the #1 player in the world according to Rolex, proving that Ai Miyazato's ascent to the top of her profession was truly just a matter of time.

Paula Creamer gets plenty of attention from the media and I probably talk about her too much myself.  But I don't think it's possible to overstate her performance this weekend.  In contention down to the final holes having played only a couple of practice rounds since February with a wrist that needed constant stretching and icing, that's pretty heady stuff.  Seventh place is an outstanding result under the circumstances.

It was a typical week scoring-wise on the Bay Course at Dolce Seaview Resort.  The average score was 71.72, right in the middle of the previous averages.  Miyazato's winning score of -16 was only one off the tournament record (Annika Sorenstam 1998 and 2005).

I feel kind of bad for M.J. Hur.  She entered the final round with a one-shot lead (two over Miyazato) and posted 68 but still got beat when the new World #1 decided to shoot 64.

Song-Hee Kim's Top 10 streak ended at 10.  She finished T22, her worst since missing the cut at Navistar last October.

The Big Surprise goes to Sherri Steinhauer.  Sherri didn't finish in the Top 10 (slipped late Sunday to T12) but she collected her best result since winning the State Farm Classic in September 2007.  The Big Disappointment is Brittany Lang, who missed her second cut of 2010.

Alexis Thompson's debut was a disappointment.  The two eagles on Saturday were nice but the three double-bogeys and one triple saddled her with a 76 and a missed cut.  Alexis hit GIR fairly well this week (.667) but 63 putts were a problem.  I know that players can't often pick-and-choose which tournaments will give them a sponsor's exemption but I think Thompson's pro debut would have been better served on a course with more driving room and fewer tricky greens.  Too bad the Curtis Cup conflicted with State Farm...