Michael Whan named LPGA commissioner

The LPGA has its new commissioner.

Michael Whan, a former marketing executive in the golf and hockey equipment industries, was introduced as the LPGA's new commissioner at a news conference at Madison Square Garden in New York on Wednesday.

Whan recently was the president of Mission-Itech Hockey and has had positions with TaylorMade Golf, Wilson Sporting Goods and Procter & Gamble. He takes over for interim commissioner Marty Evans in January.

Increasing fan and sponsorship interest in the tour will be one of Whan's primary goals. Over the last year, the LPGA's money events list has dropped from 34 to 28. A loss of title sponsors was a major factor in former commissioner Carolyn Bivens' dismissal in July.

Still, Whan is upbeat about the 2010 schedule, which will be released next month.

"If that's a downturn year, then this brand's more resilient and strong than I even thought coming in, and I was pretty confident going in," Whan told the Associated Press. "The LPGA is just fine."

-- Austin Knoblauch

Photo: Michael Whan. Credit: Mike Stobe / Getty Images

Tuesday's poll: Who is the greatest golfer of all time?

Arnold Palmer recently turned 80, and most people consider him one of the best golfers of all time, but is he the greatest? Or is it one of the obvious answers, Jack Nicklaus or Tiger Woods? What about Sam Snead, who won the most tournaments in PGA Tour history? Or Ben Hogan?

Vote in  today's poll and let your voice be heard, then leave a comment letting us know why you voted the way you did.

-- Houston Mitchell

Greg Norman and Chris Evert announce separation

Hall of Famers Greg Norman, a two-time British Open golf champion, and Chris Evert, winner of 18 Grand Slam tennis titles, are no longer the perfect sports couple. The newlyweds announced that they have separated just days before Norman is to captain the International team in the President's Cup competition.

They were married in June 2008 in The Bahamas. A month later, Norman, then 53, was nine holes away from becoming golf's oldest champion in a Grand Slam tournament when he led the British Open. He eventually tied for third.

The couple said in a statement, "We will remain friends and supportive of one another's family."

No word whether a divorce is pending.

This is Evert's third marriage, all to athletes. She had been married to British tennis player John Lloyd and then skiing star Andy Mills. She has three sons with Mills. Norman divorced his first wife after he and Evert began dating. He has two children from that marriage. 

-- Dan Loumena

Photo: Chris Evert and Greg Norman take in a U.S. Open semifinal match last month in New York. Credit: Andrew Gombert / European Pressphoto Agency

Tiger Woods is happy with his season

Tiger Woods made it clear today that his 2009 season -- which included six victories on the PGA Tour but no wins in any of the four major championships -- was, in his mind, an unqualified success.

"Absolutely it's been a successful year," Woods said in a video conference to announce the field for the Chevron World Challenge, the tournament he hosts at Sherwood Country Club in Thousand Oaks. "To have gone through what I did for eight months, and then come back to be as consistent as I have been ... as a whole it was a huge success. I'm really looking forward to next year."

Woods, who has long said that performance in major championships is an important measuring stick of a player's career, had reconstructive knee surgery after winning the U.S. Open at Torrey Pines in LaJolla in 2008. He missed the rest of that season and played his first event this year in February at the Accenture Match Play Championship.

Woods said he had not considered his schedule for 2010 and gave no indication whether he would play at the Northern Trust Open at Riviera Country Club. Woods has not played the L.A. event since 2006 and acknowledged that Jerry West, who has been hired by the tournament to elevate its profile, had contacted him about playing. Woods has never won the regular tour stop at Riviera.

-- Mike James

Photo: Tiger Woods with caddie Steve Williams. Credit: Tannen Maury / European Pressphoto Agency

Tiger Woods is greater than Roger Federer

Both are undeniably great players. But who is greater: Tiger Woods or Roger Federer?

According to my sabermetrics tally, it's Woods.

Why? Let's compare the gap between Woods and Federer and the second-best player in their respective sports.

Woods has won 14 Grand Slam tournaments, and is within reach of Jack Nicklaus' all-time record of 18. Federer has 15 Grand Slam singles titles, the best in tennis history.

But let's check out the record of their rivals. In golf, there's a logjam among Woods' contemporaries: Phil Mickelson, Ernie Els, Vijay Singh and Padraig Harrington all have won three majors. So that's a gap of 11 majors between Woods and any of his rivals.

Meanwhile, in tennis, Rafael Nadal is the obvious second-best in the Federer era, and Nadal has won six Grand Slam singles titles -- a gap of nine titles behind Federer.

For me, that makes it obvious. Federer is great, but Woods is greater.

-- Barry Stavro

Photo: Roger Federer and Tiger Woods in 2006. Credit: Andrew Redington / Getty Images

Jack Nicklaus is back at the Masters

Jack Nicklaus has a tee time again at the Masters.

Augusta National announced Monday that Nicklaus will join Arnold Palmer as an honorary starter for next year's Masters.

Nicklaus is a six-time Masters champion who last played the tournament in 2005.

He says he accepted the invitation because it was also supported by Palmer, his longtime friend who began hitting the ceremonial tee shot in 2007.

Nicklaus will become.....

more after the jump

What to watch, or how not to leave the house on a Saturday

What to do? Have some plans but, but, how to leave the television behind? It's an eclectic sports fan's dream day.

We've already got the PGA on Channel 2, Tiger Woods up four and he hasn't started yet. Channel 4 has world track and field from Berlin and to me nothing is better than being taken, because of sports, to a new place, and to me Berlin is a new place. Right after track on Channel 4 from Dallas (OK, don't necessarily want sports to take me to Dallas) is men's gymnastics and on good authority (OK, the men were on Universal Sports yesterday), it is the men who have been the stars of this USA Gymnastics nationals (the women will be on Channel 4 at 8 p.m.). Check out the high bar routines of Jon Horton and Danell Leyva.

Whew, but there's more. A quadruple header of Little League World Series games on ESPN. Women's tennis, NASCAR, men's tennis on ESPN2. On the NFL Network is a quadruple-header of preseason games: Arizona at Pittsburgh (now), and maybe a chance to check out the progress of Matt Leinart for USC fans; followed by Atlanta at Detroit followed by the Chicago Bears at Buffalo; followed by Seattle at San Diego.

Oh, yeah, baseball too, Giants at the Mets on Channel 11; Dodgers (the sky is falling, right) at Arizona on Channel 9 at 5 p.m.; Angels at Baltimore at 4 p.m. Fox West.

You want soccer? Chivas is at Red Bull New York on Fox West at 4 p.m. or even cooler, a 2010 World Cup qualifier from Baku, Azerbaijan, with Germany against Azerbaijan. That's at 1:30 on the Fox Soccer Channel.

Yep, not leaving the house today.

Diane Pucin

Photo: Tiger Woods plays a shot on the tenth hole during the final round of the PGA championship on Sunday in Chaska, Minnesota. Photo credit: Stuart Franklin / Getty Images.

PGA Championship no monster in the early going

Hazeltine National, site of the PGA Championship and a course that can play more than 7,600 yards, isn't turning out to be as difficult a challenge as some might have thought.

Michael Bradley and Alviro Quiros are the early first-round leader, both still on the course,  at four under par after , and as of about noon Central time, there were 23 players under par.

Lurking one stroke behind? Tiger Woods, who has steadily moved through the field, just getting his third birdie on his 11th hole (he started on No. 10).

Woods, of course, has not won a major championship this year and were he not to win this weekend, it would be his first season without a major victory since 2004.

With this start, though, he could change that. He's golf's best front-runner ever, particularly in majors.

-- Mike James

Photo: Tiger Woods hits out of a bunker and onto the 15th green during the first round of the PGA Championship on Thursday. Credit: Tannen Maury / EPA

Cardinal and Blue meet on the green at U.S. Women's Amateur

The semifinals of the prestigious U.S. Women's Amateur golf tournament will have a distinctly Southern California feel on Saturday. And a taste of crosstown rivalry.

USC sophomore Jennifer Song (pictured at left) tees off against Tiffany Lua, an incoming UCLA freshman, in match play at Old Warson Country Club in St. Louis.

Not that they're acting like arch-rivals, not with Lua referring to Song as "a good player."

And Song shooting back: "I've talked with her a lot in the dining area and she's a nice girl."

If that seems fairly tame when compared to the barbs that fly back and forth between the Trojans and Bruins in football and basketball, well, Song might have something else on her mind.

After winning the U.S. Women's Amateur Public Links in June, she can become only the second woman  in history to capture two USGA championships in the same year.

For Lua, there is the equally pressing matter of entering college.

"School starts on Sept. 26, but I'm supposed to be there on Sept. 6," she said. "Just to be there early and keep up."

Maybe then she'll learn to talk trash about the Trojans.

-- David Wharton

Photo: Jennifer Song tees off in the U.S. Women's Open last month. She finished tied for 13th in the event. Credit: Scott Halleran/Getty Images

Shocker: Tiger Woods favored to win U.S. Open!

OK, so it's hardly a shocker. But Tiger Woods, after his victory in the Memorial tournament two weeks ago demonstrated that he has fully recovered from the knee surgery that sidelined him for nine months, is the runaway favorite to win the U.S. Open this week at Bethpage State Park in New York.

Woods, who won the Open the last time it was played at Bethpage, in 2002, is listed as the 7-4 favorite by British bookmakers William Hill. That relegates everyone else to long shot status.

The second choice is the man who finished second to Woods in the 2002 Open, Phil Mickelson, at 14-1. Mickelson has finished second four times in the Open.

Woods is the Open's defending champion, having won at Torrey Pines a year ago despite a knee that caused him pain throughout. He had surgery shortly thereafter.

Now, much to the dismay of his fellow competitors, he's ready to go.