MVN - Most Valuable Network

The AT&T Classic and Severed Hands Trophy

This week is the 40th edition of the AT&T Classic in Atlanta, Georgia. The tournament is played at TPC Sugarloaf and Zach Johnson is the defending champion. After two rounds, Jonathan Byrd leads by three shots over Kenny Perry and Ryan Palmer.

But I’m really more interested in the above photo the PR people sent me.

Is it just me, or is the trophy weird? (Not that it would be the only weird trophy awarded in professional golf.)

What happened to the rest of the golfer? Is he also bronzed and on another trophy?

Is this what happens when you put a death grip on the golf club? Did a doctor have to sever someone’s hands because they couldn’t release the club?

I wonder.

May Is PGA Free Lesson Month

Get ready to mark “I need a golf lesson” off your excuse list.

PGA and LPGA Professional instructors across the nation are offering free, 10-minute golf lessons at participating courses and teaching facilities through the end of May as a part of PGA Free Lesson Month.

Lessons are by appointment. To find a PGA Professional offering lessons near your home, go to Play Golf America, click on the Free Lesson Month link and input your zip code.

Annika Sorenstam Announces Retirement

Annika Sorenstam, one of the greats in any sport over the last decade or so, said she will hang it up at the end of the 2008 season.

This from the AP:

Annika Sorenstam will retire after the season, ending an LPGA Tour career in which she has won 72 tournaments to date and delivered a defining moment when she teed it up against the men on the PGA Tour.

“I think I’ve achieved more than I ever thought I could,” she said during a news conference Tuesday at the Sybase Classic in Clifton, N.J. “I have given it all, and it’s been fun.”

The 37-year-old Sorenstam has hinted at retirement the past several seasons, saying she wanted to devote more time to her growing business and to start a family. She is engaged to Mike McGee, son of former PGA Tour player Jerry McGee.

Annika won the Michelob ULTRA Open in dominating fashion on Sunday. It was her third victory this season.

Breakthrough Win for Sergio Garcia at The Players Championship

An admission: Last Thursday or Friday I was going to write that Sergio Garcia, despite his fabulous opening 66, would not win The Players Championship. I was prepared to tell you that Garcia could not putt well enough over four days on the slick TPC Sawgrass greens to capture the title.

I’m not sure why I didn’t write that post. But as we now know, I would have been dead wrong.

Garcia changed his personal history by hitting wonderful shots and, more importantly, making the key putts to wrestle the trophy from the people’s champion, an appealing journeyman and jokester named Paul Goydos.

Sergio is a major talent who may go on to win majors if he can continue to do what he accomplished at Ponte Vedra Beach. What I heard him say over and over again in post-tournament interviews was how he had to believe in himself. What he thinks, how he thinks, can make all the difference.

Garcia’s win is good for golf because Tiger Woods needs a better supporting cast. The 20-somethings who have emerged in recent weeks will hopefully continue to contend on the big stage and make championship golf more compelling.