Oh we of little faith. Back in early March, just before the competition got under way, Paul Sheehan, the winner of the 1998 Golf Masters, told us (in an off-the-record comment) that he fancied his chances of retaining his title. We admired his confidence but the track record of defending champions through the history of the competition left us a little doubtful that he'd be troubling the upper reaches of the overall leaderboard this time around.
Only last week we even considered running a "Where are they Now" piece on Paul, who had yet to put in an appearance on either the overall or weekly leaderboards.
But look who's leapt to 31st overall this week. It's himself. Is Paul timing his run towards the finishing post (which, granted, is still 17 weeks away) to perfection or have we just completely blown his chances by drawing attention to the surge of "Bite Baby"? Paul might suspect the latter so we'll say no more, other than to point out that of last year's winning line-up only Darren Clarke makes it on to the Bite Baby team sheet - the rest, Peter Baker, Bob Estes, Billy Mayfair, Miguel Angel Jimenez, Costantino Rocca and Andrew Coltart, were left looking for alternative managers. That's gratitude for you. Jimenez was Paul's second top earner last year, behind Clarke, and is doing very nicely for his 412 managers this year, moving to first on the highest earners' list on Monday with his share of seventh at the Deutsche Bank Open in Heidelberg.
There was a healthy average score this week, £73,192, with just four teams failing to win a single pound - the overall average score now stands at £704,366. Pat Reid of Maynooth, Co Kildare didn't have either of week 12's winners - Tiger Woods (who appears in 1,454 teams) or Olin Browne (124) - in his Fairway's 2 line-up but five top 10 finishers helped the team amass a grand total of £294,000, enough to win him a fourball in Mount Juliet. Retief Goosen and Nick Price finished second and third, respectively, in Germany, with Greg Kraft, John Huston and Bob Estes winning over £140,000 between them at the Colonial in Texas.
David Maune's Cremorne 1 go top of the overall leaderboard this week, rising from fourth place, with Colomba Gavigan moving from 10th to second and last week's leader, William Brennan, down to third. Pat Corby's menagerie of teams (Lapwings, Blackbirds, Magpies and Gannets, but curiously not an albatross, eagle or birdie in sight) are all maintaining their manager's multi-pronged assault on the leaderboard.
One of the biggest climbers of the week was Buster's Super Seven, managed by John Daly of Ardee, Co Louth. Last week the team was just over £30,000 short of a place in the top 50 but they've risen to 11th overall after finishing the 14th top scoring team of week 12. Fortunately for John he didn't have his namesake in his line-up - Daly (the golfer) withdrew from the Colonial after shooting an 80 in the first round. There was considerably better news for managers of Davis Love and Steve Elkington, both of whom returned to action at the Colonial - Love, who took a share of 11th, was playing his first tournament since back problems resurfaced the week after the Masters and Elkington, who tied for 39th, was playing again just three weeks after a bout of viral meningitis.
To Peter Jacobsen's 634 managers, what can we say? A first round of 75 didn't exactly enhance his prospects of making the cut at the Colonial, but when his approach on the ninth in the second round landed in a spectator's hamburger carton the end was nigh. Jacobsen took a bite of the burger, a swig of the spectator's drink, took a drop and made bogey. And missed the cut. Better luck at week 13's tournaments, the Volvo PGA Championship (bonus money) and the Kemper Open.
