With Golf Observer's performance chart as my guide, here are my guesses for this week's Pakpicker. I'm going to need the same kind of charge Paula Creamer needs to catch Ochoa if I want to get into the top 3 this season.
1. Pettersen
2. Ochoa
3. Creamer
4. Kerr
5. Tseng
6. Inkster
7. Ji Eun-Hee
8. Kim Mi Hyun
9. Choi Na Yeon
10. Kim In-Kyung
11. Miyazato
12. Park Jane
Alts: Feng, Kung, Lu
Yeah, I'm going with the all-Taiwanese/Chinese [thanks, Jamie!] back-ups and guessing Tseng's triceps and Kim's knee will bother them less than Stanford's shoulder or Jang's wrist, that Maria Hjorth and Nicole Castrale won't keep up their good history at Blackhawk, that this will not be Stacy Lewis's or Kim Welch's week, and that Super Soph qualifiers Kristy McPherson and Irene Cho won't be able to sustain their Monday momentum.
Speaking of whom, let's look at the pairings, which are remarkably well-balanced. Sure, the world #1 highlights the early-morning back-9 prime-time quadrant:
Start Time: 8:14 AM
Jeong Jang
Julieta Granada
Meaghan Francella
Start Time: 8:25 AM
Sung Ah Yim
Young Kim
Irene Cho
Start Time: 8:36 AM
Na Yeon Choi
Laura Davies
Laura Diaz
Start Time: 8:47 AM
Maria Hjorth
Juli Inkster
Leta Lindley
Start Time: 8:58 AM
Shanshan Feng
Lorena Ochoa
Brittany Lincicome
But her highest-ranked contenders can mostly be found in the early-afternoon front-9 quadrant:
Start Time: 11:45 AM
Teresa Lu
Sophie Gustafson
Eun-Hee Ji
Start Time: 11:56 AM
Lorie Kane
Diana D'Alessio
Mi Hyun Kim
Start Time: 12:07 PM
Giulia Sergas
Janice Moodie
Hee Young Park
Start Time: 12:18 PM
Stacy Prammanasudh
Angela Stanford
Christina Kim
Start Time: 12:29 PM
Morgan Pressel
Suzann Pettersen
Paula Creamer
Don't assume, though, that the other quadrants can't produce a winner. Check out the early-morning front-9 one:
Start Time: 8:14 AM
Candie Kung
Karen Stupples
Helen Alfredsson
Start Time: 8:25 AM
Brandie Burton
Ai Miyazato
Allison Fouch
Start Time: 8:36 AM
Nicole Castrale
Jane Park
Wendy Ward
Start Time: 8:47 AM
Becky Morgan
Carin Koch
Seon Hwa Lee
Start Time: 8:58 AM
Michele Redman
Kristy McPherson
Ji Young Oh
Unlike in Ochoa's quadrant, there's nobody enduring a season-plus-long slump here. Similarly, the early-afternon back-9 quadrant is full of people who played their way into prime-time:
Start Time: 11:45 AM
Hee-Won Han
Karine Icher
Liselotte Neumann
Start Time: 11:56 AM
In-Kyung Kim
Silvia Cavalleri
Ya Ni Tseng
Start Time: 12:07 PM
Rachel Hetherington
Kyeong Bae
Pat Hurst
Start Time: 12:18 PM
Joo Mi Kim
Sun Young Yoo
Brittany Lang
Start Time: 12:29 PM
Christa Johnson
Sandra Gal
Kim Hall
There are a lot of bubble girls going out in the non-prime-time slots. Moira Dunn (#78) and Meredith Duncan (#85) get to be the last off the front, while Jennifer Rosales (#81) and Mikaela Parmlid (#96) have similar honors on the back. Check out Hound Dog's Navistar update for the big picture. With only 108 players in the field, competition should be especially intense at every level of the LPGA's performance hierarchy this season.
[Update 1 (10/8/08, 1:33 am): Of course Golf Channel is right to focus on this week's Creamer/Pettersen/Ochoa showdown, but would it have killed them to add another 15 seconds to their segment, follow Hound Dog's lead, and focus on the Rookie of the Year race, which Ya Ni Tseng could clinch this week?]
2 comments:
Feng Shanshan is not Taiwanese, she is from the mainland..
Oh, geez--stupid mistake!
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