Golf/Players Championship Irish focus : When Graeme McDowell finally arrived to the TPC at Sawgrass yesterday, he should have found a space in the car park sandwiched between the nameplates for Scott McCarron and Shaun Micheel.
It wasn't there. The confirmation that the 25-year-old had secured his place in the field for The Players Championship - the unofficial fifth major on the circuit - had come too late to alter the designated, alphabetically determined parking spaces.
Of more importance, however, was that McDowell had actually won a space in the tournament, one with an $8 million purse and traditionally the strongest field in golf.
On Sunday, a couple of hours drive down the I-95 in Orlando, his tied-second place finish alongside the reinstated world number one Vijay Singh but two shots behind Kenny Perry in the Bay Hill Invitational was a career defining moment for McDowell. Apart from the financial rewards, a cheque for $440,000, McDowell's best-ever PGA Tour finish moved him up 14 places to 38th in the world rankings which earned him a place in The Players and, almost certainly, the upcoming US Masters too.
Yet, nobody should be surprised that McDowell has achieved his early-season goals with such consummate ease. As Padraig Harrington, yesterday sitting on a low wooden fence outside the lockerroom, observed: "Graeme's a very good player. What impresses me most is that he does his own thing. He's focused and plays his own game. He's showing now what he originally showed when he came out on tour. The best thing about him is his self-belief.
"After he won (the Scandinavian Masters in 2002 in his fourth start as a professional), he lost his way a bit trying to step up to a level he was already at," added Harrington. "Now he's back to a situation where he is very comfortable with who he is and his game. I think Graeme was trying to get up to the next level (after the Scandinavian) when he was already there. That often happens. Craig Perks is a guy who won this tournament and who has had some tough times since, thinking this was a stepping stone, (but) you've already made the step when you win."
McDowell has proven to be a good learner. Taking on board advice from his manager, Chubby Chandler, he decided not to chase world ranking points in the Far East prior to Christmas and to instead focus on the early part of this year to maintain his upward momentum in the world rankings. It has worked a dream.
A top-10 finish in the Pebble Beach pro-am kick-started a stretch in the US that has seen him earn $700,630 in five starts, enough to earn him special temporary membership of the PGA Tour with no restriction on the number of tournaments he can play on sponsor's invites for the rest of the season.
The main dream, though, was to get a place in the US Masters and that now seems assured. The top-50 in the world rankings not already exempted after Sawgrass will claim the last of the invitations to Augusta National. "When that cut-off comes, it'll be a weight off my mind," said McDowell, "because I can go back to concentrating on my schedule and to thinking about winning tournaments instead of trying to get up the world rankings which has been my main focus. for a few months.
"I think it's been very distracting, yeah. It's probably been a little too distracting. As I say, I just like to concentrate on playing golf tournaments and trying to win that week instead of thinking in the future, which I feel I've been doing for a long time. I've been thinking towards the Masters and Sawgrass and stuff."
McDowell, who was the top collegiate golfer in America before turning professional, is likely to take up his US tour card at the end of this season but, for the moment, is, as he put it, "excited" with how his game has evolved. "I'm excited to get into The Players, it's something I've looked forward to all my life . . . and the Masters is going to be a special tournament to get into. To get into the Masters would be a dream come true, really. I've watched the tournament since I was a boy. For me, it's the pinnacle of world golf. It's the golf tournament. To get into the Masters would be extremely special.
"I'm just excited the way the year is panning out in front of me. I feel like I'm playing great golf and I'm a much better player than last year. I feel like my game is strong and I feel that I can win in any given week," added McDowell.
An invitation into the Masters would ensure McDowell gets to play in all four majors for the first time, as he is already exempt for the US Open, British Open and US PGA. His elevation in the world rankings has ensured there will be three Irish players in the field at Sawgrass, joining Harrington - ranked sixth in the world, and a runner-up here for the past two years - and Darren Clarke, ranked 16th.
Harrington very nearly made the decision not to play, however, due to the fact that his father Paddy was admitted to hospital last week. "I seriously considered not playing but he told me to travel, said that it would give him something to watch on television," remarked Harrington, who won the Honda Classic in his last outing a fortnight ago.
