Friday Fourball: March 18

Dustin Johnson will have a better year than he did last year. While a cynic would look at how things ended for him at the U.S. Open and the PGA Championship, it would be hard to deny that Dustin Johnson had a pretty good 2010. He won a pair of prestigious tournaments in the AT&T Pebble Beach National Pro-Am and BMW Championship; he contended in -- and very well could have won -- two majors; he played on the Ryder Cup team; and he rose into the top-15 in the World Golf Rankings.



But for as much length as he has off the tee -- and he's never averaged less than 308.3 yards per drive in three full PGA Tour seasons and parts of two more -- he's struggled with some of his shots with the shorter clubs, ones that he often has because of his power. On his approaches from 50-125 yards over the past three years his average proximity to the hole is as followings (Tour rank in parentheses).

2010 - 20-feet, four inches (168)
2009 - 20-feet, two inches (157)
2008 - 19-feet, five inches (145)

This year -- after some hard work with Butch Harmon -- he has seen a drastic improvement in that area, slicing off nearly six-feet from last year with an average proximity to the cup of 14-feet, nine inches, which ranks 11th on Tour. If you think that's an insignificant number, consider that over the last nine year that would rank as the best average in all but three seasons (Those years the averages were: 14'2", 14'3" and 14'2"). Also consider that the percentage of putts made at 15-feet is quite a bit higher than at 20-feet. For example, over the last nine seasons the PGA Tour leader in the category would make a putt in the 15-20 foot range 30.6 per cent of the time. Conversely putts from 20-25 feet were led 23.58 per cent of the time.

Working the ball right to left at Augusta? Overrated. In three appearances in the Masters, 2010 PGA Champion and world number one Martin Kaymer has never played the weekend. In fact, he's been cut more often at Augusta (three) than he has in the other three majors combined (twice). As we are now on the fast-track towards that familiar trip down Magnolia Lane, many pundits have theorized that Kaymer won't be a factor since his natural shot shape is from left to right, rather than the preferred right-to-left. While I won't try to argue that the ability to work the ball that way is not advantageous at times -- the tee-shot at the 13th for example -- I think it would certainly be more accurate to say the ability to work the ball both ways is important. Looking at the back nine -- where Augusta's famous roars were born -- at least three of the key holes -- the 11th, 15th and 18th -- would promote a left-to-right ball flight. When you consider that Ben Hogan and Jack Nicklaus -- two of the greatest players of all time -- have eight Masters titles between them and were far more likely to play their ball with a gentle, controlled fade, it also hurts that argument a bit.

What to do with the WGCs? They are called the World Golf Championships, despite the obvious fact that majority of the tournaments -- 75 per cent on a current annual basis, and 76.5 per cent all time -- take place on American soil. There was a time when the tournament that has now become the WGC-Cadillac Championship was played pretty consistently in Europe before landing at Doral. Either way, given the international flavour you're bound to find on any given leaderboard and as the game goes down a path towards the 2016 Olympics, they needn't be so landlocked in the U.S. Here are some ideas to change that.

1. Move the match play around. When you consider the number of venues that have hosted either the Ryder Cup, President's Cup, Walker Cup, Solheim Cup etc. there are so many courses suited to the risk/reward nature of match-play golf. Add in the conventional wisdom that the players don't like the Dove Mountain course that has hosted the event the last three years and it sounds like a no brainer.

2. Make the RBC Canadian Open a WGC event. This isn't homerism at it's finest, but rather a tip of the cap to the third oldest tournament on the PGA Tour and fourth oldest in the world behind only the British and U.S. Opens (and South African Open in the case of globally). On top of that, it looks as though Golf Canada is committed to the idea of either moving the tournament around or at least getting a rotation of courses. Some of these courses -- including this year's event at Shaughnessy G&CC in Vancouver -- are major championship-calibre courses.

3. Schedule a WGC event either just before or just after the Ryder Cup or President's Cup and in a similar location. This seems simple enough and means that tournament's would be moved out of the U.S. in only two of four years.

The best never: to win on PGA Tour. It should be noted that two of the participants on this list have won on the European Tour. Still, if the question is: who are the best never to have won on the PGA Tour I think it's a fair list.

1. Rickie Fowler. Reason he's poised to win: In 42 starts on the PGA Tour, he has three seconds and one third place finish to go with 11 top-10s and 16 top-25s.

2. Charl Schwartzel. Reason he's poised to win: He has seven professional wins and in the top-20 in three of the four majors last year.

3. Robert Karlsson. Reason he's poised to win: He has 11 European Tour titles and last year finished at least T43 in all four majors. In 2008, he posted top-10s in three of the four majors and was still T20 in the other.

4. Kevin Na. Reason he's poised to win: Has posted 15 top-10s in the last three seasons and won on the Asian Tour when he was just 19.

5. Steve Marino. Reason he's posited to win: Three runner-up finishes in his career, and nearly as many top-10s this year (two) as all of last year (three) in a quarter of the tournaments.