Mercedes-Benz Gets '07 in Gear

By GolfChannel.com Team

A season of great interest and intrigue gets underway as the 2007 PGA TOUR kick-starts a new campaign at the Mercedes-Benz Championship.
 
The serene setting of Kapalua, Hawaii provides the backdrop to the first event of the year – a year which will end with a mad dash for $10 million.
 

The Mercedes-Benz Championship is not only the first tournament on the ’07 TOUR calendar; it’s also the first event under the new FedExCup system.
 
For the next 33 weeks, players will be battling for points that will qualify them for the first playoff system in men’s golf. For the record, 144 players will earn entry into the first of four events that comprise the playoff. Field sizes will be reduced after each tournament. The 30 players with the most points will advance to the TOUR Championship, where they will compete for a $10 million annuity.
 
There are 34 players in the Mercedes-Benz field this year. That does not include Tiger Woods or Phil Mickelson, both of who have twice won this event and both of who opted to skip it once again.
 
Woods, who is missing out for the second consecutive year, said a busy "off"-season left him ill-prepared for the season-opener. Instead, he will try to extend his PGA TOUR winning streak to seven at the Buick Invitational, where he is the two-time defending champion.
 
Meanwhile, Mickelson, who hasn't played here since 2001, decided that he would prefer to spend more time with his family and will make his 2007 debut two weeks later at the Bob Hope Chrysler Classic.
 
Of those qualifiers who made the trip to Hawaii, 13 are making their first appearance in the lid-lifter: J.B. Holmes, Arron Oberholser, Aaron Baddeley, Chris Couch, Brett Wetterich, J.J. Henry, Trevor Immelman, John Senden, Dean Wilson, Will Mackenzie, Eric Axley, D.J. Trahan and Troy Matteson.
 
There is also a group of players who have been here before, but not in some time. That would include Tim Herron and Jeff Maggert, who are making their first appearances since 2000, and Corey Pavin, who last played this event in 1997.
 
Then there are the regulars, guys like: Jim Furyk, who is making his 10th start in the last 12 years; Vijay Singh, who has played in 11 of the last 14, including this year; and David Toms, who is making his seventh appearance.
 
And then there is Stuart Appleby. Appleby is the defending champion – as he was last year, and the year before that. Appleby has won this event each of the last three years and is trying to become just the fifth player in TOUR history to win the same event on four consecutive occasions.
 
“I'm short of words,” Appleby said after defeating Singh in a playoff in 2006. “To win it? First time great. Second time awesome. Third time, it's the wrong English, but more awesomer.”
 
A fourth win would be the most awesomest of his career then.