Spiderman again

I’ve been following Camilo Villegas’ golf game for about a year now; he’s been the subject of no less than five posts since June 2008; during that time, he’s made two top 10 finishes in majors (including a top 4), won two tournaments in a row (including the TOUR championship last week) and just missed a $10m bonus for the Fedex Cup, losing to Vijay Singh by a whisker.

And, during that time, he’s moved over fifty places in the Official World Golf Ranking, from 58th to 7th. Delightful golf from a truly talented player. One to watch for next year’s Majors. You can’t say I didn’t tell you.

Here’s what was said in pgatour.com’s Live Notes about the Fedex Cup near-miss:

PLAYOFF POINTS (7 p.m. ET): A year ago, Tiger Woods won the FedExCup by 12,578 points. On Sunday, Vijay Singh won the FedExCup by 551 points over Camilo Villegas (click here for final FedExCup point standings).

Three things proved to be the difference in Singh’s win this year:

1) Regular-season positioning: Singh finished seventh in the regular season in FedExCup points; Villegas finished 42nd. That was a difference of 2,350 points when the points were reset entering the Playoffs.

2) Villegas failed to make the cut at The Barclays by one shot. Had he made the cut, he would have received at least 2,098 points (the total Paul Goydos received by finishing last at The Barclays after making the cut).

“The only thing I can tell you is I was battling hard to make that cut,” Villegas said Sunday when asked about The Barclays. “… That’s the way this game goes. If I knew that was the case, I don’t know what I would have done different. But you’ve just got to be in the present.”

3) Singh won The Barclays after extending the playoff by making a 26-foot birdie putt on top of Sergio Garcia‘s 27-foot birdie putt. The difference between first and a tie for second (Kevin Sutherland was also in the playoff) at The Barclays was 4,600 points.