The course could be rough

ATLANTA -- Starting today, it’s the last big showdown of the year. Tiger Woods squares off against Phil Mickelson, golf’s two reigning heavyweights at the top of the 30-player marquee in the $7-million Tour Championship and the conclusion of the inaugural FedEx Cup.

And in this case, the talk about the greens isn’t only about the color of the money at stake, it’s about the condition of the putting surfaces at East Lake Golf Club.

In short, they’re not very good. A broiling summer and an extended drought didn’t do much to help the bentgrass greens, so the PGA Tour took action, starting about a month ago. Sod was added to the back of the second and 13th greens, huge fans were brought in to circulate the air, the greens weren’t mowed, the pro-am was canceled and players were prevented from their customary practice rounds this week to prop up the greens.

“We were trying to keep them alive,” said Mark Russell, the PGA Tour’s tournament director. “They’re not what we’d like to have, but what they’ve been through, they’re pretty good.”

That’s not exactly what Woods or the others want to hear as they line up for their chance to dig into the $35 million in bonuses that make up the FedEx Cup payout.

Russell said he expected the greens to run from 9 to 9.5 on the Stimpmeter, a device that measures speed of the greens, compared to last year’s 11 and 12. Slow greens, sod, spike marks and now the rain that hit the area this week are a recipe for putting problems, and Woods doesn’t like that.

He said slow greens help a bad putter, something he isn’t.

“How many bad putters have you seen over the years win Augusta, the fastest, most sloping greens?” he said. “It takes creativity, it takes touch, it takes feel, and you have to start the ball on line with the correct speed.

“When you get bumpy greens, that’s kind of out the door. You can make a mistake on a putt and pull it, push it, hit it the wrong speed and it can go in. Or you can hit wonderful putts and have them not go in. I think that’s where having perfect greens, guys that can really putt, get rewarded.”

Both Woods and Mickelson are renown for putting prowess. Woods ranks 10th, averaging 1.750 putts, and Mickelson is tied for 11th at 1.751. The PGA Tour leader is Fredrik Jacobson at 1.722.

Regardless of the condition of the greens, it’s a fact that everyone still has to play them, but there is still the chance that less than ideal putting surfaces could distract from the Woods-Mickelson rivalry.

For much of this year, it has been a two-man show. Woods is ranked No. 1, Mickelson is No. 2. Woods is first on the money list and Mickelson is second. Woods has won six times, including the PGA Championship, and Mickelson has won three times, including the Players.

Two weeks ago at the Deutsche Bank Championship, the second of the FedEx Cup playoff events, Mickelson closed with a 66 and wound up defeating Woods by two shots. Last week at the third playoff event, the BMW Championship, Woods shot a final-round 63 and won by two shots, with Mickelson sitting out.

Woods said he was not surprised Mickelson has done so well.

“I think it’s confidence. He’s driving the ball a little better and he’s certainly putting better. He putted well early in the year and then the middle part of the year struggled a little bit. We all go through stretches like that.

“I think if you look at the way he putted at the Deutsche Bank event, he putted great. He made a bunch of putts, and that’s what you have to do to win.”

This is Mickelson’s second go-around as Woods’ primary rival, a list that has included, from time to time, Ernie Els, David Duval, Vijay Singh and possibly even Sergio Garcia.

With so much money on the line -- a $10-million annuity to the FedEx Cup winner -- and the lingering story line of the convoluted Cup points system, the Woods-Mickelson confrontation is an intriguing sidelight. No matter what happens at East Lake in this first FedEx Cup, Mickelson knows that Woods is still a lock to win the PGA Tour player-of-the-year award for a record ninth time.

“I think that it will take a while for . . . winning the FedEx Cup to have the same type of stature as winning a major or having a year where you win five or six tournaments like Tiger has this year,” Mickelson said. “It’ll take a few years for [winning the FedEx Cup] to have more weight on the player-of-the-year outcome.”

Woods announced that he would not play at the PGA Grand Slam of Golf in Bermuda in mid-October. He said he wanted to take an extended break to spend time with his infant daughter.

It is the first time Woods has not been in the four-player event -- which includes the winners of the year’s majors -- when he has been eligible.

Jim Furyk will replace Woods and join Masters winner Zach Johnson, U.S. Open winner Angel Cabrera and British Open winner Padraig Harrington.

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thomas.bonk@latimes.com

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FedEx Cup

Players still mathematically eligible to win the FedEx Cup playoff series:

*--* 1. Tiger Woods 112,733 2. Steve Stricker 109,600 3. Phil Mickelson 108,613 4. Rory Sabbatini 103,588 5. K.J. Choi 103,100 6. Aaron Baddeley 102,800 *--*

Associated Press