Tour Championship is truly up for grabs

The top five players in the point standings — Woods, Stricker, Jim Furyk, Zach Johnson and Heath Slocum — are in the win-win position. However, all 30 players in the field have a mathematical chance at the playoff-ending crown.

“I pay attention to the points, but my main objective is to play well each week,” Stricker said. “... I let the points take care of themselves. I thought if I could play well and stay in the top five, that would be a huge bonus. Entering the [FedEx Cup] playoffs is when I really thought about staying in the top five and then really focusing on the points.”

There are scenarios — so many scenarios.

Even John Senden, 30th in the standings, can win. Of course he would have to win and Woods would have to finish last — among other things. There is even a chance that two players could finished tied in the FedEx Cup race at the end of the Tour Championship. In that case, there will be a sudden-death playoff to decide the winner.

“If I’m in a good frame of mind, no I won’t,” Slocum said about monitoring his position throughout the week. “I can only control what I do. There are so many scenarios. … At the end of the day I’m sure I’ll glance at the board [with projected order of finish]. It’s hard to miss those. If I do get caught up in that, then I feel like I’m going to miss sight of what I’m trying to do and probably play worse.”

Last year, Vijay Singh had the FedEx Cup won before getting to East Lake. No drama. This year, the PGA Tour might just get what it has wanted since the inception of the FedEx Cup. You could have one player standing over a putt on the 18th green that is worth the cool $11 million.

Nervous?

“I'm sure you would be just as nervous over that putt to win a tournament for a million dollars than to win a tournament for 11 million,” Stricker said. “The nerves are going to be shot any way.”

And how do you approach such a significant stroke?

“What I’d like to say is I’d walk up, stay in my routine and absolutely just try to hit a good putt,” said Slocum, an Alpharetta resident. “What would be going through your head would probably be a million things. … So I’d like to say that I’d walk up to that six-footer prepared for it to go in and hope I could still feel my hands when I was making the stroke.”

And what does Woods think of all this? He’s about to finish his season without a major championship. Surely he is watching the standings.

“If I'm on the top of the leader board, I look at the next for guys, yeah,” Woods said.

Etc.

*Despite the tremendous amount of rain to hit the area over the past week, players were surprised at the condition of the East Lake course.

"I surprised at how playable the golf course is,” Woods said. “The fairways are pretty wet, obviously, picking up a little bit of mud. The greens are unbelievable. They're firm."

Added Slocum: “With the weather and how the golf course is playing, it’s in remarkable shape. I’m absolutely stunned.”

*Slocum donated $40,000 to the Tour Championship’s Tickets Fore Charity program. The East Lake Foundation will receive $20,000 and Children’s Heatlhcare of Atlanta and the Chrohn’s and Colitis Foundation will each receive $10,000.

*Stewart Cink, also an East Lake member, spent part of Wednesday giving a clinic to about 25 students from the Drew Charter School.

*PGA Tour commissioner Tim Finchem said that through the first three weeks of the FedEx Cup playoffs, television ratings have been up 77 percent.