Lefty takes home The Green Jacket

Phil Mickelson won the 2006 Masters with ease on sunday by 2 strokes. Unlike his first Masters this win really had no drama in it. He stepped up to the 18th hole with little to no pressure. He could've double bogied and still walk off a champion. For his efforts Phil took home a purse of $1,260,ooo which puts him at the top of the money list.

There's alot of media types and sports analyst that will say that Phil didn't win this as much as Tiger and the rest of the field lost it. Tiger couldn't get his game to come together. He was hitting his driver fine and irons were great, it was his putter that gave him problems throughtout the tournament. Tiger said that he wanted to break the putting to pieces. Phil was just steady, making his shots and played virtually error free. On sunday before the bogey on 18, Phil had 13 pars along with 4 birdies. His playing partner on the sunday was Fred Couples, whom is about 13 years older than Phil, wasn't able to play to the pressure and let the newly designed course get to him posting a 71 and three shots back of Phil.

Though this years Masters didn't come with the late drama or the memorial shots it will be remembered as the tournament that Phil won. It is his second Masters in 3 years and third major in three years. The only others play to have won at least one major three straight years is Tiger. As it looks now the Big 4 as they have been called of Tiger, Phil, Vijay and Ernie has become the Big 2 with Tiger and Phil. As noted in an earlier article about the Masters, Phil is now only the second player to have won the Masters a week after another win (Bellsouth Classic). Looks like Tiger finally has a rival in Phil. Should be fun to watch in the future.

The next Major is the US Open to be played June 15 - 18.

The Masters Final Round Complete
$	POS	START		NAME	SCORE	1	2	3	4	TOTAL	EARNINGS
	1	1		Phil Mickelson	-7	70	72	70	69	281	$1,260,000
	2	T4		Tim Clark	-5	70	72	72	69	283	$756,000
	T3	T10		Retief Goosen	-4	70	73	72	69	284	$315,700
	T3	T22		Jose Maria Olazabal	-4	76	71	71	66	284	$315,700
	T3	T4		Tiger Woods	-4	72	71	71	70	284	$315,700
	T3	T2		Fred Couples	-4	71	70	72	71	284	$315,700
	T3	T2		Chad Campbell	-4	71	67	75	71	284	$315,700
	T8	T4		Vijay Singh	-3	67	74	73	71	285	$210,000
	T8	T16		Angel Cabrera	-3	73	74	70	68	285	$210,000
	10	T12		Stewart Cink	-2	72	73	71	70	286	$189,000
	T11	T10		Miguel Angel Jimenez	-1	72	74	69	72	287	$161,000
	T11	T16		Mike Weir	-1	71	73	73	70	287	$161,000
	T11	T4		Stephen Ames	-1	74	70	70	73	287	$161,000