- The Big Not-So-Easy:  True, Ernie Els did end a more than three year American victory drought at March’s Honda Classic, but having followed it up with three missed cuts (including at Augusta) and a 75th at Doral, something had to give.  What gave was Els’s 18-year relationship with David Leadbetter, scrapped in favor of an alliance with the ever-popular Butch Harmon – and while we can easily read way too much into a single finish, a T6 at the Players Championship (an event he might actually have won with a break or two) at least suggested a positive trend.  Interestingly, much of Els’s problem – at least according to Ernie – lay in his set up and alignment, the most fundamental building blocks of the swing, yet aspects upon which even the world’s elite must stay perpetually vigilant.  So, swinging better but not yet fully confident, Els returns home this week – not to South Africa, but rather to his primary residence at Wentworth, where the European Tour’s centerpiece, the BMW PGA Championship makes its annual appearance.  And here lies another interesting storyline: after rotating sites since its 1950s inception, the BMW has been played exclusively at Wentworth since 1984, yet the homestanding Els has never won this most prestigious of E Tour titles.  A problem with the golf course?  Highly unlikely.  Aside from having helped with its new millennium renovation, Els has also enjoyed competitive success upon it, winning the World Match Play title there – seven times!  Given that he has thrice finished 2nd in the BMW (though the most recent was in 1998), we must write off this lack of stroke play success as something of a fluke, allowing the new-and-improving Ernie to charge into this week’s event with hunger, confidence…and an opening 75.  It’s way too early to write off a talent this prodigious, particularly as Els – who feels like he’s been around forever – is still only 38.  But at a certain point, we must start to wonder if the desire is still there, or if, just maybe, the many years of traveling, grinding, winning – and, perhaps, the off-the-course distraction of his son’s autism – have begun to dull the flame.  Personally I hope not, for few more imposing talents have crossed golf’s modern landscape; indeed, with nearly 60 worldwide wins (including 16 in America) and three Major championships, we have seen few more successful players, period.  So lets see what Butch can do…

- Power Shift:  Recent stories reporting that England’s Justin Rose plans to play more events in Europe beginning in 2009 likely garnered little attention in America, for the world’s 11th-ranked player has never won here, nor has he ever finished higher than 19th on the PGA Tour money list.  But the key to this story isn’t the shifting of Rose’s schedule so much as the continued growing threat of the European Tour to the American circuit’s never-challenged status as the professional golf tour.  This is not so much a current news item as one that has been building over the last few seasons – enough so that it is no longer unheard of for E Tour events to offer more world ranking points (essentially meaning they have stronger fields) than their weekly counterparts across the Atlantic.  There are many reasons for this impressive growth – the development of the E Tour’s international schedule (which have made it truly a world tour), the skyrocketing number of international players atop the world rankings (virtually all of whom still play significant portions of their schedules overseas) and, of course, the growing purses available on foreign shores.  Ironically, the E Tour’s biggest sponsorship questions lie at home, in continental Europe; in Asia and especially the Middle East (where the government of Dubai will literally change the face of international golf in 2009 with a massive infusion of dollars), the pickings could scarcely be lusher.  If I were Tim Finchem, a story like Justin Rose’s (and the bigger picture it is emblematic of) would scare the hell out of me.  Then again, whatever one may wish to say about Finchem – MBA blather and all – the man is a master of keeping sponsorship balls in the air.  So far.