Only real golf fans knew that there was an “alternate” PGA Tour event during last week’s Ryder Cup—the Viking Classic in Madison, Mississippi. ANd at that tournament Will MacKenzie racked up his first PGA Tour victory in an unusual fashion.

On Saturday, MacKenzie called a two shot penalty on himself for moving a loose impediment in a hazard on the par 5 eighteenth. That resulted in him taking a triple bogey eight.

On Sunday, MacKenzie birdied the 18th to get into a playoff with Brian Gay and Mark Turnesa.

On the first playoff hole, Turnesa and MacKenzie birdied 18 to eliminate Gay.

On the second MacKenzie birdied to win the tournament.

Three birds on one hole in a single day.

That’s got to be some sort of record.

And it’s a nice reward for his honesty on Saturday.

I’m happy for Vijay Singh—one of my favorite players—but the final leg of the FedEx Cup is going to be a bit of a snooze. All Vijay has to do to win is make the cut.

It’s not what the Tour had in mind, surely. The whole idea of the playoff was to maintain some interest in competitive golf during the first few weeks of the college and pro football seasons. And now, from a competitive point of view, I can think of absolutely no reason to watch.

Not to be pessimistic, but I predict that the FedEx Cup series will continue to be a dud for many years to come.

ESPN’s Jason Sobel says the Fedex Cup playoff points are just right.

CBS Sportline’s Steve Elling says its too unstable.

The GolfBlogger has a hard time getting excited with the Majors behind us, and the Ryder Cup out ahead.

Is Padraig Harrington the player of the year? Do you have to ask?

Apparently, however, there’s some controversy. Sentiment seems to draw some to vote for Tiger Woods, following his gimpy-legged victory at Torrey Pines.

Veteran golf writer Vartan Kupelian sets them all straight, however.

Never has a golfer won two majors and not been rewarded as Player of the Year by a vote of the membership. Simply put, two majors trumps anything else that has happened this year, including Tiger’s accomplishments before his season was shortened due to injury.

Not only will Harrington’s back-to-back major victories at the Open Championship and PGA Championship be remembered at voting time, so will the way he finished the rain-soaked tournament at Oakland Hills—a pair of 66s that he posted on Sunday, a spectacular display of golf on a course that left so many of his colleagues gasping for air.

On a side note, Vartan is retiring from the Detroit News this month. I’ll miss his golf columns.

Fresh off her disqualification at the LPGA’s State Farm Classic, Michelle Wie has accepted an invitation to play in the Reno-Tahoe Open next week. It’ll be the eighth time she’s teed it up against the men. She has yet to make a cut.

“It’s not every day that a woman is given the opportunity to play on the greatest tour in the world,” Wie said “This is a tremendous opportunity for me to learn from these great players and take those lessons to the LPGA. This is another step in the process of making me a better player.”

I hope one of those lessons is in signing scorecards.