Over at the main site, I wrote up a piece on Padraig Harrington's up-and-down year; check it out right here. His upswing this year coincides almost exactly with his downswing last year. Creepy, huh? Here's the lead:
ATLANTA - When you win two majors in a season, realistically there's only one direction to go: down. But for Padraig Harrington, nobody could have possibly predicted how fast and how far he would fall.
If it were possible to take a mulligan on a year of golf, Harrington would leap at the chance. Harrington put together an exceptional 2008 that saw him capture the British Open, the PGA Championship and Player of the Year award. Right after the PGA, though, things turned south for Paddy, and in one of the strongest indictments of golf's playoff system, the reigning two-time major winner missed qualifying for the 2008 Tour Championship.
Ironically, life turned bright again for Paddy almost exactly one year later. In August, he began showing up on leaderboards again and now stands as the only golfer to place in the top 10 of all three playoff events. He enters this week's Tour Championship ranked No. 6, revitalized, recharged and ready to challenge for an event he couldn't even conceive of competing in last year.
