My latest MSN/Sympatico column is now online. Here’s a taste:

Heading into last year’s RBC Canadian Open, Chez Reavie looked like just another struggling graduate from golf’s minor leagues.
The previous year, he’d won on the Nationwide Tour, and made enough cash to make the leap to the PGA Tour. Once there he was neither awful nor particularly good. Heading into last July he’d missed more than a handful of cuts, and finished in the Top 10 just once. Reavie looked destined for Q-School, just like so many other rookies who find the adjustment to the PGA Tour more than they expected.
Then amidst rain delays and a course that was so wet you could take a canoe down some of the fairways, the short-hitting Reavie lit up Glen Abbey. On Sunday, when everyone figured the rookie would fumble about like John Daly at a Hooters after closing time, Reavie held his own and won the tournament. Suddenly everything was different. He received entries to World Golf Championship events and to Augusta for the Masters (but not the British Open, incidently). He was guaranteed his tour card for two years. It was a career defining moment for the Arizona native.

The full column can be found at Sympatico’s golf site.