Best player without a major win: Lee Westwood

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Lee Westwood lost a shot at the 2009 British Open with a slew of bogeys on the back nine on Sunday.

Who is the best active golfer who has yet to break through with a major victory? We asked eight PGATOUR.COM writers to each pick a different player and make the argument why that player deserves (or perhaps is stuck with) the label as best player without a major. Read the argument below and click here to see the arguments for seven other players.
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The conversation -- at least when considering players on the opposite side of the Atlantic Ocean -- has always centered first on the oft-maligned Colin Montgomerie and more recently on the supremely-talented but currently searching Sergio Garcia.

Over the last two years, though, the British veteran Lee Westwood has played his way into the picture of majors-in-waiting with a pair of third places that saw him finish one stroke out of a playoff at two very different championships.

The blue-collar, if not blue-blooded Englishman had a 15-foot birdie putt on the 72nd hole at Torrey Pines last year that would have enabled him to join Tiger Woods and Rocco Mediate on Monday to decide the U.S. Open.

Most recently, Westwood needed only a two-putt par at the 18th hole at Turnberry -- rather than his second bogey in as many holes -- to get into the four-hole aggregate playoff with the ageless Tom Watson and Stewart Cink. He admits to being "deflated" until his son put things into perspective.

"He said, 'Dad, you did really well. You finished third," Westwood wryly recalled last week at the World Golf Championships-Bridgestone Invitational.

But Westwood's seventh top-10 in 47 major championship appearances was still hard to swallow for the 18-time winner on the European Tour, a gritty performer who is so tough he was unbeaten in the 2004 and 2006 Ryder Cups.

Although none of those top-10s have come at a PGA Championship, don't be surprised to see Westwood contend at Hazeltine National this week. Particularly not when he comes to Minnesota on the heels of a sterling 65 on Sunday at Firestone, which is major-caliber course, and finishes of ninth or better in his last four events.