Week 12 Power Rankings: Knoxville Open

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Editor's note: Adam Wallace is a media assistant for the Nationwide Tour. Each week, Wallace will size up the field and provide his top five players going into the tournament, based on factors such as the player's strengths, the course setup, recent performances, etc. | POWER RANKINGS: St. Jude Classic

The Nationwide Tour is in Knoxville, Tenn., this week for Knoxville Open presented by Food City. This event is one of the four original tournaments still on the schedule since the Tour's inception in 1990. The other three tournaments are the Price Cutter Charity Championship (Springfield, Mo.), Preferred Health Systems Wichita Open (Wichita, Kan.) and Albertsons Boise Open (Boise, Idaho).

Fox Den Country Club, the tournament host, is statistically one of the easiest courses on the Nationwide Tour in recent history. Of the 33 courses played on Tour last year, the 7,110-yard, par-72 track was the 25th least difficult, playing to an average of 71.26.

Last year, Jarrod Lyle and Chris Kirk took the event into extra holes, and Lyle birdied the first playoff hole, securing the win and his 2009 PGA TOUR card. In route to his second Nationwide Tour victory, Lyle hit a stunning 86.11percent of the greens in regulation and averaged 6.25 birdies a round.

Power Rankings: Knoxville Open presented by Food City

Rank Player   Comment Cameron PERCY He's ranked third in scoring average (69.9) and first in par-breakers. He makes birdie or better 27.2 percent of the time, converting greens hit in regulation into birdies 40.07 percent of the time. He plays this well on tough courses, so he's in good shape here. Hunter HAAS Haas won this event in 2004 and 2006. He obviously has the recipe for winning on this course. He's had three top-25 finishes so far this year, and he's due for a breakout performance. Craig BOWDEN He's made three cuts in a row, recording two top-15s. In his last three events, he jumped from 72nd on the money list to 39th. Ranked fifth in driving accuracy, he hits the fairway 81 percent of the time. He's played here seven times and has four top-25s. Gary CHRISTIAN He's leading the Tour in greens in regulation (78.95 percent) and coming off his two best finishes of the year (T23/The Rex Hospital Open and T12/Melwood Prince George's County Open). In 2006, he was runner-up here to Hunter Haas. Esteban TOLEDO Toledo is one of the most consistent players this year. He's tied with Andrew Buckle for the most consecutive cuts made to date (seven). He came in fourth last week in Maryland. Of the 28 rounds he's played, only six were over par.