LEMONT, Ill. -- Geoff Ogilvy needs to have a great week in order to stay alive in the PGA TOUR Playoffs for the FedExCup. At 69th in points, he barely made the BMW Championship field and he'll need to finish 3rd or better to give himself a shot at moving onto the top 30 who advance to next week's TOUR Championship by Coca-Cola.

Although Cog Hill is not one of Ogilvy's favorite courses, he does think he has the game plan to make a run this week.

"To play it well, you've got to keep it out of the fairway bunkers," Ogilvy said. "The fairway bunkers are pretty much in play on almost every hole."

Ogily also will pay particular attention to his approach shots in order to make sure he gives himself the best opportunity at the pin. He said there are some greens in which it's preferable to chip out of the rough rather than putt over some big holes.

"The greens, you can get some pretty crazy putts if you miss the pin by a long way on the greens," he said. "So I guess a lot of these greens, you're better off to miss the green on the pin side of the hole rather than be a long way away on the greens."

Ogilvy and Chris Stroud (70th in points) tee off in an hour off the 10th tee.

By Helen Ross, PGATOUR.COM

LEMONT, Ill. -- Geoff Ogilvy needed a birdie putt on the 72nd hole at the Deutsche Bank Championship in order to survive and play another week in the PGA TOUR Playoffs for the FedExCup.

Now he needs another good week at the BMW Championship -- but the reasons are two-fold. Not only does Ogilvy want to advance to the TOUR Championship by Coca-Cola, where the FedExCup will be decided, he wants dearly to qualify for the International Team for the Presidents Cup.

Ogilvy, who is bidding to play in the biennial competition for the third straight year, came to Cog Hill ranked 10th in the Presidents Cup standings and must maintain that spot on Sunday evening in order to automatically qualify to play for Greg Norman. Norman will complete his team with two picks on Sept. 27 after the TOUR Championship is over.

"From my perspective it's frustrating because I was really happy with where my game was at say in January," Ogilvy said. "Messed my finger up, hurt my shoulder later on in the year, had kind of a strange digestive sickness there for a while. So it didn't really go very well for me this year. ... So I have to have a reasonable week, I think, to hold my position."

If the team were finalized right now, Ogilvy would be one of three Australians on the team. Vijay Singh, who has played on eight Presidents Cup teams, is on the outside looking in at No. 13, as is last year's British Open champ, Louis Oosthuizen (No. 11) and Australians Aaron Baddeley and Robert Allenby (Nos. 14 and 15, respectively.)

So Norman clearly faces a difficult choice.

"It's been frustrating for me because it's the last year I would like to play poorly is the year that the Presidents Cup is being played in Australia," Ogilvy said. "And from Greg's perspective it's obviously making it difficult for him. ... You get the feeling he's been watching pretty closely all year because he does seem to be very in touch with what we're doing over here. I'm sure he'll end up making the right choices."

Ogilvy's desire is heightened by the fact that the Presidents Cup is being played this November at Royal Melbourne, which is located about 400 or 500 yards from where he grew up. He remembers jumping the fence and sneaking in to watch Tom Watson win the Australian Open there in 1984. He also attended the Australian Bicentennial Open, which was played on the famed Sandbelt course four years later.

"It was probably the biggest golf tournament in the world in 1988," recalled Ogilvy, who now owns a home adjacent to Royal Melbourne. " It was $500,000 first place in 1988, which was unheard of at that point, yeah. Nicklaus played, Freddie played, everyone, like Crenshaw was there. It was huge.
   
"So Royal Melbourne is pretty special just because of that, my history there.  And the fact that it's The Presidents Cup in Australia, yeah, it's definitely not one that I would like to miss.  It would be a pretty amazing week.  I'll probably be around there regardless    whether or not I was in the tournament I'd be there anyway. ... So I would like to play, yeah."

NORTON, Mass. -- Geoff Ogilvy just rolled in a birdie putt of 69 feet, 6 inches on the third hole at TPC Boston.

It's the longest putt of the week by 7 feet, 4 inches and the second from more than 60 feet.

The birdie putt got him back to 8 under for the tournament, which is three strokes off the lead. Ogilvy had bogeyed the first hole when he failed to get up-and-down from the left greenside bunker.

Ogilvy entered the Deutsche Bank Championship ranked 91st in the FedExCup with only the top 70 advancing. He's currently projected at 64th.

 

Rank	Name	Length	Hole (Round)	Result
1	Geoff Ogilvy	69 feet, 6 inches	No. 3 (Fourth)	Birdie
2	Jonathan Byrd	62 feet, 4 inches	No. 9 (First)	Birdie
3	Ben Crane	59 feet, 8 inches	No. 14 (First)	Birdie

By Helen Ross, PGATOUR.COM

NORTON, Mass. -- Geoff Ogilvy matched his low round of the season with a 66 on Sunday at TPC Boston.

The last time Ogilvy shot that low was back in February in his second round of 2011. Some 56 rounds later, Ogilvy used the most recent 66 to make a strong bid to extend his season -- and possibly play his way onto the Presidents Cup team, as well.

Ogilvy started quickly Sunday, reeling off three straight birdies beginning at the second hole. A bogey at the fifth halted his momentum but the Aussie managed six more birdies on the back nine against just two bogeys to move to 8 under for the tournament.

"It was pretty good," Ogilvy said. "It could have been better probably. When you're 3 under after 4 you kind of feel like you have a chance at a really low one. I needed to have something under par today to give myself a chance to have a decent finish here. That's probably what I had to do. Not enough to really  --  I might be happy. It depends what (the leaders) do. I'm going to need a low one tomorrow."

One more good round and Ogilvy will likely have played his way to the BMW Championship for fifth time since the PGA TOUR Playoffs for the FedExCup began in 2007. He had put himself behind the eight-ball a bit when he fell 12 spots with a missed cut last week at The Barclays.

When he finished on Sunday, though, Ogilvy was projected at No. 58 -- with the top 70 players advancing to the third Playoffs event at Cog Hill in two weeks. His goal for Labor Day is to play as well as he can and let the rest take care of itself. 

"There's too many different scenarios," Ogilvy said. "I don't know really. I'd like to have a good enough one to guarantee Atlanta, guarantee Presidents Cup, win the tournament. I just want to keep playing. If I have a half decent round tomorrow, I'm sure I'll get to Chicago. Then I've got to find some way to have four decent rounds around there. Just trying to play well."

Ogilvy, who ranks 12th in the International Team standings for the Presidents Cup, says he doesn't change his strategy when he's in a do-or-die situation like the Playoffs. He's well aware of the points system but he doesn’t obsess about it.

"I look at it with interest, more as a ... ah, if I finish there, I'm going to finish there in the FedExCup, rather than, oh, I've got to have another birdie so I get a few (more points)," he said. "... More interested to see what the fluctuation is going to be rather than concerned about what it's going to be."

Notes from the third and final round of The Barclays, the opening event in the PGA TOUR Playoffs for the FedExCup. ( Click here for updated FedExCup standings): WHO’S ELIMINATED: With the conclusion of The Barclays, the field in the PGA TOUR Playoffs for the FedExCup has been trimmed from 125 to 100 players. Officially being eliminated Saturday at Plainfield Country Club were Bryce Molder, Josh Teater, Hunter Haas, Chris DiMarco, Paul Goydos, D.J. Trahan, Nick O’Hern, Matt Bettencourt, Arjun Atwal, Tim Herron, Michael Bradley, Retief Goosen, Kevin Stadler, Heath Slocum, Joe Ogilvie, David Hearn,. These 16 join the nine players who were officially eliminated Friday after missing the cut or withdrawing from the tournament: Tom Gillis, Michael Thompson, Vaughn Taylor, Rod Pampling, Billy Mayfair, James Driscoll, Steven Bowditch, Steve Flesch and Stuart Appleby. TRENDING UP: The 2011 Playoffs took on a very 2008 feel this week. The 2008 FedExCup runner-up, Camilo Villegas, was No. 125 in the standings and in danger of missing the Playoffs two weeks ago. He is now at No. 51, probably safe through to the BMW Championship, after a 51-spot jump this week at The Barclays. Villegas finished tied for sixth at The Barclays a week after a T9 finish at the Wyndham Championship got him into the Playoffs. … Vijay Singh, who won the FedExCup in 2008, got his putter rolling and led the field in birdies as he tied for third and moved up to eighth in the FedExCup standings. … Padraig Harrington and William McGirt were the last two in the Playoffs and both moved on to the Deutsche Bank Championship. Harrington tied for 13th at The Barclays and moved 44 spots to No. 80 in the FedExCup standings. McGirt isn’t far from the “last man in” at TPC Boston, where he will open the week at 90th in the FedExCup standings. TRENDING DOWN: Ben Crane fell from No. 86 to No. 100 in the FedExCup standings, finishing just three points away from being the highest-ranked player to be eliminated from the Playoffs at The Barclays. Crane made it to the TOUR Championship by Coca-Cola last year and has played in the BMW Championship each of the last three seasons. He has his work cut out for him if he wants to make it four straight trips to Chicago. … Geoff Ogilvy has played 16 of 17 events in the history of the Playoffs but after a missed cut at The Barclays, he fell to 91st in the FedExCup standings and in need of a strong showing next week to move on. … Andres Romero’s quest for survival was a compelling story during the 2010 Playoffs. Romero, after this week’s T64 finish, is on the bubble again at No. 72 in the FedExCup standings. The 30-year-old has finished outside the top 40 in his last two starts and will need to rebound to move on to the third event of the Playoffs. TOP FIVE: Here’s how the top five players in FedExCup points going into this week performed on Saturday. The top five in points going into the final event of the Playoffs, the TOUR Championship by Coca-Cola, will control their own destiny.

Rank	Player	Last week	Comment
1	Dustin Johnson	19	Picked a great time to get his first win since last year's Playoffs
2	Matt Kuchar	12	Another strong Barclays makes Kuchar a FedExCup threat again
3	Nick Watney	1	Didn't hurt himself with a Sunday 64 and a T10 finish.
4	Webb Simpson	3	Carried momentum from Wyndham win to T10 at Plainfield
5	Luke Donald	4	Started slowly but good weekend moved him ahead of Stricker

DEFENDING CHAMP: Jim Furyk  finished T52 at The Barclays and is one of two players in the field to have maintained their FedExCup standing. Furyk heads to TPC Boston at No. 60 in the standings for the second consecutive week.

By Brian Wacker, PGATOUR.COM

CROMWELL, Conn. -- Geoff Ogilvy’s left shoulder is getting closer to 100 percent after an injury to it caused him to miss about a month of action from mid-May to mid-June.

“Memphis I was semi worried about it,” Ogilvy said Wednesday at the Travelers Championship. “It’s getting better every week. Today I didn’t even think about it. My first three shots in the morning, maybe it’s just age, like a few different parts of my body hurt. But after about 10 it seems to go away and it’s business as usual.”

Ogilvy is back at the Travelers Championship for the first time in 10 years -- mostly because he missed a couple of starts due to the injury.

“The problem with injury, you don’t miss just tournaments, you miss golf altogether because I couldn’t really do anything,” Ogilvy said.

When Ogilvy did return, he tied for 66th at the FedEx St. Jude Classic then missed the cut at the U.S. Open.

“I didn’t really play that bad last week,” Ogilvy said. “It just didn’t turn out very well, so your expectations are getting back to where would have been before.”

By Brian Wacker, PGATOUR.COM

CROMWELL, Conn. -- Rory McIlroy’s performance at the U.S. Open has drawn comparisons to Tiger Woods and his 2000 victory at Pebble Beach. Geoff Ogilvy, however, compares McIlroy to Greg Norman -- not for his Masters meltdown, but for his ball-striking and ability off the tee.

“He hit 62 of 72 greens at the U.S. Open,” Ogilvy said Thursday from the Travelers Championship, where players were still buzzing over McIlroy’s victory at Congressional. “There’s no way I could ever do that. Not too many people can do that, especially after the Masters when everyone probably would have given him the year off.

“Two months later he was playing like it never happened. Amazing. It’s Greg Norman ‘86 type stuff; he’s just clearly better than anyone else. There’s so few really class ball-strikers out here -- I know that sounds silly but real class ball strikers like Nick Price and Greg Norman. It’s Greg Norman in the mid-80s is who he is. He just completely outplays everyone with no fear. Some people are being aggressive and they’re just cavalier. He’s not cavalier.”

Ogilvy should know. He had a view of McIlroy from two groups behind him the first two days of the U.S. Open. Ogilvy also played against and beat him in 2009 on his way to winning the World Golf Championships-Accenture Match Play Championship and later that year was paired with McIlroy in the final round of the WGC-HSBC Champions, where McIlroy nearly came from nowhere to win the tournament with a Sunday 63.

“I played well and I birdied 15, 16 and 17 and didn’t win any of them,” Ogilvy said of the WGC-Accenture Match Play. “To be 2 up with four to play and go birdie, birdie, birdie and not win a hole was pretty unbelievable.

“I remember I closed out the match and my caddie and I jumped in the van that takes you back to the clubhouse and we both just looked at each other and said this guy’s unbelievable.”

Ian Poulter took it a step further.

“He’s as good a ball-striker as I’ve ever seen,” Poulter said.

“He swings it naturally. There’s not much technically he needs to worry about.”

Poulter added that he also wasn’t surprised that McIlroy bounced back from his heartbreak at the Masters and that he did so in resounding fashion.

“Look at his first rounds in majors,” Poulter said. “It was a case of when, not if.”

Now it will be a case of not when but how many.

PONTE VEDRA BEACH, Fla. – Geoff Ogilvy was forced to withdraw from THE PLAYERS Championship after nine holes in Friday’s second round with a left shoulder injury.

Ogilvy had to pull out prior to last week’s Wells Fargo Championship with the same injury, and had been receiving soft tissue treatment since then in preparation for this week.

“The dodgy shoulder was perhaps not ready for play,” Ogilvy tweeted after withdrawing Friday. “It was just slowly hurting more and more out there. More rest for it, I guess.”

Ogilvy shot a 3-over 75 in Thursday’s first round at TPC Sawgrass, with a scorecard that included four birdies, five bogeys and a triple bogey at the par-5 16th.

On Friday, he started his second round off the 10th tee. He bogeyed the 12th hole, bounced back with a birdie at the 13th, and posted consecutive bogeys at 15 and 16 in making the turn at 38.

The shoulder injury is not the only health problem Ogilvy has suffered this year.

Prior to the season-opening Hyundai Tournament of Champions, Ogilvy suffered a cut to his right index finger when he slipped and fell on some coral reef at a nearby beach. Having to pull out from that event was especially disappointing since Ogilvy entered as the two-time defending champ.

The Australian didn’t make his next start until a month later at the Waste Management Phoenix Open, where he finished 13th.

Last month at the Masters, Ogilvy produced his best result of the year, a tie for fourth after shooting a final-round 67. But he said that was when his shoulder began bothering him, and it still affected him when he played the next week at the Valero Texas Open, where he finished tied for 23rd.

Ogilvy has won seven PGA TOUR events, including the 2006 U.S. Open but has not enjoyed much success at THE PLAYERS.

In nine previous starts at TPC Sawgrass, his best finish was a tie for 16th in 2003, and he’s missed the cut four times. In 27 career rounds at THE PLAYERS, he’s carded just two rounds in the 60s at the par-72 Stadium Course.

FEDEXCUP: Standings | Who’s up, down? | Weekly Leaders | FEC 101 | More notes By Chris Dunham, PGATOUR.COM Editorial Coordinator With a full field of 145 players and 600 FedExCup points available to the winner, THE PLAYERS Championship provides the greatest opportunity for someone to make a big move in the season’s first five months. This week’s field boasts the top 80 in the FedExCup standings and anyone currently inside the top 19 could unseat Bubba Watson for the top spot with a victory at TPC Sawgrass. PREDICTING SUCCESS: Since the PGA TOUR Playoffs for the FedExCup were installed in 2007, 43 of 44 playoff-eligible competitors who finished inside the top 10 at TPC Sawgrass went on to qualify for postseason play. That’s nearly 98 percent. The lone exception was Chris Stroud, who tied for 10th in 2010 but was eliminated from the Playoffs on the final day of the Regular Season. Two PLAYERS champions (Phil Mickelson in 2007 and Sergio Garcia in 2008) have gone on to finish third in the PGA TOUR Playoffs for the FedExCup. Henrik Stenson was not a TOUR member when he won in 2009 and last year's PLAYERS champion, Tim Clark, finished 24th. POWER PAIRINGS: Those near the top of the standings will be able to keep a close eye on one-another during the first two rounds this week. The top 12 players in the current standings will be grouped for Rounds 1 and 2 of THE PLAYERS. Nos. 1-3 Bubba Watson, Luke Donald and Mark Wilson are this week’s Featured Group and will start their first round Thursday on No. 10 at 8:08 a.m. ET. Phil Mickelson, Martin Laird and Gary Woodland are ranked Nos. 4-6 and will start Thursday on No. 1 at 1:18 p.m. ET. Nos. 7-9 Nick Watney, Rory Sabbatini and Jonathan Byrd tee off on No. 10 Thursday at 8:18 a.m. ET, just behind the top 3. Nos. 10-12 Brandt Snedeker, Aaron Baddeley and Webb Simpson will follow Mickelson’s group of No. 1 at 1:28 p.m. ET Thursday. BIGGEST MOVERS: Lucas Glover surged 120 spots from 120th to 27th with his victory at the Wells Fargo Championship. Joining him on the upswing were Andres Romero (T16, from 150th to 119th) and Bobby Gates (T6, 125th to 96th). Two time PLAYERS champion Davis Love III climbed 25 spots to 108th when he tied for 16th at Quail Hollow. NOTABLE DROPS: Chris Riley took the hardest fall, going from 123rd to 135th in the standings when he did not play last week. Camilo Villegas and Geoff Ogilvy were among the other four to fall double-digit spots. Each of the three players mentioned will tee it up at TPC Sawgrass this week. MORE ON LAST WEEK’S WINNER: Lucas Glover got to 27th in the FedExCup standings with his victory at Quail Hollow. It was Glover’s first win since the 2009 U.S. Open and got him to his highest spot in the standings since closing the 2009 Playoffs in 17th. Glover’s 622 points are just 121 shy of his total of 743 from last which was good for 47th at the close of the Regular Season.