The Big Three?

The Golf Channel just promo'd Golf Central by teasing that one of the "Big 3" has withdrawn from the Arnold Palmer Invitational. The one who withdrew was Ernie Els. The "Big 3" are Tiger Woods, Phil Mickelson and Ernie Els.

To me, that's more like one of those standardized test questions where you're given a set of items and asked to identify the one that doesn't belong.

Remember when there was a "Big 4"? That was Woods, Mickelson, Els and Vijay Singh. Then, for a while, there was a "Big 5" - Woods, Mickelson, Els, Singh and Retief Goosen.

Goosen would have trouble making the "Big 35" these days. And Singh is 45 years old and going through some swing changes (although it would be foolish to count out the possibility of his rising back into the Top 4 in the world rankings).

And the "Big 3" the Golf Channel referenced? Well, Els has one win in the last three-and-a-half years on the PGA Tour. Sure, it came just a couple weeks ago, but still ...

In his career, Els has half as many wins as Mickelson, and a quarter as many as Tiger.

There is no "Big 3." There the Biggest One and the Bigger One, and then there's everyone else. The "else," not "Els."