Keegan Bradley of the US celebrates winning the US PGA Championship

Normally lists are done in tens. The 10 best golfers of all time. The 10 best shots of the year. But in golf, 10 isn't the number we surround ourselves with. It's nine. We play 9 holes. We hope to end our round with a 9 in it (be it, 89, 79, 69, or even, gasp, 59), and so this year, we've decided to focus our end of year awards in nines. Here are the nine best birdies of 2011.

9.) Bubba Watson's birdie on the final hole at Torrey Pines - He had another lefty, Phil Mickelson, hot on his heels, and a birdie would mean Phil would have to hole out for eagle to win, so what did Bubba do? Calmly

Luke Donald of Britain plays a shot

Can Luke Donald win a major?

Ever since Tiger Woods fell from golf's good graces, we've seen a strange melange of top-ranked golfers and major winners capturing the headlines, but never at the same time. The reigning world No. 1 hasn't won a major since Woods at Torrey Pines more than three years ago.

That's going to change in 2012. Luke Donald, without a doubt the best player in the world, is going to win his first major this year. Best guess? Either Augusta or the PGA Championship. But it will happen, and Donald will secure his place as the best golfer on the planet.

Why? Recent history.

Bubba Watson

If you've ever played with a professional golfer on his home course before, you know those guys have no problem going ridiculously low on a consistent basis.

Besides having the local knowledge and game to fire at pretty much every pin they see, the lack of pressure also makes it a heck of a lot easier to just let loose and have some fun.

You'd have to think that was the case for Bubba Watson, who rewrote the Estancia Club, located in Scottsdale, Arizona, record books with a round from the gold tees - measuring 7,314 yards - that certainly turned some heads.

So how low did Bubba go? Try 58. BM

Luke Donald must be absolutely exhausted. He has just been crowned king of golf in both
Europe and America, the first man to do so; he has just completed a season which saw him record top 10 finishes in 20 of his 25 events; he is grieving the recent loss of his father, who died just a few weeks ago; and he has two baby girls, with the youngest, Sophia, being born just a few days after his father's death while the other, Elle, has only just celebrated her first birthday.

Yet despite all that, and with Christmas less than a fortnight away, he still finds the energy and inclination to fly to the 

Last week Martin Kaymer came out and said that he had no intention of following Rory McIlroy and Lee Westwood to the US PGA Tour and said that he finds their decision to rejoin the circuit "strange".

Westwood and McIlroy have been bouncing between both the US Tour and the European Tour for the last few years, while Kaymer has stayed loyal to Europe.

Currently players have to play a minimum of 15 events to keep their US PGA Tour card and 13 events to keep a European card although the WGC events and the four Grand Slams are co-sanctioned events so count on both tours.

This makes it possible, but

Amid the predictable toing and froing in steamy Atlanta yesterday, there was a common theme among those candidates involved in what has become quite a rowdy battle to land the 93rd US PGA Championship: no touring professional is particularly fond of the 18th hole at the Highlands Course. It leaves them feeling low.

In fact, let us rephrase that: some professionals visibly hate this finishing hole so much that they are actively campaigning to see it reworked from a hate-filled par-4 to a more relenting par-5. The 18th hole is 507 yards of water, sand and much wailing. Oh, how they lament the

"Cinderella story. Outta nowhere. A former greenskeeper, now, about to become the Masters champion. It looks like a mirac..It's in the hole! It's in the hole! It's in the hole!" bellows Bill Murray's dim greenkeeper character Carl Spackler in the riotous golf comedy Caddyshack. Such sentiments pretty much sum up what went on around Atlanta Athletic Club in blistering Georgia over the past four days.

It would be difficult to claim this is the start of the Keegan Bradley era in golf, but the man with two names deserves a few days to relax and bask in the glory of making off with the 93rd US

When Bunker
Mentality first heard Fred Couples guaranteeing Tiger Woods a spot on the Presidents
Cup team, it seemed exactly the right thing for the captain to do.

Ever since
then, however, BM has become totally convinced that it is utter, unexcusable madness
that will do nothing to help anybody whose life does not revolve around TV
ratings.

Fans will
be paying to watch a golfer who, right now, simply can't hit a ball in anything
like a straight line. The competition will be hobbled as the US side effectively
plays with 11 and a half men. And the international team, who will be hot
favourites