Who's next?
Heading into the St. Jude Classic this week, there have been 10 winners in their 20s on the PGA Tour not halfway through the season, two more than in all of 2009, and if this continues, there could be more than the 15 young guns who won tournaments in 2008.
And the money list and the FedEx Cup standings show there are several more candidates to join the club, including Rickie Fowler, 21; Jeff Overton, 27; Kevin Na, 26; Ricky Barnes, 29; Alex Prugh, 25; Troy Merritt, 24; Brendon De Jonge, 29; and Marc Leishman, 26, among others.
Rory McIlory of Northern Ireland is the leader in the clubhouse, having won the 2009 Dubai Desert Classic on the European Tour before capturing the Quail Hollow Championship last month, two days before he turned 21.
By becoming the youngest winner on the circuit since Tiger Woods in 1996, he climbed into the top 10 of the World Golf Rankings.
Of course, you don't have to be in your 20s to win for the first time, as 37-year-old Ian Poulter proved at the WGC-Accenture Match Play Championship and 34-year-old Tim Clark reiterated at the Players Championship.
However, it's important that the next generation of golf stars begins developing, especially with such longtime stalwarts such as Phil Mickelson, Ernie Els and Jim Furyk turning 40 within eight months of each other, beginning with the Big Easy last October.
Furyk and Els each have won twice this year and Lefty captured the Masters, so they probably will join Vijay Singh, Kenny Perry and Steve Stricker in proving that there is life on the PGA Tour after 40.
But long term, the game needs talented youngsters to come along every few years to keep the sport thriving, and it is happening in spades right now.
"When I look at these young players in their 20s, they're all so talented," Mickelson, who won 17 times before turning 30, said two years ago. "They all have so much game."
Lefty was talking about players such as Sergio Garcia and Trevor Immelman, who have since turned 30; Anthony Kim, 24; Hunter Mahan, 27; Dustin Johnson, 25; Adam Scott, 29; Camilo Villegas, 27; Sean O'Hair, 28; Nick Watney, 27; and Martin Kaymer, 25.
As McIlory has shown, they are getting younger and younger.
You have 17-year-old Matteo Manassero of Italy, who was the No. 1-ranked amateur in the world before turning pro recently. He was low amateur in the Open Championship at Turnberry and the Masters and became the youngest player (16 years, 11 months and 22 days) to make the cut at Augusta.
Ryo Ishikawa, 18, of Japan captured his first victory on the Japan Golf Tour at the age of 15 and claimed his seventh victory on that circuit last month when he shot 12-under-par 58 in the final round of The Crowns tournament.
Danny Lee of New Zealand, the 2008 U.S. Amateur champion, became the youngest winner on the PGA European Tour last year when he captured the Johnnie Walker Classic at the age of 18 years, six months, and Noh Seung-Yul of South Korea was right behind him when he claimed the Maybank Malaysian Open in March at the age of 18 years, nine months.
Others to watch include 22-year-old Jamie Lovemark, the former NCAA champion from USC who nearly won on the PGA Tour late last year and is playing on the Nationwide Tour; 22-year-old Chris Wood of England, low amateur in the 2008 Open Championship at Royal Birkdale, who returned last year to finish third at Turnberry; 22-year-old Danny Willett, the 2008 English Amateur champion, who is making noise on the European Tour, including a tie for fifth in the BMW PGA Championship; and 25-year-old Rhys Davies of Wales, who captured the 2010 Trophee Hassan II and finished second in two other Euro Tour events this season.
"It's an impressive group," Greg Norman said of the younger generation last year at the British Open. "I think it's a sign of the times. They start so early now, and their training technique and conditioning is so generally top-class that these kids come out here prepared to play.
"They have no fear. And the thing that really impresses me is that they're from all over; they're a truly global group. I think it's great, and it's great for golf."
Scott, who will turn 30 in July, knows the pitfalls of being earmarked for stardom at an early age, having suffered through a slump late in his 20s before rebounding to capture the Valero Texas Open last month.
He believes the youth movement has something to do with the Tiger Effect.
"Every generation learns from the one before," Scott said. "Tiger won early and Sergio learned from that, and he did it early. I was doing it at a fairly early age.
"Now you have Rory and Ryo. They've learned from guys like Tiger. Look at Ryo. He's 18 and he's been doing this for three years. He's already played a Presidents Cup. That's hard to get your head around."
A few weeks ago, 16-year-olds Jordan Spieth of Dallas and Grayson Murray of Raleigh, N.C., made big news on the same weekend.
Murray, a high school sophomore, birdied five of his last seven holes in Round 2 to make the cut in the Rex Hospital Open, becoming the second-youngest player to play on the weekend in a Nationwide Tour event.
Spieth, a junior at Jesuit High in Dallas, not only became the sixth-youngest player to play on the weekend in a PGA Tour event, but he was also with the leaders most of the way before finishing in a tie for 16th at the HP Byron Nelson Championship.
"Nobody that's here enters a tournament if they don't think they can win, at least in their own mind," said Spieth, who is playing with the big boys again this week at TPC Southwind.
That's right out of the Tiger Woods playbook.
