"Is strange that it has taken so long for wee Timmy to catch on to the obvious benefits."

Thursday's Woods-Kaymer-Westwood pairing came as little surprise to the Euro press, but to us it's still a shocker considering we're only a few weeks into storyline pairings on the PGA Tour. Steve Elling and John Huggan kick this and other stuff around on the eve of the Pebble Beach and Dubai events.

Elling: My only question is, what took so long? The PGA Tour said at Torrey Pines that it will be tweaking groupings this year to heighten interest and generate newspaper column inches, as commissioner Tim Finchem put it last week. At Torrey, the U.S. tour paired Woods and Rocco Mediate, who dueled on the same course for the 2008 U.S. Open title. Kudos to the Euros for going a step farther.

Huggan: This sort of thing is old news on the ET. Is strange that it has taken so long for wee Timmy to catch on to the obvious benefits. Still, he has Ray Romano this week at Pebble Beach.

Elling: It's interesting that the PGA Tour, which has never had a truly blind draw even within its status categories, is copping to manipulating the tee sheet to draw eyeballs. Notice how Tiger and Mickelson are never paired in a regular tour event and are always on opposite sides of draw sheet? That's for TV. And it's contrived. Still, who loses? Hard to see a downside, really.