Phil Fired: Fesses Up To Reason Behind Assistant Coach Role

It was heartwarming to see Phil Mickelson enlisted as an ASU interim assistant coach at his alma mater and working under brother Tim Mickelson. And now it's all over before Phil could even get his luxury Mercedes Sprinter van-driving license.

Golfweek's Cassie Stein with Phil's refreshingly honest explanation today that this was really more about recruiting one player and ensuring NCAA rules had not been violated. And I had "blame a rogue videographer" in the Phil is no longer assistant coaching pool!

"He (Tim, his older brother and head coach) needed some real help," Mickelson said. "We had developed a plan to where I could call some recruits. We weren't really going to say anything and hadn't said anything for a few weeks until one of the players had tweeted it and it looked like there were some improprieties, which there weren't, so we had to publicly announce I was assistant captain; otherwise, I wouldn't be able to make the phone calls I had been making."

Mickelson is referring to Australian Ryan Ruffels, who tweeted about his phone call with Mickelson. Ruffels is ranked 19th in the World Amateur Golf Rankings.

Besides not digging a hole for himself and ASU, there is reason to like Phil's chances this week, reports Mark Lamport-Stokes on Mickelson's Super Bowl/Scottsdale synergy.