Meanwhile, back on the links (golf's other top stories of 2010)

He has been forever encamped at No. 1 in the world rankings, atop the endorsement earnings and seasonal money list, has won more often than any player in history over the comparative arc of his career, and in 2010, achieved yet another pack-leading distinction.
This time, the scorekeeping was downright unsettling.

Jim Furyk gave the tour a legitimate Player of the Year and FedEx Cup winner at the Tour Championship. (Getty Images)

According to the keepers of many year-end lists, Tiger Woods' downfall in 2010 was the No. 1 story in sports, not just in the genteel pastime called golf.
So that's a first, if not a worst, too.
There's no need to dredge up the dregs of Woods' unseemly scandal, his stint in rehab, two-month disappearance, ham-handed comeback plan, his scatological and X-rated text messages or divorces from his wife and swing coach. That's covered already.
What was found behind his bedroom door will never be completely forgotten, no matter how well he plays the rest of the way. Yet with Woods largely rendered a member of the walking wounded this year, doling out hush money and going winless for the first time since he was a toddler, doors of opportunity opened. Garage doors, in terms of their size.
Woods was in the courtroom, on the Internet, serving as the focal point of stand-up acts, hardcover books and hardcore porno movies. Inside the ropes, though, he was mostly irrelevant, which meant there were plenty of other plotlines that developed as the Tiger-centric void was filled from without and within.
Thank goodness. As ever, though this time for entirely different reasons, Woods ranked Numero Uno as the game's leading water-cooler topic. But even the biggest golf story in the history of the game could not overshadow every noteworthy development elsewhere.
Here's a look at the remaining nine items on our Top 10 of 2010 list, which, years from now, might one day represent the Year Everything Changed.
2. We've become their Euro peons
It's hardly a startling revelation that the thrust of the American charge during the past decade-plus has been led, if not limited, to a pair of players, Woods and Phil Mickelson. With the pair combining for one win in 2010, the international contingent took full advantage, claiming three of the major titles. Europe, in particular, made the most of the changing of the guard, winning back the Ryder Cup, claiming the U.S. Open title for the first time in 40 years and winning the PGA Championship for the second time in three years. By year's end, seven of the top 11 in the world ranking were European players, all but one of them younger than Lefty and Woody. Usually, these things are cyclical, but with Woods, Mickelson and Jim Furyk all 35 or older by the time the 2011 season starts, it doesn't feel like the wheel's coming around again for the Yanks anytime soon.
3. An ocean runs through it
It was, at times, entertaining. In others ways, it was a bit annoying. But the rift between the game's two biggest pro tours is starting to make the Atlantic Ocean seen like a dry creek bed. Rising star Rory McIlroy quit the PGA Tour after one season. Lee Westwood accused the PGA Tour of provincialism when McIlroy was passed over for top-rookie honors. Westwood, newly minted as world No. 1, and then PGA winner Martin Kaymer, declined to take up their membership on the States. Their well-chronicled snubs were roundly celebrated abroad, where the mighty PGA Tour is held in the same general esteem as a schoolyard bully. Meanwhile, the European Tour hiked its membership provisions for the second time in three years, making it even tougher for top Euros to split time on two tours. The territorial battle lines and carping were never more obvious than in 2010.
4. Jim Dandy to the rescue
For weeks, the tour waited for the leading candidate to emerge. Make that months. From the fog of the FedEx Cup finale, not to mention a steady final-round downpour, Jim Furyk finally became the first player to win three titles on the PGA Tour, claiming the FedEx bonus in the process. Furyk, overshadowed by Mickelson and Woods his entire career, probably ensured that he will someday land a spot in the Hall of Fame, since being voted Player of the Year by his peers carries some weight. Furyk can count a U.S. Open among his 16 career wins, and in winning the Tour Championship, he saved the farcical FedEx from even greater scrutiny and ridicule. After all, Paul Casey almost won the $10 million bonus and he didn't win a tournament all year.
5. Crappy lyrics and you can't dance to it
With one year of data in the books, there's no doubt the Great Grooves Grinddown of 2010 was a complete non-starter. Outside of some awkward name-calling and posturing by Mickelson and other stars at the beginning of the season, the decision by the game's rule makers to soften the edges in irons caused precious little impact in the attacking styles of pro players. Sure, Robert Allenby hit a pair of fliers early in the season that cost him chances at victory, but players certainly didn't throttle back much on the dump-and-chase mindset off the tee, a style they've used for more than a decade. Indeed, some prominent players said they liked playing with the new grooves better because they can hit the ball farther out of the rough. Statistically, the grooves change had almost zero effect, though the USGA warns that PGA Tour setups were more generous this year and that a larger database will be needed to measure the effectiveness of the rule change. Maybe Jack Nicklaus was right, when he said three years ago after learning the rule change was in the pipeline, that tweaking the grooves was like "throwing a deck chair off the Titanic." As for the increased emphasis on shot-making that the rule was supposed to precipitate? Glub, glub.
6. Rules and irregulations
Dustin Johnson blew a chance to win a major championship and was nicknamed "Dustbin" by the European writers. Juli Inkster, who has been a pro so long, she has daughters older than many of her LPGA peers, got disqualified from an event. A player was mistakenly kicked out of a Futures Tour event. Jim Furyk was disqualified for missing his pro-am tee time. Ian Poulter got dinged a stroke in a playoff when he dropped his ball on his marker in the Euro finale and Brian Davis inadvertently clipped a piece of vegetation in a playoff with Furyk at Hilton Head. We could do a top-10 list alone of the biggest rules disasters of 2010. In a season in which TV ratings and attendance declined, the last thing golf needed was to get caught up in the fine print, which most fans find to be as undecipherable as hieroglyphics and about as relevant to their everyday lives. The Johnson penalty was met with outright outrage in many quarters, and like the Woods scandal, put golf at the fore of the sports section for all the wrong reasons.
6. Finally, the next generation
Tiger Woods, Phil Mickelson and Vijay Singh combined to average more than 11 wins annually in the decade from 2000-2009. Last year, they managed one between them. They dominated the money list during the same span, but only Lefty finished in the top 10 in earnings in 2010. As their temples finally began to gray, the kids with funny hairdos finally showed up. Teens Ryo Ishikawa and Italy's Mattero Manassero won on the Japanese and European tours, joining erstwhile classmates and the top stars among the kiddie corps, Rory McIlroy and Rickie Fowler, both 21. At some point, biology mandates that a new generation must begin supplanting the old guard, but nobody envisioned that in an era of unsurpassed depth in the professional game, the training wheels on their trikes would come off so early.
7. Monty the magnificent
Compared to U.S. captain Corey Pavin, a guy so bland he could put coffee in a coma, European Ryder Cup captain Colin Montgomerie was always going to look like an enervated, enlightened leader. But when Monty was heralded as the conquering hero after leading Europe to victory in the first four-day Ryder contest ever, slogging through the mud and mayhem, it was just the final headlining piece to his busy season. For those with short memories, Monty generated more tabloid-style news and gossip than any other player not named Eldrick. He was caught in an extra-marital affair, not long after he became one of the first notable players to opine that Woods had lost his aura as a result of his multiple affairs. As if that bit of hypocrisy wasn't enough, Monty succeeded in getting a restraining order that prevented the U.K. publication of purportedly embarrassing photos taken by a former girlfriend that were to be printed during the run-up to the Ryder Cup. Outside of Lee Westwood, Martin Kaymer, Graeme McDowell and Rory McIlroy, no Continental generated more buzz in 2010 -- although the rest did it with their clubs. But when Monty recaptured the Ryder Cup, by the thinnest of margins despite his squad losing three of the four sessions, all was forgiven.
8. Kooch conquers the world
What, you were surprised by the season of Matt Kuchar, who had played so poorly earlier in his career that he had been bounced back to the Nationwide Tour for more seasoning? Clearly, you had not been tracking his ascent for the previous three years. Starting when he got his PGA Tour card back in 2007, Kuchar ascended from No. 115 to No. 70 to No. 24 to first in earnings, a remarkable climb for a player who was a smiling breath of fresh air at a time when the tour needed positivity and good news. While others, like Jim Furyk, won more tournaments, Kuchar was steady from start to finish and won the Vardon Trophy for lowest stroke average. Turns out the guy absolutely massacred the 23 other players on the Ryder Cup teams on the ping-pong tables in Wales, too. With his putting stroke, it would be surprising if Kuchar doesn't contend at many more majors.
9. Inheriting the throne
It didn't happen like anyone envisioned. With nobody charging the castle walls, Lee Westwood assumed the No. 1 position in the world ranking though he had barely played for weeks, mostly because of the attrition caused by Tiger Woods' poor play in 2010. Phil Mickelson had so many shots at claiming No. 1 for the first time in his career, we lost track in the teens. In China, three players had a chance to wrest the No. 1 ranking from Westwood, though nobody did. Westwood was his usual, steady self in 2010, though he only won once. He has been the best player at the majors for two-and-a-half years. With experts predicting that Woods will never again soar to the same heights as before, there could be a veritable turnstile installed at No. 1. Whereas Woods once led by margins so wide he was able to quit playing for a half-season (knee injury) and still retain his crown, a handful of top players are one big win from climbing to the top. As they say on the London subway, Mind the Gap.
10. Feelgood Phil, just when we needed it
When Tiger Woods returned from his self-imposed hiatus, the toxic cloud of his sex scandal still surrounding him, he shot 68 in the opening round at the Masters, his best first round at Augusta National ever. A fellow scribe, who, like many of us figured that Woods would find a way to win despite the tumult in his personal life, said, "If Tiger wins this thing, it sets karma back a thousand years." Not to worry, because kismet, providence and karma would rule the day eventually. In one of the most heart-warming scenes on the PGA Tour in decades, Phil Mickelson hit all the hero shots down the stretch to win his third Masters title and was met behind the final green by his tearful wife, who has been battling breast cancer. While the sordid details of Woods' life played out, Mickelson handled his family issues -- his mother was also diagnosed with the same affliction -- with class and dignity. Without question, it was the most celebrated and appreciated victory of the entire season, for all the right reasons.

extracted from cbssports.com