Casey victory would clinch $13.6m payday

PAUL CASEY could be forgiven a rueful smile for remarking 10 days ago that one of the reasons he had not won more often was because he played in the era of Tiger and Phil. It is as if the best players of the present generation have taken it upon themselves to show they are quite good, as well. First, it was Rory McIlroy — at close to his very best — who denied the englishman a long overdue win and then, on Sunday, Casey (right) played beautifully once again at the BMW Championship, only to be foiled this time by the brilliance of Dustin Johnson. Aside from adding a none-too-shabby $1.8million to his bank balance over the course of seven lucrative days, the other good news for Arizona-based Casey is that he is now in the all important top five going into the last event in the Fedex Cup race. It means that if he claims the Tour Championship at east Lake next week — and he has a good record there — he will earn himself a gargantuan $11.8m payday, on top of that $1.8m. That might take care of any pangs of regret for contentiously ruling himself out of the Ryder Cup, mightn’t it? As for McIlroy, despite a disappointing week at the BMW, he still lies sixth in the table and will head to Georgia in virtually the same boat as Casey.