O'Hair played well the first half of the season. Then his wife Jackie gave birth to the couple's third child (Grady, their second son) in June, about the same time he was dealing with an injury to his forearm. But he would close with three top eights in the Fed Ex playoffs, including a third (behind Phil Mickelson and Tiger Woods) in the Tour Championship.
He finished sixth on the money list, with just over $4.3 million, and is 14th in the world rankings.
And this week he gets the chance to experience something new.
"I've had a phenomenal year, for me," O'Hair said late last week. "That's not to say you can't improve on it. You can always do more. But I got my third win [at the Arnold Palmer Invitational in late March]. This is just kind of icing on the cake a little bit. It's obviously an honor.
"I've been looking forward to this, but now it's really starting to settle in. It's like all the hard work paid off. This is something you earn. And now that it's here, I'm starting to get goose bumps just thinking about it. A lot of guys never get to do this. To an extent, we'll all be Tiger Woods out there. That's pretty cool. I mean, think about it. Five years ago I was playing on the mini-tour."
How's that for perspective? Speaking of which, O'Hair understands there's a certain amount of pressure with this kind of competition, although probably not quite the level seen at a Ryder Cup. The Americans have won five of the seven meetings, with one tie (in 2003). The World has never won on U.S. soil. O'Hair wants to win. And perform. Yet above all else, he yearns to savor the moments.
