"Tee-Off" from the PGA Tour event in Boston

Notes and Quotes on the 2014 Deutsche Bank Championship:

By TERRY LYONS

Rory McIlroy at the DBC in Boston (Getty Images)

NORTON, MA, August 29, 2014 -- The Deutsche Bank Championship - @DBChampionship - is the second of four events of the PGA Tour's FedExCup Playoffs. After the full PGA season, the top 125 players qualified for The Barclays tournament, held last week in northern New Jersey. The top 100 players after The Barclays qualified for this week's tournament in suburban Boston. Ninety-three players are teeing-off on Friday, a day later than usual first-round play as the DBC tournament wraps around the Labor Day holiday in the USA. Notable PGA Tour players, such as Tiger Woods (DNQ-injuries kept his FedEx Playoff points total down), Jason Dufner (neck), Dustin Johnson (leave from PGA Tour) are not playing while Graeme McDowell and Paul Casey are taking a week off with personal time to witness the birth of their children. Casey's decision will cost him the opportunity to advance to the third round of the FedEx Playoffs in Denver. Sergio Garcia and Justin Rose each took the week off but at 15th and 20th, respectively, on the PGA's FedEx Cup listing, he will advance and is expected to play the final two rounds. Tim Clark (elbow) withdrew from the tournament on Thursday.

Tourney Sites: The DBC Championship at the TPC in Boston (Norton, Mass) and the Tour Championship (East Lake CC in Atlanta) are the two constant sites for the PGA Tour playoff system. The BMW Championship, to be held next week in Denver, rotates through various courses in the Midwest and The Barclays, the first-round tourney, is staged at the premier courses in the New York-New Jersey metropolitan area, some of the best courses in the Continental USA.

Pay the Man: The Tiger Woods Foundation is the host charitable organization for the DBC within the PGA Tour's season-long commitment to local and national charitable efforts. Overall, the PGA Tour has donated more than $2 billion to charity with $133 million donated in calendar year 2013. Tiger Woods' foundation concentrates its efforts on youth and breaking cycles of poverty through college-access programs for children of low-income families. Significant efforts are made in the area of mentorship, professional development and providing four-year scholarships to many first generation scholars. ... On the player's side, a purse of $8 million is on the line at the DBC with $1,440,000 going to the winner and $864,000 for the runner-up. Overall, the FedExCup playoffs has a $10 million dollar bounty awaiting the season champion with the top five players at the Tour Championship being in the best position to gain the lofty prize.

Hunter, the hunted: Hunter Mahan vaulted to the top of the FedExCup points list with his win at The Barclays in Ridgewood, NJ last weekend, shooting 68 and 65 to close out the tournament. "Jumping to "No. 1" and securing my spot in Atlanta, it feels good having done that," said mahan when he met the media after the Thursday Pro-Am outing. "I want to be the FedEx Cup champion. I was close a few years ago (2011 when he finished 2nd). "Golf is all about winning. Top-5s are great, Top-10s are great, but if you don;t win, you're not making an impact in the game. Winning is the most important thing and it's heavily favored in this format. I think it's fun for our sport to have a "winner-take-home" (all) kind of mentality, since we don;t have that in golf, kind of a finale. I think it's pretty neat with so much on the line."

Defending Champ: Henrik Stenson, the 2013 DBC Champion, is teeing-off as No. 66 on the FedExCup list after serious moving-up exercises at the PGA Championship where he tied for third place and his T38 at The Barclays last week. In doing so, he moved from No. 92 to 66 and is now in place to possibly defend his title. Last year, Stenson overcame a two-stroke deficit to Sergio Garcia to card a 5-under 66 to outpace Steve Stricker on a rain-soaked Labor Day, The 38-year old Swede became the fourth international golfer to win the DBC, joining Adam Scott (Australia, 2003), Vijay Singh (Fiji, 2004, 2008) and Rory McIlroy (No. Ireland, 2012). Stenson recorded scores in the 60s in each of his four rounds, becoming only the seventh player to do so.

Said Henson when he met the media in Boston: "It's great to be back at a venue where you've done well in the past or won in the past," he said. "I need some sort of result this week to carry on to Denver (BMW Championship). I don;t need any miracles, but if I want to make it to Atlanta, I have to have a good showing this week or next week. I'd rather do it this week than to wait to the last minute. I'm trying to move on and it would be a shame not to make it to the Tour Championship and defend my title."

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