Shootout: Players ready for weekend

The Franklin Templeton Shootout is ready for a charming weekend,

its third in Southwest Florida.

According to tournament founder and host Greg Norman, the

unofficial PGA Tour event has grown in stature since its move to

Tiburon Golf Club, the course he designed, and the Ritz Carlton

Golf Resort, which opened in time for last year's event.

"The tournament's always been structured as a fun, relaxing

week," Norman said. "Obviously, coming to Naples here has helped us

enjoy that a little bit more."

Twelve two-man teams of PGA Tour players will compete for the

$2.4 million purse, with $550,000 being split by the winners of the

tournament's 15th edition. Teams will play alternate shot on

Friday, better ball on Saturday and a scramble on Sunday. The

National Childhood Cancer Foundation once again is the tournament

charity.

Lee Janzen and Rocco Mediate are the defending champions.

Janzen, a two-time U.S. Open champion, fired an 8-iron from 157

yards to three feet on the last hole for a birdie that clinched the

win over the teams of David Gossett and Matt Kuchar and John Huston

and Jeff Maggert.

"This is the biggest three-day tournament I know, of I would

say," said Mediate, who plans to move to Naples next year.

"I've been working with him, trying to get him to maybe play a

little bit better so it's not so close," Janzen said of

Mediate.

Janzen and Mediate, teammates at Florida Southern College, will

have a lot of competition, perhaps starting with 2003 PGA

Championship winner Shaun Micheel and 2003 Tour Championship winner

Chad Campbell, who finished second to Micheel at the PGA.

"I think Greg's had such a great career," Micheel said. "I've

never really deserved to be in this event, and I'm more than happy

to be here."

Brad Faxon and Scott McCarron also are back. They are the only

team to win back-to-back tournament titles, in 2000 and 2001.

Rich Beem, last year's PGA winner, Kenny Perry, a three- time

winner on tour this year, Fred Funk, Craig Stadler, and 49-year-old

Peter Jacobsen, a part-time Bonita Springs resident who won the

Greater Hartford Open, also are in the field.

Stadler, who won three times on the Champions Tour this year and

once on the regular tour, and Jacobsen are paired together.

"I think anybody in the field can win," Janzen said.

"We've got an excellent field," said Norman, who will play with

longtime friend Steve Elkington.

"We've got an excellent golf course that's in fabulous

shape.

Every year we've had tremendously low scores here. I don't think

it's going to be anything different this year."

Campbell, Funk, Perry and Faxon just played in the Tour

Championship last weekend in Houston. Funk, Perry and Jeff Sluman,

an assistant captain, will leave after Sunday's final round to

catch a flight to South Africa to represent the U.S. Team in the

Presidents Cup.

Fifteen of the 24 players are back from last year, a sign of how

much they've enjoyed the event.