Dan O'Neill

For all of his 14 major championships and PGA Tour wins by the dozens, Tiger Woods is not the most interesting player in professional golf. That designation almost certainly belongs to Phil Mickelson.

He is most interesting because he is most fallible, most often second-guessed, most difficult to interpret. He is not necessarily a favorite with the press, who he sometimes has dismissed. He is a unequivocally a favorite with the galleries, who he embraces and entitles.

Mickelson is remarkably talented, with a short game to die for. He is remarkably frustrating, a player who has suffered some of the most spectacular near-misses in golf history. He has won three majors, he has painstakingly lost several more, most profoundly the 72nd hole waterboard at Winged Foot in 2006.

Mickelson throws right-handed, he bats left-handed. He speaks right-handed, he thinks left-handed. He has two wins this season, two missed cuts, two other top-10s, two ties for 55th. Mickelson is a walking roller coaster ride of highs and lows, contrasts and ambiguities, entertainment and exasperation. Tiger is the clear choice as the game's best player, perhaps its best ever. “Lefty” is the People's Choice, the kindred spirit, the imperfect soul with which so many relate.

And part of that karma, integral to the every man model is family. As Mickelson demonstrated by carrying a “labor beeper” at the 1999 U.S. Open, as he has underlined by making Amy Mickelson an equal partner in their charitable foundation, as we have seen when his children — Amanda, 9, Sophia, 7, and Evan, 6 — are such a prominent greenside part of his best moments, Mickelson is a proud husband and passionate father.

That's what makes the news about Amy Mickelson's battle with breast cancer hit so close to home for so many sports fans. Mickelson will stand down now, put golf aside and put his wife and family first — although he's coming back for two weeks, including the U.S. Open. He will try to channel his masterful recovery touch around the greens around his family, carry the bag for his wife as she fights this formidable opponent.

Golf has had other significant absences. There was Ben Hogan's horrible car accident in 1949, and incredible return of 1953. There was Woods' recent eight-month recovery from knee surgery. 

He is still searching for that U.S. Open, the championship that has so cruelly spurned him at Pinehurst in '99, at Shinnecock in 2004, at Winged Foot in '06. Bethpage in June figures to be a redemptive opportunity. Mickelson likes the monstrous golf course, where he finished second in the 2002 Open. Woods won the tournament, but Mickelson won the crowds, gaining rock star status in the shadow of Gotham, partnering with a city still trying to recover from post 9/11 shock.

The galleries will be with him. Everyone is pulling for the Mickelsons to win this major challenge, everyone including Woods.