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The hole, and the player who tamed it to win the Northern Trust Open, are proof that looks can be deceiving. Before Sunday, John Merrick might have been hard for the average golf fan to pick out in a threesome waiting to tee off.

Merrick, 30, has pleasant looks and a pleasant demeanor, and in his first six years until this year on the tour, his results were perfectly pleasant: 13 top-10 finishes in 164 starts for earnings of $ 5.8 million. In the final round of the Northern Trust Open, it became obvious that Merrick’s boy-next-door looks and manners hide a sniper’s heart. He remained eerily calm down the stretch, playing the final six holes of his fourth round in one over par despite missing four of the last five fairways. He got up and down from off the green on 18 to seal a closing two-under 69 for an 11-under 273 and a spot in the playoff against Charlie Beljan, who posted a 67.

And aft…………… continues on New York Times

Jeff Haynes/Reuters

LeBron James was an important voice when the players voted to oust their longtime union leader, Billy Hunter.

For the greatest basketball player on earth, All-Star weekend is not a game, but a marathon, a dizzying three-day slog through news media scrums, promotional appearances, charity events, business meetings and more news media scrums.

The merry-go-round of obligations starts Friday morning in the host city and does not end until long after the final buzzer Sunday night.

On Saturday afternoon,

PACIFIC PALISADES, Calif. — Bill Haas, the 2011 FedEx Cup Champion and Tour Championship winner, is not an underdog or an overachiever or any of those other adjectives used to describe people who win when they aren’t supposed to. He’s not like Jeremy Lin, the current poster boy of overachieving athletes. No coach overlooked Haas as he was coming up through the ranks of junior golf and at Wake Forest.

As a son of Jay Haas, a 9-time PGA Tour winner, he was supposed to make it. But on Sunday at the Northern Trust Open, he must have felt like the odd man out in the three-way playoff with Phil Mickelson and Keegan Bradley. It was Phil’s tournament to win and if he didn’t win then everybody wanted his prot�g�, Bradley, to wa…………… continues on ESPN

There’s a “1,000 percent” chance the 2013 Arizona Nationals will be at Firebird International Raceway. But, after that, it’s increasingly likely there won’t be an NHRA Full Throttle Series event in the state until 2015 — and at a new location.

2012 NHRA Arizona Nationals

Raceway President Charlie Allen told The Republic, “I still don’t know” if he’ll be successful in exercising a seven-year option on his current lease with the Gila River Indian Community. The Community owns the land where the track is located, near Chandler, and the lease expires next spring. Allen said the early season 2013 NHRA weekend will happen “1,000 percent.”

“We’re constantly after them,” Allen said of Gila River leaders. “We’re communicating, our attorneys, their attorneys.”

In case no deal is reached, however, Allen already has been studying a new site. He declined to reveal the exact location, other than to say, “It’s south o…………… continues on AZ Central.com

LOS ANGELES • Phil Mickelson wasn’t at his best Friday at Riviera. But two shots helped him stay in the lead.

Despite having only two birdie chances inside 15 feet, Mickelson holed out from the eighth fairway for eagle and chipped in for birdie on the par-3 16th. That carried him to a 1-under 70 and a one-shot lead over Pat Perez in the Northern Trust Open.

Mickelson made three par saves from outside 10 feet, starting with his opening hole at the par-4 10th. He went from the front bunker to the back bunker, blasted out safely to 18 feet and curled in the par putt.

That set the tone for a day that only looked good on the scorecard.

“I probably didn’t play the greatest today, but I was able to kind of salvage a good round and had a good break on eight where I holed out from the fairway,” he said. “That was a nice little bonus.”

Perez had a tournament-best 65, without a bogey on his card, and he saved his best shot for the final hole. He hit his tee shot on the 18th and was too far right, the green blocked by the eucalyptus trees. Perez cut a 6-iron, hopeful of finding the green, and it wound up 12 feet away for a birdie he wasn’t expecting.

“I didn’t hit it like you’d think I would,” Perez said. “I didn’t drive it all that great. I just scrambled well. I put myself in the right places to make…………… continues on STLtoday.com