We’re just days away from the first swings of the 2012 PGA Tour season, and so it’s time to get in our last-minute predictions, guesses, estimates and prognostications. We begin with the World No. 1 … and ask what he could do to get better.

Ever since Tiger Woods fell from golf’s good graces, we’ve seen a strange melange of top-ranked golfers and major winners capturing the headlines, but never at the same time. The reigning world No. 1 hasn’t won a major since Woods at Torrey Pines more than three years ago.

That’s going to change in 2012. Luke Donald, without a doubt the best player in the world, is going to win his first major this year. Best guess? Either Augusta or the PGA Championship. But it will happen, and Donald will secure his place as the best golfer on the planet.

Why? Recent history. The guy ran the table in 2011, winning the money titles on both the PGA and European Tours, taking four tournaments over the year, and securing Player of the Year honors from both the PGA and the PGA Tour. That kind of sustained steadiness is what you need to show up big in major after major. Anyone can have a single hot weekend; Donald has the kind of game that doesn’t need to rely on hot streaks for victory. Consider, for instance, his astonishing run this year of 449 holes without a three-putt. That’s the kind of course management that wins you tournament after tournament.

Obviously the majors are a different beast; pressure and tradition and jacked-up courses and your own internal butterflies combine for an experience that demands players dig deeper than they ever have. It’s time for Donald to do exactly that. And this year, he will.

Normally lists are done in tens. The 10 best golfers of all time. The 10 best shots of the year. But in golf, 10 isn’t the number we surround ourselves with. It’s nine. We play 9 holes. We hope to end our round with a 9 in it (be it, 89, 79, 69, or even, gasp, 59), and so this year, we’ve decided to focus our end of year awards in nines. We conclude our recap of 2011 with the nine best birdies of 2011.

9.) Bubba Watson‘s birdie on the final hole at Torrey Pines – He had another lefty, Phil Mickelson, hot on his heels, and a birdie would mean Phil would have to hole out for eagle to win, so what did Bubba do? Calmly rolled in a 12-foot birdie putt on the closing par-5 to put the tournament basically out of reach for Phil. It was a big start to a great year for Bubba.

8.) David Toms‘ birdie on the 72nd hole at the Players to force a playoff – Sure, he didn’t end up winning, but Toms made as clutch as birdie as you can in the game of golf when he knocked his second shot out of divot on the 18th at Sawgrass to 20 feet and then calmly rolled it in to force a playoff. The final hole at Sawgrass is considered one of the toughest closing holes in all of golf, and when Toms saw his ball was in a divot, most wrote him off as the winner, but he knocked it on the green, made his birdie and gave himself a shot at golf’s fifth major.

7.) Webb Simpson‘s birdie putt to force a playoff at the Deutsche Bank – If 2011 started as the Year of Bubba, it ended as the Season for Simpson, and mostly because the kid never missed an opportunity to be clutch. The best example? When he needed a 30-foot birdie putt on the final hole of the Deutsche Bank to force a playoff with Chez Reavie, and knocked it right in the back of the jar. He went on to win his second event of the year, and nearly got himself another award for his efforts, the FedEx Cup.

6.) Luke Donald‘s birdie putt on the 15th on Sunday at Disney – He made six straight birdies, but it was the lengthy putt he drained on this hole that really showed he was about to close out an improbable 2011 season. The birdie on 15 helped him not only win this event, but the PGA Tour money title as well.

5.) Tiger Woods‘ birdie on the final hole at the Chevron – Sure, it wasn’t a PGA Tour event, but if you’re talking importance, this was it. Tiger closed with birdies on his final two holes, but it was the final one that really made the difference because it showed he really can close out events, even if it’s against a smaller field. This putt might not just be important for 2011, but might help propel him to a big season in 2012.

4.) Suzann Pettersen’s closing birdie against Michelle Wie at the Solheim Cup – The closing play by the Europeans at this year’s Solheim was legendary, but the match of the day was between Pettersen and Wie, and it was Pettersen that made three straight birdies to win her match against the face of women’s golf. She was as clutch as you can get in these team events, and her final birdies deserve to make this list.

3.) Steve Stricker‘s closing birdie at the John Deere Classic – Standing awkwardly in a bunker, having to carry an entire lake, needing to make a birdie, and then actually pulling off that golf shot only to follow it up with a lengthy putt that went dead center? Stricker’s birdie was absolutely incredible to close out his 11th career win and was one of the moments of the 2011 season.

2.) Charl Schwartzel‘s birdie on 17 on Sunday at Augusta – When a man closes out a Masters with four straight birdies, the first time that has ever happened at the famed links of Augusta National, it is tough to pick just one, but it was the birdie on 17 that slammed the door on the competition, and came when his closest competitor, Jason Day, was making the same score on the hole.

1.) Keegan Bradley‘s birdie on 17 on Sunday at the PGA Championship – We had seen putts from this area nearly roll off the green, so to have Keegan give his putt a chance, and actually make it, was more than remarkable. He had basically dug himself a grave at the PGA Championship before this moment, but the birdie on his 71st hole gave him life, and put him in a position to eventually win the golf tournament.

Jim Huber, longtime golf commentator for TNT and CNN, has passed away at the age of 67. His sudden death will leave a hole not only in the world of golf coverage, but in the lives of the many who knew him, either as a friend or as a comforting voice on the many Turner broadcasts he graced.

Huber, who started his career in newspapers, later transitioned to broadcast media, and with his voice, it wasn’t hard to see why. He could recite a grocery list and make you feel like you were listening to a classic, well-told tale on a late-afternoon porch.

His recently published book “Four Days In July,” the story of Tom Watson‘s near-victory at the 2009 British Open, contains what would become an unintentional yet utterly appropriate epitaph: “I wanted to tell stories,” Huber wrote. “My mother to this day claims, with a wry smile, that was my purpose in life from birth. I wanted to sit in front of a roaring fire, gather my friends at my feet, and tell them stories that would make them both smile and cry. I wanted to place them on the wings of their imagination and visit people and places that would quicken their hearts and souls.”

As Scott Michaux notes over at the Augusta Chronicle, Huber’s final days played out on social media, a sad string that likely will be repeated often in the coming years. Posts concerning his “persistent cough” on Christmas Day and a request for a “pulmonologist in the North Atlanta area” the day after take on added poignancy and pain now. Huber was diagnosed on Dec. 27 with acute leukemia. Just days later, he was gone.

We were lucky enough to talk to Huber for a podcast a couple years back. And like everyone who ever crossed paths with him, either in person or on television, we’ll miss him. Condolences to his family and fans on this devastating loss.

If you’ve ever played with a professional golfer on his home course before, you know those guys have no problem going ridiculously low on a consistent basis. Besides having the local knowledge and game to fire at pretty much every pin they see, the lack of pressure also makes it a heck of a lot easier to just let loose and have some fun.

You’d have to think that was the case for Bubba Watson, who rewrote the Estancia Club, located in Scottsdale, Ariz., record books with a round from the gold tees — measuring 7,314 yards – that certainly turned some heads.

So how low did Bubba go? Try 58. I don’t care if Watson was playing at his home course, going low at a track like Estancia Club, where there’s trouble all over the place, is incredibly impressive.

Same ball all day, 58. #urwelcome #mylowestroundever lockerz.com/s/169625189

— bubba watson (@bubbawatson) December 29, 2011

Even more impressive was that Watson was tweeting during his round, right up until the last putt fell. I don’t know about you, but if I had a chance to shoot a sub-60 round, the last thing I’d be doing is responding to tweets on the course. It just goes to show you the difference between a pro and a really accomplished amateur; the pro has no problem blocking out the pressure during a casual round.

Watson, who already owned the course record from the gold tees, managed to best his previous record by two shots. He also holds the course record from the blue tees (62), which measure 6,696 yards, and the black tees (61) at 7,100 yards.

With the opening event of the season less than a week away, it would appear Bubba’s already in mid-season form.