PONTE VEDRA BEACH, Fla. — The moment Martin Kaymer walked in the room Wednesday and saw the crystal trophy seated at the table he beamed as if he had been reunited with a lost love. At last year’s Players Championship, Kaymer embraced it, posed for photographs with it. He might have even kissed it. And then he traveled home to Germany without it.
A replica of the trophy, a heavy block of carved crystal, was shipped to his Düsseldorf address the day after his one-stroke victory over Jim Furyk, but it never arrived. Kaymer returned this week for his defense of his title and said he planned to “order one” as if he were talking about a college class ring.