Tributes pour in for Payne Stewart

A blue ribbon marked the empty parking spot Payne Stewart was supposed to fill this week as one of the honored guests of the Tour Championship. Stewart was killed along with four others when their LearJet flew uncontrolled for hours Monday before crashing in South Dakota. He was among the US PGA Tour's top 30 money winners and qualified for the $5m tournament at Champions Golf Club.

A blue ribbon marked the empty parking spot Payne Stewart was supposed to fill this week as one of the honored guests of the Tour Championship. Stewart was killed along with four others when their LearJet flew uncontrolled for hours Monday before crashing in South Dakota. He was among the US PGA Tour's top 30 money winners and qualified for the $5m tournament at Champions Golf Club.

Stewart, aged 42, won his second US Open in June and played in his first Ryder Cup since 1993. He was on his way to Texas, where the Tour Championship is being played this week in Houston. Fans and colleagues were stunned as practice began today, and the PGA Tour canceled Tuesday's pro-am event.

"I think of Payne Stewart, and there's a guy that's going to be like Jack Nicklaus and Arnold Palmer, a guy you want around all those years," player Duffy Waldorf said. "He's such a big part of the game."

Waldorf and fellow pro Jeff Maggert said Stewart was well-liked by the players and a gallery favorite. "Playing on the tour for nine years and being able to share a passion with someone ... to play on the Ryder Cup team with him, it's just amazing that in a fraction of the time your world and your life and a lot of things can change," Maggert said.

"It will be a tough week for all the players, for myself, for the wives, everyone. It's a tragic situation."

Flags flew at half staff at the golf course after it was confirmed Stewart was aboard the wayward jet. The mood was thoroughly somber as players practiced in the sunshine.

"I was looking forward to seeing him play. He is a very colorful pro," said Vance Riley, 68, a golf fan and resident of the neighborhood adjacent to the course.

Charlie Hall, 76, spoke of Stewart's unmistakable attire. "He was very distinguished in clothing, but when you got used to it he didn't look right with long pants on," said Hall, who like Riley is an ex-pilot. "You hate to see a good guy like that go. He's one of the good people in this game."

Jackie Burke, 1956 Masters champion and co-founder of Champions, had trouble digesting the news of Stewart's death. "I can't believe anything like this could happen ÿ a private aircraft going down like that," Burke said. "But, I mean, missing him is just unbelievable."

"It is if difficult to express our sense of shock and sadness over the death of Payne Stewart," PGA Tour commissioner Tim Finchem said.

Said Tiger Woods: "It is shocking. It's a tragedy. I can't even comprehend the scope of it. None of us can right now. There is an enormous void and emptiness I feel right now."

Europe's top golfers joined Monday in paying tribute to US Open champion Payne Stewart after he was killed in a plane crash.

Members of Europe's Ryder Cup team, gathered in Jerez, Spain, for this week's Volvo Masters, expressed shock at the news of Stewart's death.

Masters champion Jose Maria Olazabal of Spain was due to play Stewart in the Grand Slam of Golf featuring all four of this season's major winners in Hawaii next month.

Fighting back tears, Olazabal said: "I played with Payne quite a few times and I always enjoyed his company. A true sportsman on the course and a gentleman off it. He never failed to conduct himself in the true manner.

"We all knew what the Ryder Cup meant to him, but he never lost perspective on what the match was all about. He said that winning the Cup back last month completed his year. ... We have lost a precious man and someone who still had good years ahead of him."

England's Lee Westwood said, "I am too choked to talk at the moment."

France's Jean Van de Velde, runner-up at the British Open said: "I'm devastated, totally devastated. It certainly puts into perspective little things like missed putts. My thoughts go to his family because he was such a family man. We was a wonderful sportsman and wonderful person."

Said Germany's Bernhard Langer: "We all know where he is going. We've been friends for a long time and he's been a wonderful colleague - very friendly, very polite, very out-going. Every time you saw him he seemed happy and joyful and he was a man of many talents."

Ken Schofield, executive director of the European PGA Tour, called it a "very, very sad day for the world of golf for a number of reasons."

"Firstly (Stewart) was a wonderful person, there was no question of that, and he was a magnificent golfer with a totally international focus," Schofield said. "Tonight golf is a sad family. He was the reigning US Open champion and that says it all. Whether he was playing in the Ryder Cup in Brookline or at The Belfry, he stood for golf's sporting values."