My appetite has been appropriately whet with the PGA Tour's fall events and subsequent Hawaii swing. We are now on the precipice of the heart of the 2018-19 season. The moment where the roller coaster slows to a near stop as it climbs that first monstrous hill.

I can feel that, and if you follow golf closely, I'm sure you can too. With the Farmers Insurance Open on deck next week and a bevy of big boy events just behind it and the Players Championship two months away, what could be an all-time golf year is about to unfold.

Maybe we say this every year -- maybe I say this every year -- but this season and this year seem like they could be historically great. I don't think I've thought that about every season I've covered, but maybe that's a bit of revisionist history. I did think it last year depending on what Tiger Woods did (because he remains the planet around which all other players are in orbit), and we did get a good year. But we didn't get a great year.

So here are five reasons why 2019 could be even better than 2018 and also could be one of the great seasons in PGA Tour history.

1. The new, condensed schedule: With the move to spread out the biggest tournaments equally over the course of the year comes one possibly unintended benefit. We don't get deep lulls like we sometimes did with the old schedule. This year's schedule with the Players in March, Masters in April, PGA Championship in May, U.S. Open in June and Open Championship in July will have a terrific rhythm and will likely provide us with better in-between events with guys trying to prep for the big ones.

2. A healthy Tiger: Even though I'm fading Tiger this year, there's still a legitimate chance that he goes out and wins two times or three times and legitimately contends for a major championship. As exciting as golf got without him, tossing him into the mix is like emptying a bucket of gasoline on a campfire. The results may not end up exactly how you want them, but it's going to be a hell of a show.

3. That major rota: Augusta National, Bethpage Black, Pebble Beach and Royal Portrush. My knees are weak! Golf course and architecture enthusiasts when they saw the 2019 major rotation several years ago when it was finalized reacted like so ...

via GIPHY

This goes beyond nice views and player praise, though. It's about going to courses that engender elite winners. That's what the best courses in the world do, and all four of these are among the best courses in the world. 

4. Hall of famers in their primes: Let's count the potential of hall-of-fame players currently in or around their primes in the current OWGR top 30.

  • Justin Rose
  • Brooks Koepka
  • Dustin Johnson
  • Justin Thomas
  • Bryson DeChambeau
  • Xander Schauffele
  • Jon Rahm
  • Rory McIlroy
  • Jason Day
  • Patrick Reed
  • Bubba Watson
  • Jordan Spieth
  • Webb Simpson
  • Hideki Matsuyama

We can argue that Rickie Fowler and Tommy Fleetwood should be on the list or that Sergio Garcia, Henrik Stenson and Tiger Woods are still in their primes, but this is the most reasonable list I could come up with. It's also almost half of the top 30 in the world, several of whom are already locks for the hall and others who are just one or two wins away. Golf, even without Tiger Woods, has never had a better youth-talent 1-2 punch in the history of the sport.

"Now I've gotten older, it's shifted the other way (away from the older players being the best players)," Charles Howell said recently. "And the best players seem to be the younger players. So you go look now at all the guys that we talk about, that we focus on -- Jordan, McIlroy, Justin Thomas, etc. These are all the young guys. And they're the sport's best."

5. Due for some duels: Here's a dirty little secret of the past five years: there haven't been that many classic shootouts between two or three players at the biggest tournaments. Sergio-Rose at the 2017 Masters was solid, two Opens (2016 and 2017) were absolute gems and then one PGA Championship (2014 with Rory beating Phil Mickelson and Fowler) was tremendous. Everything else has been good, but I'm here for some majors that spark 30 for 30 documentaries. Hopefully we get that (and more) in 2019.