Yep, I’d still probably wager that he’ll best Jack’s mark. But each major that passes without a victory makes the odds a little longer.
Interesting question posed this morning on Mike & Mike’s radio show.
Right now, which would you wager is more likely:
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That Tiger will win 5 more majors and eclipse Jack Nicklaus?
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That Tiger will never win another major?
Now, I happen to fall in between- I suspect he’ll win 1 or 2 more.
But given ONLY those two possibilities? I’d say “Tiger NEVER wins another major” is far more likely.
I think he’ll win four more over the next six years, then he’ll win the Masters at age 50 for the record.
I think we mostly agree about Tiger, but his scoring average this year is well over a full shot worse than his best (and that is a huge difference in a stat that is measured in thousandths of a shot), and besides the PGA he has the WGC-Bridgestone and the FedEx Cup playoffs yet to play before he’s done this year.
But you are right, they are all tough events. Ironically, the weakest event he now plays regularly is his own ATT National.
I agree on both counts. He is still pretty clearly the best player in the world; nobody but Tiger would consider T6 at a quirky major to be a big disappointment.
And it was quirky. He didn’t have his best stuff, but he hit a lot of shots exactly the way he wanted to, only to see them stop short or bound over the green, depending on whether that particular square foot of turf was green or not. I realize they all play the same course, but that doesn’t mean that some get more lucky bounces than others. It may all even out over the course of a career, but not over a week.
Considering he was resting his elbow and didn’t start practicing until a week or two before the Open, T6 isn’t bad. The old Tiger could have won in spite of the bad bounces; the current Tiger seems to need a few breaks to win. But he will get them sooner or later, and he won’t need them if he continues to improve.
True, but Tiger’s (adjusted) scoring average includes a +13 at the US Open where he was injured. If you took that out and put in it’s place a hypothetical -20 at some easy course, that would lower his unadjusted scoring average by almost a full point.
Tiger is 37 years, but some 37 year old are “older” than others.
Tiger is chronically injured. His left knee and his left achilles heel are just step away from being an issue again. As in a step in unseen hole like a sprinkler head or gopher hole in knee high rough.
His elbow is hurt and in the past he has withdrawn from tournaments because of wrist issue and neck issue.
For someone that has reportedly work out with Navy Seals, he is quite fragile.
His body has changed radically since turning pro, I would guess that he has added at least 40 lbs to his frame since turning pro. His legs, knee, and feet may not be designed to take that extra stress, step after step after step. His old swing was violently hard and put a tremendous stress on his left knee when he snapped at impact.
I am not a Tiger fan, but I think if I was, I would not be bullish on his chances to get his great White Whale. I saw a different Tiger this week. It almost looked like he didn’t want to be there. There was a look of resignation and none youthful exuberance. It was almost like he had to be there, as a requirement, rather than wanting to be there. Phil Mickelson on the other hand was effusive in his interviews.
Add the fragile factor, his lack of Joie de Vivre, and his 5 years of Major Goose-Eggs, I see no reason for any optimism of getting to 18 majors. Yes he still is ahead of Jack’s pace, as Jack didn’t win #15 until he was age 38 and 6 months. But Jack was actually contending in majors on the back 9 when he was 37. Yesterday, when Tiger should have been positioning himself for back nine charge, he was trying (and failing) to two putt from 100 ft.
Golf Channel’s Monday Golf Central showed a montage of recent post round interviews of Tiger after not winning. Every interview he said the green speeds had changed and he could not adjust. Hey Tiger, that what golfers do, they adjust. That is what you used to do. And Tiger, your putting was not the problem, it was those 100 ft putts that you had on holes 1,3,4,7 that cost your chance.
And I think his game plan is far too conservative. It was really evident last year at Lytham. this year, I truly think Tiger lost the Open Championship on hole 17 on Saturday. He took an iron off the tee, could not clear the cross bunkers on his second shot, and made bogey. While Westwood took driver, easily cleared the cross bunkers on the 2nd shot and made birdie.
Tiger no longer has ability to shift into overdrive and put the pedal to the metal.
What is the point of this?
Tiger played the US Open in 2000 when he set his personal best scoring average.
And all the other contenders for scoring average also played the US Open.
And if you are talking about unadjusted scoring -20 under on a par 72 course vs the +13 he shot at par 70 Merion is only 25 shots. By the time Tiger plays his ~70 rounds, it is only going to amount to about a third of shot.
Performance in majors:
Jack, ages 36 & 37:
3-11-2-4-2-10-2-3
Tiger:
40-21-3-11-4-32-6
Those records are in no remotely way comparable, and they also include Jack losing twice to Tom Watson when nobody else was in close contention, something you can’t say about Tiger (tho some here will of course knee-jerk reflexively pooh-pooh that and pretend that one great rival in middle of his prime doesn’t matter at all).
If you had both men in front of you, middle of age 37, with all the information available to you that we have, most betting men would place their money on Jack to win 4 more majors, not Tiger, even if Tiger doesn’t have a Watson to currently bedevil him.
Since “all the information available” to me includes the fact that Jack actually did win four majors after age 37, I guess you’re right, and I wonder why you said “most betting men,” rather than “anybody but an idiot”?
“All the information available” also includes the fact that just prior to age 36, Tiger had had two major injuries that had him miss four majors in three years plus he underwent probably the greatest public humiliation any athlete had ever undergone, and that he was injured in the 2013 US Open where he finished 32nd.
The last four majors when he wasn’t injured he finished 3-11-4-6, which is pretty comparable to Nicklaus’ performance.
Yeah, it’s kind of funny how guys will say Tiger is washed up, just because he hasn’t put it together in one of four particular weeks for a while. He’s a full four points ahead of second place in the world rankings, a larger margin than anybody else has had since Tiger turned pro.
In fact, if Tiger doesn’t win the PGA next month, he’ll have had a year similar to the one Jack had in 1964, at age 24. Jack had four wins, and led the money list and (he claims) the scoring list, but won no majors. And his four wins were not anywhere near as strong as Tiger’s. Jack was 35 years old the last season he led the PGA tour in wins, money, and scoring, so at 37, Tiger seems to be holding up better than Jack, injuries and all.
In 1977, Jack was playing in at least 20% fewer tournaments than his competition. He was leading the (not tracked) Money List.
Watson made $13.6k per event in 1977, Nicklaus earned $15.6k per event.
It is easier to lead the PGAT money list in the current era by playing 16-20 events than it was in Nicklaus era. The other elite players in the Nicklaus played 25-30 events while the elite players of this era only play 20-22 events and 1/3 of those events are at 20% higher purse than other events.
“Claims the scoring list?”
and in 1964, Nicklaus did have a lower scoring average than the Vardon Winner, Arnold Palmer. 69.96 for Jack and 70.01 for Arnold. But Jack was victim of archaic rules of the PGA where he had to complete five years of apprenticeship learning bookkeeping and how to peddle sweaters. A
And, in 1963, Jack does not claim the lowest scoring despite having a lower scoring average than 1963 Vardon winner, Billy Casper. 70.42 for Jack and 70.58 for Casper. That tells me someone else had a lower scoring average that was not eligible for the Vardon. Possibly Ray Floyd.
Those same archaic rules kept Nicklaus from competing in the Ryder Cup until 1969.
Well
as a sane and rational Tiger hater who is NOT deranged I can honestly say that the 14 years Tiger DOMINATED golf;
100+ world wide victories
2nd most all time pga victories (78)
14 majors
a 16+ golf ranking
2 fe-ex cups
10 player of the year awards
8 vardon trophies
a 26% victory rate (1 out of every 4 tournaments)
were all just a fluke!
where-as Phil’s current hot streak is all we need to prove that phil has been the best golfer for the past 15 years
Fair point about the money list, but it was Jack’s choice to play fewer events, and it gave him a big advantage in the majors, as he was playing practice rounds at the major venues while his competition was slogging through the regular tour events.
Besides, the money list is only one of the three stats I mentioned. It’s easier to lead the scoring average when you play fewer events, but Jack wasn’t even in the top ten in scoring in 1977. Nor did he lead in wins, as Tiger does almost yearly, in spite of playing less often than most. Tiger currently has four PGA wins in 10 events, while nobody else has more than two wins, and some fairly big names have already played 20 or more PGA events this year. Jeez, Tiger even had more wins than anybody else when he played only six events in 2008. As I said, the last time Jack had the most wins was when he was 35.
Yes, that is what Jack claims. I’m not saying he’s wrong, but it would be nice to have an independent source. If you know of one, please post it. Note that the Wikipedia article on Jack uses his website as its source. And the fact that you have to speculate about Ray Floyd indicates you really don’t have a complete list, you only know what the Vardon winner did, and what Jack did.
I’ve been looking for a source for pre-1970 PGA data for a long time, so I will be very pleased if you prove me wrong.
Other players that might have had a lower scoring average in 1963 than Nicklaus (and Casper) could have been Al Geiberger and Bobby Nichols who might have not completed PGA Class A certification yet. They both finished in the top 10 of the money list.
My best guess who had a lower scoring average is Gary Player who might not have had enough rounds to qualify.
It is no coincidence that Golf records are sketchy prior to 1970. The PGA was in the process of asexual reproduction in the late 60’s, dividing itself into the PGA of America and the PGA Tour. The PGAT started keeping better records once they got “On their feet”.
I remember when I started following golf in the 1970’s that Golf Digest would have a big “Year in Review” Issue. They would have all the tournament results summarized into one issue. Perhaps if you could find a brick and mortar library who has these issues archived you can get the information you want with the 1963 Year End Review.
You might even contact golf digest to see if you can purchase back issues. I believe it was the February Issue that had the Year in review data.
Or contact some golf writers via twitter and they might have some suggestions. Doug Ferguson, Jason Sobel have personally answered some of my questions before.
I am not all that sure that Jack was getting a noticeable advantage by not playing Greensboro, Milwaukee etc in the weeks leading into Majors.
One (or two) additional rounds is not that big of deal, and how many times have we heard that the course changes on “GAME DAY”.
In the Mid 70’s, Jack had a lot of NOISE in his life. He had rugrats playing little league, peewee football, and whatever. He was also building a world class golf course design business and trying to save MacGregor golf.
The top two finishers at Muirfield played the prior week. Mickelson left Merion on Tuesday and didn’t return until early Thursday morning for a 7:15 am tee time at the US Open. (and played in Memphis the week before)
IMO, preparation is over rated and taking weeks off before hand is what players can do now because there are so many high dollar events.
Just say the world rankings and not only is Woods the number one golfer in the world but he is the number one golfer by a larger measure.
There are six big tournaments in the next 8 weeks. Tiger is about 200 points ahead of Phil Mickelson.
If can Hefty can continue his unlikely streak and win 3 of the 6 tournaments, he could overtake Tiger for the #1 spot. Depending on how Tiger performs and how Phil does in the other three tournaments.
Kuchar is off to a good start in Canada this week. He can get into the Player of the Year equation if he wins this week.
I don’t believe that. Of course you’re right about the split, but I don’t believe that the PGAofA didn’t keep good records. I think they just refused to give them to the Tour after the split, and maybe even hid or destroyed them so they couldn’t be sued for them, and then they were lost.
The split was very bitter. Billy Casper was the best golfer in the world in the late 60’s, despite the hype about the “Big Three” (he won more tournaments than any of them from 1964 to 1970, in fact, he won more than Palmer and Player combined), but he was cheated out of a Player of the Year award in 1968 when the PGAofA simply threw a hissy fit and refused to name a POTY, to show the touring pros who was boss. 1968 was a poor year by Jack’s standards, just two wins out of 22 starts. Casper had six wins, the Vardon Trophy, and the money title.
Jack was one of the leaders of the rebels. He wrote an article for SI that reads llke a SDMB flame:
http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/vault/article/magazine/MAG1081571/index.htm
I get a lot of flack on golf boards for saying the majors of the 60’s often had weaker fields than the Memorial does today, but in that article, Jack agrees with me:
That is Jack Fucking Nicklaus calling the quality of the field in the PGA Championship “absurd and unfortunate.” He doesn’t mention that it was practically impossible for an international player to get into the field. They typically had less than five. So if we had reliable world rankings for that period, we’d probably find less than 40 of the top 100 players in the world in the field — less than a modern Memorial, but about the same as the British Opens of the 60’s, which typically had only half a dozen American touring pros in the field, at a time when well over half the best players in the world were Americans.
Gary Player’s first British Open win had ZERO American touring pros in the field — there were three Americans, but one was an amateur, one was a senior, and one was a club pro. Jack’s first win at Muirfield had only 8 other Americans in the field. And the aforementioned Billy Casper, who played in majors for 50 years, played the Open only five times.
Imagine how many majors guys like Tiger, Phil, Ernie, and Vijay would have won against fields like that.