Tiger is back. all Hail tiger

The Game Room
341

Your “Eat your Veggies” analogy…is…is fascinating. Did not anticipate that Strawman argument. Honestly don’t know how to respond.

Sure, I would expect the US Open to mostly won by Americans…since they dominated the field

Just as I would expect the British Open from the 1950’s through 1980 to be won mostly won by Brits, since the field was predominantly British.

and your damn right it would take a lot of research. Because you would be hitting a lot of dead ends. But it sure is a lot more easier for you to prove who was a world class players than me to show you that there weren’t any world class players (proving a negative)

Your LPGA analogy is fascinating too. do you think there were a bunch of world class Asian lady golfers (Koreans, Chinese, Japanese, Thais) being oppressed either by their country or prohibited from playing by the LPGA?

The 1955 US Womens Open was won by a Uruguayan who won 10 other times on the LPGA. The 1967 US Womens Open was won by a French women (an amateur). Back in the 1970’s and 1980’s there were LPGAer from South Africa (Sally Little), from Spain (Marta Dotti), from Australia (Jan Stephenson) and Japan Ayako Okamoto. Chako Higuichi won the LPGA Championship in the 1970’s. Women’s golf in other countries did not develop past the amateur level. Many golf fans think Se Ri Pak was the first Korean to win on the LPGA Tour in 1998 Actually it was 10 years prior in 1988, Ok Hee Ku won an LPGA event in Arizona.

Just like it wasn’t Tiger’s fault that those WGC events were short field, it was not Mickey Wright’s fault that there were not many female Int’l players world class elite golfers.

There wasn’t anything preventing players from taking the wares to the US based tours. Other than talent. The ones with talent came to America

342

Rhetorical? If not, then the answer is neither.

343

Of course it wasn’t.

That may be the most ridiculous thing you have ever written. Probably 9 out of 10 Korean women born with elite golf talent in the 1950’s never touched a club in their lives, because they were working on a farm. Probably 9 out of 10 of the ones who did play golf couldn’t possibly afford to travel to the US at all, let alone spend a year on tour. And judging from the fact that the US Women’s Open paid the winner less than $2000 as late as 1963, tenth place in a regular tour event probably paid a couple hundred bucks, at most, so there was very little incentive. If you have a link that shows what it actually paid, I’d be happy to be corrected.

But you know what, let’s say you’re right about all this. Let’s say that there weren’t more than a dozen “world class elite” players, men or women, outside the US during the Jack era.

Can you really not see that it doesn’t matter? It’s still a fact that unless 50 world class elite Americans suddenly stop playing golf, then the addition of 50 world class elite international players to the fields makes the fields much deeper.

It doesn’t matter whether the international players of Jack’s day chose not to play, or weren’t good enough to play. Either way, they are good enough today. 12 of the top 20 players in the world rankings this week are international players. That means that to win a tournament today, you are facing more than twice as much competition as in the Jack era — unless you believe that American golfers have suddenly gotten worse.

It’s so simple. Think of the best football player in your high school. Maybe he got a scholarship to a big university, but probably he didn’t. And the chances are about 1 in 100 that he got into the NFL. He was a star when he was in a small pond, but expand the talent pool, and he can’t make the practice squad.

And once again, just to be clear, I’m not saying this means Jack couldn’t beat Tiger. I’m saying it means that Jack didn’t compete against fields as deep as Tiger.

344

Not what you said in your previous post. You said the only reason American women dominated the LPGA during the Jack era was because there were few to zero talented Asians. So obviously, Asian women suddenly evolved into talented golfers sometime after 1970.

345

I am so dizzy from the Sinclair Merry-Go-Round

346

Sorry, I don’t get the reference. But regarding the strength of PGA Tour fields in the 60’s, you might find this post, from a golf discussion board, interesting. An excerpt:

347

Gee, times change. Who would have thunk it?

Whats remarkable is that Scoring Averages from the elite golfers hasn’t changed much. Sure courses are longer, and greens are faster and more contoured.

But look what has more than mitigated and offset the increased yardage increases and faster putting surfaces.

Better agronomy. Modern irrigation, better application of chemicals (pesticides, fungicides, fertilizer etc). Golf course are in pristine shape vs 50 yrs ago. Faster greens are smoother greens. Smoother green mitigate the increased difficulty of faster greens. Mark Broadie in his Strokes gained says the avg pro is 50/50 from 7 ft 10 inches. Studies from back in the 60’s says the 50/50 distance was 7 ft.

Better Golf Course equipment. Triplex and “Norelco” mowers, fairway mowers, aerators

Laser range finders: Players know the exact yardage from various landmarks

Better Putters: Computers can analyze the putting strokes to optimize a golfers putting stroke

Better Irons. Irons from the 1960’s and 70’s, are as thin as the letter opener on my desk

Hybrids: Didn’t exist in the 1960’s and 1970’s

Woods: They were actually made of wood and were 200 cc in the 1960’s. Now made of Graphite/Titanium 465 CC.

Balls: Golfers used thin skin balatas that easily got scuffed and out of round. Now there is the three piece Pro V generation golf ball.

and TRAC-MAN…where science can optimize a golfers distance with shaft, ball, club head based on launch angles, ball speed and spin rate.

The Modern golfer has all this technology available, and and the top players scores are not much better.

Increased distance: More than offset by the golf ball by itself, let alone the technological improvements in driver, wedges and irons. And the introduction to of Hybrid. Senior Tour golfer keep saying that they drive the ball as far or farther than they did 30 years ago when they were in their 20’s.

Faster Greens: Mitigated by modern agronomy, smoother and more consistent greens. Champions and Mini verde Bermuda greens in the south versus the grainy and common bermuda of 50 years ago.

348

Translation: I can’t refute what the ex-pro said, so I’ll just zoom off in a completely different direction, and make the second stupidest argument in the history of golf boards. The only thing dumber would be to say, “Tiger won way more money than Jack, how do you explain that?”

Tweaking golf courses to control the score is the easiest thing in the world. Forget 60 years and completely different venues, they can do it on the same course in the same year.

Tiger’s winning score in the 2008 Buick Invitational, played at Torrey Pines: 67-65-66-71=269
Tiger’s winning score in the 2008 US Open, played 4-1/2 months later at Torrey Pines in perfect weather: 72-68-70-73=283

Yes, they play the North Course one day out of four at the Buick, but Tiger didn’t shoot 14 under that day.

349

Not to pile on – well, OK, I’m piling on. The only other course in recent history that has hosted a regular PGA event and a US Open the same year is Pebble Beach. It’s more difficult to compare, because at the Pebble Beach pro-am, they play 3 different courses. But they always play the same course the US Open uses in the last round, so we can compare the last round scoring. Note that since it’s the last round, only the pros who made the cut are considered here.

In 2000, the final round scoring average for the 60 pros who made the cut at the Pebble Beach Pro-Am was 71.63. Four months later, the final round scoring average at the same course for the 63 “world class elite” pros who made the cut in the US Open was 73.2. Note that includes what most consider the single best major performance in history, when Tiger won by 15 shots.

In 2010, the final round scoring average for the 69 pros who made the cut at the Pebble Beach Pro-Am was 73.2. Four months later, the final round scoring average at the same course for the 83 “world class elite” pros who made the cut in the US Open was 74.9.

The Pebble Beach field is about average for a PGA Tour event, usually worth about 50 world ranking points to the winner, where 100 is the max. And yet, on the same course just four months apart, the average field outscored the very best players in the world by an average of over a shot. And even that understates the difference, because when the Pro-Am is played, it’s a par 72 course, but when the US Open is played, some of the par 5 holes are shortened to make it a par 71 course. So the average field is over two shots better than the major field when compared to par.

As I said in the previous post, it’s the easiest thing in the world to make the scoring average higher, even in the same year. Narrow the fairways, lengthen the tees, let the rough grow, and put the pins near the edges of the greens. If you take a longer view, you can plant more trees, add some water hazards, etc.

This is exactly why the events with the weakest fields typically produce the lowest scores. It’s very common to see rounds in the low 60’s in weak field events, because the tournament officials know that the crowd wants to see birdies and eagles, and if a weak field plays a US Open type course, you are going to see more bogeys than birdies. So they make the course a bit easier, and you regularly see rounds of 61, 60, even an occasional 59 or 58. But in the entire history of the majors, there has only been one round below 63.

And it’s exactly why comparing scoring averages from 50 years ago to today is dumb.

350

I think we have a candidate for the next scarecrow in the Wizard of Oz remake!

351

Okay, so, uh, does this mean that we’re not allowed to find the apocalyptic level of hype surrounding the man right now, especially relative to what he’s actually accomplished recently, absolutely insufferable? Because if I didn’t before, I sure as hell do now. Seriously, I never begrudged a single second of the wall-to-wall scream machine when he was running roughshod over tournaments and winning majors and being #1 for 683 weeks. But things have changed a bit since then, to the point where I’m fairly certain NBC would’ve been vastly better served giving a wee bit more airtime to the man who actually WON the freaking Valspar Championship*. Y’know, if it’s not too much trouble.

The other thing is, exactly what kind of reaction am I expected to give the next time he wins something? Because…how do I put this…Tiger Winning Something is bigtime been there, done that territory, and it’s impossible for me to get excited over it. I mean, don’t get me wrong, good on him that he’s doing well enough to keep his card for another year; gotta be relevant before you can be anything else. But he’s done huge, huge things over his career, and the idea that “He got one!” now is cause for wild celebration strikes me as patronizing, if not downright insulting. As an ESPN analyst once said about Se Ri Pak: “The good news, she made the cut. The bad news, that making the cut qualifies as good news.” Let’s be perfectly honest: there is one mark left that has any meaning for him. Majors. When he picks up #15, I promise that I will cheer with as much enthusiasm as I can convincingly fake. Until then, I’m just going to wish him well and call it a day. All right?

Unless this has become a “let’s see how many times we can bump this thing before an enraged moderator drops the hammer” thing, in which case, have fun, guys. :slight_smile:

  • Paul Casey!
352

No, feel free. You are totally welcome to that opinion.

The thing is, a lot of people are excited about it. Naturally, NBC, the PGA, and lots of other folks are going to take that into serious consideration. If most people felt the same way you did, the hype wouldn’t exist. But the hype does exist, which only means that there are a large number of people who don’t share your opinion. That doesn’t make your opinion or their opinion wrong per se, but it does put it in the minority, golf-wise.

Where you are measurably wrong is that NBC would be better served by putting more attention on the man who won the tournament. Clearly, that’s not the case. Networks chase ratings. End of story.

It would take some real mental gymnastics to justify a narrative that didn’t involve Tiger Woods if that’s what most people wanted to talk about. High minded principles are fine and all, but TV networks have always been more concerned with ratings and berating them for not following principles they never had in the first place (not to mention not chasing the clear money-making story) is a mug’s game.

353

As a matter of fact, they did show almost every shot that Casey and Reed during the final round, as they always do with the leaders. And I wouldn’t quit your day job to become a programming executive, because NBC is pretty happy with the results.

That said, while I and millions of other fans want to see every shot Tiger hits (except for tap-ins), I agree that they don’t need to show him walking down the fairway, or waiting for someone else to play. I could also do without so many commercials, human interest stories, and comments from the CEO of whatever company is crowing about giving two or three million dollars to charity, while giving 6 or 7 million to the millionaires playing the event.

354

Reviving this thread because of his PGA finish, but also because I think it’s hilarious that a thread repeatedly hailing his “comeback” is now seven years old.

355

For TV it’s all about ratings , when the ratings don’t go up for Woods they will stop showing him.

356

Tiger leads The Tour Championship by 3 strokes going into the final round of play.

Will this be the day?

357

And he birdied his first hole.

358

Victory #80 for Tiger!

359

That was some fantastic golf by Tiger, and I’m thrilled that Rose won the Fedex Cup. They both deserved those results.

We came pretty close to seeing “golf hooligans” today. :smiley:

360

Manfully done. I expected another “Meh, short field” comment from you.

I guess we need a new narrative, since Rory crumbled in the last pairing with Tiger just like all the supposedly inferior competition did during his prime.