With a win today at the Buick that seems in the bag he will tie Arnie with 62 wins in the PGA tour. That is 62 wins in about 216 PGA events entered...28.7% win%. Has finished 2nd 22 times....top 2 38.9% of the time. Has finished 3rd 17 times....top 3 46.8% of the time. Next in Tiger's path is Hogan with 64 wins, Jack with 73 wins, and then Snead at #1 with 82. Tiger has won an average of 7 events the last 3 years so he would very well move into #1 within the next 3 seasons. Of course if you add in his 20 worldwide wins he already has 82....in 267 events...30.7%. Another crazy thing to think about Tiger's pace is that really he has won all of this in about 10 years on tour....and that is his 1st 10 years. Pretty ridiculous.
It is remarkable. I was a huge Arnie fan; I still have the newspaper clippings from his last two victories in a scrapbook. What TIger has done/is doing is astounding because he is surpassing the giants of the game career and lifetime achievements in his first ten years.
We all knew Tiger would be great, but his numbers are crazy. He is just awesome to watch. I was too young to enjoy Arnie & Jack but I feel like I am watching one of the greatest athletes of all time. Considering the fact I have been able to see MJ in his prime too, that makes two of the all-time greats in their prime. If not the two greatest period.
He's played pretty good this week but he's not proving that he knows how to close a tournament with those last three bogeys. He looks like he's falling apart.
One of the announcer's was saying that he is likely testing some things out in a real speed environment. Nobody trains as hard as or as intensive as Tiger. He is the first one on the practice courses in the morning and the last one to leave more times than not in the afternoon after the round. What I love is that he is willing to accept that he needs to change things here and there and does not get complacent. Status quo is not acceptable, he wants more, he wants to improve. That he appears human in his personal life and helps/affects so many endears him to fans. It must somewhat suck to be a Mickelson or Singh type player (among others) who at any other time would be the superstar as they have the talent and game. But Tiger just keeps putting on the pressure. Amazing and I am glad to be alive to watch it all unfold.
Singh and Phil do not appear to have the desire to be up there. Phil had a great season 2 years ago and Singh before that. Then they both just kind of fell off. Tiger continually steps up his game to get better and fight off these guys yet they just seem satisfied winning the Houston Open.
Well, to be fair Vijay has 3 majors, 31 PGA tour wins and 54 world wide; I wouldn't doubt his competitiveness.
I am not saying either are not copetitive or driven, they are just not as good as Tiger, all things considered, it is not even close. But if there were no Tiger, they would be prolific to a level they are not now. Duval and other brief threats fade away.
I stand by my comment. If either wanted to be winning close to what Tiger is they could be. They both had the game in recent years to challenge Tiger. What happend? Tiger went to work on his game and is now dominating, meanwhile they both have just kind of disappeared.
Arnie and Jack posted their astounding records in the era where there was a lot of balance - besides Jack and Arnie, consider Trevino, Player, and Watson, just to name a few. Tiger had the great fortune to (a) refine his skill and talent to a very high level and (b) play during an off-period in golf where the competitive field has no balance. How dominant would Jack be if he were playing in this era and Tiger wasn't? Totally hypothetical, but it makes a point. I'm impressed with Tiger's ability to play the game, but I'm less impressed with his streak of wins simply because the game has not produced the field of competitors as it did in the last era. And that's a bit sad - I don't watch on the weekends if Tiger has a big lead. Why bother? I don't want to watch a coronation march on Sunday, I want to watch a competitive round where every shot matters on the back nine. HornHuskerDad
You guys are being too hard on Phil Mickelson. Dude has won 32 tournaments including 3 majors. He definately had a major tournament monkey on his back for a while but he's won all three of his majors in the last four years. Mickelson was also pretty sick this week. Who knows how much this affected him? In terms of trying harder, I would love to see Phil workout and get into better shape. I'm sure it would help his game. It's unfair to compare Phil to some of the other greats and ask why he hasn't achieved the same results they did. Phil already has won more pga tour tournaments than Lee Tevino. By the end of his career, it is entirely possible that he will match or beat Trevino's six majors. Before I get blasted, Tiger is my favorite golfer, and I also root for Phil. It's fun to watch both of them play.
Huskerdad, That is not entirely accurate. You do realize that Tiger is the reason some of them do not look as good as they could? Furthermore, Tiger has had such an impact on courses that even THE MASTERS changed the course because of him. You have a guy that literally came in and destroyed everything on the courses, so they have had to change them, make them harder and longer. The courses they play on now are 5 times the difficulty of previous eras.Of course, the equipment makes up for some of that too, but these guys are having to play courses built to hold Tiger and most of them can't hit it that far. The Tour is a very hard place to play for the short drivers who used to depend on the their iron game (JL for instance). Their game is basically obsolete except for an occasional course or two. Seriously, think about the fact that Tiger won a British Open going away two years ago playing a two iron off the tee. It is borderline ridiculous. What he is able to do with his irons and the distance he gets on them is unreal. Think about it, there are now 500 YARD PAR 4's, 600 yard PAR 5's & 225 YARD PAR 3's. The entire Tour is having to adjust to that. Then get up there and putt on ice. It is just crazy.
and in fact, most golf historians would argue that, Tiger excepted, today is a MUCH more level playing field than in Nicklaus' day. In Jack's day, maybe 10 players were a legit threat to win a given major. Today, 50-75 are. You have guys like David Toms, DLIII, David Duval, etc that all have only one major, that likely win 4 or more in Nicklaus' era (or if Tiger was never born).
I have seen articles and interviews with both Palmer and Nicklaus and both concede that were Tiger around when they were, their names would not be known the way they are. It was not them being humble or showing humility, they know the deal. There is likely not an era in golf that Tiger Woods with any equipment would not dominate. All other golfers can suddenly change their workout or their routine and dedicate themselves the way Tiger Woods does but they won't be as good as he is because he starts off better out of the blocks. It is a simple matter of probably the best golfer to ever have lived having a work ethic second to none as well. There are lots and lots of talented basketball players who could have been famous had they the work ethic and tenacity that the guys who made the pros did.
This argument has been done to death. If you take Tiger out of the picture, is there or is there not an extremely deep and level playing field? Without Tiger, I think you might mention Phil, Vijay, and Ernie in the same way that Jack, Arnie, and Gary are discussed. Tiger is just a whole other animal. His weaknesses are as good as other players' strengths.
Vijay is about to turn 45. If anything, he might be an even harder worker than Tiger. He's just old and not as good. I think it's pretty obvious Phil could have been better than he has been. David Duval got to world number 1 in part due to hitting the weights and being really fit. Tiger has also historically been in great shape. Phil ... has boobs. Still, like others have said, Phil and Vijay both have had great careers. In that sense it's pretty hard to say that what they are doing doesn't work.
Sorry didn't mean to derail my thread. I think what I was saying though is that you had VJ in 04, when Tiger was slumping, dominating and then he just fell off. Perhaps that is getting older as mentioned by others. Phil took his game to another level in 05/early 06 and was really challenging Tiger and outdueling him at times. IMO Phil has gotten out of shape and thus my take is that he isn't the worker that he needs to be to keep his game where it needs to be to consistently challenge Tiger. Perhaps I am wrong about VJ. It just seems like a bit of decline in a short 2 years period of time for his game to fall off as much that you really don't even think of him when looking at the leaderboards these days.
