This debate is such a classic example of people's generally poor logic and debate ability. The pro-Jack side is completely statistics-free consisting almost entirely of strong statements of opinion and ad hominem attacks. That is not a debate. It's just childless yelling.

It's clear the debate has little to do with golf ability for the pro-Jack side. They don't like Tiger as a person (a position many if not all off the pro-Tiger side might agree) but are unable to separate his personality from his game.

Strong, dispassionate post full of stats and free of ad hominems here

Sometimes I think the Media creates the controversy.

Tiger's new Nike Ad

Nothing wrong with it to me and I think his new Nike Commercials are well done

http://www.golfchannel.com/news/asso...dayNL_20130327

I don't think it has much to do with not liking Tiger. It's just very natural for people to hang on to a belief they established first. The same thing is happening in basketball with Lebron James or baseball with tons of different people over the years.

Once you establish someone is the best at something in your mind the next person has to often times go far above and beyond the original persons accomplishments in order for you to let go of your pre concieved notion.

The bottom line in this argument is that there doesn't seem to be any reasonably simple way to evaluate the level of competition that Jack played against and that Tiger is playing against. The concept that we should simply add majors together and form an opinion is pretty much stupid but given that we don't have a whole lot else to go on that is widely accepted it's hard to get too mad at people for being simple minded and choosing to rank players that way.

Personally I think that the competition that Tiger plays against is reasonably similar (relatively) to what Jack played with, but I think the fields are far far deeper talent wise than back in the day. Because of this I think Tiger's accomplishments to this point in his career are better than Jack's. But that's not based on any sort of irrefutable evidence.

I do, however; think that if your only criteria for ranking players is simply major wins that you really should reevaluate your critical thinking skills. The competition level they played against is far more important than the technical amount of wins they had. If some random golfer won 10 straight majors around the turn of the century in 10 man fields against people who farmed for a living he obviously shouldn't be recognized as one of the best players ever.

You may need to look up ad hominem.

I think most of this is dead on. Though I disagree with the Lebron comparison. People disliked Lebron mainly not for leaving Cleveland but how he did it. Though I doubt we see Tiger run up and hug a guy after making a hole in one shot at a pro am. Though based on that logic Phil Mickelson deserves more credit than the Tiger Lovers give him

I wasn't saying anything about disliking Lebron. I'm saying there is a legitimate shot that Lebron at some point in his career may be better than Jordan. But some people refuse to even acknowledge that such a feat is possible.

You ain't kidding.

Try being a LeBron fan in an office full of Chicago Bulls die-hards!

I love Tiger, there isnt a player on tour I would rather watch.

I just don't understand how anyone can label someone the grestest of all time when there is someone with more major championships. The majors are what counts, in my book. To go ahead and crown him makes 0 sense to me. And I know he trumps Jack in many other categories on the PGA tour, but I honestly don't give a ****. Majors are the biggest factor in greatness for me and WHEN he does break it, there will be no question who is the GOAT.

Mainly because it doesn't tell the whole story. What if Tiger was beating 100 man fields and Jack was beating 20 man? What if Jack won 18 and finished dead last in 50 others and Tiger won 17 and had 50 second place finishes?

Like I said. The data is not really available to make a reasonable conclusion on lots of things related to them. But there is certainly an argument to be made for either one.

Michael Jordan doesn't lead the NBA in points scored, yet he's largely seen as the best ever. He also doesn't have the most championships won. Cy Young leads the major leagues in wins, but nobody in their right mind would think he's the best pitcher ever. You can't just pick one statistic and decide that's the only true way of deciding greatness, especially when people in that sport aren't even from the same era.

Do you not understand that not everyone has the same criteria as you? And do you also not understand that the criteria you are using is an arbitrary measure that makes up a super small portion (like less than 20%) of their overall playing careers? And that by dismissing the other 80% of their careers you might be overlooking some things? And that winning an event 40 years ago is not equal in difficulty to winning one today? And on and on?

Like, NXT made this comparison earlier, but I believe that Karl Malone is the GOAT basketball player. He has made the most free throws of all time, and that's what counts, in my book. Nothing else matters. Care to refute that?

He's actually the worst pitcher ever.

BO

to me it's pretty much the majors that count....

BUT, i think you need to go and look at jack and tiger's career in majors and see how much concentration there was in major victories when either didn't win. i get the idea in jack's day it was much more like men's tennis today where if jack didn't win a small number of guys won the major. not as small as men's tennis (basically 3 or 4 guys for the last 10 years) but much smaller than today. i'll see if i can work up some stats.

here's what i came up with on jack vs. tiger on majors (and their competition)

jack was 18 majors over 25 years. but i am taking out the last major and the 6 years preceding it (this flatters jack, instead of harming him.

so jack was 17 majors from 1962 through 1980. 19 years. so 17/76.... probably should add a few years onto jack as he was definitely major contender in 1980, 1981 etc.... so maybe 23 years. so 17/92??

tiger is 14 majors from 1997 through 2012. so 16 years. so 14/64

in jack's time, here are other major winners.

player 9 (shocked me)
watson 8
trevino 6
seve 5
floyd 4
hale 3
casper 3

some go a bit beyond 1980. but that's 7 guys with 38 majors. disregarded someone like larry nelson as all his majors came after 1980

tiger's time:

phil 4
els 4
vj 3
payne 3
pharrington 3

i stopped at 3 so i don't consider this thorough list but it's close ... so that's 17 majors by other multiple winners.... guys like norman, faldo, price and daly are either only 2 or much of it before tw's time on tour.

i'll give ratios in my next post.

Isn't looking only at wins and not top 5 or top 10 or top 3 finishes or cuts missed also not looking at the whole picture? Tiger may be better with regard to this but I haven't seen all the numbers. A great stat would be to take every round played in stroke play and measure Standard Deviations above and below field avg and avg that over similar career periods.

ok, here's what i have:

jack 17/86 19.8%

TW 14/68 20.6% (obviously the trend is not good)

jack's major competitors: 38/86 44.2%

TW's major competitors: 17/68 25%

soooo much interpretation of jack's beyond 1980. where do you stop? if you add in 1986, you are adding in 6 years where he was a strong player for maybe half the time. i have sort of gone to 1983.5 for my year but i'm going to look into his pga rank for each year. hopefully tighten up the numbers.

definitely jack was beating fewer legit contenders than tiger. especially these days i'd say.

LOL, if alive these players are still exempt on pga tour. EDIT: i presume they were all alive fairly recently or the list would be alot bigger (i.e. it only lists the living players)

1. Winner of PGA Championship or U.S. Open prior to 1970 or in the last five calendar years:

Keegan Bradley Al Geiberger Jack Nicklaus
Jack Burke, Jr. Lucas Glover Arnold Palmer
Angel Cabrera Padraig Harrington Gary Player
Billy Casper Don January Lee Trevino
Dow Finsterwald Gene Littler Ken Venturi
Jack Fleck Graeme McDowell Tiger Woods
Raymond Floyd Rory McIlroy Y.E. Yang
Doug Ford Bobby Nichols Webb Simpson

Win percentage. It also helps if you assume today's field is stronger than yesterday's. The game is significantly more popular globally, and the population is substantially larger than it was 50 years ago.

Variance.

Why would this be great? Jack's fields were far worse. And rounds played when not in contention may not be indicative of true talent.

Doug Ford up through perhaps the early 90's played quite a few events on the PGA Tour. He would routinely shoot in the 90's and when asked about it he said that he still wanted to compete and this was the only place he was eligible, or some such.

BO

ok, i need to add alot more years for nicklaus.

he was top 20 or cusp of it (or much better) in majors (often more than one major) every year until early 90's

remembering back, i thought that he came out of nowhere to win masters in 86. but i think it was his strong sunday (coming from behind) and his advanced age that made it special, not that he had done nothing the past few years (which is how i vaguely remembered it).

so i have to add one more major to jack and about 10 more years to jack's ratio.

and then multiple winners in 1980's (faldo being the very obvious one) to his competitor list. not alot of majors concentration in the 1980's. more the 1960's and the 1970's

i hadn't seen this post when i listed the guys still exempt from the pga tour. i think they should have an invitational pairing the last 5 year exempt guys with the lifetime exempt guys (maybe a scramble)

I dont think you can just throw out the last 6 years. Not fair to Tiger at all. If your going to do that throw out the 6 years (2, 2 and 2) of where he was making swing changes and the scandal and was hurt for a year. They both had their ups and downs but the overall picture is what counts

I thought we were sticking to the numbers and avoiding subjective assessments. You never saw those guys play remember?

Just because it's not easily-quantifiable doesn't mean a position isn't correct.

I think it stands to reason that the fields are better now than they were 50 years ago. I could be way off but I think the global population has grown a ton, the popularity of the sport has grown a ton, the industry as a whole has grown a ton, the accessibility of the game has grown a ton, etc.

I wonder if poker players are better in 2013 than they were in 1978. We'll probably never know!

Theorietical Player x wins 19 majors but not a single other tournament in his career. GOAT?