My point is how do you know who is this generations Watson or Player until the time has passed? Those guys didn't start off with 5+ majors just like this crowd hasn't. But I wouldn't be surprised to see Charl Schwarzel, Rory, Keegan, Kaymer, Oosthuizen, Dustin wind up with 5+ majors and then, IN HINDSIGHT, we will know who this generations Watsons etc are. Your blanket statement of they have never done anything is talking about people who are early in a career and thus by definition haven't had time to amass 5+ majors, but somebody will.

That or if they don't win 5+ majors it will just be proof that the fields are deep and you have 10 different major winners every 3 years.

that is fair ship, but if i look back on phil ( you win a pga event as an am) as a disappointment he def had the talent to do more. adam scott and badds have been the same so has sergio. these are all guys that at 19 or 21 showed great potential but really did nothing.

i agree with rory he does seem like he could be a great. dj maybe but he better go see dave pelz cause he has no short game.

jt, heart does matter. it can overcome a gap in talent. ive seen it many times up close.

you ever heard its not the size of the dog in the fight but the size of the fight in the dog?

I completely disagree with the "will" or "heart" with regards to golf Leo, this isn't boxing or football, you can't just will yourself to win at golf. God knows I have tried. There is a specific talent and will that must be present. Otherwise your logic would hold in tennis...and the same person or at least small population wins EVERY TIME.

Great point - Watson (my all-time fav) was known as a choker early in his career, yet will go down in history as one of the all-time greats. He certainly didn't lose because he didn't have heart - he just didnt know how to win at that level early in his career. Personally, I thought Phil would have won more because he was dominant in college - more than Tiger, and, while he's had a great career, its less than I expected for him coming out of college.

ok ship i will yield to you some. you have played on the highest stage. like i said my background is football. where ive seen guys 5'11 220 on dline go against guys 6'5 320 that wound up in the nfl for years.

now there is no way on paper that the small guy shouldnt get destroyed. but somehow he competes and even gets some wins vs the talent.

if you really think that the diff between tiger and say phil ernie scott etc is more physical than mental so be it.

I will address this first I guess. Yes, undeniably I am a huge Tiger fan and have been every since I was young and my grandfather introduced me to golf. I also love numbers and statistics. That is the reason why Trackman is unbelievably interesting to me. The same reason why I was able to pour over equity calculations in relation to poker hands enabling me to succeed fairly well during the online poker days and will hopefully lead me to success in the trading world.

I always want to know "why"? My wife gets pissed at me all of the time because I don't "trust her"(that's what she calls it when I don't immediately believe everything she says). I ask a lot of questions and hardly ever take anything someone says as "it". I need to understand "why" what they say is right, and if I don't understand it myself then I will ask them to prove it to me, or I will look it up and figure it out myself.

Unfortunately it appears the double whammy of being a Tiger and numbers fan has caused me to become hated in the golf forum. Maybe if someone would remind everyone that I encouraged dagolfdoc(who is obviously a HUGE ASSET to any golfer) to sign up and participate here they will take it easier on me. I knew he would like it and I knew the posters on this forum would love it. Oh well, but I really enjoy these discussions. I'm trying to take opinions out of the conversation. Sure, I have opinions and I realize that anything I say about Tiger will be taken with a grain of salt on this board, that is why I always try to provide the statistics that lead me to my opinion.

When you are wondering if someone is "close" obviously some speculation is necessary. If it was a yes or no question as to whether he was back to form, it would be no. I don't particularly care for "if" statements either, but in reference to the "close" argument they are essential. My "close" argument hinges with Tiger returning, at least to some degree, to the days of his great putting. We've seen it here and there over his last tournaments, but unfortunately the "bad" has outweighed the "good".

I also think people put too much stock in the fact that Tiger missed that 5 footer on the last hole in the match play. He hit a great putt on 17 and made a putt slightly shorter(maybe?) than the one on 18 on the 16th hole that was quite important. Nobody is giving him credit for the 10 footer he made on Wednesday to seal his match, or the putts he holed on 17 and 18 at the Chevron. Sunday at Abu Dabi wasn't a putting issue, Sunday at Pebble was. That's how it goes sometimes.

If you were 6'10" yea maybe you do would have played college bball, but that's not a gaurantee. If Tiger Woods putted half-way decently in any of his previous events he would have more wins. That is a fact.

No. All I did was look at their last 4 stroke play appearances, and I only did it because Tiger has a better average finish than 5 guys who are "playing better" than him at the moment. For the record, I obviously don't think Tiger had a better 12 months. I'll bet that he has a better next 12 months tho

Maybe this is the poker player in me talking, but yea wins are great and major wins are even greater, but the difference between the winner and 2nd place finisher in a particular week is negligible. Go back to the 3 way playoff with Haas, Bradley, and Phil. Because Haas drained a 40 footer on the 2nd playoff hole, all of a sudden he played better than Phil and Keegan that week. No, all 3 of them played great, Haas won the variance battle.

I don't like to use 1 or 2 tournaments to decide if someone is playing well. Anyone who's good enough to play on Tour can have 1 or 2 good weeks in a row. Start expanding that timeline though and you can weed out the noise and get down to business to see how someone is playing. And while 4 isn't much better, it is a little bit better and exposes some weaknesses aka missed cuts.

The general population is so results oriented it is ridiculous. Almost everyone who tee's it up in a PGA Tour tournament "could" win. Does that mean whoever wins next week at the Honda is playing better than Tiger Woods at the moment? No, but they played better THAT week. If Heath Slocum wins this weekend is he all of a sudden playing better than Tiger because he has a W? No, he played better for a week. If Tiger wins, is he now playing better than Phil, Keegan, Haas, Stanley, and Snedeker now that he matches them in recent wins and the consistency of his non-wins is much better? Yes(IMO) Does it really come down to if Tiger wins he's playing better, if he comes in 2nd he's not? That seems silly.

Just for fun.
Compare these 2 seasons from last year. Who does everyone think is "better"? Why is that?
Player A
-28 events
-10 missed cuts
-2 wins
-4 top 10s
-12 top 25s
-Scoring Average- 70.26

Player B
-26 events
-4 missed cuts
-1 win
-7 top 10s
-12 top 25s
-Scoring Average- 70.13

For me, I would rather have player B on a week to week basis. I'm sure it's close, and when you guys see who the players are that may sway your opinions. I put more weight on consistency, playing a lot of very solid golf, because in the long run the guy with the lower scoring average "should" produce better results. However variance is huge, and when you compress the average scores on tour from top to bottom like they are nowadays it makes it even harder, statistically to win. It's no wonder we have more and more first time winners and seasons where a lot of people win, where its not just a few guys dominating. The answer is in the stats.



As for "the others who are close?", not a single one of those guys is "close" to anything resembling Tiger Woods during one of his dominant stretches. This is them playing their A game, and Tiger Woods is playing "consistently better" with whatever grade you want to give his game now, and it's obviously not A.

Also, regards to silly season and the Grand Slam. If someone thinks that Tiger's win at Chevron is even remotely comparable to Keegan's win at the Grand Slam then just wow.

i did a bad job of explaining that scenario. we also have a situation we call pressing where you over try. when you over try your muscles will get tight and your natural ability will not be achieved.

but there is a way to get more out of your body than you should while still being relaxed. it just happens with some guys.

a great example of over try is 40 speed vs game speed. some guys try so hard in the 40 esp when running solo they tighten up and run a bad time. you put them out in the game they arent thinking i have to run a great time i have to catch that guy and they dont think about anything but the target and everything else happens.

There's a huge difference between "mental" and "heart and will."

I'm waiting for Usain Bolt to be called the "toughest" runner or the sprinter with the most heart.

Enlightening. If I'd only known....

@nxt i picked A. and nobody should hate people on a forum for stating their opinion. thats what its for.

its about having fun discussions with other golf fans. even if the talks become emotional and heated they dont mean anything in the grand scheme of things.

Nobody hates making bronzey more than UB

you are still a great player though.

So you are a victim because you are a rigorous thinker who greatly admires Tiger Woods's on course accomplishments. I'm guessing you are also kind of young, but that is neither here or there.

Nicklaus is the greatest of all time. Even Woods himself would say this. I highly doubt Woods will even be remotely competitive when he is in his 40's. When he lost his club head speed and mental game it has all gone down hill. It shows that Nicklaus not only was superior in the mental game but also that he was more of a pure talent in his ability to still be competitive while his body got older. I think Woods losing his dad had a lot to do with his decline as well. Not having someone to really keep him focused has taken a great toll on him. It seems watching old footage that Nicklaus was over all more passionate about the game as well. Sometime Woods really looks like he is grinding just to get through a tournament.

lol shemp doing serious work itt

yea, he is a solid troll

Do you think it may be that Phil had other areas in his life that were a priority like his family? Tiger was a machine and only cared about winning at all costs which included working harder than anyone else. He has proven he had no regards for his wife or kids. Even though it is just my opinion and not fact I also think PED's also contributed to huge success.

For me now he has lost his mental edge and his body is worn out.

no phil is just lazy. lots of great talents dont work hard they dont have to. this is in all aspects of life.

The Tiger discussion is funny to me - if someone is a Tiger fan - they can find all the ammo they need on how is back - if they are a hater they can certainly make that argument. He hasn't played a full season in a couple years, doesn't have a win (outside of off-season ((is that better wording?))) but he is "close" the haters can make their claim that he is on his downfall. I'm a complete 3rd party - I don't really care - if he plays good - I like it - if he doesn't, I enjoy watching those who do. He hasn't performed to the expectations I (or anyone else I would guess) came to expect of him when he dominated, and anyone who would trade his past few years with Bradley, Kuchar, Haas, etc is nuts. My point has been, and is, does no one notice/recognize the other good play? OK TW's average is better than Bradley's over 4 tournaments - yes TW has more majors, more $$, more child support, etc - but who is "close" and is "closer?" If anyone wants to say Tiger is playing better over the last 6 months/year/whatever than Bradley, Phil, Haas, Sneds, Day, -- ok, I get it, he's better overall, long-term. But NOW, he's not the best player on the planet as he was for a long time. He's lost tons of fans & $ because of his off-course activity, and hes' going through a major swing change - I get that. However, IF TW didn't have 14 majors and his name was Mark Wilson, how many on here would be going nuts about him?

All-in-all it's an interesting time in golf - Tiger took things to a new level and some younger guys are trying to reach that bar. No doubt, if Tiger gets back to his "A" game it will be a fun year watching guys like Rory, Bradley, Scott, playing against him on a Sunday, but right now, Tiger is, unfortunately, a really good tour player, not the best.

WTF? Do you know Phil? Lazy is hardly a word I'd use to describe him.

i don't know why i even expect a coherent thought out of leoslayer. trololo

Best player in college golf -- EVER?

Phil? Tiger? Jack?

I'm not savvy enough to put that little spoiler thing in here, but its:

Bryce Molder. Best ever. Lowest scoring ave. of all time. Would that make him the GOAT? Or, would it be based on wins? Or on NCAA Ind Champ? What about winning a tour event or a US Am? Based on #'s it's Bryce, but I don't know that he's the name that comes to mind when people think about best ever in college golf.

Did he not have the success on tour because he didn't have "heart" or "desire" - no way - if anyone on here knows him, they know that is not true! Based on #'s though he was better than TW last year and in college.