Tiger Woods widens lead at AMEX, en route to 6th straight win
It's over, even with 2 rounds left. Tiger Woods widened his lead to 5 strokes, shooting 7-under. It is very possible that Tiger Woods will never lose a tournament again.
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17 Comments:
Unless, you know, it's match play. ;)
Tiger is an exceptionally selfish player. Before and after the Ryder Cup while playing for himself, he's invincible. During the Cup his play was uninspired and apathetic.
Just amazing! AMAZING! Tiger won three points in the Ryder Cup! So in other words, if he doesn't win every match he's both a lousy Match Player and Selfish! The Ryder Cups means NOTHING in the grand scheme of golf anyway, regardless of who wins it!
Agreed... Tiger won 3 points for the Ryder Cup team!!! He's only responsible for what 4?
So, team play isn't his strong point? Ask his team mates at Stanford. I bet they'd have a different take.
Maybe there's something about the Ryder Cup that doesn't fit him. Big Deal. That doesn't mean he's selfish. As for being a lousy match player, that's ridiculous. Take the Ryder cup out and he's one of the most aggressive and intimidating players in the world and has historically dominated match play. Besides that, the nature of match play is such that anyone can lose on any day.
Interesting looking at tiger's play the first day. He is only 41% in GIR, but is 95% in scrambling.
In addition, he has eagled #18 both days, a 567 yard par 5. He is averaging 307 off the tee. Assume he steps up on this hole and hits it 330. He still has made a birdie from 237 for two days straight. Pretty impressive.
Lastly, he is the only player in the field to shoot 63. His 64 has only been matched by two other players, and they shot in the 70s on their other round.
No one can argue that Tiger has not lived up to the ryder Cup record expected out of him. But when he has that list of goals (records held by Nicklaus), i doubt that the Ryder Cup record is very high on his accomplishment list. Sure, he wants to do well, but it is hardly the thing that drives him. Unlike Sergio, who must rely on his ryder Cup, as the remainder of his accomplishments have been sub-standard at best in comparison to expectations.
The consecutive victory record is important. Setting aside Nelson's record, Hogan was in second place with a 6 tourament streak. Tiger tied that in 2000 with his own streak of six. Hogan had another streak of four. Tiger beat that at the Deutsche Bank Championship this year with his fifth. Now it looks like he is in good position to tie his own and Hogan's streak of six, although this one will have an asterisk because of the World Match Play loss.
By the way, the Ryder Cup is an exhibition that meant something before the era of air travel. Now all of these guys belong to the same country clubs in Florida, share nannies (and how!), compete head to head every week etc. The media tries to contrive a rivalry to pump up the ratings, but it doesn't work. Nobody cares.
One more point. Tiger Woods is a master of conserving and marshalling his focus. He is then able to tap into it on command at the precise moment he needs to perform to his maximum ability. He's not going expend his precious and limited mental and nervous energy on an meaningless team exhibition and I don't blame him at all. From his point of view, you are asking him to risk losing a major in order to win a Ryder Cup. As a fan, I feel the same way. I want to be cheering for a Tiger Woods who shatters the major records of the great Nicklaus, beats Snead's total victory record and challenges Nelson's consecutive win streak, not Tiger Woods the Ryder Cup champion. Leave that for Sergio.
Wow, I didn't realize that all of you were such authorities on the sport of golf. Who would have thought that the Ryder Cup was merely an outdated exhibition that doesn't matter? Well the fact is, the Ryder Cup DOES matter and players like Tiger Woods do care about it. You all might not care, but, thankfully, your opinion means nothing. People like Tiger actually do care about winning the Ryder Cup. Losing three in a row is only making them want to win it more. Look at it this way, Tiger wants to break Nicklaus' record, well, Nicklaus was also dominant in the Ryder Cup. It stands to reason that Tiger wants to play well and win Ryder Cups. You idiots can go watch pro wrestling for all I care.
Hey without a doubt the Ryder Cup means something, but that's the only thing that the Euro's have to crow about. There's an amazing lack of majors up and down the board. When was the last one? Olazabal? The Ryder Cup is an exhibition of the best teams and clearly the Euro's have the best team, but individually they lack the mental toughness to close the deal. Monty - US OPEN and Sergio (pick a Sunday this year) Even Ryder Cup Sunday.
I think there should be more team events, worldwide. Combine the President's Cup and Ryder's Cup.
I perhaps overstated my views by calling the Ryder Cup meaningless. Tour players are very competitive by nature and want to win everytime they tee it up. Having said that, there are different levels of wanting to win. Tiger wants to win the Masters more than he wants to win the Bell South Classic, for example. When Tiger says he wants to win the Ryder Cup, yes he technically means it, but anyone who watches Tiger regularly knows he is putting nothing into it. Like I said earlier, there is only so much concentration and focus in his gas tank. He never wastes a drop. Tiger always says all the right things about Ryder Cup - he has to living under the media microscope.
Quick, name me a memorable Jack Nicklaus Ryder Cup moment. Buzzzz!! Too slow!
I think today's players see the Ryder Cup as an event that is fun, in that the top guys get to hang out together and play in an unusual format against their friends who happen to be European. There are also 15 or so "cusp" players every year who covet making the Ryder Cup team. But this is solely because of the prestige of being in the top 12 (? I don't even know the number) players in the US/Europe, not because they are passionate about which side is holding the Cup at any given time.
I'm not a golf historian, but I greatly enjoyed reading Mark Frost's books about Harry Vardon/Francis Ouimet and Bobby Jones. In that era, there was a genuine rivalry between England/Scotland and America over who "owned" the game of golf. Of course, originally England and Scotland owned the game and the history of golf in the first half of the 20th Century is the story of America taking it over. My point is that with the modern transportation system and the current tour setup, I think that rivalry is pretty dead. In that sense, the Ryder Cup has lost most of its meaning. Guys like Nicklaus and Jackie Burke Jr. have a foot in the old era and are trying to keep the Cup's importance alive, but I think they fighting losing battle.
"Wow, I didn't realize that all of you were such authorities on the sport of golf. Who would have thought that the Ryder Cup was merely an outdated exhibition that doesn't matter? Well the fact is, the Ryder Cup DOES matter and players like Tiger Woods do care about it. Y...... You idiots can go watch pro wrestling for all I care."
Nearly everyone on this board can recite by memory how many majors Tom Watson, Nick Faldo, Ben Hogan and Arnold Palmer won, but I'd bet not a SINGLE person can recite their Ryder Cup record.
Young Tom, why don't you grow-up and stop calling people names that don't agree with you? Or go hang at one of those forums where there all young, they constantly flame each other, and just don't act too cerebral.
Woods argument that everyone can tell you that Jack won 18 majors, but no-one can cite his ryder cup record doesn't hold from me because everyone knows that Jack's contribution to the ryder cup was massive--both as a player and as a captain. Most also remember Jack's famous concession of a putt to Jacklin that meant the Cup was tied...
If Jack had a poor ryder cup record, we'd know about it - just as we know about Woods.
Also on the Ryder Cup, I wonder whether the US would benefit from having a captain who was slightly more detached from current players. I mean Woosnam, Langer and Faldo (captain in '08) are all the leaders of European golf in a way that doesn't hold for Sutton or Lehman (or for that matter Azinger or Pavin who are being touted as possible captains for '08). Maybe the US should look to a guy currently competing on the Champions Tour: Hale Irwin would have the drive to do the job, did pretty well when he was Presidents Cup captain in the 1990s.
Joel123 nails it.
Golf is an individual sport.
Tiger is clearly one of the two best golfers of all time, and one of the greatest sportsmen of all time. I'd argue the best sportsman competing today.
So he dominates an individual sport. So what are you doing harping on team stuff? Jeebus -- Tiger would give up every future Ryder Cup point for another major.
How often did Jack win 6 in a row?
PS -- anyone know Jack's winning percentage in the Ryder Cup, compared to his teams' winning percentage? And the same stats for Tiger?
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Check out this article: Ryder Cup Doesn't Matter
I'm not really sure why anybody actually argues this assesment. Next year for example when we are all discussing who's the best players in the world, nobody will be mentioning Ryder Cup records, even the guys who are arguing that it matters right now.
Tiger won again today, by 8. That will be 12 wins in 22 World Golf Championships events. His 200th event. Winning percentage of 27% (note – Jack Nicklaus’ winning percentage was 12%). Tiger’s top-10 percentage is over 60%. He’s at just about $10 million in PGA event winnings for the year, just shy of Vijay’s record (who played about 2x more events that year). From the web:
It was his eighth victory of the year, making him the first player in PGA TOUR history to win at least eight times in three seasons.
Woods had such control of his game that he went 36 consecutive holes without missing the green, a streak that ended when he hit his approach into a bunker on No. 12 and made his only bogey of the final round.
One other streak ended on the final hole - it was the first time all week Woods failed to make eagle on the 567-yard 18th. His chip from just short of the green ran a few feet past the cup, and he tapped in for a mere birdie.
[ed note: after his tee shot on 18 yesterday, he was 283 yards away from the green and in the rough. Yet he made eagle.]
Woods now is 109 under par over his last six stroke-play tournaments, and this was his largest margin of victory since he won by 11 at the Bay Hill Invitational three years ago.
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