Can Tiger Woods Win Against The New Generation?

Tiger has been cleared for full golf activity. News broke yesterday and those of us that like golf are thrilled. Why? Because there’s never in the history of the game been anything like Tiger Woods. He elevated the game on his own in a way not even the Big Three could muster together. He made it cool, popular, athletic, and a multi-billion dollar industry. Jack Nicklaus is the greatest major champ of all time, but Tiger played the greatest golf ever played, and did it in the most compelling nature we’ve ever seen. I can’t remember who, but someone once wrote that if you took an alien who had no clue about anything and dropped it off at Augusta National for the Masters, it would gravitate towards Tiger Woods. There’s just something about him. You see him and know you need to watch.

It’s the biggest cliché in golf media but it’s damn true — Tiger moves the needle unlike any other.

Been cleared to play for a few hours and he’s already ALL OVER the golf world. Now, every time he makes another comeback you get the haters. They’re not what bother me. I write about politics for christ sake — if they bothered me I wouldn’t have made it this long. What bothers me is when people say there’s no way Tiger can compete against the new generation.

An insane take on many levels. There’s this misguided theory that golf right now is better than it’s ever been. That it’s deeper than it’s ever been.

This is false. Our guy Brandel Chamblee dispelled this notion on Shane Bacon’s The Clubhouse podcast recently.

“I’ve done a lot of studies on ‘is golf better now, deeper,’ and it’s really not. People love to say that but it’s just not true. You can go to the 25th, 50th, 100th, 150th spot and they’re almost identical scores to what they were shooting 20 years ago to the hundredth of a stroke. Almost identical. This in spite of agronomical improvements, this in spite of technological improvements, this in spite of ballistic improvements, this in spite of much, much shorter shots into greens. So it’s a bit dubious to say golf is better now than it was 20 years ago or 40 years ago.”

He then goes on to detail how there’s been a deterioration in swing coaching and thus technique.

Conversely, Tiger Woods in the year 2000 had a scoring average of 67.79. In 2007, he had that same scoring average of 67.79 and in 2008 it was 67.66, despite him playing injured. He was more than ONE STROKE better PER ROUND than the next best guys on the PGA Tour.

Jordan Spieth won the Vardon Trophy (low scoring average) this year with an average of 68.85. Tiger was over a stroke better PER ROUND and was that way for a long time.

These young guys are good, don’t get me wrong. They’re very good. And Tiger Woods isn’t going to be waltzing out there averaging early/mid-2000s Tiger Woods-caliber scoring averages. But to say this generation is simply too good for him to be able to compete? That’s insane. That’s false. I won’t stand for it!

Jimmy fucking Walker won a major championship 14 months ago; he was 37. 15 months ago, Henrik Stenson won the Open at age 40. Sergio Garcia just won the Masters at age 37.

Tiger is 41 now, will be 42 by the time he makes any real return. You’re telling me 42-year-old Tiger Woods, with the talent to produce the above results, can’t win… but Jimmy Walker, Henrik Stenson, and Sergio Garcia, all within a couple years age of Tiger, can?

And against guys that, despite this misguided notion, aren’t WAY BETTER than any other generation? In fact, statistically they’re identical, perhaps even a little worse?

Tiger isn’t going to come out here and spoil us the way he used to. He’s not going to win US Opens by 15, Masters by 12, and Opens by 8. He’s not going to be a full stroke better PER ROUND than the next best players on the planet. DJ, Rory, JT, or Spieth’s very best A-game might be significantly better than 42+ year old Tiger’s. That’s fine, I’ll concede that.

But these guys don’t bring their A-game every week. They don’t bring it anywhere near the clip that Tiger Woods brought it, so there will be plenty of chances for other guys (like Tiger) to win tournaments.

The biggest obstacle isn’t an unbeatable field, it’s his health. If he ain’t healthy then he ain’t beating anybody, whether it’s this “new generation” or it’s Sam and Charlie in the backyard. An unhealthy Tiger and this whole blog is moot.

But he was just cleared for full activity, and if he can find some consistency in the health department, there’s absolutely no statistical evidence to suggest Tiger Woods can’t compete with this generation. He won 5 times and was player of the year in 2013. Jack Nicklaus produced the greatest all-around driving season ever in 1980 at the age of 40 and won the Masters at the age of 46.

Sure, we probably overdo it with excitement and our expectations probably grow a little too high each time Tiger mounts a new “comeback,” but I think this blog serves to show there’s substantial evidence to prove our enthusiasm is validated.

One more Tiger run — with today’s media-crazed, social media-heavy world, and with everything he’s been through — would be the greatest spectacle in golf.

Make. Sundays. Great. Again.