Remarkable Tiger Woods keeps streak alive

By: Larry Fitzgerald
Minnesota Spokesman-Recorder
Originally posted 3/20/2008

 

Tiger Woods is the new Greatest. That title has long belonged to three-time Heavyweight Boxing Champion Muhammad Ali; but now, after what Tiger Woods has accomplished, there may be at least consideration for a tie.

 Woods has gone where no athlete has ever ventured. At age 32, he may be the greatest athlete ever.

You can argue all you want about the merits of gauging whether or not golfers are athletes — I say yes, they are. It’s certainly not football, basketball, baseball, hockey, tennis, track, or boxing, but it is a demanding sport that can break an athlete both mentally and physically. Considering that, and that it’s one man against 155 of the absolute best players in the world every week, my vote is for Tiger Woods as Greatest.

 Let me explain something: To get into a PGA tournament you must first qualify, and once you’ve qualified you have to shoot the lowest score after 36 holes in order to get paid. In other words, if you don’t go low, you don’t play on the weekend, and if you don’t play on the weekend, you don’t eat.

Woods made a dramatic 25-foot birdie putt on the 18th hole to win the Arnold Palmer Bay Hill Invitational for the fifth time, extending his PGA consecutive tournament winning streak to five in a row. In the history of professional golf, there have been five winning streaks of a player winning five tournaments in a row or more. At age 32, Woods has three of those streaks.

 Byron Nelson won 11 straight; Ben Hogan won six straight; Woods has streaks of six and five to go with this current streak of five. His latest victory was his fourth of the year worldwide in four tournaments. He has won nine of his last 10 tournaments since July of 2007, and his scoring average is a remarkable 66.13. That’s the lowest in the history of golf.

 Consider this: Par is 72 on most courses. At the Arnold Palmer’s Invitational, Tiger beat Bart Bryant with a -10 score of 270 by one shot. Par for 18 holes was 70; that means his average score was four strokes under par. No player has ever shot lower than 68 as an average score over a year.

 After 36 holes of this tournament, Woods was seven shots behind leader V.J. Singh. Woods has the mental and physical gift to dig deep down inside and produce great shots under pressure. He shot 66 on Saturday to go into the final round tied with four other players at six under par. Woods shot 66, his average, on Sunday to win by one.

 The win was the 64th of his career; he is now tied with the legendary Ben Hogan for third best all-time. Hogan won 64 times over 21 years and 245 tournaments. Woods has 64 wins in this his 11th year on tour in just 219 tournaments.

 Woods is closing in on Jack Nicklaus, who has 73 career wins in the number-two spot, and on Sam Snead, who is number one all-time with 82 career wins. Woods is also the first player in PGA history to win four different tournaments five times: the Arnold Palmer Invitational, Buick Invitational, Bridgestone Invitational and the CA Championship, where he plays this week as the three-time defending champion.

 Woods won over $1 million in prize money for the Arnold Palmer Invitational, and now he is closing in on $80 million in career winnings on the PGA tour. He is number one all-time in career earnings.

Fitz Notes & Quotes

How big was this year's Big Ten Men's Basketball Tournament? In 2008 the tournament has drawn over one million fans in ten years. It was down right Tubby you might say this year. For the 32nd straight year the Big Ten Men's regular season led the nation in attendance. The Gopher's 2007-08 season highlight was clearly shocking Indiana 59-58 on freshman guard Blake Hoffarber's stunning buzzer beater over the number 18 ranked Hoosiers in the Big Ten tournament. It clinched the 15th straight year that coach Tubby Smith, a three time National coach of the year has won at least 20 games. The all-time record for consecutive 20-win seasons is 27 by Dean Smith at North Carolina.

  Minnesota reached the semifinal's of the Big Ten Tournament for the third time in school history which is as deep as the Gophers have ever gone. Losing to Illinois 54-50 in the semi-finals. The Gopher's successful season came to and end losing to Maryland 68-58 in round one of the National Invitational Tournament (NIT) on Tuesday at Williams Arena.

Last year the Gophers finished 9-22, Tubby's Gopher's finished 20-14 the fourth best turn around season in the nation. Tubby will bring in some players. He's a master recruiter the Gopher's played good defense all year but struggled scoring in the last weeks of the year. The Gopher's could not score more than 59 points in any of the last eight games going 3-5.

 After covering another Big Ten Conference Men's tournament this year in Indianapolis, Indiana. The consensus is the the conference had another down year in Men's College Basketball, unlike last year when Ohio State was number one in the country for most of the year and played for the National Championship before losing to Florida.

 Two years ago not one Big Ten team even reached the Sweet Sixteen of the NCAA tournament  Big Ten regular season and tournament champion Wisconsin, Purdue, Indiana, and Michigan State were the only teams to qualify for the field of 65 in 2008.That's the fewest of the power conferences Big East, ACC, SEC,Big 12, and Pac Ten.

 That is not good Billy Packer of CBS Sports is working his 34th consecutive NCAA Men's tournament as the lead analyst on network T.V. Packer said," One of the things about the NCAA tournament it is a report card on your season not necessarily on your conference in general but it certainly is on your season. If your one of the power conferences which almost all of them get four teams or more in the NCAA tournament you get a real judgment.

  You've got to put your teams on the line you can't schedule your way forward. You've got to put your team's on the line they have to win tomorrow night's game. In this particular case without question the report card on the Big Ten this year is not good."

 Greg Olden leaving early to be the No.1 overall pick in last summer's NBA Draft by Portland did not help. Olden has been out all year with a knee injury. Olden said, "I'm doing good, a little set back, I'm getting better, I'm doing better the knee's getting stronger life's alright. I've been running once a week just a little bit stiff. I have not really done a real basketball workout, I have not really jumped that much on my leg but I've done some running."

 And NBA scout working the Big Ten Tournament did not want to be idenified told me, Michigan had the worst talent they've ever had. He said thier were no NBA players in the Big Ten this year. He said D.J White of Indiana and freshman sensation Eric Gordon would both get drafted however he thought Gordon should stay in school at Indiana.

 State Champions

 Congradulations to Pilgram Lutheran Boys 7th and 8th grade basketball team. They are state champions after winning the New Ulm Tournament Pilgram captured the state title at Concondia College and will represent the state of Minnesota in the national championship tournament in Valparaiso, Indiana March 27-30th. Steve Cambrice a former Gopher football star is Pilgram's head basketball coach.

Larry Fitzgerald can be heard weekday mornings on KMOJ Radio 89.9 FM at 8:25 am, and biweekly he commentates on sports 7-8 pm on Almanac (TPT channel 2). He welcomes reader responses to lfitzgerald@spokesman-recorder.com, or visit www.Larry-Fitzgerald.com.