Tiger Woods Master Catch-All Discussion

[turtleback]

16 hours ago, iacas said:

 

And 4th, without the inflated denominator.

8 hours ago, sofingaw said:

Just a couple of notes about how good Tiger (and Brooks) were this week:

264 (Brooks) is the lowest winning score for a PGA Championship ever, and Tiger’s 266 would have won outright every stroke play PGA Championship ever, except for David Toms’ win at 265 in 2001, and would have tied Jimmy Walker at 266 in 2016. That’s 58 out of 61 stroke play PGA’s that would have been won outright.

Also, looking at Tiger’s winning scores in all of his PGA Tour victories, 266 was better than 69 of the 79 overall.  58 players broke par.  

 

They both played great, but these records point out what a poor metric raw score is.  The conditions left this course defenseless.   58 players broke par.

[nevets88]

That driver swing on 17 on tv from the down the line angle looked a little extra violent, but in the video from a different angle I posted in the tournament thread didn't look that way.

 

[70sSanO]

3 hours ago, Ty_Webb said:

My point was more that if Tiger had posted -20, then Koepka wouldn't have had anything he could have done at that point and it may look like they are all folding. That's why I put fold in quotes. Take the 2000 US Open. If Tiger hadn't been playing, it would have been a great tournament and really close. People would have been talking about how tough the course played and how +3 wound up in a playoff. As it is, no one talks about any of that, because Tiger made it irrelevant.

As to the depth of field thing, I don't disagree with you that the field depth is much higher. I would also happily buy that DJ and Brooks are better players than Vijay and Phil and Retief and Ernie were back in 2005. My point there was that some people seem to think that the field were incredible until 1997, then they fell away drastically for about 15 years and now they're back. The reason people think that is because for a 15ish year spell there was one guy who was far and away better than everyone else. If he gets back to being that, then the field are going to appear to have suddenly got worse again. They won't actually have. It will just look that way for the people who try to undermine Tiger's legacy. 

Yes the field is better now than ten years ago, but they are not immune to wobbling. Spieth wobbled at Carnoustie. DJ wobbled Saturday at Shinnecock. They all do. They just don't always have one person cleaning up when they do, so it's not called out so much. I'm on your side on most of this...

No disrespect, but Tiger shot his lowest final round in a major and lowest score over 54 holes.  To get to -20 I guess he would have had to post a 64 on day 1 or maybe throw in a couple of 63's.  Anyone in the field would have won posting a -20.

John

[nevets88]

Watching him grouped with McIlroy and Thomas in the early rounds, was thinking jeez, McIlroy is sometimes taking satellite photos of his drive and lost a little faith. Glad to be proven wrong.

[nevets88]

Quote

The other image is the fist pump on No. 18. Goodness, it took me back to my childhood. After Woods unveiled his complete arsenal of club twirls on Saturday, he followed suit with his signature fist pumps on Sunday. He showed them all. He stepped into the one on 18 and ripped through it. It reminded me that he was once young. So was I. We all were. And now none of us are as young as we used to be, but that doesn't mean we're worse for it.

It reminded me that Tiger has lived some life -- some real life -- with his growing children and aging, injured body. That humanizes even the most mammoth of superheroes. It reminded me that I've done the same. I've lived some life. The great and the awful but mostly the routine. When Tiger was unleashing with frequency and building a database of celebratory fist pumps that far outshone anything else in golf history combined, I was a kid. I don't know if I was 19 or 14 or 12, but I was certainly a kid. Now I'm not. Neither is he.

It appears a Faustian bargain, getting older. You presumably gain many things -- career, status, money -- but lose your childlike wonder. And yet, Woods' year and this part of his career reminds us that it's not over. It reminds us that with time and age come perspective and wisdom. Prize them highly, some might say. They will change you. 

https://www.cbssports.com/golf/news/pga-championship-2018-tiger-woods-won-everything-but-the-wanamaker-trophy-at-bellerive/

[mvmac]

 

On 8/13/2018 at 9:20 AM, GrandStranded said:

I have a question for guys like @iacas and @mvmac. We've all mentioned, heck, we've gone on and on about, Tiger's struggles off the tee with his driver (even his long iron yesterday). I certainly don't know enough about the golf swing to know what's wrong. I'd bet you guys have watched and dissected his swing(s) over the years. He was always a bit shaky since he went to graphite, but I don't remember it being this bad. What do you think his problem is, and will he ever be able to fix it once and for all? Or will this always be his proverbial "Achilles heel"?  

Except for 2000 he has never been an accurate player off the tee, especially the first couple holes. 

It's a swing issue, little bit of what makes him so good with his irons hurts him with the driver. But overall I really like the way he's swinging. IMO it's the best he's been mechanics wise since those early 2000's. Which is pretty exceptional given what he's gone through.

Also on Sunday he mentioned missing it both ways on the range and didn't know which side to pick/err on, so took him several holes to figure it out. 

[Zeph]

1 hour ago, mvmac said:

Also on Sunday he mentioned missing it both ways on the range and didn't know which side to pick/err on, so took him several holes to figure it out. 

Do you think he did figure it out? He first missed two left, then two right, then left, then two right, then fairway for four holes, one right, one fairway.

He certainly found more fairways on the back nine. Only missed one drive on the 17th. Also missed one right on 14, but that was with an iron.

[Ty_Webb]

37 minutes ago, Zeph said:

Do you think he did figure it out? He first missed two left, then two right, then left, then two right, then fairway for four holes, one right, one fairway.

He certainly found more fairways on the back nine. Only missed one drive on the 17th. Also missed one right on 14, but that was with an iron.

I don’t think you can say that missing in both sides means he has a two way miss going. If his swing is missing right or going straight he’s likely aiming down the left. Straight shots will miss left. Big misses will miss right and small misses will hit the fairway. That’s a one way miss with fairways missed left and right. 

[iacas]

8 minutes ago, Ty_Webb said:

I don’t think you can say that missing in both sides means he has a two way miss going. If his swing is missing right or going straight he’s likely aiming down the left. Straight shots will miss left. Big misses will miss right and small misses will hit the fairway. That’s a one way miss with fairways missed left and right. 

That doesn't make much sense. He wasn't planning on good shots to miss left and for his "small misses" to hit the fairway.

He had a bit of a two-way miss; I agree with @Zeph and others on that. It wasn't the traditional pull/slice variety, but a bit of a pull-draw/pull-slice difference. Though with irons it can be different than with the driver, and I'd wonder how those broke down.

Tiger is mostly playing a fade with the driver from what I can tell.

[Ty_Webb]

9 minutes ago, iacas said:

That doesn't make much sense. He wasn't planning on good shots to miss left and for his "small misses" to hit the fairway.

He had a bit of a two-way miss; I agree with @Zeph and others on that. It wasn't the traditional pull/slice variety, but a bit of a pull-draw/pull-slice difference. Though with irons it can be different than with the driver, and I'd wonder how those broke down.

Tiger is mostly playing a fade with the driver from what I can tell.

He was planning on all of his shots finishing in the best possible spot. If he's on the range and half his shots are going straight and half are missing 30 yards right, he's not going to aim his opening tee shot down the middle unless the right miss is harmless. If there's a lake right, he's aiming that down the left. He's going to aim somewhere that gives his shot pattern the best outcome. The two way miss sucks because your shot pattern becomes much larger and it's much harder to control for that. 

I should have said his straight shots will miss left, his fades will hit the fairway and his big misses will miss right. Sorry that wasn't obvious.

[Vinsk]

I have a bit of a chuckle when Tiger does the TaylorMade ‘face-twist’ technology. If it can’t help Tiger, good luck for the rest of us. I guess he’s already done it, but maybe he’d come across something if he just got the Trackman out and experimented with as many different shaft/head combos as he can. Just spend the day with driver only. I dunno, just seems he could come up with something to keep his drives in the fairway. 

[Ty_Webb]

1 minute ago, Vinsk said:

I have a bit of a chuckle when Tiger does the TaylorMade ‘face-twist’ technology. If it can’t help Tiger, good luck for the rest of us. I guess he’s already done it, but maybe he’d come across something if he just got the Trackman out and experimented with as many different shaft/head combos as he can. Just spend the day with driver only. I dunno, just seems he could come up with something to keep his drives in the fairway. 

I doubt his misses are often a result of missing the middle of the face. Twist face won't help you if your face is open to the path, if you hit it in the middle of the club.

[klineka]

2 minutes ago, Vinsk said:

I have a bit of a chuckle when Tiger does the TaylorMade ‘face-twist’ technology. If it can’t help Tiger, good luck for the rest of us. I guess he’s already done it, but maybe he’d come across something if he just got the Trackman out and experimented with as many different shaft/head combos as he can. Just spend the day with driver only. I dunno, just seems he could come up with something to keep his drives in the fairway. 

I saw some things on either twitter or instagram from TaylorMade that indicated the versions of the M3 and M4 that are used on tour dont have the twist face in them. Not sure how true it is. I'll see if I can find it

[iacas]

9 minutes ago, Ty_Webb said:

He was planning on all of his shots finishing in the best possible spot. If he's on the range and half his shots are going straight and half are missing 30 yards right, he's not going to aim his opening tee shot down the middle unless the right miss is harmless. If there's a lake right, he's aiming that down the left. He's going to aim somewhere that gives his shot pattern the best outcome. The two way miss sucks because your shot pattern becomes much larger and it's much harder to control for that. 

I should have said his straight shots will miss left, his fades will hit the fairway and his big misses will miss right. Sorry that wasn't obvious.

I still don't think that's what he was doing. I think he had a bit of a two-way miss going. I believe he said as much about his range session on Sunday - balls curving a bit in both directions and misses going both ways.

Which is backed up by his on-course performance. He hit both over-draws and over-fades. Or hooks and slices if you want.

[Ty_Webb]

1 minute ago, iacas said:

I still don't think that's what he was doing. I think he had a bit of a two-way miss going. I believe he said as much about his range session on Sunday - balls curving a bit in both directions and misses going both ways.

Which is backed up by his on-course performance. He hit both over-draws and over-fades. Or hooks and slices if you want.

I never said it wasn't. I was just pointing out that whether he missed fairways left and right doesn't on its own tell you that he had a two way miss going.

[Vinsk]

Tiger had 13 misses left and 11 right. It would be interesting to have someone respectable analyze what may be the problem there. I’ll pass on Kostis’ opinion. Hank Haney was asked on the radio but he just kind of sputtered around any real answer.

[iacas]

4 minutes ago, Ty_Webb said:

I never said it wasn't. I was just pointing out that whether he missed fairways left and right doesn't on its own tell you that he had a two way miss going.

We're talking about what he actually did at the PGA Championship, not some hypothetical Jack Nicklaus-like thing where you aim left-center and fade it to the right-center.

[lastings]

14 minutes ago, Ty_Webb said:

I doubt his misses are often a result of missing the middle of the face. Twist face won't help you if your face is open to the path, if you hit it in the middle of the club.

this.