The Tiger Woods Retirement Thread

[Shorty]

I heard on the radio last week that only 22 different golfers have won a major after the age of 40. Woods will be 40 later this year. Given his current physical condition, and state of his game, I think the probability of him winning five majors is pretty remote.

Only?

I see that  as a huge number.

And....he's certainly a better player than 21 of them.

Which makes his odds of winning well into his 40s quite high if he's fit.

Having said that, only a fool would think he will eclipse Nicklaus in total majors won.

[Zeph]

Having said that, only a fool would think he will eclipse Nicklaus in total majors won.

I wanna be a fool.

Imagine Tiger got rid of all injuries in 2015, even playing some tournaments where he makes the cut towards the end. Then he plays competitively for 10 more years on the PGA Tour. 40 majors.

Colin, back me up here.

[Silent]

Why would you want that? Because history will be made? Tiger already made history, fantastic player. For me diversion is also something to keep it interesting, would like to see some new (young) guns getting (a) major title(s). People like Koepka, Reed, Luiten (keep dreaming eh), Spieth, Wiesberger etc. I would like that a lot more then Tiger winning again. Even though a good comeback would be quite spectacular ofcourse, can't deny that.

Ontopic, I don't think Tiger will retire in 2015 already, but I don't expect him to be at a constant high level also again. 1-2 years more and then he's done is my guess.

[Zeph]

Why would you want that? Because history will be made? Tiger already made history, fantastic player. For me diversion is also something to keep it interesting, would like to see some new (young) guns getting (a) major title(s). People like Koepka, Reed, Luiten (keep dreaming eh), Spieth, Wiesberger etc. I would like that a lot more then Tiger winning again. Even though a good comeback would be quite spectacular ofcourse, can't deny that.

I want it because I want to witness one of the greatest players of all time while he's still young enough to compete. And Tiger still moves the needle more than anyone else.

It's not like Tiger will win every single major should he become healthy and play well again. If he wins 5 by the time he's 40, there are still 35 up for grabs. He hasn't won one since 2008, so it's not like he's hogging them.

[David in FL]

I think he'll be fine once he gets healthy. My suspicion is that most of his struggles have come from lingering issues with his back.

Sorry, but he IS healthy. Even he hasn't claimed that his prior back injury is recurring. EVERY player I out there has stiff muscles and soreness that they work through and yes, play through. Tiger himself played, at least 36 holes in the US Open with a freaking broken leg, and won! Now, instead of heading to the PT trailer after a tough first round to see if it can't be worked out, he simply packs it in. Thats not health....that's head.

[Zeph]

Sorry, but he IS healthy. Even he hasn't claimed that his prior back injury is recurring.

EVERY player I out there has stiff muscles and soreness that they work through and yes, play through. Tiger himself played, at least 36 holes in the US Open with a freaking broken leg, and won! Now, instead of heading to the PT trailer after a tough first round to see if it can't be worked out, he simply packs it in. Thats not health....that's head.

I don't care what he says. When he flinches and WDs from a tournament in the first round, being in a decent position, he's not healthy. He might hit it harder on the course or lose focus on parts of the swing, but if he can't play tournament golf, he's not healthy.

Tiger's been injured so many times the last lots-of-years, I don't doubt it when he WDs. I think he might have some mental problems, or lack of some mental strength he had before, but I don't think it makes him WD from a minor stretch or muscle twitch that can be rubbed out.

[9iron]

If Tiger does indeed retire in the next year or so, then golf will try to fabricate a new rivalry. Rory vs. (Fill In The Blank).

In team sports it has been proven that consumers of those sports prefer balance, meaning multiple teams having a chance to win. Meaning spreading out of power. This is why you have the NBA and NFL draft, so that one or two franchises can't just buy up all of the top talent.  In individual sports like golf, consumers act in the exact opposite way. I read a paper recently that pretty clearly illustrated this phenomenon. Consumers of golf actually prefer thru their own purchase habits that wins and prize money are less balanced. Less spread out. More concentrated in a few players. This can be seen right here at TST (as well as other golf forums) where most of the threads are about one player. Some consumers of golf claim to not even want to watch golf if said player isn't playing, which proves the point of the thesis.

The PGA Tour leadership has known this for years, and they have taken at least two direct steps to try to concentrate wins and money at the top of golf. Even the golf media gets in on the act with their constant pining for manufactured rivalries. Who does not recall The Golf Channel talking heads saying something like "Will this be the Year of Tiger vs. Rory". Before that it was "Tiger vs. Phil". And before that we had "The Big Four" and/or "The Big Five".

No worries. Tiger will go, but he will soon be replaced by someone else. Golf will survive his absense, just as they survived when Jack and Arnie were no longer winning. And the fans will latch on to this new player with enthusiasm, and golf will be great for them again. And the beat will go on.

[saevel25]

If Tiger does indeed retire in the next year or so, then golf will try to fabricate a new rivalry. Rory vs. (FOWLER).

There you go . With the way that Ricky did in the Major's last year I would say he is poised to be a consistent threat to Rory.

[Crim]

Golf will be really weird without Tiger, if he does in fact retire.  My wife used to love to watch tour golf on TV--when Tiger contended, of course.  Now, it's a bunch of guys with carbon copy swings that she doesn't know.  To her, the current PGA tour is a bunch of cookie cutter, personality-less robots.

I tend to agree.

Here's hoping Tiger can get his mind, body and game fixed so he can continue to compete.

dave

Interesting, I don't know why some people don't like Rory. Has just as much personality as Tiger IMO, and absolutely bombs the ball. Thank goodness my wife likes him as well so she'll actually watch the tournaments Rory is in.

On topic: I've always hoped Tiger will at least overtake Sam Snead in total wins. Jack's record is a lost cause. I don't claim to know anything about body health in relation to a swing, but I believe Tiger needs to change his swing into something with less explosion, he needs more Els/Couples, less McIlroy/Day. There is absolutely no reason Tiger needs to be #1 in driving distance like he was in the 2 rounds at the Phoenix open. I hope he tries this before he retires.

[Silent]

For what it's worth, but my wife likes Rory as well

[weekend hacker1]

There you go . With the way that Ricky did in the Major's last year I would say he is poised to be a consistent threat to Rory.

You beat me to it. I was going to say that they already have invented a new rivalry: McIlroy v Fowler. I say invented, because it is not a rivalry in any meaningful sense of the word. Hell, Martin Laird has more PGA tour victories than Fowler. It is no more than wishful thinking to say that this is a true rivalry.

[Infamous 273]

I think that but for the unlucky fluke of hitting the pin on the 15th, he'd have definitely added #15 at the 2013 Masters. Sheer bad luck. And that may have provided the impetus for more. Right now another five must seem like a very ponderous task indeed. On the one hand, reason enough to retire; on the other, I severely doubt whether Tiger scrutinizes the quality of the field in British Opens of the 1960s when arriving at a judgment as to whether he is the GOAT yet - reason enough to persevere, health allowing....

We can't forget that awful break on the sixth hole, final round, 2012 Open Championship. Throw in a par at the 71st in the 2009 PGA while we're at it. Three shots, potentially, that couldn't really made things interesting had they gone the other way for him.

[dkolo]

Sorry, but he IS healthy. Even he hasn't claimed that his prior back injury is recurring.

EVERY player I out there has stiff muscles and soreness that they work through and yes, play through. Tiger himself played, at least 36 holes in the US Open with a freaking broken leg, and won! Now, instead of heading to the PT trailer after a tough first round to see if it can't be worked out, he simply packs it in. Thats not health....that's head.

The guy's body went into spasms and he couldn't bend over just because the tournament started an hour or two later than expected. Reasonable people would agree that that suggests he's dealing with some significant health problems. You bring up that he won the Open with a leg fracture and torn ligaments as evidence, but I don't know of what. It shows that he has a tremendous pain tolerance, that he's willing to play through pain, and he's able to make adjustments to compensate for a bad injury. And yet despite those virtues, his present condition is bad enough to keep forcing him out because it's too much. I think the logical inference would be that the injuries he has now, both those we know about and those we don't, are serious and certainly different in nature to what he had then. He played through a catastrophic leg injury. Maybe he could ignore it. For whatever reason, like perhaps that the back is the central hub of the golf swing and his swing puts tremendous pressure on it, he can't ignore this, try as he might.

[saevel25]

The guy's body went into spasms and he couldn't bend over just because the tournament started an hour or two later than expected. Reasonable people would agree that that suggests he's dealing with some significant health problems. You bring up that he won the Open with a leg fracture and torn ligaments as evidence, but I don't know of what. It shows that he has a tremendous pain tolerance, that he's willing to play through pain, and he's able to make adjustments to compensate for a bad injury. And yet despite those virtues, his present condition is bad enough to keep forcing him out because it's too much. I think the logical inference would be that the injuries he has now, both those we know about and those we don't, are serious and certainly different in nature to what he had then. He played through a catastrophic leg injury. Maybe he could ignore it. For whatever reason, like perhaps that the back is the central hub of the golf swing and his swing puts tremendous pressure on it, he can't ignore this, try as he might.

I will say this, a back injury is a whole different animal than a knee injury.  At least from a knee injury he knows when the pain hits and he can try to protect it a bit. Anyone who has had a back injury before knows that it is debilitating. Especially on anything to do with staying in an athletic position and putting any type of torque in the core region.

I've sprained ankle before, heard a ligament pop, and I've been able to walk it off and play 27 more holes of golf before. A sprained ankle isn't as bad as a knee injury, but try to swing the golf club when you can not put any pressure on the outside of your lead foot. I played the rest of those holes with my left leg flared about 45 degrees to towards the target to compensate for it.

I've thrown out my back before. You can't do anything. You can't bend over, you can't turn, you can't do any sort of golf movement. There is no mind over matter with severe back pain. You just can not move at all with out some sort of debilitating pain.

[David in FL]

The guy's body went into spasms and he couldn't bend over just because the tournament started an hour or two later than expected. Reasonable people would agree that that suggests he's dealing with some significant health problems. You bring up that he won the Open with a leg fracture and torn ligaments as evidence, but I don't know of what. It shows that he has a tremendous pain tolerance, that he's willing to play through pain, and he's able to make adjustments to compensate for a bad injury. And yet despite those virtues, his present condition is bad enough to keep forcing him out because it's too much. I think the logical inference would be that the injuries he has now, both those we know about and those we don't, are serious and certainly different in nature to what he had then. He played through a catastrophic leg injury. Maybe he could ignore it. For whatever reason, like perhaps that the back is the central hub of the golf swing and his swing puts tremendous pressure on it, he can't ignore this, try as he might.

I think that the "logical inference" is that he can play through pain when he's playing well, and wants to, but that he's equally willing to bail out given any opportunity if he's not playing well and might be embarrassed yet again.

[dkolo]

I think that the "logical inference" is that he can play through pain when he's playing well, and wants to, but that he's equally willing to bail out given any opportunity if he's not playing well and might be embarrassed yet again.

You're ascribing a lot of character flaws to him that are unsupported by both distant and recent history when the simpler explanation would just be to accept that he's genuinely hurt and that's impacting his game.

[David in FL]

You're ascribing a lot of character flaws to him that are unsupported by both distant and recent history when the simpler explanation would just be to accept that he's genuinely hurt and that's impacting his game.

I think that his character flaws are well documented. I also struggle with the belief that some have, that significant character flaws are limited to only one facet of his (or anyone's) life, and aren't a factor in other facets....

[dkolo]

I think that his character flaws are well documented. I also struggle with the belief that some have, that significant character flaws are limited to only one facet of his (or anyone's) life, and aren't a factor in other facets....

While he may have had his personal issues, I don't see that as a reason to impugn is credibility as a professional, especially when there's no basis for it. Indeed, people were engaging in similar character attacks last year when Tiger pulled out of the Honda. He finished the final round of the subsequent WGC Cadillac, shooting a crappy 78 in obvious pain and wound up having spinal surgery. I'm assuming no one's questioning his need for the surgery or arguing he was malingering at that point. When he came back, he played lousy at the British but finished out having made the cut. He's had bad rounds and finished them if he could and he's had bad rounds and not finished them if he couldn't. When he pulled out of the Farmers last week, he was at +2 through 11 holes of the North. That's not so bad that he's embarrassing himself with his play. I don't find the cynicism to be supported by any reasonable factual basis.