The Match: Tiger vs. Phil Showdown for $9M

[Zekez]

On 7/10/2018 at 8:11 AM, iacas said:

Why would this matter? That amount doesn’t matter to them. They’ll make money owning the business.

So you are saying that losing their own $10 million doesn't matter to them?  

[iacas]

3 minutes ago, Zekez said:

So you are saying that losing their own $10 million doesn't matter to them?  

I’m saying that they’re making a business of this and thus it wouldn’t really be their money anyway. Or they’d still earn more than they lost.

And even if they somehow were invited to play and wagered $10M, that’s like you or me losing a thousand bucks or something.

[Patch]

Pretty sure this match is going to generate more than just the $10 mil going to the winner. Lots of folks, other than the players, will be making money off this. 

As a side note, I read where the Vegas sports books have Tiger as the over whelming favorite at -110. Phil was listed at +115. Those numbers will change obviously as bettors throw their money around. 

[sofingaw]

I will say that now/soon is the best time to do this match. With Phil having a good year, and Tiger still working his way back, their world ranking should be similar.

By this time next year Tiger will be top-5 in the world, if not #1 again. Phil could still be up there, but the odds are he will be a bit lower. 

[PeaceFrogg]

On ‎8‎/‎8‎/‎2018 at 1:12 AM, sofingaw said:

By this time next year Tiger will be top-5 in the world, if not #1 again. Phil could still be up there, but the odds are he will be a bit lower. 

Yeah, sure. LOL.

[iacas]

3 hours ago, PeaceFrogg said:

  Yeah, sure. LOL.

You do realize he's within the top 10 or so if you just consider this year, right?

I'm not saying he'll sustain it, but I don't think what @sofingaw said was that far out there.

[PeaceFrogg]

1 minute ago, iacas said:

You do realize he's within the top 10 or so if you just consider this year, right?

I'm not saying he'll sustain it, but I don't think what @sofingaw said was that far out there.

If ifs and buts were candies and nuts, we'd all have a Merry Christmas!

Hard to get to #1 when you can't win a golf tournament. Even intimating he can get to #1 next year is patently ridiculous.

[iacas]

8 minutes ago, PeaceFrogg said:

If ifs and buts were candies and nuts, we'd all have a Merry Christmas!

The only "if" in my statement was "if you consider this year." That's a reasonable "if" because… he didn't play last year. So he really didn't earn many points before the Hero Challenge in 2017.

8 minutes ago, PeaceFrogg said:

Hard to get to #1 when you can't win a golf tournament.

Not really. You earn a lot of OWGR points for finishing second, too. Or third. Or fourth. Tiger earned

• … 6.24 points for finishing 12th at the Honda Classic.
• … 26.00 points for finishing 2nd at the Valspar.
• … 12.75 points for finishing T5 at the Arnold Palmer.
• … 9.18 points for finishing T4 at the Quicken Loans.
• … 18.0 points for finishing T6 at the British Open.

What do those average? 14.34 points. Dustin Johnson has 10.78 points right now.

Is it likely to get to #1 without winning? No, maybe not. But it's definitely possible, and I would disagree that it's "hard." Like I said, he's inside the top 10 after his last 14 events already, and those were at the very beginning, within the first year, of his comeback.

18 minutes ago, PeaceFrogg said:

Even intimating he can get to #1 next year is patently ridiculous.

I don't agree.

I don't think it's likely, but I disagree that he has no chance of getting into the top five and that it's "patently ridiculous" for him to get back to #1.

That said I think he has a good chance to spend a good chunk of 2019 inside the top 10.

[sofingaw]

11 hours ago, iacas said:

You do realize he's within the top 10 or so if you just consider this year, right?

I'm not saying he'll sustain it, but I don't think what @sofingaw said was that far out there.

I’ll admit that my prediction is on the optimistic side. But nothing so far has indicated that he can’t get back to top 5 or #1, even. He’s certainly trending that way, overall. 

11 hours ago, PeaceFrogg said:

If ifs and buts were candies and nuts, we'd all have a Merry Christmas!

Hard to get to #1 when you can't win a golf tournament. Even intimating he can get to #1 next year is patently ridiculous.

It’s not ridiculous at all. Perhaps a tad optimistic. But very plausible and would not be surprising to many (excepting mostly virulent Tiger haters), considering the solid start to his comeback so far.

[PeaceFrogg]

7 hours ago, sofingaw said:

I’ll admit that my prediction is on the optimistic side. But nothing so far has indicated that he can’t get back to top 5 or #1, even. He’s certainly trending that way, overall. 

It’s not ridiculous at all. Perhaps a tad optimistic. But very plausible and would not be surprising to many (excepting mostly virulent Tiger haters), considering the solid start to his comeback so far.

It would be surprising to everyone, except you, if he got to number 1 NEXT YEAR. The top five would basically have to stop showing up and he'd have to win many times over.

An can we please stop with this labeling of anyone who doesn't agree with any unrealistic expectation heaped upon Tiger to be a hater?

[iacas]

58 minutes ago, PeaceFrogg said:

It would be surprising to everyone, except you, if he got to number 1 NEXT YEAR. The top five would basically have to stop showing up and he'd have to win many times over.

No, he wouldn’t. He’d simply have to play a little better than he did this year and a few guys ahead of him slightly worse. Not as extreme as you keep saying.

Just math.

[PeaceFrogg]

38 minutes ago, iacas said:

No, he wouldn’t. He’d simply have to play a little better than he did this year and a few guys ahead of him slightly worse. Not as extreme as you keep saying.

Just math.

If it's just math, than be specific: quantify "a little better", "a few guys" and "slightly worse" and even you will see it's not as simple as you were trying to make it by using vague terms and then a reference to math.  The man would have to win, something he hasn't done in 5 years, and win often. Players like DJ and Thomas would have to stop winning. Sometimes you just have to realize that though something is mathematical possible it is highly unlikely, given the facts and circumstances. This is all I'm going to say on this until this time next year when Woods is nowhere #1 in the WGR.

[iacas]

5 hours ago, PeaceFrogg said:

The man would have to win, something he hasn't done in 5 years, and win often.

No, he wouldn't. Players have ascended to #1 taking the week off, after all. Finishing in the top five many times is often more than enough to get a player to the top five or even to #1.

Typically, it doesn't happen, because a player that's that often in the top five often manages to win, but Tiger wouldn't have to win "often" at all to ascend to #1. It's simple math.

And again, the guy above said he'd be top five, IIRC, which isn't anywhere near as big of a stretch.

[Dr. Manhattan]

On 8/10/2018 at 12:42 PM, PeaceFrogg said:

If it's just math, than be specific: quantify "a little better", "a few guys" and "slightly worse" and even you will see it's not as simple as you were trying to make it by using vague terms and then a reference to math.  The man would have to win, something he hasn't done in 5 years, and win often. Players like DJ and Thomas would have to stop winning. Sometimes you just have to realize that though something is mathematical possible it is highly unlikely, given the facts and circumstances. This is all I'm going to say on this until this time next year when Woods is nowhere #1 in the WGR.

 

He is currently #4 in points per start. It will be interesting to see how things play out moving forward. He is trending in a pretty strong direction. I don't know if he will get back to #1 by end of 2019, but I do think he has a very good chance to reach the Top 10 or possibly Top 5 if he stays healthy and keeps playing like we've seen this year. 

[brocks]

On 8/10/2018 at 10:42 AM, PeaceFrogg said:

If it's just math, than be specific: quantify "a little better", "a few guys" and "slightly worse" and even you will see it's not as simple as you were trying to make it by using vague terms and then a reference to math.  The man would have to win, something he hasn't done in 5 years, and win often.

Not that often.

Lee Westwood became the World #1 on Oct 31, 2010.  He had only two wins (the St. Jude on the PGA Tour, and the Dubai World on the Euro Tour) in the 52 weeks before that, and neither of them were worth as many points as Tiger's 2nd place finish in the PGA.

Tiger is certainly capable of getting to #1 next year, but it's a big ask.  Getting into the top 5, though, shouldn't even require him to play "a little better."  All he has to do is keep playing the way he has in the last two majors, which is pretty damn good.

Tiger has four high-point, short-field events coming up in the FedEx Playoffs.  Coming off two top tens in a row in majors, it's not overly optimistic to expect him to average about ten points per event, which would move him up to about #15 in the world rankings after the Tour Championship. 

At Bellerive, he played well enough to win anywhere, missing the all-time scoring record by one shot, so it's not overly optimistic to expect him to win an event or two next year, always with the caveat that he stays healthy.  Since he only plays elite events, a win or two means a boatload of points.  If he continues to play as well as he has lately -- and IMO there's reason to expect he will play even better next year -- moving up to top 5 over the course of next year isn't wildly optimistic at all. 

Sure you could say the same about anyone, but as @iacas said, Tiger isn't just anyone. 

[Groucho Valentine]

Somebody just bet me $100 that Phil is going to dominate tiger at least 4&2.
 

God i love tiger haters....😂

[ghalfaire]

I can't imaging any serious golfer not wanting to see this match.  Yes Tiger is the better golfer, his record shows it, and I suspect he is the odds on favorite.  But Phil is not a bad stick himself and as they say, "on any given day".  So I would not say Phil has no chance.  After all the NY Jets & Broadway Joe beat the MN Vikings and the Eagles, with a backup QB beat the Patriots.  Sometimes in sports strange things happen. 

Before anyone offers me a bet, I do believe the race is not always to the swift nor the battle to the strong, but that is the way to bet.

[Patch]

Read a while back that the purse is now $9 million. Apparently the $10 million number interfered with the FedEx $10 million number.  The PGA decided on $9 million.