[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
.66 So the press was geared up for another epic confronta-tion between Woods and Harrington, especially since they were pairedto play together on the first two days at the PGA.Going into the finalround, Woods led Harrington by two strokes, but a totally unknownKorean golfer, Y.E.Yang (110th in the World Rankings) had somehowmanaged to get into the fi nal pairing with Woods.The consensus wasthat Yang would wilt under the pressure of being in the final pairing ofa major championship with Tiger Woods.However, in what was to become one of the most shocking upsets ingolf history, Yang managed not only to stay in touch, but he chippedin for eagle on the 14th hole to take a three-shot lead over Tiger.Tigergot the deficit down to one stroke going into the 18th hole, where Yangwas faced with a difficult shot to the green.He hit a towering iron overa tree guarding the green that plunked down within eight feet of thehole.Yang had won.Interestingly, Tiger received more publicity losing than he wouldhave if he had won.What would have been just another sports story,and a fairly standard one at that, Tiger Wins Another Major, becamea front-page news story.In addition to defeating the heavily favoredWoods, Yang became the first Asian to ever win a major, and given thesignifi cant impact of Korean women golfers on the LPGA, his victorywould signal increased interest in world golf.Signifi cant also was the comparison of television ratings betweenthe 2008 PGA (without Tiger) and 2009, with Tiger in contention.The 2008 ratings were 3.0 compared to 7.5 in 2009.67THE RECORD 113THE RECORDSOver the course of 13 years as a professional golfer, Tiger Woods hascompiled a record that remains unparalleled in the history of the sport.He entered 203 tournaments, worldwide, and finished 145 times in thetop 10.He won 55 times and finished second in 23 tournaments.He wonover $45 million in prize money.Among his many records accomplishedon the PGA Tour, his run of six PGA tournaments in a row stands out.Starting with the PGA Championship on August 15, 1999, Tiger wonsix consecutive PGA tournaments, ending with the AT&T PebbleBeach National Pro-Am on January 9, 2000.During this streak, consid-erable attention was paid to the historical significance of Tiger s quest toreplace the legendary figure, Byron Nelson, who in 1945 set the record,winning 11 consecutive tournaments.However, it should be noted thatwhen Nelson set the record he was playing on a tour with relativelyfew full-time professionals.Consequently the depth of the competitioncould not be compared with the PGA Tour of 1999 2000, when virtu-ally every player on the tour was a full-time tournament golfer.WorldWar II was just ending, and the quality of the tour was further depletedbecause of the potential professionals who were in military service.Forwinning 11 tournaments, Nelson won $52,000, which has no compari-son to the monumental purses on the modern PGA Tour.Finally, in1945 the media exerted considerably less infl uence on the Americanpublic than the high-powered newspaper, magazine, radio, Internet, andinternational television coverage of contemporary tour events.It looked to all that the streak would come to an end at the AT&TInvitational at Pebble Beach as Tiger trailed by fi ve shots going intothe fi nal round.On the 15th hole, he was still four shots behind theleader, Matt Gogel.Woods hit his approach shot to the par four holeand the ball bounced on the green, spun to the left, and rolled intothe hole for a rare eagle two.He trailed by two strokes.He birdiedtwo of the final three holes and was declared the winner.When Tigerfinally lost the next week to Phil Mickelson in the 2000 Buick Invita-tional, he had tied the streak of Ben Hogan, who won six consecutivePGA tournaments in 1948.But while his record in regular tour events is impressive, it is Ti-ger s ability to win major tournaments that has separated him from anyother golfer playing today.Sports writers had coined the term Grand114 TIGER WOODSSlam in 1930, when Bobby Jones won the U.S.Open and Amateur,and the British Open and Amateur.Since the two amateur champion-ships became less important with the evolution of a legitimate profes-sional tour, the writers invented a professional Grand Slam, whichincluded the U.S.and British Opens, the Masters, and the U.S.PGAChampionship.Only five players, over their careers, have ever won allfour champion-ships.At the age of 24, Tiger Woods became the young-est player to achieve this feat, beating out Jack Nicklaus (at age 26),Gary Player (age 29), Gene Sarazen (age 33), and Ben Hogan (age 40).While the professional career Grand Slam had been done before, golf-ers and the press had only speculated on the possibility of a player win-ning all four tournaments in the same year.Only one player had ever come close.Ben Hogan had a promisingcareer in 1949 when he was injured in a near-fatal automobile acci-dent, after which doctors said he would never walk again, let aloneplay tournament golf
[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]