Well, I'm back from vacation, where I was supposed to play golf at any number of nice courses in the Carolinas. Needless to say, the heat index was somewhere around 115 degrees all week, which barely made it tolerable to swim in the bath water that was the Atlantic Ocean so much of my vacation was spent watching TV, drinking Yuengling, and reading Mahler's "The Bronx is Burning", which I thoroughly enjoyed.
Speaking (kinda) of golf...
Did anybody even watch the PGA Championship this weekend? If so, please comment as to why. Because there is nothing, friends, more exciting than watching every golfer watch Tiger Woods and what he did this weekend in Tulsa. Sarcasm aside, Tiger Woods is your PGA Champion, giving him a win and two runners-up for the 2007 Majors. On the large, that's a pretty mediocre year for the stripped one, considering the two #2 finishes came with Tiger leading for a portion on Sunday. But Tiger was unbeatable this weekend, which was set up nicely by his round on Friday. He shot 63 at Southern Hills and missed a putt on 18 that would have given him a score that would have more closely resembled a score from Tiger's video game. It was academic after that with the rest of the field is wilting like Brady Quinn against any kind of good college football team.
All told, that is 13 for Tiger, 5 shy of Jack's immortal 18 majors. Which gets me thinking about next year. Tiger is easily the favorite in, well, anything he does, from table tennis against Lephty McBigboobs to major championship golf. If he puts it together next year and wins the Grand Slam (entirely possible, considering the lineup of courses: Augusta, Torrey Pines, Royal Birkdale and Oakland Hills) then that puts Jack record on life support. We're talking about a record that was nigh unbreakable in 1929 when Hagen posted his 11th title and a new mark that was set at Augusta in 1986. As of right now, in two years, that record could be out the window.
I'll anoint Tiger Woods as the greatest golfer ever right now. I have no problem with that, but I still think Jack is the greatest Major golfer ever. It's a point I've made before: Jack came from behind to win 8 of his majors and was the runner up in 19 times. Though the latter is more a longevity mark than a talent mark, the former certinaly is not. Face it: if Tiger has a 54-hole lead then it's over and done with. Start engraving the trophy and writing out the winner's check to Mr. Woods. With Jack, however, there weren't any guarantees like that, save for the fact that he was good enough to finish in the top-2 37 times with 18 wins. I want to see Tiger come from behind [Ed. note: on Elin] just once. When that's all said and done, if Tiger has a line like that, then they might as well rename the sport "Eldrick".
Props to Matt Sussman at
The Futon Report and the Deadspin linkage this weekend. Glad I could shed some light on why Sergio might have shitted the shit out of his bed this weekend.
