PGA Championship Results 2012: Elusive Major Victory No Closer for Tiger Woods
“Where’s Tiger?” has become the “Where’s Waldo?” of golf.
As in, where’s Tiger Woods? I can’t find him in the 2012 PGA Championship leaderboard results. Here, scan up and down the final top 10 and see if you can come across him (via ESPN).
| Pos. | Player | To Par |
| 1 | Rory McIlroy | -13 |
| 2 | David Lynn | -5 |
| T3 | Justin Rose | -4 |
| T3 | Keegan Bradley | -4 |
| T3 | Ian Poulter | -4 |
| T3 | Carl Pettersson | -4 |
| T7 | Blake Adams | -3 |
| T7 | Jamie Donaldson | -3 |
| T7 | Peter Hanson | -3 |
| T7 | Steve Stricker | -3 |
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OK, you can stop searching now. He’s not hidden. He’s just not there.
Woods finished the PGA Championship at two-under-par, 11 strokes behind the leader Rory McIlroy. His performance tied him with six other golfers for 11th place. And just like that, Woods has gone yet another season without a major victory.
And one isn’t in sight either.
Woods hasn’t won a major since the 2008 U.S. Open. It’s not like he isn’t a great golfer anymore, though. Over that time, he’s had seven top 10 finishes.
What does that tell you?
The ultimate closer that we used to exalt is long gone.
From the time Woods’ career took off in the 1999 PGA Championship to before his latest drought began, he recorded 23 top 10 finishes. Of those 23 finishes, 13 of them were triumphs. That’s about a 57 percent success rate when he was in striking distance of the lead.
Since then, one of, if not the most, clutch athletes to ever grace the planet has been transformed in to a mere mortal.
Maybe it was the exposure of his affairs. Maybe it was injuries. Maybe it was age.
Who knows what truly caused Woods’ killer instinct to vanish? But there’s no debate, when he gets on the grandest stages, it isn’t there anymore.
Optimists will point to three PGA victories this year compared to goose eggs in the previous two as a sign of progress. After all, he just passed Jack Nicklaus in all-time PGA Tour triumphs.
Sure, his progress in terms of your average wins and losses is undeniable. But in majors, he still doesn’t look like a formidable challenger for Nicklaus’ record.
David Daniels is a featured columnist at Bleacher Report and a syndicated writer.
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