Come To Think Of It...Tiger Woods is the Gretzky of Golf

At the Arnold Palmer Invitational in Orlando, golfer Bart Bryant said this about Tiger Woods:

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"I don't think people really understand." "I think the guys on tour understand. I think the real avid golf fans understand it. Good golfers around the world understand it.

"But people in general, the average golf fan, cannot appreciate exactly what Tiger is doing. I mean, they appreciate it. I just don't think they understand the magnitude of what he's accomplishing right now."

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Now Bart Bryant isn't exactly a household name in the world of golf, or any other world come to think of it. But what he said resonated with me as I started to think about what we are witnessing here.  And what we are witnessing, is the greatest golfer in the history of the sport.

I am 46 years old. In my lifetime, I have been fortunate enough to witness the best basketball player ever and the best hockey player ever. Perhaps Wilt Chamberlain was more dominant, but no one was an all-around better competitor that MJ. And I think that Gretzky's accomplishments speak for themselves. And now we're witnessing the best golfer ever. Amazing times.

Golf is not one of my sporting passions, but even I stop to watch Tiger. And I read about him too. Probably the only golfer who elicits such a following is John Daly, and as we all know, it is more out of a morbid curiousity than true greatness that we follow his life.

When I was younger, I never thought there would be a better golfer than Jack Nicklaus. But then again, I never thought there would be a better hockey player than Gordie Howe.

And Tiger is on a tear, winning seven of his last eight starts. By comparison, Jack Nicklaus won seven of 19 tournaments in 1972, seven of 18 in 1973 and five of 16 in 1975. Arnold Palmer won eight of 21 starts in 1962 and seven of 20 in 1963. Woods won eight of 21 in 1999, nine of 20 in 2000. The last couple years have been off the charts: eight of 15 in 2006, and seven of 16 in 2007. He's been out of the top 10 just eight times in his past 41 starts dating back to the start of 2006, and has won 21 times around the world in that period.

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Maybe many of you will respond with a resounding "Duh!". But I, for one, never really stopped to fully appreciate how fortunate we are to be alive while the greatest golfer ever is playing in his prime.

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