Scottie Scheffler Has More to Prove to Earn 'Closest to Tiger' Crown After US Open
We can all agree on one thing, right?
Scottie Scheffler is the best golfer in the world.
Regardless of also-ran status over the weekend in the U.S. Open at Oakmont, the affable Texan has done more than enough since turning pro seven years ago to distance himself from his nearest pursuers among the sport’s current elite.
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He strikes the ball well. He has a splendid short game. His 16 PGA Tour wins are just shy of the all-time top 50, and only a handful of active players have either met or surpassed his three major championship victories.
It’s no fluke that he’s been No. 1 in the Official World Golf Rankings for every second of the last two years, and he’s unlikely to cede the position anytime soon. That will be particularly so if he keeps reeling off seasons like 2024, when he had seven wins and two second-place finishes in 19 PGA Tour events—and a four-shot victory at the Masters.
Nevertheless, there’s another inarguable point to be made, too.
Regardless of the degree of his recent preeminence, Scheffler is not Tiger Woods.
Playing contemporaries are correct to complement Scheffler’s steely resolve and competitive consistency—and some have even invoked the 15-time major winner’s name while lauding the 28-year-old’s successes.
"Scottie is the closest thing to Tiger I think any of us have seen," Wyndham Clark said in March, per Max Schreiber of Sports Illustrated. Adam Scott followed up in April with similar sentiments, telling The Athletic's Brody Miller, "I would have said I don’t see anyone separating themselves as much as Tiger did, and Scottie is getting close to it."
But let’s not kid ourselves.
He’s not there yet. He’s not all that close. And he probably never will be.
But before it’s dismissed as hate, just know that’s hardly intended as an insult.
In fact, it’s more a celebration of Woods than a slight of Scheffler.
Because a new generation of fans has come of age since the now-49-year-old was a red-shirted fixture on Sunday afternoon broadcasts, it’s easy to forget just how masterful Woods was at the peak of his powers.
Within a year of turning pro at age 20—after three U.S. Amateurs and a NCAA DI title—he’d already won three PGA Tour events and the Masters while climbing to No. 1 in the world.
His first PGA Championship came in 1999 and was prelude to the greatest stretch in the sport’s history, during which Woods executed his signature “Tiger Slam” by winning all four majors in succession from the U.S. Open in June 2000 to the Masters in April 2001.
He’d gotten to eight majors by the time he reached Scheffler’s current age and ultimately pushed that number to 15 (second to Jack Nicklaus’ 18) alongside 82 PGA Tour wins (tied with Sam Snead for first), two prolonged stretches atop the world rankings—including 264 weeks from 1999 to 2004 and 281 from 2005 to 2010—and a nod from the Associated Press as its “Athlete of the Decade” from 2000-10, succeeding 1990s winner Michael Jordan.
Plenty of folks who never watched golf tuned in just to see his greatness.
And plenty who know what they’re looking at suggest he’s the best to ever do it.
So, for Scheffler, there’s ground to cover after a lost weekend in Pennsylvania.
He was seven shots back after a first-round 73 and four clear of the cut line entering Saturday. A third-round 70 kept him eight shots behind 54-hole leader Sam Burns and a double-bogey at No. 3 quickly doused any hopes for an epic Sunday comeback.
Instead, he finished tied for seventh. It was his 22nd major as a professional, during which he’s picked up three wins, two seconds and a third while making 20 cuts. During his first 22 majors, Woods had eight wins and two third-place finishes with zero missed cuts.
Assuming Scheffler remains competitive until age 40, not a huge stretch given a run of few injuries, he’d still have to average five tour wins and a major per year to approach Woods’ career totals of 82 and 15.
And while he’ll certainly be a favorite in every tournament he enters for the time being—for example, he’s a field-best +450 pick to win next month’s British Open at Royal Portrush—to call Scheffler even close at this point still seems a stretch, even as much as it might feel like it to his peers.
It's a reality the man himself seems to concede.
“Anytime you can be compared to Tiger I think is really special,” he said, “but, I mean, the guy stands alone I think in our game.”
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