I’m a huge Tiger fan. Every tournament he’s in I want him to win, without question. He does some amazing things, but this weekend there was more uncertainty from hole-to-hole than ever before. And understandably so. He hasn’t played competitive golf for over 5 months. But the fact that he can play (arguably) bad and still be in contention on Sunday is rather amazing. Here are some interesting stats from Tiger’s return to golf at Augusta.
Over his 4 rounds…
- 14 bogey’s (10 of which came in the final 2 rounds, 5 each day)
- 17 birdies
- 4 eagles
- He shot 68 (-4) in round 1. He has never shot below 70 in round 1 at The Masters before this year.
- He had 2 eagles in the same round, twice: round 1 and round 4. He has never scored 2 eagles in the same round at Augusta before this year.
So overall, that’s more than I thought he could do in his return to golf, I must admit. If you’re reading this, you probably know Phil Mickelson won the 2010 Masters. To put this in perspective, let’s compare some of Tiger’s stats to Phil Mickelson’s.
Over Phil’s 4 rounds…
- 6 bogeys
- 16 birdies
- 3 eagles
So even though Tiger played so bad, he still had more birdies and eagles than the person who ended up winning. That’s pretty incredible. And if Tiger would have only had 6 bogeys like Phil (definitely not an unrealistic feat), he would have won the tournament by 4 strokes. And since Mickelson won by 3 strokes, that means Tiger would have beaten the rest of the field by 7 strokes.
If only.
Yes, Tiger has some kinks in his game. That was expected. But to see what he has done (I believe he recorded more birdies and eagles than anyone else in the entire tournament), it’s easy to see that 2010 will be an exciting year for him. I cannot wait.
