Light at the end of the tunnel ?

[mprach024]

@porkchop is not alone in feeling this way.  Several of my closest friends feel the same way he does, and we often debate this very topic.  Just another topic where the population is divided, and arguments are common place but often futile.  Hopefully when this is all passed us, we can go back to disagreeing on less haunting topics.  Like who was greater, Jack or Tiger?  
 

Tiger obviously....?

[El Presidente]

Just now, mprach024 said:

@porkchop is not alone in feeling this way.  Several of my closest friends feel the same way he does, and we often debate this very topic.  Just another topic where the population is divided, and arguments are common place but often futile.  Hopefully when this is all passed us, we can go back to disagreeing on less haunting topics.  Like who was greater, Jack or Tiger?  
 

Tiger obviously....?

Not just the US. I have good mates who have lost their businesses / livelihoods due to what can be seen as government overreach.  Well locally in our state it is more "analysis paralysis" where the art of "doing nothing" and locking borders for the past 8 months actually got them re-elected for 4 years . 

We have zero cases in our state. The country has zero cases and yet I can't fly into most states without having to quarantine for 14 days upon return. 

idiots. 

[porkchop]

Might be wrong about all this (doubt it though).

Has to be Tiger, don't know Jack.

 

[Ken Gargett]

okay, rather than continue arguing, i do understand that people have different perspectives

but it is so clearly jack that i'm surprised it is up for debate. 

[El Presidente]

Just now, Ken Gargett said:

okay, rather than continue arguing

It has always been your kryptonite. 

Discussion is far more enriching than argument. 

[mprach024]

7 minutes ago, Ken Gargett said:

but it is so clearly jack that i'm surprised it is up for debate. 

I had a feeling you’d bite ?? 

[Ej456]

...

[Nino]

7 hours ago, porkchop said:

 Hopefully a vaccine comes quickly.

 

Hallelujah - a vaccine has been found .... ?

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/11/09/health/covid-vaccine-pfizer.html?campaign_id=60&emc=edit_na_20201109&instance_id=0&nl=breaking-news&ref=cta&regi_id=83141946&segment_id=44009&user_id=20e2ef107d129c8068f6a6f86ee4c0a5

[Meklown]

Tiger obviously. Dominated a more competitive field! 

Schumacher > Hamilton! 

[Nino]

Ali - Foreman ?

Ali all the way ever since he was Cassius ... ?

 

 

[Ken Gargett]

7 hours ago, nino said:

Ali - Foreman ?

Ali all the way ever since he was Cassius ... ?

 

 

never in question. 

i spoke with a guy who fought Ali twice (and if i recall, was not knocked down in either) back when tyson was at his awesome best. asked who'd have won. he just laughed and said that there was simply no possible way that tyson would have landed a punch on ali. he was amazing. 

[Ken Gargett]

8 hours ago, Meklown said:

Tiger obviously. Dominated a more competitive field! 

Schumacher > Hamilton! 

i would go jack for exactly the same reason. the top players challenging him were better. 

so i googled and found this from espn - it is a few years old but interesting perspectives. but in the end, i think it confirms that jack and his peers were a cut above. 

 

 

we have grounds for debate, for among many knowledgeable observers there seems a sense that perhaps Tiger is not being tested -- particularly on Sunday afternoons -- to quite the same extent that Jack was.

Were the elite stars of Jack's era simply better?

 

According to former British Ryder Cup stalwart and current CBS broadcaster Peter Oosterhuis, a frequent competitor of Nicklaus and regular observer of Woods: "The immediate reaction is to say that the stars challenging Nicklaus were better than the talent chasing Tiger. Their names are well-known. However, there are a few things to consider." Oosterhuis cites several prominent factors which help to lift the modern player's performance, most notably greater physical fitness, the growing impact of sports psychology and, of course, hugely enhanced equipment. And inasmuch as the depth of today's fields is universally conceded to be greater than that of 30 years ago, there is clear truth to what he says.

For venerable writer/historian Al Barkow, however, the issue is more cut-and-dried.

"The players giving Tiger his competition are just as good as those who Jack faced in terms of pure talent, but they don't have the heart, the guts, the tenacity, maybe even the sense of pride that the [Tom] Watsons and [Lee] Trevinos had."

Why, one wonders, would such things be lacking?

"It has to do with money," Barkow continues, "although no one likes to say that. But today's players are so rich they don't have the real need for money the previous generation had, and are also so incredibly pampered and spoiled from the day they took up the game that they don't know how to respond to the dominant player. Watson, Trevino et al, gave Jack a good go and took him a few times head-to-head. I can't see anyone out there today giving Tiger that sort of competition. They don't need to."

 

To a large extent, the numbers bear Barkow out. For while the 100th-best player today may indeed surpass the 100th best of Nicklaus' era, the elite stars do seem to falter when facing Tiger on the biggest stages -- a circumstance highlighted at the 2002 Masters when a relatively nondescript final-round 71 carried Woods to victory after so-called rivals Ernie Els (73), Retief Goosen (74), Sergio Garcia (75) and Vijay Singh (76) collectively went to pieces around him.

Are such Sunday fiascos caused by Woods' unique brand of greatness or some common deficiency among his pursuers?

Ever the gracious sportsman, Nicklaus has mostly taken a noncommittal approach to that question, stating recently: "We've got a lot of very, very good players today. They just don't seem to be able to beat Tiger when they have to. Whether Tiger is just that much better or they're just not quite there, I don't know."

To be sure, there have been occasions -- say, Tiger's 15-shot romp at the 2000 U.S. Open, or his 12-shot runaway at the 1997 Masters -- when the rest of the field's skill level has simply been rendered irrelevant. Yet it is telling to note that among the top 10 players in the current Official World Golf Ranking, only Phil Mickelson has claimed a major championship in anything resembling a head-to-head contest with Woods -- his 2006 Masters triumph in which Tiger finished among five players tied for third, three strokes back. Nicklaus, on the other hand, seemed regularly to have epic performances thrown at him in major championship play, beginning with Arnold Palmer's fabled final-round 65 at the 1960 U.S. Open (enough to beat Jack by two), then extending on through four heartbreaking losses to Lee Trevino, a tough 1976 British Open defeat by Johnny Miller and, ultimately, three crushing setbacks at the hands of Tom Watson, most memorably at Turnberry in 1977 and Pebble Beach in 1982. Remarkably, Nicklaus shot no worse than 71 in the final rounds of these nine events and broke 70 seven times -- but in each case, his rivals simply lifted their games to heroic levels in order to beat him.

As Oosterhuis suggests, the names of Jack's primary rivals were of the household variety, with the top seven -- Billy Casper, Raymond Floyd, Johnny Miller, Arnold Palmer, Gary Player, Lee Trevino and Tom Watson -- all enshrined in golf's Hall of Fame. All told, this group claimed a total of 40 major championships, 252 official PGA Tour victories and more than 150 additional titles overseas, gaudy numbers at any time in professional golf's nearly 150-year history. That additional Hall of Famers like Gene Littler, Julius Boros, Ben Crenshaw, Hale Irwin and Tom Kite were also Nicklaus contemporaries only serves to highlight the topflight talent of his era.

 

Tiger's career, of course, is only halfway through its primary competitive phase, with its comparable list of top competitors thus far amounting to Phil Mickelson, Ernie Els, Vijay Singh and Retief Goosen, with Jim Furyk, David Duval (on the strength of his spectacular late-1990s run) and Jose Maria Olazabal filling the final three spots until stronger candidates appear. To date this group has claimed 15 major championships, 112 official PGA Tour victories and 112 additional titles overseas, and boasts one already-inducted Hall of Famer (Singh), a few surefire candidates (Mickelson and Els) and a pair of possible future honorees (Goosen and Olazabal). A solid bunch to be sure, yet even with continued large-scale success for these or future Woods rivals, statistical comparisons with Nicklaus' peers will not, it appears, ever be favorable ones.

And while measuring numbers across golfing generations can be a dicey proposition, the idea that Tiger's competition has frequently stumbled on his victorious major Sundays does appear to be numerically verifiable: Over the course of his 12 professional major victories, Woods' primary rivals have played a total of 24 Sunday rounds in which they started within five shots of the lead (i.e. both they and Tiger were in contention), compiling a stroke average of 72.37. Leaving out the freakishly windy final round of the 1972 U.S. Open at Pebble Beach (where the field's average score of 79 strokes would skew this relatively small sample), Nicklaus' top opponents managed a comparable Sunday stroke average of 71.87 -- a substantially lower number, particularly given the generally higher major championship scoring of his era.

For some, these various statistics stand as proof of the superiority of Nicklaus' rivals. For others, Oosterhuis sums it up nicely when he says that the uniqueness of Woods' skills "has been able to make it appear as if the chasing pack is not as significant as those big names of the past."

[mprach024]

16 minutes ago, Ken Gargett said:

i would go jack for exactly the same reason. the top players challenging him were better. 

so i googled and found this from espn - it is a few years old but interesting perspectives. but in the end, i think it confirms that jack and his peers were a cut above. 

 

 

we have grounds for debate, for among many knowledgeable observers there seems a sense that perhaps Tiger is not being tested -- particularly on Sunday afternoons -- to quite the same extent that Jack was.

Were the elite stars of Jack's era simply better?

 

According to former British Ryder Cup stalwart and current CBS broadcaster Peter Oosterhuis, a frequent competitor of Nicklaus and regular observer of Woods: "The immediate reaction is to say that the stars challenging Nicklaus were better than the talent chasing Tiger. Their names are well-known. However, there are a few things to consider." Oosterhuis cites several prominent factors which help to lift the modern player's performance, most notably greater physical fitness, the growing impact of sports psychology and, of course, hugely enhanced equipment. And inasmuch as the depth of today's fields is universally conceded to be greater than that of 30 years ago, there is clear truth to what he says.

For venerable writer/historian Al Barkow, however, the issue is more cut-and-dried.

"The players giving Tiger his competition are just as good as those who Jack faced in terms of pure talent, but they don't have the heart, the guts, the tenacity, maybe even the sense of pride that the [Tom] Watsons and [Lee] Trevinos had."

Why, one wonders, would such things be lacking?

"It has to do with money," Barkow continues, "although no one likes to say that. But today's players are so rich they don't have the real need for money the previous generation had, and are also so incredibly pampered and spoiled from the day they took up the game that they don't know how to respond to the dominant player. Watson, Trevino et al, gave Jack a good go and took him a few times head-to-head. I can't see anyone out there today giving Tiger that sort of competition. They don't need to."

 

To a large extent, the numbers bear Barkow out. For while the 100th-best player today may indeed surpass the 100th best of Nicklaus' era, the elite stars do seem to falter when facing Tiger on the biggest stages -- a circumstance highlighted at the 2002 Masters when a relatively nondescript final-round 71 carried Woods to victory after so-called rivals Ernie Els (73), Retief Goosen (74), Sergio Garcia (75) and Vijay Singh (76) collectively went to pieces around him.

Are such Sunday fiascos caused by Woods' unique brand of greatness or some common deficiency among his pursuers?

Ever the gracious sportsman, Nicklaus has mostly taken a noncommittal approach to that question, stating recently: "We've got a lot of very, very good players today. They just don't seem to be able to beat Tiger when they have to. Whether Tiger is just that much better or they're just not quite there, I don't know."

To be sure, there have been occasions -- say, Tiger's 15-shot romp at the 2000 U.S. Open, or his 12-shot runaway at the 1997 Masters -- when the rest of the field's skill level has simply been rendered irrelevant. Yet it is telling to note that among the top 10 players in the current Official World Golf Ranking, only Phil Mickelson has claimed a major championship in anything resembling a head-to-head contest with Woods -- his 2006 Masters triumph in which Tiger finished among five players tied for third, three strokes back. Nicklaus, on the other hand, seemed regularly to have epic performances thrown at him in major championship play, beginning with Arnold Palmer's fabled final-round 65 at the 1960 U.S. Open (enough to beat Jack by two), then extending on through four heartbreaking losses to Lee Trevino, a tough 1976 British Open defeat by Johnny Miller and, ultimately, three crushing setbacks at the hands of Tom Watson, most memorably at Turnberry in 1977 and Pebble Beach in 1982. Remarkably, Nicklaus shot no worse than 71 in the final rounds of these nine events and broke 70 seven times -- but in each case, his rivals simply lifted their games to heroic levels in order to beat him.

As Oosterhuis suggests, the names of Jack's primary rivals were of the household variety, with the top seven -- Billy Casper, Raymond Floyd, Johnny Miller, Arnold Palmer, Gary Player, Lee Trevino and Tom Watson -- all enshrined in golf's Hall of Fame. All told, this group claimed a total of 40 major championships, 252 official PGA Tour victories and more than 150 additional titles overseas, gaudy numbers at any time in professional golf's nearly 150-year history. That additional Hall of Famers like Gene Littler, Julius Boros, Ben Crenshaw, Hale Irwin and Tom Kite were also Nicklaus contemporaries only serves to highlight the topflight talent of his era.

 

Tiger's career, of course, is only halfway through its primary competitive phase, with its comparable list of top competitors thus far amounting to Phil Mickelson, Ernie Els, Vijay Singh and Retief Goosen, with Jim Furyk, David Duval (on the strength of his spectacular late-1990s run) and Jose Maria Olazabal filling the final three spots until stronger candidates appear. To date this group has claimed 15 major championships, 112 official PGA Tour victories and 112 additional titles overseas, and boasts one already-inducted Hall of Famer (Singh), a few surefire candidates (Mickelson and Els) and a pair of possible future honorees (Goosen and Olazabal). A solid bunch to be sure, yet even with continued large-scale success for these or future Woods rivals, statistical comparisons with Nicklaus' peers will not, it appears, ever be favorable ones.

And while measuring numbers across golfing generations can be a dicey proposition, the idea that Tiger's competition has frequently stumbled on his victorious major Sundays does appear to be numerically verifiable: Over the course of his 12 professional major victories, Woods' primary rivals have played a total of 24 Sunday rounds in which they started within five shots of the lead (i.e. both they and Tiger were in contention), compiling a stroke average of 72.37. Leaving out the freakishly windy final round of the 1972 U.S. Open at Pebble Beach (where the field's average score of 79 strokes would skew this relatively small sample), Nicklaus' top opponents managed a comparable Sunday stroke average of 71.87 -- a substantially lower number, particularly given the generally higher major championship scoring of his era.

For some, these various statistics stand as proof of the superiority of Nicklaus' rivals. For others, Oosterhuis sums it up nicely when he says that the uniqueness of Woods' skills "has been able to make it appear as if the chasing pack is not as significant as those big names of the past."

No disrespect, but Jack often was in fields on 30+ guys in the 60s, so of course the same guys won more.  That’s just numbers.  That’s also in a time where internationally there was little golf presence unlike today where it’s everywhere.  

My best friend hates Tiger, lives Jack.  I just post this up whenever he makes comments:

Jack

586 pga tour events/73 wins

144 European Tour Events/22 wins

18 Amateur Wins

Tiger ☑️

347 pga tour events/82 wins

120 European Tour events/40 wins

21 Amateur Wins

 

[Ken Gargett]

1 hour ago, mprach024 said:

No disrespect, but Jack often was in fields on 30+ guys in the 60s, so of course the same guys won more.  That’s just numbers.  That’s also in a time where internationally there was little golf presence unlike today where it’s everywhere.  

 

sure, no question way more golf/golfers today. but that does not make them better golfers. for me, jack's era was more like when there were numerous great tennis players (you can have that as today or back in the day - another debate).

as the writer said, mickelson has been the only one to take him on. back then - palmer, nicklaus, trevino, player, watson, miller, casper, floyd, crenshaw, irwin and so on. not sure tiger had that level of top players at the same time. 

[helix]

1 hour ago, Ken Gargett said:

never in question. 

i spoke with a guy who fought Ali twice (and if i recall, was not knocked down in either) back when tyson was at his awesome best. asked who'd have won. he just laughed and said that there was simply no possible way that tyson would have landed a punch on ali. he was amazing. 

Who was the fighter?

[Ken Gargett]

4 minutes ago, helix said:

Who was the fighter?

joe bugner. pretty sure he fought ali twice and lost both by points. think he also fought frazier. can't imagine he actually fought tyson though he'd have been seriously past it if he did. 

[mprach024]

9 minutes ago, Ken Gargett said:

sure, no question way more golf/golfers today. but that does not make them better golfers. for me, jack's era was more like when there were numerous great tennis players (you can have that as today or back in the day - another debate).

as the writer said, mickelson has been the only one to take him on. back then - palmer, nicklaus, trevino, player, watson, miller, casper, floyd, crenshaw, irwin and so on. not sure tiger had that level of top players at the same time. 

I get that argument, and there’s no way to be able to tell if those greats you mentioned were great because they just were that, or a product of a generation with fewer people with the accessibility to golf.  Golf was a country club elitist sport more so then than now (still is).  But it’s still a fair point to make.  Watson owned Jack, nobody ever owned Tiger.  Might be a lack of quality, or might be Tiger was just head and shoulders better.  It’s a fun debate with no ending.  We can at least point to Tiger in his prime had no weakness in his game and still is the greatest iron player to have lived.  Jack always had a lousy short game.  Tigers prime was/is much shorter than Jacks so its like Gehrig vs Mantle.  Can’t knock Jacks longevity of his performances, so consistent.  But man when Tiger was on point (99-02, 05-09), I still think it’s the best golf we've ever seen.   

[Meklown]

I love this thread now

[helix]

9 minutes ago, Ken Gargett said:

joe bugner. pretty sure he fought ali twice and lost both by points. think he also fought frazier. can't imagine he actually fought tyson though he'd have been seriously past it if he did. 

.Ali said Chuvalo  was the toughest fighter he ever faced

[Ken Gargett]

6 minutes ago, mprach024 said:

I get that argument, and there’s no way to be able to tell if those greats you mentioned were great because they just were that, or a product of a generation with fewer people with the accessibility to golf.  Golf was a country club elitist sport more so then than now (still is).  But it’s still a fair point to make.  Watson owned Jack, nobody ever owned Tiger.  Might be a lack of quality, or might be Tiger was just head and shoulders better.  It’s a fun debate with no ending.  We can at least point to Tiger in his prime had no weakness in his game and still is the greatest iron player to have lived.  Jack always had a lousy short game.  Tigers prime was/is much shorter than Jacks so its like Gehrig vs Mantle.  Can’t knock Jacks longevity of his performances, so consistent.  But man when Tiger was on point (99-02, 05-09), I still think it’s the best golf we've ever seen.   

both were extraordinary and the article makes the point about whether tiger was that much better or had less competition. easy to find arguments for both ways. 

not sure watson owned jack. not sure anyone really owned him and i suspect a lot of people would like to be as lousy as jack with the short game. 

golf is a little different to most sports when comparing eras in that it is not really a sport where you oppose someone. just yourself and the course. so scores should give us a comparison. but then this era has clubs that give big advantages. 

i do not have many regrets - don't see the point - but i do have one. i was fishing in nz and my guide tried to insist i come back in three weeks. there was simply no way i could. he told me why. one of his fellow guides had set up a nice little lodge of three huts (i had been there before - and i am sure i have told this on FoH before as well). he said two guys were flying in to fish and i could grab the third spot. you don't fish together but you breakfast together and then meet each evening for drinks and dinner and post drinks. 

my guide kept telling me that batman was coming. and a mate off his who was a keen fisherman. i could not work out what he meant. finally the penny dropped. michael keaton - i knew he was a very keen fly fisherman. my guide said that he was bringing a friend. some bloke called nicklaus but he had no idea who that was. spending the week at a fishing lodge with those two guys would have been something. 

[mprach024]

3 minutes ago, Ken Gargett said:

i do not have many regrets

Oh man that would have been epic!!  Would have made a fine addition to your Bio Epic you need to write.  Still a cool story I had not heard before thanks for sharing.

That chapter could have been called “The Second Best Golfer and the Second Best Batman” ?

[Lunettesman]

On 11/11/2020 at 8:35 AM, GP said:

 

 

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.businessinsider.com/sweden-brings-in-regional-measures-cases-surge-2020-11%3famp

One of the highest death rates in the world from Covid, no joke


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

 

I've never said the opposite. I just applaud the swedish government to treat it's citizens like sovereign adult.  What about the rest of the world?

- lockdown: first time ever in history

- vaccin ready within 6 months: first time ever in history

- being focus on cases and not actually death rate: first time ever in history

 

 

Well... Somebody is trying to fool us or what?!?

[Nino]

18 minutes ago, Lunettesman said:

I've never said the opposite. I just applaud the swedish government to treat it's citizens like sovereign adult.  What about the rest of the world?

- lockdown: first time ever in history

- vaccin ready within 6 months: first time ever in history

- being focus on cases and not actually death rate: first time ever in history

 

 

Well... Somebody is trying to fool us or what?!?

Bad joke - More like they are waking up from being fools & risking lives - 3 days ago :

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-11-11/sweden-imposes-partial-lockdown-of-bars-with-alcohol-curfew

For the first time since the pandemic started, Sweden is imposing a partial lockdown on bars and restaurants by banning the sale of alcohol after 10 p.m.

The restriction marks a departure from the country’s previous guidelines that relied mainly on voluntary measures to stop transmission. The new measure applies across the country from Nov. 20 and means all businesses with a license to serve alcohol must close by 10:30 p.m.

“We are facing a situation that could turn black as night,” Prime Minister Stefan Lofven said at a press conference in Stockholm. “We risk ending up in the situation we had last spring.”

[Lunettesman]

I d like to see a proper study on lockdown that prove the new lockdown trend is effective. 

I d like to understand why it's mandatory for kids above 6 yo to wear masks in france when 80% of contamination are by hands.

I d like to understand how in the world they can make a vaccin within 6 months. And not every day vaccin, an RNA vaccin (once again a first timer).

I d like to understand why france voted a law in December 2019 to be able to lockdown their citizens. 

I d like to understand why there s no flu or pneumonia anymore.

I'd like to understand why no one is talking about china anymore.

I d like to understand why when people question the government they are labeled as conspiracionist.

I d like to understand why between March and October tons of hospital have closed beds when it's the most needed.

There are so many questions that don't seem to have a common sense answer

 

[mprach024]

39 minutes ago, Lunettesman said:

when 80% of contamination are by hands.

That’s not what any health organization is saying.  CDC, WHO, all state this mainly spread through aerosols.  

 

41 minutes ago, Lunettesman said:

how in the world they can make a vaccin within 6 months

Cause it’s worth billions of dollars and everyone in the world started working on it.  Emergency powers let them bypass what would normally be years of red tape.  There’s no money in creating a MERS or SARS vaccine because those diseases solved themselves quickly. No money in that vaccine now.

 

42 minutes ago, Lunettesman said:

why there s no flu or pneumonia anymore.

Cause no ones around each other anymore lol. 
Hence no transmission 

 

43 minutes ago, Lunettesman said:

why between March and October tons of hospital have closed beds when it's the most needed

Not sure where this is from.  But most ICUs have not closed beds in fact most are pretty full right now.  What you did see was a stop in elective procedures.  So yes I suppose those beds were unused, but those rooms are not designed to house intensive care patients, they are for people getting a knee replacement and lack the proper equipment and bio security to allow highly contagious people to be quarantined while in life support.