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Who'll be the next Tiger? Who cares?
I don't suppose the comparisons to Tiger Woods will stop anytime soon . I probably have a better chance of holding back the North Sea with a pitchfork. But this is becoming ridiculous. Every bright young player -- amateur, college or professional -- or anyone who has a career week and wins a tournament is dubbed as a possible challenger to Woods. Get a grip, people. One recent golf magazine touted Rory Sabbatini as a Tiger chaser after his scintillating win in Vancouver. Yes, Sabbatini is long and he plays aggressive golf. If he was anywhere near Tiger's league, he would've spent the last three years mopping up the competition. Barring a miraculous instruction breakthrough -- like, say, Vijay Singh suddenly learning to putt as well as Ben Crenshaw -- the only players likely to challenge Tiger are players who are dominant at every level. Last time I checked, Sabbatini wasn't dominating anything. I like his game and his attitude and the way he plays. He'll win more tournaments. He may beat Tiger somewhere. But he's not about to challenge Woods' supremacy. The same goes for Charles Howell, the former Oklahoma State University star who turned pro this summer and is making a run at earning his PGA Tour card without going through the qualifying tournament. I followed him at the Greater Hartford Open, his first event as a pro, for a few days and was impressed. He's remarkably long off the tee and he can make putts. He has a bright future on the PGA Tour. But it's not as if he was a dominant player in college. If Howell continues to improve, he'll have a very good career. He may win a major or two. He has a very methodical, professional approach to playing the game that I like. Howell is not Tiger, however, and to keep reading stories that tout him as a potential "next Tiger" is not only grossly unfair to Howell, it's wishful thinking. Throughout Hal Sutton's second career revival, he has repeatedly talked about the burden he carried as the next Bear Apparent -- Jack Nicklaus. It was one of the reasons his career bogged down in the late '80s and he was never able to reach his potential. We're already way past calling Woods the next Nicklaus; now the media are looking for the next Tiger Woods. The odds of another virtuoso talent like Woods coming along within a couple of years is a long shot on the order of the Chicago Cubs winning the World Series. So let's be serious. Let's be responsible. Let's become informed. Let's see who can cover a golf tournament or write a feature story about another player without mentioning Tiger Woods. I've been looking lately and I haven't been able to find many.
The short gameFrom the Blame Tiger Woods Department: The world rankings, which were a hot topic not that long ago, are largely irrelevant. Woods is so solidly entrenched at No. 1 that the debate is rendered moot. That makes talking about the rankings uninteresting. Let's face it, we just can't get excited wondering who's No. 2 or whether Colin Montgomerie should be ranked third, fourth or sixth. ... While 2000 was the year of the classic major -- you can't beat Pebble Beach and St. Andrews as host sites, and Valhalla, well, two out of three isn't bad -- next year may be the year of the Heat Index major. The U.S. Open will be played at Southern Hills in Tulsa, Okla., and the PGA goes to Atlanta Athletic Club. Oklahoma in June and Georgia in August. No need for sweatshirts, I guess.
Sports Illustrated senior writer Gary Van Sickle is a regular contributor to the magazine's Golf Plus edition. Click here to send a question to his Golf Mailbag.
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