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Another challenge Woods hopes to win second-consecutive WGC event
Posted: Friday February 18, 2000 03:20 PM
It's not exactly the Grand Slam, but next week at the Andersen Consulting World Match Play Championship, Tiger Woods will be working on a sweep of the new World Golf Championships. Last year, Woods was the winner of the inaugural NEC Invitational and the American Express Championship at Valderrama. Next week, he will be after another $1 million first prize at La Costa, where last season he was beaten in the quarterfinals by Jeff Maggert.
Closing the dealBy winning the Buick Invitational, Phil Mickelson enhanced a career record of converting third-round leads into victories that is exceeded only by Woods. Mickelson has now won eight of the nine times he has held the 54-hole lead. Tiger has won a phenominal 12 of 13. The tour average is approximately 40 percent. To give you an idea of the kind of closers Woods and Mickelson have been, consider that since 1970, the best conversion rates have been posted by Johnny Miller, who was 15 out of 20, Jack Nicklaus, 24 out of 35, and Tom Watson, 26 out of 43.
Top dollarWell, Davis Love, who supplanted Greg Norman, held the title of all-time PGA Tour career money winner title for exactly two weeks. Now that Tiger Woods has it, there is no telling when he will let it go. Considering that he is 24 years old and has what might be termed some solid earning years ahead of him, look for Woods to keep the title even longer than the record 17 seasons it was held by Jack Nicklaus. Sports Illustrated senior writer Jaime Diaz covers the golf beat and appears regularly on CNN/Sports Illustrated and CNN's Pro Golf Weekly.
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