Tiger Woods' dramatic fall from the world's top-ranked golfer is unprecedented. But that has not completely destroyed his fans' faith in him.
Forbes.com tried to find similar circumstances under which a golfer seemed to lose a great deal of his skills, the way Woods has done, now having fallen to No. 258 in the world.
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"Meaningful data analysis depends on some connection between the past and the present," Forbes reported. "These are hard to find with Tiger. In the only truly comparable player since 1960, Jack Nicklaus, there's nothing close to Tiger's demise. From 1962 to 1982, Nicklaus won tournaments in all but two seasons, and, at the longest, experienced only a 2-year drought (two times) in winning a major. However, in those two spells, while cut once, he finished in the Top 5 nine times. Over the past four seasons, Tiger has finished in the Top 5 of a major only 3 times and been cut 3 out of the last four."
Despite Woods being trapped in mediocrity, golfdigest.com is reporting that the gambling website Bovada lists him as a bigger favorite to win the PGA Championship than British Open champion Zach Johnson.
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Woods is listed at 33-to-1 odds while Johnson unfathomably is a 40-to-1 bet. The reason?
"Of course, this has a lot to do with handicappers realizing the public -- aka suckers -- will continue to bet Woods, currently ranked No. 258 in the world, no matter how far he's fallen," golfdigest.com reports.
Another gambling site, GolfOdds.com, lists Johnson at 50-to-1 and Woods at 60-to-1, which is still mind-boggling.
Forbes couldn't find any player with Woods' accolades that has had such a drop in play.
https://www.golfdigest.com/blogs/the-loop/2015/07/tiger-woods-favored-over-zach-johnson-at-pga.html
"To find off-the-cliff performances similar to Tiger, one has to pull out players who could only touch Tiger's top-level skill for a short time," Forbes wrote. "For example, David Duval went through his own best-to-bad episode, dropping from World Number 1 in 1998 and a major winner to a ranking of 200+ by 2003. Ian Baker-Finch won the 1991 Open Championship and reached a World Top 10 ranking, only to fall drop of the map with ball striking and confidence issues by the mid 1990s. Johnny Miller won 18 times from 1971 to 1976, including two majors, and then experienced a four-year dry spell in wins as he fell prey to putting 'yips.'"
Yet, there are fans that still believe.
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