There was a time when Tiger Woods ruled the PGA kingdom like none of us had ever seen before, competing for wins at nearly every tournament he ever played in and putting himself alongside names like Jack Nicklaus, Bobby Jones and Arnold Palmer as the best ever.
And thanks to a five-plus-year slump following that whole cheating scandal in 2009 and, naturally, getting older, many of Woods’ peers believe his days of finishing at the top of a major championship are long gone—according to a survey conducted by ESPN The Magazine.
Seventy percent of the nearly 60 PGA Tour golfers polled said Woods’ major-winning days are behind him, compared with 63 percent in a survey taken in 2015.
When posed the question of whether Woods or Phil Mickelson would win more majors in the next five years, Mickelson nearly tripled Woods’ chances (59 percent to 16 percent) in the 2016 survey. A quarter of the golfers called it a tie, although most of those players said neither would accomplish the feat.
This probably isn’t shocking news—considering Woods is 40 years old now and has had a string of injuries over the past few years—but the fact that Mickelson almost triples Tiger’s chances is, as Phil’s five years his senior.
Taking the torch from Woods and Mickelson have been players like Rory McIlroy and Jordan Spieth over the past few years. And when 56 current pros were asked who would finish 2016 as the year’s No. 1-ranked player in the world, both McIlroy and Spieth were even at 38 percent, with Jason Day finishing third at 19 percent.
In addition to the Woods question, ESPN gathered this info from the surveyed players, per ESPN:
* Nearly half (46 percent) of players responded in the affirmative when asked if they had seen a golfer cheat and not get caught, although almost all said it was related to taking an illegal drop.
* On the controversial topic of fans phoning in rules violations, pros continued to show their distaste for it, voting 84 percent against the practice.
* When asked how many green jackets Spieth would have 20 years from now, the average answer was three. Because the 22-year-old Texan already has one, the belief is he’ll win one more per decade.
* With the sport returning to the Olympics for the first time in 112 years, players were asked to choose between winning a major championship or an Olympic gold medal. It was a near-unanimous vote (95 percent) in favor of major titles.
All interesting stuff as The Masters is set to tee off this week—which doesn’t include Tiger Woods in the field because of injury.
[H/T ESPN]