With each major that Tiger Woods doesn’t win, the window to catch Jack Nicklaus’ major benchmark of 18 closes just a smidge more. Woods will turn 36 in December, leaving 10 years between his current age and when the Golden Bear went on a second-nine tear at Augusta National to win the Masters for a sixth time at age 46.
More or less, that’s 40 majors for Woods to win five – as many as Seve Ballesteros took for his storied career.
Nick Faldo does not see Woods doing that, according to an interview published by the Montreal Gazette. The six-time major winner says Woods’ concentration had been snapped since Thanksgiving 2009, as well as the ensuing string of personal issues made very public.
“That’s the first thing I thought: ‘His concentration will be shattered.’ He had this amazing ability to go away from a tournament and then go on and practice as close to tournament-mode as anybody could do or better than anybody else could do. Now, I think that’s been shattered,” Faldo said to the paper.
“That’s one of the simplest things that can affect you, whether it happens for business reasons or personal reasons. Once you break that concentration, it really does affect you.”
Though not always noted, Y.E. Yang could have had a similar impact on Woods with his win at the PGA Championship before Woods’ Windermere car accident. Yang ended Woods’ perfect record when leading a major after 54 holes which went as one of sport’s most intimidating records. Though it was a singular moment, what Yang accomplished may have had just as much reverb in Woods’ psyche as the unfolding of his personal life.