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Just to show how good that is, lets just look at playing performance of tour players since 1999. If you take Tiger Woods out of the equation, Vijay Singh has won the most money with $47.6 million. Woods Firestone earnings would place him 69th of all the players on this list.
Even better little stat, look at the PGA Tour since 1999, Vijay Singh has won 24 times, Phil Mickelson 18, Jim Furyk 10 and David Toms 11 times. Rounding out the list you have Ernie Els with 9 wins and who would be seventh on our list, Tiger Woods with his six Firestone wins along side Davis Love III six wins.
With Woods six Bridgestone win he joins a list of Alex Ross, Jack Nicklaus, Sam Snead, Harry Vardon and himself at the WGC-Ca Championship with six wins. Sam Snead is at the top of the list with eight wins at Greensboro, but he did that on two golf courses, winning four times at Starmount and four at Sedgefield, So who has won the most on one course?
Tiger is tied with Alex Ross, who won six times at the North & South at Pinehurst, six by Sam Snead at the Miami Springs G&CC and six by Jack Nicklaus at Augusta National. But what about of all the active players? Of course Tiger leads the way with six wins at Firestone but the closest to him is Davis Love III with five wins at Harbour Town in the Verizon Heritage and Woods with five wins at Torrey Pines. Then you have Woods with four wins at Bay Hill.
| Now here is an important list of players that have won the most money on one golf course: | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Earnings | Player / Course | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| $7,937,400 | Tiger Woods Firestone 10 events played | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| $5,107,993 | Tiger Woods Augusta National 13 Masters played | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| $4,435,692 | Phil Mickelson Augusta National 15 Masters played | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| $3,933,800 | Tiger Woods Torrey Pines 7 Buick Invitationals | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| $3,885,600 | Tiger Woods Doral 5 events played | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Total Under-Par Score 80-under (32 rounds)
Front-Nine 46-under
Back-Nine 34-under
Par 3s: 17-under
Par 4s: 32-under
Par 5s: 31-under
Total Eagles: 3 (No. 2 in the first, second and third rounds in 2000)
Total Double Bogeys: 3 (No. 17 in 2005 and 2003, No. 16 in 2001)
Lowest 18-Hole Score: 61 (9-under), second round, 2000
Highest 18-Hole Score: 72 (2-over), second round, 2000
Lowest 9-Hole Score: 30 (2000, front nine, first round), 30 (2000, front nine, second round)
Highest 9-Hole Score: 38 (2003, back nine, final round),38 (2006, front nine, third round)
Lowest 72-Hole Score: 259 (21-under), 2000
Highest 72-Hole Score: 273 (6-under), 2003, 2005
Most Under-Par on Single Hole: No. 2, par-5 (27-under par)
Over-Par Holes (28 rounds) No. 18, par-4 (7-over par)
I just only hope that the World Golf Federations of PGA Tour's doesn't decide to leave Firestone, because if Tiger gets another ten years at Firestone he will have a better record on this course than many have had careers.
Now this isn't picking on Rory Sabbatini, but Woods has won more times at Firestone than Sabbatini's four career wins. When I hear players like Sabbatini mouth off about getting a piece of Woods like he did at the Players this year, I have to remember what Lee Trevino use to say about Jack Nicklaus when someone would say something was wrong with his game. Trevino's words were "Just let the Bear sleep, don't ever wake up the Bear."
In a way the same could be said of Woods, wise men would just smile and not mention any problems with Woods game or the fact that they would like a piece of Woods. Just look at the history of this.
First you had Colin Montgomerie at the 1997 Masters say that Woods would have problems holding on to the lead. What happened, Woods shot 65 while his playing partner Montgomerie shot 74 and Woods went on to one of the biggest romps in golf at the time, 12 shots.
Just last year Stephen Ames drew Woods in a first round match and trying to be funny said, "Anything can happen." Well "anything" did happen as Woods waxed him 9 and 8.
The fact is I like that Sabbatini is honest, Lord knows the PGA Tour needs more people that tell it the way they feel but Sabbatini may want to tell the truth about someone else because he is getting waxed by Woods and you know that Tiger just loves letting his clubs do all of the talking.
Keys to victory for Tiger Woods
Of course he has to thank Tiger Woods for not having any kind of game, Woods looked out of sort the whole week but still finished T2nd, just two back.
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Key to his win has to be getting a piece of Rory Sabbatini. Everything set up too good for it, trailing Sabbatini by one going into the final round, playing with him. Still for those that want it broken down a bit more here are some statistical reasons:
Here are some other keys for his victory:
- Hit more greens than anyone else in the field (52) Woods was also the longest driver of the week Now that has only happened by the winner ten times since 1997 and of course Woods has done it seven times. Here is the list:
Tiger Woods 2007 WGC Bridgestone
Vijay Singh 2004 Shell Houston
Tiger Woods 2001 Masters
Tiger Woods 2000 PGA Championship
Tiger Woods 2000 U.S. Open
Tiger Woods 2000 British Open
Tiger Woods 1999 WGC Bridgestone
Mark Calcavecchia 1997 Air Canada
Scott McCarron 1997 AT&T Classic
Tiger Woods 1997 Masters
- Of the 83 players in the field Woods was one of seven players that went through the week without taking a double or higher. Here is the other six players that accomplished that feat:
Justin Leonard
Charley Hoffman
John Rollins
Ian Poulter
J.J. Henry
Raphael Jacquelin
- Tiger played the par 3s in four under, best in the field
- Not only did Tiger hit more greens than anyone else but he got it up and down better than anyone else on the greens that he missed. Of the 20 greens he missed he made par or better 16 times.
- Tiger had 60 putts of 8 feet and under and made everyone of them.
Woods's stats (with rank in parentheses):
Fairways hit: 31 of 56 ..... (T21st) Driving average: 335.0 ..... (1st) Greens hit: 52 of 72 ....... (1st) Putts: 114 (28.50 a rd) .... (T31st) Putting breakdown: 0-putt greens: 2 1-putt greens: 28 2-putt greens: 40 3-putt greens: 2 Play on par 3s: -4 Play on par 4s: -1 Play on par 5s: --3 Eagles: 0 Birdies: 14 ................ (T6th) Scrambling: 16 of 20 (80.00%)... (1st)
Scrambling measures how many times a player gets up and down for par or better on the holes where he missed the green in regulation.
What This Win means for Woods
- Tiger was Woods seventh win of 8 shots or more. Here is the list of Woods largest margins of victory on the PGA Tour:
15 at the 2000 U.S. Open
12 at the 1997 Masters
11 at the 2000 WGC-Bridgestone
11 at the 2003 Bay Hill Invitational
8 at the 2000 British Open
8 at the 2006 WGC-American Express
8 at the 2007 WGC-Bridgestone - In the nine-year history of the World Golf Championships-Bridgestone Invitational, Tiger Woods is the only player to enter the final round outside of the lead to come back to win. In 2001, he entered the final 18 holes two behind Jim Furyk before prevailing in a seven-hole playoff. In 2006, he was one-stroke back of Stewart Cink after 54-holes before defeating Cink in a four-hole playoff. This year he trailed Rory Sabbatini by one stroke through 54 holes and fired a closing 5-under 65 to win by eight strokes over Justin Rose and Rory Sabbatini.
