Tiger vs Jack through 72 majors

Tiger Woods missed the cut at the US Open this past weekend. It was his 72nd major as a professional. In the past there was the foregone conclusion that Tiger would break Jack Nicklaus' record of 18 professional major victories, so I started keeping track of where each player was at the same number of majors played. Here's the comparison through 72 majors:

Tiger: 14 wins, 6 2nd places, 24 total top 3's (14+6+4 others), 31 total top 5's, and 38 total top 10's.
Jack: 15 wins, 15 2nd places, 39 total top 3's, 46 total top 5's, and 55 total top 10's.

That's the thing that always amazed me about Jack - even when he didn't win, he was up there. He had as many top 3 finishes in majors as Tiger has top 10 finishes (1 more, in fact) through the same number of events.

Although Tiger is only 1 behind the pace on wins, he's going to have some catching up to do. In majors 73 through 83 for Jack (1980 Masters through 1982 British Open), Jack had two wins, two 2nd place finishes, two other top 5 finishes, and two other top 10 finishes. That's 8 out of the next 11 majors where Jack was in the top 10 at least.

Through 72 majors, Jack missed the cut 4 times. Tiger has missed the cut in 5 of his last 7 major starts. The chances of him breaking the record are getting slimmer and slimmer. Jack was born on January 21, 1940. So he was 39 years old when he played his 72nd major. Tiger is 42 years old right now, so he's 3 years behind. Starting in the 1983 Masters when Jack was 43, and going through the rest of his career (73 more majors - wow), Jack had 1 win (1986 Masters), 1 second place finish (1983 PGA), and 5 other top 10's (Masters in 1985, 1987, 1990, and 1998, and 1986 US Open). At pretty much the same age, Jack started going downhill and not being in contention as often. But Tiger still has to make up those 2 extra wins Jack had before age 43.

It's going to be a very difficult task.

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