FORE! Oye Cartoon! Daru!

Vijay Singh notches up another win at the WGC. It ended a long drought of going winless (0-34) since playing in Arnold's Invitational way back in March of 2007. What's amazing is the age at which he's doing it. The guys holds the record for the most number of wins in the 40s (interesting records here), with 21 titles. The next person on that list is Sam Snead with 17 wins.

I'm curious to see how Tiger does in his "waning" years. Knowing Tiger the challenges won't be mental. But there's only so much abuse a knee can take. You have to see him live at a golf course to realize how hard he swings and how much stress that puts on the legs. I guess we'll just have to wait and watch.

And while I think it's fundamentally incorrect to compare players across generations, especially in sports that have undergone fundamental changes (such as equipment, access, popularity and therefore competition), it's interesting to ponder some stats on Tiger and Jack. Someone I played a round with over the weekend remarked that while most people are aware that Jack has 18 major titles, a lesser known fact is that he came in 2nd 19 times! That's impressive. I know some of you think finishing second doesn't count. Tell that to the runners-up on the PGA tour who pocket anything between $500K-$800K for their "first loser" efforts. Mathematically speaking, ranks other than 1st should matter, albeit in some weighted sense. Well, I asked, what's the comparable number for Tiger. He didn't know it, so I researched it once I got back. Purely for contemplation, here are some stats, not canvassing one conclusion vs. another ...

Stats are shown Jack / Tiger ...

• Career Titles 73/65
• Career Win% .16/.30
• Majors 18/14
• Major 2nds 19/5
• Major Win% .11/.34
• Major 2nd% .12/.12
• Wins in 20s 30/46
• Wins in 30s 38/19

Notes: Sam Snead holds the record at 82 for most titles. Win% =win/enter and includes Jack's waning years; but even adjusting for that would be ~20%. Even if Jack won all his 2nd places at Majors, his win% is less than Tiger. The crucial difference here is that Jack has played in 159 Majors, Tiger just 41; it helps Jack with the totals but hurts on the win%; we'll just have to see the stats again when Tiger retires.

Take a look at Jack in his prime ... 1970s ... mind boggling

• He only missed one cut
• He finished outside the top ten only five times
• He won eight of his 18 majors
• He finished fifth or better in every British Open
• He only finished outside fourth in the Masters once

In other news, I find it striking (ironic, strange, funny, stupid, essentially human) that the French are all up in arms about another cartoon, and are now arguing against absolute free speech. At least some of them are. Would love to hear people's comments on this one.

Currently reading this book on modern India by Edward Luce (first spotted the book at kk's lair; Luce used to be a FT bureau chief in India). Several "new" anecdotes for me at least. One relevant to the bewdaas on this blog. I didn't know that Ambedkar is largely responsible for our ability to freely purchase alcohol in most parts of India. Apparently, our founders wanted a prohibition of alchohol enshrined into our "core" constitution. He, for good or bad reasons (I'm thinking certain livelihoods), had it demoted to the "directive principles" where it ended up akin to being on a wish list.

cheers
dhakks