In 2001, Tiger Woods was at the peak of his powers. He’d just completed the Tiger Slam after his wonderful victory at the 2001 Masters, his fourth consecutive Major victory following successes at the US Open, Open Championship and PGA Championship in 2000.
Phil Mickelson, meanwhile, was a prolific winner on the PGA Tour but he’d yet to land one of the game’s big four. His first PGA Tour title came as an amateur at the 1991 Northern Telecom Open and he added 16 more between then and the 2000 Tour Championship.
His 17th PGA Tour title came at the Buick Invitational in 2001. In August 1996, he breached the top ten in the Official World Golf Ranking for the first time. While he never made it to World No.1, he spent more than 25 consecutive years in the world’s top 50.
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In 2001, Karrie Webb was also flying. The Australian had won two Major Championships – the Nabisco Championship and US Women’s Open – in 2000, her second and third titles overall. At that point, she’d notched 19 LPGA Tour titles.
Webb and Annika Sorenstam were dominating the women’s game back then. Sorenstam burst onto the scene in 1995 and landed her first LPGA Tour title at the US Women’s Open.
By March 2021, she had 25 more to her name. Her second Major arrived at the 1996 US Women’s Open and her third came in the 2021 Nabisco Championship.
At this point, the Golf Monthly editors decided to use an analytics tool to make a projection on the career tallies of the aforementioned players, using the same formula that forecasts baseball players’ statistics…
Annika Sorenstam with the US Women’s Open trophy after her 2006 win
(Image credit: Getty Images)
Right or wrong?
Woods had six Majors to his name at this point and the topic of conversation on every television broadcast and in every golf club bar was whether he’d be able to reach and indeed usurp Jack Nicklaus’ record of 18.
Our modelling suggested he’d reach a tally of 18 Majors at the age of 35, with 80 PGA Tour titles as well, from a total of 330 events.
In reality, he’s reached 15 Majors, although our projection only went up to the age of 35. He had 14 Major titles to his name at that point. In total, he has 82 PGA Tour titles from 378 starts.
Interestingly, the forecasting tool believed Phil Mickelson would still have no Major titles at the age of 35. That projection fell flat on its face as the left-hander had three victories at that point – the 2004 and 2006 Masters and the 2005 PGA Championship.
As we all know, he went on to win three more, the last of which came at the 2001 PGA Championship at the age of 50 years, 11 months and seven days, making him the oldest ever winner of a Major Championship.
The forecast was also wide of the mark when it came to both Webb and Sorenstam. The projected total for the Australian at the age of 35 was a massive 12 Majors and 58 regular tour titles, but she ended her career with seven, including every single women’s Major.
The tool felt Sorenstam would have five Majors and 35 tour titles by the age of 35. It underestimated the Swede, who notched ten Major titles and 79 LPGA Tour wins before she called time on her career, in addition to 17 victories on the Ladies European Tour.
