The Jack Nicklaus era vs. The Tiger Woods era

This is one of my favorite golf controversies, and it emerges around every major tournament.

Jack Nicklaus won 18 majors, and Tiger Woods has won 14. Woods is the overwhelming favorite to win his 15th this week at the U.S. Open at Bethpage Black on Long Island, N.Y.

Why?

Four reasons: He arguably is the best player of all time, the best player in the world right now, a winner when the Open was held at Bethpage in 2002, and there is nobody out there who challenges him on a regular basis.

That wasn’t the case in the Nicklaus era when Tom Watson, Arnold Palmer, Lee Trevino and Gary Player were challenging and beating Nicklaus.

“In that era, there were probably ten guys that were very capable of beating Jack each week,” Kenny Perry said this week at Bethpage. “In our era, you've got Phil (Mickelson); you've got a few guys up there in the top that challenge Tiger each and every week. But you'll see one guy come from out of there, like I did at Augusta.  I'll pop in there every now and then. You'll see a guy pop in here and there but you don't actually see the same six, eight guys really competing against him. He's definitely a step ahead of us when he's playing his golf.  Jack had more guys there. There were always different guys winning the majors it seemed like instead of the one guy always in focus.”

That is why you can’t bet against Tiger this week. Even in his absence, only Padraig Harrington stepped up to win two majors. When Tiger returned, you didn’t hear about Harrington or anyone else on a regular basis.