Rough break for Tiger in the Open, but I think, to be expected -- believe this was his first major in three years. As he said himself, if you haven't played a major in awhile, you tend to lose sight of the reality that the courses are tougher, the setups are tougher, and of course, the competition is tougher.
It's an open question whether he'll win another major, but, as the article I've linked below suggests, his window is closing fast. Only 24 golfers since 1900 have won a major over the age of 40, only two over the age of 45. In the past 25 years, there have been only five. So, a golfer over 40 wins ca. 1/20 of all majors.
The average and median age of a major winner is 32. And, as one would guess ca. 65% of all majors are won by players between 26-35. Since 1960, more than 75% of majors were won by golfers under 35.
All this jibes 100% with some research for a project a couple of years back (when I was younger and better ;-) about age-related human performance. Intellectual abilities peak at 21 (except for judgement) and for most pro athletes their career peak is 26-30. This shouldn't surprise anyone -- we know this from watching sports. What most pro sports fans usually don't notice though, is that there is a very sharp decline at age 37-38, which most seems to affect reflexes, vision, and hand-eye coordination, in general. One researcher pointed out to me the late career stats of two great players as an example -- Babe Ruth and Derek Jeter. Their hitting stats virtually fell off a cliff at about this age -- other examples abound, but it's most noticeable in players of this order.
As one poster here observes, Tiger was last playing well in 2013 -- in fact he won five tour events (although no majors) and was named Player of the Year -- and this was years after the disruption of his marriage. That year he also turned 37. Since then he's been plagued by the ongoing complications from his back and knee injuries and barely played at all. He said that last year before his spinal fusion, he thought he'd never play again.
So, since Tiger has played so little in recent years, it's difficult to distinguish between the all factors that might affect his play -- not only the effect of layoff time and his recovery from the spinal fusion, but simply the natural decline of the aging process, which affects him in exactly the same way as it would any other human -- forget about athlete.
Those who chalk up his problems to lack of 'mental toughness', should ask whether Derek Jeter suddenly lost his ability to hit due to lack of 'mental toughness'.
https://www.golfchannel.com/article/...f-yes-it-does/
