Thought for the Day
If you’re deciding on a lucky number, don’t go for 759 – it’s not likely to come up too often
Hot Stuff
With the exception of those deranged egotists who sprint across playing arenas naked, streaks in sport are not uncommon. An individual or team temporarily discovers the secrets of the universe and embarks on a sequence of almost unparallelled success, to the point whether you wonder if it will ever end. But of course, it always does. Eventually. Even Barcelona or Manchester City in football, or the Australians in cricket (thankfully) or Lewis Hamilton in Formula One, ultimately lose the capacity to beat all-comers.
Right now, however, in golf we are witnessing two remarkable runs of sustained brilliance in which everyone else is playing for second place. I refer, or course, to Nelly Korda on the LPGA Tour and Scottie Scheffler on its male equivalent. Each of them seems capable of winning not only at will but without any of the apparent stress or anxiety that usually accompanies people trying to do something that few others have achieved.
Scheffler finds fairways with monotonous regularity and then not only puts his ball on the green, but routinely does so to kick-in distance. Since changing his putter and acquiring a new putting coach, the one previous weakness in his game has been eradicated so completely that it now seems a distant memory. Nelly has perhaps had to fight a little harder to maintain her pre-eminence, having had to secure two of her recent wins via playoffs but they only stretched to three holes in total.
Nelly’s streak of five consecutive wins has been matched only by Annika Sorenstam and Nancy Lopez in the women’s game. At the time of Nancy’s streak – which came in her maiden year in which she won nine times in all, Joanne Carner said: ‘We’re all trying to steal Nancy’s birth-control pills, but so far we’ve been unsuccessful.’ We don’t know if Nelly Korda’s rivals have considered a similar tactic.
It is appropriate to look at players of an earlier era in order to put the achievements of Scottie and Nelly into perspective. The greatest streak of all time, and one which I confidently predict (despite my hopeless record of prognostication), will never be bettered, belongs to Byron Nelson. He holds two of the most remarkable records in sport, both achieved in 1945 when, during that final year of war he went on a winning streak that took him to 11 consecutive victories and, over the course of the season, 18 wins in all.
Today it is considered a minor marvel to win two on the bounce. Three would create headlines, four would elevate the golfer to demigod status and five is about as likely as asking Jack Nicklaus a question on any subject under the sun and receiving the reply: ‘I don’t have an opinion on that.’ So the idea of 11 in a row is inconceivable.
Byron’s feat was achieved in war-time and there has been much debate about the true value of these wins because many pros were actively engaged in military service (the man himself was excused military duty because, although he did not suffer from haemophilia, as has been widely reported, he did have a disorder that caused his blood to clot slowly). Nevertheless, his greatest rivals, Ben Hogan and Sam Snead, played in many events that year, and won quite a few.
In addition to those 18 wins (from a full tour schedule of 38 events), Byron was runner-up seven times – so he was first or second 25 times, or in 65% of all the tournaments staged that year and of course he didn’t enter them all.
But it doesn’t end there. His scoring average for the season was 68.33, a record that stood for over half a century, until Tiger Woods finally bettered it in 2000. And, just to get the last pesky statistics out of the way, he established a new tournament benchmark for both 18 holes (62) and 72 holes (259). The inescapable truth is that it would not have mattered who else had been competing in that astonishing season, ‘Lord Byron’, as he became known, would have wiped the floor with them all.
Speaking of Tiger – he also, of course, has won five in a row; and six, and seven. So Scottie has a ways to go yet to match him.
And it is stretching credibility beyond breaking point even to suggest that Scottie Scheffler and Nelly Korda could match Byron’s 11 tournament streak and his winning run eventually ended, and so will theirs. Nevertheless, they have already elevated themselves to that lofty status of being such low-price favourites to win, that the rest hardly get a look-in at the bookmaker. Not since Annika Sorenstam and Tiger Woods were in their pomp have two golfers dominated their fellow competitors and their sport to such a degree.
Enjoy it while you can.
Quote of the Week
Be brave if you lose and meek if you win
Harvey Penick