Has it finally happened? Does Tiger Woods finally have a rival worth talking about? Is there finally someone brave enough to grab the tiger's tail with both hands and hang on long enough to make a difference? Maybe.
When Phil Mickelson coasted to his second Masters win last Sunday, it was as if the Big 5 was suddenly pared down to the Dynamic Duo.
Ernie Els, Vijay Singh, and Ratief Goosen quickly faded into the azaleas, joining the likes of David Duval and Sergio García, all of whom were once supposed to challenge Tiger as he threatened to turn to the PGA Tour into his own personal victory parade. Els has two gimpy knees, Vijay may finally be on the downside of his career, Goosen never really belonged on the list, Duval seems happier snowboarding, and Sergio appears at least a decade away.
Which leaves Phil Mickelson.
Sure, it took about five years for his ego to get out of the way and let his phenomenal talent take over, but now that he gets it, golf fans might finally have what they've been wishing for.
I didn't watch a single stroke of CBS's coverage of the Masters (here's why), but I did see two separate video clips which seemed to tell the whole story.
The first was an interview with an angry Woods as he walked off the course. He reflected on a day in which he hit the ball from tee to green as well as he ever has, then gnashed his teeth while talking about his shoddy putting. (For his part, caddie Stevie Williams blamed the putter, discarding it with instructions to "break the fucking thing.")
The second moment came during Mickelson's victory ceremony when Tiger's status as defending champion obligated him to drape the green jacket over Phil's shoulders, just as Lefty had done for him a year earlier. Tiger offered congratulations and grinned for the camera, but the smile was forced as he was clearly thinking of missed putts which easily could have erased his three-stroke deficit.
I've never been one to think that Tiger needed anyone to push him. Tiger has always seemed to understand that his only real competition is Jack Nicklaus, and that his legacy will not be defined by this week's Buick Open or that week's Greater Hartford Classic, but by his performance in the major championships. Ten times out of thirty-seven tries as a professional, he has risen to the occasion. This frequency is absurd, and yet it doesn't stop him from boiling over when an opportunity to win passes him by as it did this weekend in Augusta.
But if Tiger doesn't need a rivalry to keep him interested, the rest of the golf world does. Much has been made of the fact that Mickelson, long the best player never to win a major, has now won three of the past nine. What's more significant, though, is that he and Woods between them have won four of the past five: Tiger the '05 Masters and British Open, Lefty last year's PGA and last week's Masters.
As a result, both men will likely head towards June's U.S. Open shoulder to shoulder as co-favorites, each looking make a major statement. If Phil were to win, his fourth major championship would separate him from peers like Els, Price, and Singh and put him one major short of duplicating the Tiger Slam.
If Tiger were to win, he'd move a step closer towards Nicklaus and remind us of what even Mickelson understands: there is Tiger, and there is everyone else.
Regardless of what happens in this summer's U.S. Open, one thing is clear. Tiger and Phil are thirty and thirty-five years old, respectively, and we should see dozens of confrontations between the two over the next five or ten years. Tiger may be racing towards immortality, but Phil's got him by the tail and he's holding on for dear life. It should be quite a ride.
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