Rory McIlroy vs Tiger Woods vs Jack Nicklaus
Rory McIlroy won his second major this past weekend and a question comes to mind: Will McIlroy beat out Tiger Woods for more majors sooner than Tiger will beat out Jack Nicklaus?
Tiger is still one of the best golfers in the world, but his major days just might be over. If they aren't, I doubt he has five majors left in him at this point in his career.
While McIlroy was playing bogey free golf, a struggling Tiger was trying to get out of one jam after another. Winning the Wanamaker Trophy by a record eight strokes, a confident McIlroy seemed to be serving notice it's his time to shine. Two majors in the last two years. Not a bad piece of work for the exuberant 23 year old.
With Phil Mickelson fading and not appearing to be focused at this stage of his career, who will join Rory and Tiger in the next few years to move golf's needle? Rickie Fowler is the people's choice, while Jason Dufner, Adam Scott and about 10 others will usher in the next era of golf.
The game might be the best it's been since the days of Nicklaus, Tom Watson, Lee Trevino and Seve Ballesteros.
We will continue to have plenty of quality golf to watch because the sport is loaded with new young talent. It just keeps getting better and better.
Sox should roll
past Detroit
Good to hear Robin Ventura echoed my sentiments the other day about Alex Rios, declaring him the team's best all-around player.
It will still be up to the pitching down the stretch however, and wasn't Detroit supposed to have caught our Pale Hose by now? At 14-3, Chris Sale better get some love from Mr. Cy Young. I do think Jose Quintana, Jake Peavy, and the bullpen deserve a bow too.
Detroit doesn't want it. So let's take it!
USA Olympics to resurrect boxing?
Congrats to our Olympians, from Michael Phelps, Missy Franklin, Gabby Douglas, the men's and women's hoops team to every one of our athletes who participated.
It will forever be a thrill when USA triumphs over all the other countries as they did this year with a total of 104 medals- 46 of those gold.
Good to hear the US Olympics Committee is going to do what it can to upgrade our boxing program. Some have talked about adding our pros like Floyd Mayweather as we have done with our other sports.
But I still long for the days when we had the best amateurs beating out the other countries on a regular basis. Everyone remembers our 1980 Olympic hockey team bringing home the gold. But what about our boxers? Guys like Ray Leonard, Oscar De La Hoya, Evander Holyfield and a young Muhammad Ali, known as Cassius Clay, were all amateurs when they competed and won in the Olympics.
Here's hoping the USOC can rebuild boxing, sink more money into it, and make it be a big-time medal sport once again for the US.
Ÿ Mike North's column appears each Tuesday and Friday in the Daily Herald, and his video commentary can be found Monday, Wednesday and Thursday at dailyherald.com. For more, visit northtonorth.com.