Tim Bradbury/Getty Images
By Alex Myers
Tiger Woods’ pursuit of Jack Nicklaus’ record 18 major championships has always drawn more focus than his chase of Sam Snead’s 82 PGA Tour wins for two main reasons: 1.) It’s a bigger deal; and 2.) It’s a lot easier to understand. In the modern era, the golf’s four majors have been long established, while the criteria of what constitutes an official PGA Tour victory has been somewhat of a moving target. Snead’s case, in particular, required a panel of golf historians put together by former commissioner Deane Beman in the late 1980s. That group combed through the Slammer’s records and concluded he had 81 wins instead of 84. No, wait, make that 82. They eventually settled on 82, a total with which Snead wasn’t pleased.
Regardless, Snead won a LOT. Over a long period of time. And now over his own long period of time, Woods has also won a LOT. And until Woods wins again or another panel is created, they are officially tied at 82 following Tiger’s three-shot victory at the Zozo Championship. So instead of digging into a comparison of these two legends—we’ve done that already—let’s look closer at how Tiger got to No. 82.
20: Tiger’s age when he won his first PGA Tour title.
43: Tiger’s age when he won his 82nd PGA Tour title. Snead was 52 when he won his 82nd and final PGA Tour title at the 1965 Greater Greensboro Open.
3: Number of Woods’ wins that have come in his 40s.
33: Number of Woods’ wins in his 30s.
Gregory Shamus
46: Number of Woods’ wins in his 20s. Just this total would rank him No. 7 on the PGA Tour’s all-time wins list.
15: Number of major championships Woods has won. Woods has also completed the career Grand Slam three times.
18: Number of World Golf Championships Woods has won. Dustin Johnson is second with six.
10: Number of seasons Woods has won at least five times, a PGA Tour record. Snead is No. 2 on the list with eight such seasons.
7: Number of tournaments Woods has won at least 5 times, a PGA Tour record. Snead and Jack Nicklaus have the next most with three.
David Cannon
8: Number of times Woods has won his first event of the season. For comparison, Rickie Fowler has five PGA Tour titles total in his career.
5: Number of times Ernie Els and Vijay Singh have finished runner-up in a Woods win, the most of anyone. Phil Mickelson, Jim Furyk, and Davis Love III have all finished runner-up to Woods four times.
16: Number of different states Woods has won in. Woods has also won 16 times in Florida alone.
Chris Condon
226: Number of fewer starts Woods needed than Snead to get to 82 wins.
22.8: Woods’ winning percentage in his 359 career PGA Tour starts. Ben Hogan is second on the list at 21.3 percent. Snead won 14 percent of his career starts.
79: Number of Woods’ PGA Tour wins that have come in stroke-play events. Woods has also won the WGC-Match Play three times.
243: The total number of strokes Tiger has won his 79 PGA Tour stroke-play titles by. That comes out to winning by a little over three shots per win.
4: Number of times Woods has won by at least 10 shots.
15: The largest margin of victory during Woods’ career, his romp at Pebble Beach in the 2000 U.S. Open.
David Cannon
11: Number of Woods’ wins that have come in playoffs. More incredibly, Tiger’s record in extra holes is 11 and 1 with his lone loss coming to Billy Mayfair at the 1998 Nissan Open. Woods’ first win also came in a playoff against Davis Love III at the 1996 Las Vegas Invitational.
24: Number of Woods’ wins in which he’s trailed after 54 holes. Woods’ biggest come-from-behind win was five shots, both at the 2000 AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am and at the 2009 Arnold Palmer Invitational.
7: Woods’ longest winning streak, which spanned parts of 2006 and 2007. Woods also has winning streaks of six and five tournaments. No one else since 1953 has ever won more than three PGA Tour events in a row.
3: Woods’ number of wins in his past 14 PGA Tour starts. In other words, even as Tiger nears his 44th birthday, he doesn’t seem like he plans to stop winning anytime soon.
