Tiger Woods and Michael Jordan are two of the biggest icons in the history of sport, as well as friends.
Woods has won 15 majors in golf, including the Masters on five occasions. While Jordan won basketball’s NBA title three times in a row for the Chicago Bulls twice in the 1990s. Not only have both achieved greatness, they both know a thing of two about a comeback.
After winning three NBA titles with the Bulls between 1991 and 1993, Jordan retired from basketball to play professional baseball for the Chicago White Sox. Sensationally, he returned to basketball with the Bulls in 1995, winning a further three NBA titles in a row between 1996 and 1998. This was well documented in the Netflix documentary The Last Dance.
Despite that being arguably the greatest ever comeback in sport, Jordan is on record to credit Woods’s win at the 2019 Masters at Augusta, Georgia, as the greatest. It was the first major Woods had won since 2008. He had endured many debilitating injuries prior to his 2019 triumph. They included stress fractures to his leg, surgeries to his back and knees, along with problems with his Achilles tendon.
“I never thought he’d get back physically,” said Jordan. “He didn’t think he’d get back physically. But he did it. No one expected him to be back the way he is now. He’s probably the only person who believed he could get back. To me, that’s a major accomplishment. To me, it’s unbelievable. Mentally, you always think you can. But you can’t answer to what your body has to deal with. To me, it was the greatest comeback I’ve ever seen”
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Aged 43, Woods became one of the oldest players to ever win a major in golf. Going to the last hole needing only a bogey to win the title, Woods won by a shot to finish thirteen under par. Given his long catalogue of injuries and the well-publicised problems in his personal life, this was truly an astonishing and unforeseen comeback. If anyone is equipped to verify that, it is Michael Jordan.
Topics: Tiger Woods, Michael Jordan, Golf, NBA
Mark Sanderson