If not for two swings by Tiger Woods, and two holes by Karrie Webb, both could easily be on the verge of something grand.
Winning the Grand Slam is thought to be next to impossible,
perhaps because no ever has won all four professional majors in one
season. No one will this year, either.
The best Webb and Woods can hope for is to win three, which is
hardly cause to hang their heads. Only four other players -- Babe
Didrickson Zaharias, Ben Hogan, Mickey Wright, and Pat Bradley --
have won three majors in one year.
Should Webb and Woods join them, they will have managed to make
the Grand Slam at least look feasible.
Consider how close they came.
Woods dropped five shots in a span of three holes in the first
round of The Masters -- a 7-iron that caught a plugged lie in the bunker on No. 10 and led to a double bogey, and an 8-iron that
bounced off the bank and into Rae's Creek for a triple bogey on No.
12.
He wound up six strokes behind Vijay Singh. Minus those two
swings, he would have started the final round just one stroke out
of the lead.
Webb kept Grand Slam hopes alive by winning the Nabisco Championship by a record 10 strokes. In the second major, the LPGA Championship, she was at 4-under through eight holes in the final round when she took bogey on the par-5 ninth, and made a double bogey on the par-5 16th.
Pars on those holes would have put her in the playoff, won by
Juli Inkster.
Webb went on to win the U.S. Women's Open by four strokes, giving her two majors by a combined 14 strokes. Woods won the next two majors by a combined 23 strokes -- the U.S. Open by 15 strokes and theOpen by eight.
Karrie Webb shows off her Women's US Open trophy.Allsport.
On Thursday, Webb will try to become the first woman since
Bradley in 1986 to win three majors when she defends her title in
the du Maurier Classic. A week later, Woods will try to become the
first man since Hogan in 1953 to win three majors when he defends
his title in the PGA Championship.
Should they win, both might look back at what might have been.
The rest of us can look forward to what might be.
Is the Grand Slam really possible?
"I never say never to anything, but I think it is a long
stretch of the imagination,'' Webb said. "It's high odds that one
player is going to like all four courses in one year, and then peak
at the right time. But it's always a possibility.''
Woods was first asked about the Grand Slam after winning the '97
Masters. His 12-stroke victory must have made him wonder about the
possibility when he said, "I think it can be done. If you win the
right tournaments four times, then you have the slam.''
But after he tied for 19th in the U.S. Open, and tied for 24th
in the British Open, Woods was singing a different tune when he
arrived at Winged Foot for the PGA.
"Realistically,'' he said at the time, "it's almost next to
impossible to win all four.''
Is it?
Two swings. Two holes.
And Woods has contended in nine of the last 11 majors.
The closest anyone came to a Grand Slam was Hogan in '53, a
performance every bit as dominant as what Woods has done this year.
Hogan won The Masters by four strokes, the U.S. Open by six, and his
only British Open by five.
Hogan never had a chance to go for the fourth leg because the
PGA ended the day before the British Open began. The Babe couldn't
go for the Slam because there wasn't one -- the LPGA only had three
majors in 1950.
In fact, the Grand Slam wasn't on anyone's checklist until
Palmer first raised the notion in 1960 after winning The Masters
and U.S. Open. In his first British Open, he finished second at St.
Andrews by one stroke.
Jack Nicklaus in 1972 was the last man to win The Masters and
the U.S. Open in the same year. Just like Palmer, he finished
second in the British Open by one stroke, and the dream was gone.
Nicklaus's best year in the majors was 1975. He won The Masters and
PGA, and lost the U.S. Open and British Open by a combined three
strokes.
Bradley was even better in 1986. She won the Dinah Shore, LPGA
Championship, and du Maurier, but missed the U.S. Women's Open
playoff by a mere three strokes.
Perhaps the closest of any was Greg Norman that same year. He
led every major championship after 54 holes, but won only the
British Open.
Is the Grand Slam impossible?
That would suggest Webb and Woods are simply having one of those
seasons that don't come along very often.
Instead, we might be looking at two players who don't come along
very often. And they still have at least 15 years ahead of them.
