America At Large: It seems almost mind-boggling this morning to consider that barely four months ago this was actually a subject of serious debate, writes George Kimball.
Had you polled four golf experts back in April and asked them to forecast which of the so-called Fab Four would emerge from the pack in 2005, it would have been like asking "Who's your favourite Beatle?" You might have gotten four different answers.
And at the time a more legitimate question was whether we weren't slighting Retief Goosen by omitting him from this elite group. Should the two-time US Open Champion be granted conditional status (though "Fab Five" just didn't sound right), or was he destined to remain its Pete Best?
As the world's best golfers assemble on the starting line at Baltusrol today for the final lap of the 2005 Grand Slam, the argument has, for the moment, been stilled. Tiger Woods is a 2 to 1 favourite in the US (5 to 2 with Paddy Power) to continue his domination. With victories in the Masters and British Open and a runner-up finish in the US Open, Woods is poised to win his third professional major of the year.
Only two men in history have won as many in the same year. One was Ben Hogan, the other Woods.
And should Eldrick master the 7,392-yard test in New Jersey, it's a safe bet future golf historians will spend less time marvelling at the feat than they will analysing his performance at Pinehurst as The One That Got Away.
The common recollection of that tournament is that on Sunday Michael Campbell was dropping in long bombs from all over the greens, while Woods was three-putting from 25 feet and missing a couple of tiddlers that cost him the championship. But as Tiger acknowledged here on Tuesday, he putted abysmally all week. He led all Pinehurst competitors in driving distance and greens in regulation, but 79 golfers that week took fewer putts.
"Sure, Michael made some putts, but he did what he needed to do to win the tournament and I didn't. For me, it was disappointing because I wasn't able to have one facet of my game that's usually pretty good.
"I hit the ball beautifully all week; I just putted terribly," recalled Woods of his Pinehurst misadventure. "People have said 'You lost the tournament on 16 and 17 on Sunday', but that's wrong. I lost it all four days on the greens, because I didn't putt well any day. I didn't putt the way I needed to putt for all four days to win our national championship. It wasn't there when I needed it the most.
"My best day (at Pinehurst) wasn't very good, and that's not normally the case for me," recalled Woods. "Usually I'm a pretty good putter, day-in and day-out, but I had a bad putting week at the wrong time. But to putt that poorly and still have a chance to win the US Open, that's when you know you're hitting the ball pretty good."
Having thus taken heart, Woods declines, at least for now, to retrospectively view Pinehurst as a blown opportunity.
"I swear," he said. "I don't look at it that way at all." The rest of us will reserve judgment.
In the meantime, events of the past four months have rendered the Fab Four - or Five, take your pick - but a memory. If Woods's performance has been other-worldly, only Vijay Singh has been in the same universe, albeit on a different planet.
Phil Mickelson has finished 10th, T33 and T60 in the three majors. Ernie Els went 47, T15 and T34, and is done for the year, sidelined by knee surgery. Goosen (T3, T11 and T5) has two top-10 finishes, but experienced embarrassing final-round melodeons of 81 and 74 at Pinehurst and St Andrews.
"Vijay's done all right, you know," pointed out Woods. "Three top 10S. It's not like he's been out of it. He was there. So was I. Ernie and Goose and Phil didn't really play all that well, although Goose played great and was leading the US Open (after three rounds)."
When Woods stumbled through a two-year major drought and Singh crept up to displace his number one ranking, much of the criticism concerned Tiger's apparent petulance in abandoning swing guru Butch Harmon for the counsel of Hank Haney, but his re-tooled game has silenced the critics for the nonce. Most would agree that he has equalled, if not surpassed, the form of five years ago that saw him win four majors in a row.
"I think in 2000, he was unbeatable because he probably believed he was unbeatable," supposed Padraig Harrington this week. "But he's more experienced and doesn't need it."
A day after his first practice round at Baltusrol, Woods had done his best to explain his golfing metamorphosis for the benefit of the mere mortals in the press tent.
"My lofts, my lie, my length on my irons haven't changed since I was 14 years old," said Tiger. "I've won a lot of tournaments since I was 14, so I'm not going to change. But I have changed my three-wood and my driver over the years, trying to keep up with everybody off the tee. I'd have to say my iron play is probably better now than it was in 2000. My driving probably isn't as good, because I'm hitting it 20 or 30 yards further now."
The added length - a combination of technological advances in equipment and enhanced upper-body strength - has at times been a mixed blessing.
A few months ago Woods reviewed tapes of his driving performance in the three majors he won in 2000 and realised that if those five-year-old drives had each gone 30 yards further, he would have missed more than half the fairways he hit in those events.
"I had to get better," explained Woods. "The other guys have gotten better as well, so if you're standing still, you're getting worse."
