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The Honolulu Advertiser
Posted on: Tuesday, April 3, 2001


Slam must be achieved in same year

"Hopefully, if I win the Masters, it will be considered the (Grand) Slam."
— Tiger Woods

By Ferd Lewis
Advertiser Staff Writer

If Sammy Sosa hit 69 home runs in the last 161 games of this season and two homers in the opener of the next one, would he break Mark McGwire's record?

If Nomar Garciaparra finished this season with a 50-game hitting streak and got base hits in his first seven games of 2002, would he break Joe DiMaggio's mark?

If Andre Agassi won three of tennis' majors this year and captured the remaining one next year, would it be a Grand Slam?

No, of course not.

Which is also why if Tiger Woods wins the Masters this week, he will not have completed golf's Grand Slam.

Since Woods has won his last two outings, there is little doubt who the favorite in Augusta, Ga., is or what the big questions hanging over the Masters this week are: What constitutes a Grand Slam? And will Woods have one if he wins the Masters?

They are yet further examples of Woods, as he alone seems to have the ability to do, taking golf into heretofore rare territory. It is Woods' brilliance at age 25 testing new limits and definition.

Golf's original Grand Slam, won by Robert Jones in 1930, included the U. S. Open, British Open, U. S. Amateur and British Amateur tournaments. The Masters didn't come along until 1934.

And the first widely accepted idea of a professional Grand Slam didn't exist until the 1960s when Arnold Palmer was chasing immortality and sportswriters resurrected the concept.

Palmer, Sam Snead and many of the sport's legends applaud Woods' accomplishments and marvel at his future, but say the essence of a Slam is to win all four components in the same year. Palmer says it is impossible to patchwork a Slam over portions of two years. Snead dismisses the notion there can be a continuation.

Tennis similarly considers it a Grand Slam only when all four of its majors, Australian Open, French Open, Wimbledon and U. S. Open, are won in the same calendar year.

Enter Woods, who has won, in succession, the U. S. Open, British Open and PGA Championship, all of them in the year 2000. All with record scores.

If he wins the only remaining major prize in the series, the Masters this week, that gives Wood ownership of all four professional majors at once. An unprecedented accomplishment to be sure.

One, Woods argues, that should also be considered the Grand Slam by definition. "In my estimation, it would be because I would hold all four at the same time."

Do that and, given the depth of the competition in golf today, he will have achieved one of the most amazing feats in sports history. By this generation or any other.

And it will, without question, certainly be grand.

But The Grand Slam?

As Palmer put it, "That's ridiculous."