Comparing Golfers of Different Eras

It's good to hear again from Dave Riffey of Shell Lake, WI. He's taken a break from shoveling snow and wants to talk about the endless comparisons of today's players (especially Tiger) with those of years gone by:

Every week it is the same old thing. someone comparing Tiger and the current players to the old guys and gals.   Why hasn't anyone set up a tour for the current players that required them to use the old wooden headed clubs. Call it the 60's & 70's tour. Each pro would be required to use clubs, balls, and putters only available from that era. Put the greens at the same speed, the distance the same as back then. This would really be an interesting test to see how good the NEW players on the PGA and women of the LPGA tours would react and play.

Send them to Pebble, Augusta, the Old Course, Doral, Wing Foot etc. If the old players had the technology of today, back then, they would be  better than the players of today. >

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Dave, we were just talking about that today after someone mentioned Mark Frost's book, The Match, the new book about the great match among Hogan, Nelson, Venturi and Ward, that Bo Links wrote about in Golf World recently. How would those guys fare with all of this new equipment?

My thought: Tiger could play with bamboo and win and so could Hogan, Nelson, Nicklaus and a few others. Just how far down the list you'd go is why it's a great question.

By the way, I'm not wishing for the old days. We have one of those throwback events at the club from time to time. Man, golf gets hard when you're playing persimmon and balata!

--Bob Carney