Ranking the best of each major championship in the 2010s

2 of 5

Tiger Woods winning in 2019 was the greatest Masters moment of the 2010s

AUGUSTA, GEORGIA – APRIL 14: Tiger Woods of the United States wears The Green Jacket and holds The Masters Trophy after his historic one shot win during the final round of the 2019 Masters Tournament at Augusta National Golf Club on April 14, 2019 in Augusta, Georgia. (Photo by David Cannon/Getty Images) /

Best of the Masters: Tiger Woods wins his fifth green jacket in 2019

Was Tiger Woods winning the 2019 Masters the easy, obvious call? Of course it was. Does it hurt that Tiger’s resurgence to the top of the game has brought an incredible renewal in golf’s popularity overall? Absolutely not.

However, if I asked you to be completely honest and tell me if you saw this coming as little as two or three years ago? Heck, even as an unabashed Tiger fan, I was losing that faith for a while, so I wouldn’t have blamed you.

Let’s even revisit the thoughts from the man himself. At the 2017 Masters Champions Dinner, Woods had to have a pain-relieving injection just to get through the ridiculous back pain he was suffering from. Sir Nick Faldo heard Woods tell another Masters champion “I’m done, I won’t play golf again.” Woods acknowledged that when he accepted the Golf Writers Association of America’s Ben Hogan award in late 2018.

"“Golf was not in my near future or in the distant future,” Woods said in his speech. “I knew I was going to be part of the game, but playing the game, I couldn’t even do that with my son Charlie. I couldn’t putt in the backyard.”"

Tiger returned to the winner’s circle in 2018 at the TOUR Championship, so his run at Augusta this year wasn’t exactly an out of nowhere moment, but that doesn’t diminish how incredible it was. As the final round came to a peak on the second nine, the momentum felt like it shifted towards the inevitable moment even before Woods finally took the lead on No. 15.

Woods has had some of the most iconic moments of his career at the hallowed grounds of Augusta National, but to me, the win that looked like it would never come is easily among the greatest of all time.

Honorable Mentions

As great as Tiger’s Masters win was, I have to give a nod to two others from the last decade. Adam Scott holding off Angel Cabrera in a playoff in 2013 was a tremendous moment for a player who had struggled with his game over the previous years, and broke through to win the first Masters for Australia.

The other close runner-up was Jordan Spieth in 2015. He came so close to winning the tournament in his first try the year before, but he left nothing to doubt in his second time out. Spieth went to the 18th green on Sunday with a chance to set the all-time Masters scoring record at 19-under, and even though he didn’t set the new mark, he has been so good at Augusta that it would have been impossible not to include him here.

Home/Majors