More than a decade of launching missiles from the tee, targeting the green with long irons, battering the pin with approach shots, chipping close from the rough, nailing putts long and short on greens flat and undulating around the globe, pumping his fist, intimidating opponents, and forging preposterous victories – by 15 strokes in a U.S. Open and 13 in his first Masters – have certified Tiger Woods as the greatest golfer in history.  The forgoing statement in no way disrespects the achievements of Jack Nicklaus, the Golden Bear.  It merely underscores what most observers serious and casual have long realized: Tiger is in outer space, and the mystery is how far he’ll be able to travel.

Tiger Woods wallpapered the bedroom of his youth with the unmatched exploits of Jack Nicklaus.  Most important of these to Woods, possessed then as now by grand ambition, were Nicklaus’ 18 major championships.  Less than 12 years after turning pro, Woods already has 13 major titles and we’re unaware of anyone who believes he won’t surpass 18.  The essential question therefore becomes: how many will he win?  Mathematical projections, even when based on a lengthy playing history, can be deceptive.  At age 34 Tom Watson, one of the finest putters ever, had won eight major titles and 36 tournaments, yet he spontaneously lost his feel – beset by the dreaded yips – and began missing putts most Saturday golfers would drain.  Despite continued excellence in ball striking, he won no more majors and only three tournaments the following 14 years.  It’s impossible to now prove that Woods, age 32, won’t be beset by this not uncommon malady.  But we doubt he’ll get the jitters in his thirties since his mind is as impressive as his athletic arsenal: he not merely enjoys pressure but craves it and unlike everyone else plays better when conditions are toughest.

If putting won’t soon diminish Tiger’s accumulation of victories, what could?  He’ll certainly be careful with his left knee, which was recently operated on a third time following his second-place finish at the Masters.  This wasn’t a major procedure – none were – just a cleansing of bone and ligament rather than cutting and restructuring them.  And, we must emphasize, golfers don’t have to run off tackle or soar above the rim to excel, and generally maintain their peak much longer than those in other sports.  So let’s do some math.  As a professional, Tiger Woods has played 45 major tournaments and won 29% of them.  No one else is in the same solar system.  He once won four in a row over two seasons, a feat comparable to hitting 90 steroid-free home runs over a 162-game stretch.  That won’t happen again, notwithstanding Tiger’s ability to consecutively win several other tournaments.  Over the next eight golf seasons, which will take Woods through the age of 39, he will probably win about a quarter of the major championships, averaging one per year, and possess 21 at the end of the 2015 season.  He could have more by then, but it’s almost as likely he’ll have less.  Family life, fishing, skiing (which he better give up), and his burgeoning businesses soon to make him a billionaire – all could diminish the time he invests in golf and, more critically, the passion he feels for the game.  He’ll be hungry for a long time, but will he be as ravenous as he’s been since childhood?

We think he will remain obsessed.  After what will then be two decades of unquestioned supremacy – and perhaps even sooner – some young guns are going to challenge him for the mantle of World Greatest Golfer.  They’ll be threatening his birthright, and the besieged warrior, player of the year and winner of the most tournaments nine times his first 11 seasons, will mobilize to slay his enemies – “to kick their butts.”  The quest for more golfing records will again be as alluring as it was in his youth.  He already owns 64 victories.  By 2015 he’ll probably have won more than 100 career tournaments, demolishing the august total of 82 that sweet-swinging Sam Snead has held for decades.

That won’t suffice. On stormy nights he’ll yearn to pummel Vijay Singh and win more than his three majors and 19 tournaments after turning 40.  He’ll fume about Nicklaus’ six green jackets at the Masters.  Woods now has four and at 40 still may not have seven.  He’ll also toil to top Jack and be older than 46 when he wins his final Masters.  Then it’s the suave Julius Boros who must be roughed up.  In the 1968 PGA tournament Boros at age 48 became the oldest player to win a major title.  This record will have endured more than half a century when Tiger is old enough to challenge it.  And, unavoidably, there must be more abuse for Sam Snead.  In 1965 he won the Greater Greensboro Open just shy of 53, oldest ever for a regular tour event.  At 67 Snead also became the first player to shoot his age and the oldest to make the cut in a tournament.

Tiger Woods wants all those records, and even more he’ll need to keep hunting old lions and new studs to let them know that Tiger, though balding and less svelte, is still swinging and passionate about making painful their walks with him down the fairways of history.