Tiger Woods shock showing in last week’s Phoenix Open has seen him drop outside the world’s top-50 for only a second time in his career to be now ranked 56th in the world.
Woods first moved into top 50 in his sixth pro event in finishing third in the 1996 La Cantera Texas Open.
The effort some 19 years ago saw Woods jump from 61st to 37th on the rankings.
However in November 2011 he dropped out of the 50 to be ranked 52nd for just week after finishing T30th in the frys.com Open but a week later he won Chevron World Challenge and moved up to No. 21.
Woods has slumped outside the elite top-50 under the weight of a second round 82 and sharing last place at TPC Scottsdale.
It was his worst score since turning professional in late 1996, and it came after Woods shot an 80 in December and also be last in his Hero World Challenge at Isleworth in Orlando.
Tiger Woods drops outside of the world’s top-50 for a first time since 1996.. (Photo – Eoin Clarke/www.golffile.ie)
Woods had gone to No. 1 in the world for a first occasion since his share of 19th place in the 1998 US Open.
He then was World No. 1 for a world record 683 weeks included an unbroken period of 281 weeks.
However Woods, who has won 102 events around the globe in his career, has not finished inside the top 20 in any of his past 10 events up to and including his first event of 2014.
Woods prior worst drought without a top-20 finish was four and that was from the 2010 AT&T National through the 2010 PGA Championship.
And now that Woods has dropped outside the top-50 he is at present ineligible to contest next month’s WGC – Cadillac Championship and an event he’s won seven times between capturing the inaugural tournament in 1999 and winning two years ago at Doral in Miami.
If so, it would be only the second time in his career he’d be ineligible for a World Golf Championship event and with the only other WGC for which Woods didn’t qualify was the HSBC Champions in 2011.
In contrast, Scotland’s Marc Warren has moved to 50th place and at this stage will compete in the WGC – Cadillac Championship for a first time in his career while the Scot will receive an invitation to tee-up at Augusta National for a first time.
“It’s the first time in my career I’ve ever been close to Tiger Woods in the World Rankings,” said Warren.
“But then Tiger’s too good a player to be outside the top-50, so he’s sure to get himself back up to the top of the rankings where we have been used to seeing his name for such a long time.
“He’s too good a champion.
“My goal now over the next few weeks is to cement myself inside the top-50. It’s always been a career goal of mine to be among the top-50, and I have to say I was a little surprised today in looking up the rankings on the website and seeing that I had moved up six places to 50th.
“I thought I might pick up a few spots so to move up six places is great and it’s another big incentive for me to play well again this week here in Malaysia.”
However Warren will need to remain inside the top-50 by the end of February to make his debut in $US 8.5m WGC – Cadillac Championship while he has to the last week in March to cement a maiden Masters invitation.
Fellow Scot Stephen Gallacher moved to a career high of 31st in the world after his third place in the defence of his double Dubai Desert Classic title.
And Martin Laird jumped 34 places to 136th in the world despite letting slip victory by posting a final round 72 and finish T5th in Sunday’s concluding Phoenix Open.
