Can a 68-year-old legend beat Tiger Woods? We may soon find out

Nothing says Happy New Year like the arrival of Bernhard Langer in the arrival of a media center at a high-profile event in Florida, and there Langer was the day before, 68 and still very much at it, fielding questions about the state of his game in the preamble of the Chubb Classic presented by Servpro at the Tiburón Golf Club in Naples, a two-hour drive from Langer’s home in Bocaton.

I’m not there this year, but I’ve been there in the past, and if you like your golf tournaments soft and under control – well, let me just say this: The Chubb Classic presented by Servpro at Tiburón Golf Club in Naples will never be mistaken for 2025 Ryder Cup on the Black Course at Bethpage State Park in Farmingdale, NY

The final question posed to Langer was a desperation, a classic example of a category we like to call Only in Golf.

Tiger Woods turned 50 and he can compete with you this year. Do you see yourself trying to beat him?

Langer: “I try to beat everybody. It doesn’t matter who comes out here. The goal is to win. If you want to win, you have to beat him. So, yeah, that would be the goal.

“But my goal is not to play against Tiger Woods. My goal is to play against the golf course and myself and shoot the lowest score and then see if anyone can do that. If Tiger Woods is better, so be it.

“I’m sure we’re going to have some good games. I hope he comes out. I hope he’s healthy enough. Nobody knows. He won’t let us know until a couple of weeks in advance. That’s usually how it works.

“But it would be exciting to play against him again.

“We had a good time about a year and a half ago when we played the PNC Championship together on Sunday, when he played with Charlie, his son, and I had Jason, my son, and we spent a Sunday together. We had a great time and enjoyed each other’s company.”

Three quick notes.

I. Langer, born and raised in German, speaks perfect and precise English without a word wasted.

II. Langer is too gentlemanly to notice that he and Jason beat the Woods father and son team in a one-hole playoff.

III. It’s conceivable that Langer and Woods could play in the same senior event, and Langer could finish ahead of Woods despite the 18-year age difference. But it is unlikely.

For completely unscientific comparison, I looked at the 11 major events in which Woods and Langer played on the same courses since Langer turned 50 in the summer of 2007.

For example, in April 2008, Langer missed the cut at the Masters and Woods finished in a tie for second.

In 2018, Langer – at the age of 60! — had a T38 finish at Augusta and a T24 finish at the British Open. But Woods, in another of his many comeback trips that year, went T32 and T6, respectively, in the same events.

Langer is 1-for-11 in this random comparison. In 2020, he had a T29 finish at the Masters and Woods, as the defending winner, had a T38 finish, when he made a famous 10 on the par-3 12th hole on Sunday.

Can it happen? Could Langer finish ahead of Woods in (for argument’s sake) a 72-hole, standing-only major, the top events he would be most likely to play? of course. Will it happen? It would be fun to watch.

Meanwhile, two quick images that tell you something about these two World Golf Hall of Famers.

When Woods won the 2019 Masters, there was a line of Congolese players waiting to high-five, fist bump and hug the winner on his way to the scoreboard. Langer was the last person Woods saw before walking into the clubhouse, scorecard in hand. They shook hands in a way that Jack Nicklaus and Arnold Palmer would have known.

When Langer made a putt to win the 2024 PNC to secure a father-son victory, Tiger and Charlie Woods, as best I can tell, said this to Langer: “Bernhard? You’re the best. You’re the best, dude. Awesome.”

Well, he was Tiger in a glorified exhibition. A US Senior Open is another thing entirely.

Michael Bamberger welcomes your comments at Michael.Bamberger@Golf.com