Scottie Scheffler's victory at The American Express in California on Sunday has helped strengthen the longstanding comparisons between the 29-year-old American and golfing legends Tiger Woods and Jack Nicklaus.
The global number one fired a closing 66 to finish on 27 under par in his first PGA Tour appearance of 2026, claiming a victory that represents Scheffler's 20th title on the American circuit - a milestone that grants him lifetime membership on the Tour.
He is the first player since Rory McIlroy in 2021 to reach the mark and it is yet another major title added to his growing collection.
Scheffler’s dominance increasingly resembles the statistical profiles once associated only with Tiger Woods and Jack Nicklaus, yet the same numbers also underline how much distance still separates sustained brilliance from historical immortality.
The 29-year-old achieved the milestone on his 151st appearance on the PGA Tour. Woods took 95 events to reach 20 wins, Nicklaus 127. The three are the only players to win 20 PGA Tour events and four majors under the age of 30.
The victory in California was calculated, avoiding much drama or any major blow-ups.His approach play alone separated him from the field by multiple shots, a recurring theme in his career and the clearest indicator of elite control.
Some statistics suggest Scheffler now sits in rare company. Over the past several seasons, he has led the PGA Tour in strokes gained tee-to-green by margins more commonly associated with Woods at his peak than with the modern era.
His average finishing position in majors has steadily improved, and his win rate relative to starts mirrors early-career Nicklaus more closely than any contemporary player.
Scottie Scheffler's victory at The American Express in California on Sunday has helped strengthen the longstanding comparisons
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Like Woods, Scheffler separates himself from the field before the weekend and like Nicklaus, he converts those advantages without drama.
Woods’ peak dominance was not measured over two or three seasons, but across nearly a decade in which he routinely gained more strokes per tournament than Scheffler currently does.
He remains the only player to hold all four modern majors simultaneously, known as the Tiger Slam.
Between 1999 and 2003, Woods won 32 times. No other player won more than five.
Woods’ peak dominance was measured across nearly a decade
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Five quirky facts about golf | GETTYNicklaus’ greatness was built on volume and longevity, major wins and top-10 finishes spread across generations of competitors.
Scheffler’s latest win, while impressive, remains far short of the historical benchmarks.
His World No.1 ranking has been statistically dominant, but not yet historically transformative.
Nicklaus holds the majors record with 18, alongside his 73 PGA Tour victories and while Scheffler is the most statistically reliable golfer in the world, a closer look reveals he is far from the dominance of the other two golfing legends.
Nicklaus' greatness was built on volume and longevity
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Woods boasts 82 PGA Tour wins (tied for first all-time), 15 majors, and 683 weeks as world number one, and while both players took 1,197 days to win their first four major titles, Scheffler's record of 16 wins and four majors, with 149 weeks at world number one, is significantly inferior.
The stats on overall victories do little to highlight just how dominant Woods was. At the US Open in 2000, he set the record for the largest margin of victory at a major by beating Miguel Angel Jimenez and Ernie Els by a whopping 15 strokes.
It came three years after he’d set another record at The Masters by topping Tom Kite by 12.
All of Scheffler’s major wins have been by single digits, and his five-stroke victory at the PGA Championship in 2025 is currently his most impressive, far off the dominance of his predecessors.
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