It’s a word that keeps popping back into the golfing vernacular whenever someone comes along who might just be the next Tiger Woods.

Rory McIlroy held that particular baton for a while, then Jordan Spieth took it on. Now it’s Scottie Scheffler who has it. And why not? The guy has just become the first player since Arnold Palmer in the ’62 to win six times PGA Tour titles before the end of June, and he’s also smashing records in the Official World Golf Ranking too.

So maybe it’s time we just took five minutes to remember just how good Woods was in his pomp – because the man has done other-worldly things that will never, ever be repeated…

The best Tiger Woods stats

Woods has won the Vardon Trophy a record nine times. Dished out to the player with the best scoring average over a 60-round minimum, Woods is also the only player to go lower than 68, which he did in both 2000 and 2007 when his scoring average was 67.79. Billy Casper and Lee Trevino are second on the list with five.

Woods is credited with 41 European Tour victories – the third of all time – despite never being a full member. Next on the list of players still playing regularly on the European Tour is Lee Westwood with 25.

Woods’ 46 PGA Tour wins while in his 20s alone would put him 8th on the all-time list. Jack Nicklaus is second on that list with 30 wins in his 20s.

Woods has won five or more titles in 10 separate calendar years. Of those years – 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2013 – he won at least one major in seven.

Woods’ largest winning victory was 15 shots. And at a US Open, no less. Woods finished on 12-under, with runner-up Ernie Els on 3-over, to win his third major at Pebble Beach in 2000.

Woods was victorious in each of Jack Nicklaus’s final appearances at the four majors. In 2000, Nicklaus played in the US Open and PGA Championship for the last time, and in 2005 the 18-time major champ bowed out of the Masters and The Open. Tiger won all four. A true passing of the torch.

Tiger Woods is the only player to have held all four majors at the same time. (Credit: Getty Images)

Woods was the reigning US Amateur champion when he won the Masters by 12 shots in ’97. It’s mad to think he needed 38 holes to beat Steve Scott in that final at Pumpkin Ridge, too.

Woods’ combined score during the so-called ‘Tiger Slam’ was 86 better than the next best player. After that 2000 US Open win Woods also won The Open at St Andrews – becoming the youngest player to complete the career Grand Slam – and the PGA Championship in the same year before adding the 2001 Masters to become the only player in history to win all four majors in a row. He also beat each field by an average of more than five shots.

Woods won his 100th, 200th, and 300th official career starts on the PGA Tour. They were the 2000 WGC-NEC Invitational, the 2006 Farmers Insurance Open, and the 2013 Players Championship. Woods’ 82nd win that tied Sam Snead’s record came in his 365th PGA Tour start. His 82 wins in 371 events is a winning percentage of 22%.

In the four-major era, there are only two occasions where a player has won a major by 10 or more strokes – both were Woods. They were at the ’97 Masters and 2000 US Open. The other four times it happened were all in the 19th century: Tom Morris Sr by 13 at the 1862 Open; Tom Morris Jr by 11 at the 1869 Open and by 12 at the same tournament a year later; and Willie Smith by 11 at the 1899 US Open.

Woods spent a total of 623 weeks as world No.1. That’s more than 11 years. To put that into context, current No.1 Scottie Scheffler will need to stay there until 2035 in order to beat it. Tiger also holds the record for most consecutive weeks as world No.1 with 281 from 2005 to 2010. He is also second on this list with 264 from 1999 to 2004. Greg Norman is third with 96.

Woods made a whopping 142 consecutive cuts on the PGA Tour. The streak began in 1998, broke Byron Nelson’s previous record of 113 in 2003, before ending in 2005. For context, you would have to play every PGA Tour event – and make the cut in all of them, of course – for approximately four years to beat it.

From 1997 to 2013 Woods was a combined 126-under-par in major championships. That’s not even the best bit. Among the players with 90 or more rounds played in that same timeframe, guess who is next on the list? That’s right, Steve Flesch, who was a whopping 251 strokes behind Woods at 125-over-par. Phil Mickelson is third on +128 and Hunter Mahan fourth on +137.

There’s only one player we can call Tiger-esque – and that’s the man himself.

Thank you to golf data doyen Justin Ray, as well as Wikipedia and my trusty calculator for helping provide these stats.