One day, I was listening to our local NPR station, WHQR, when the afternoon host announced the next piece of music. He said of the composer (and I feel bad that I can’t remember the composer’s name, but it does illustrate my point), “This guy had chops. It’s too bad he was writing at the same time as Beethoven.” A list of Beethoven contemporaries include both well-known composers, and musicians that nobody but a serious student of music would know.

Measuring their music by any other standard than Beethoven, these guys would have been rock stars in the 18th century. It was their bum luck to share similar birth years with the genius. I’m thinking that the same notion holds true for golfers. For instance, those playing in the Tiger Woods Era, such as Vijay Singh, Phil Mickelson, Sergio Garcia, and Jim Furyk, are they getting the true attention they deserve, or do they wish, perhaps, that they were playing in a Tiger-less time? But wait–doesn’t stiff competition help improve the sport of golf? Maybe, maybe not.

The Tiger Woods Effect

Slate Magazine posted an interesting article about the phenomenon they call “The Tiger Woods Effect” that, with any sport, hobby, or profession, if there is one “superstar” or “genius” player at one time during history, others are likely to give up on the top prize and thus fare worse in their endeavors. The column challenges the common view that competition breeds innovation and excellence. The basis of the Slate column is Jennifer Brown’s UC Berkley study titled Quitters Never Win: The (Adverse) Incentive Effects of Competing with Superstars, published in April 2008. The study discovered that, on average, scores of golfers were .2 to .8 strokes higher (that’s worse, if you don’t know about golf) on average when Tiger was playing in a tournament than when he was not. There was a direct correlation between the scores of the other players and Tiger’s “Hot Spots” when he won many tournaments in a row and “Cooling off Periods,” when his game was not so sharp.

What causes this Tiger Woods Effect? Simply put, competition with a rival of a similar level pushes both to be better, run faster, play harder, etc. Competition with a “superstar” that is so far above the rest that nobody feels they have any hope of reaching the top, can actually make people stop trying so hard for number one.

Nike Arrives at Queensboro

To be honest, I had never thought about competition this way–because I am always at the top of the heap? Or the bottom? Or I don’t care? I always like to get better, faster, and more creative. I compete against myself.

My research on Tiger and his unintentional effects on other competitors came as a result of Queensboro’s first-ever Nike brand sale of Nike Golf apparel. I wanted to write something about Nike, and my first thought was, I’ll write about Tiger Woods! Tiger would not be Tiger without his spiffy Nike Golf apparel. Well, internet click led to Google Search, which led ever deeper into everybody’s opinion of everything Tiger. I got so caught up in the whole Tiger phenomenon, good, bad or indifferent, that I went completely off my Nike topic and into competitive music composing.

Needless to say, however, we are really excited about the introduction of Nike Golf apparel to Queensboro’s product line. I mean, it’s Nike, how is that not fantastic?

To sum it all up as neatly as possible–my feelings are that, whether you are competing against a superstar or you are the superstar, never stop trying, never stop learning, never stop improving. Who knows who will be the superstar when history looks back? Keep going. Just do it!