Tiger Woods Loses Top Career Money Earnings Spot

We are all extremely excited to see what Tiger Woods will be able to bring to the PGA TOUR once he returns in the next week for the HERO Challenge. But in the meantime, Woods has lost another major ranking in the sports industry.

Going into today, Tiger was top in career money earnings in all sports throughout the world. This should come as no surprise to even the casual fan, as golf is notorious for its huge payouts and Woods was the best golfer in the game for well over a decade.

To date, Woods has earned a whopping $110,061,012 from tournament victories on the PGA TOUR, according to Forbes.

Passing the former golf giant was a giant of another, similar sport, tennis. Roger Federer, who has been astounding the tennis community with how well he plays at 36-years old, is the man who passed Woods.

By placing in last week’s ATP Finals, Federer was able to bring his total winnings up to an equally ridiculous $110,235,682. But these numbers really don’t tell the entire story.

Tiger Woods and Roger Federer during a practice round at the CA…

Tiger Woods and Roger Federer during a practice round at the CA Championship held at the Doral Resort and Spa on the Blue Monster Course in Miami, Florida on Wednesday, March 21, 2007. Get premium, high resolution news photos at Getty Images

First off, the number that Forbes calculated for Tiger’s winnings, for some reason, doesn’t count any earnings he has made on the European Tour. Factoring in those numbers, Woods would retake that crown. And in the world of endorsements, Federer doesn’t even come close to Tiger. Factoring in those sponsorships, Tiger sits at $1.65 billion in earnings and Federer is closer to $600 million.

No matter who you want to crown as the highest money earner in professional sports, you really can’t deny how dominant both of these players have been in their sports. Tiger, as we know, has 79 victories on the PGA TOUR, 14 of them being majors, plus another 60 wins on various other Tours. And Federer sits at 95 career titles and 19 of those being grand slams.

Now that he’s coming back to professional action, Tiger is going to have the opportunity to take back that money title from Federer. We can only hope that he’ll have one more comeback in him that allows him to reclaim that crown for good.

Cover Photo via Wiki Commons