Michael Jordan is an avid golfer who takes pride in this hobby. So it must have come as extra sweet, beating Tiger Woods at a golf bet.
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MJ’s passion for golf is quite well-documented. He would go on golfing trips on off days even during the NBA playoffs. Jordan even went golfing with Charles Barkley during the 1993 NBA Finals to gain a mental edge.
He’s also invested a ton into keeping his hobby up after retiring. Jordan owns a private golf course called Slaughterhouse XXIII in Florida, where he often entertains his friends.
Given his status as the GOAT and his passion for golf, Jordan has featured in a lot of celebrity golf tournaments. One of them was back in 2009, when Bethpage Black hosted the Golf Digest U.S. Open Challenge.
The celebrity event pitted Michael Jordan, Justin Timberlake, Ben Roethlisberger and an amateur qualifier against each other. The likes of Fred Couples, Rocco Mediate, and Anthony Kim worked as caddies.
Tiger Woods bet that Michael Jordan couldn’t crack a 92 on this course
The Long Island course was considered a really difficult one – Woods would essentially rule himself out of contention with a 2-over 74 score on Day 1 of the US Open just a week later.
Naturally, he did not have much faith in Jordan’s ability to navigate through the tricky challenge. Tiger Woods bet Michael Jordan that he would not be able to finish below 92 in one round of 18 holes.
Jordan started off badly with a triple-bogey on the first hole. He was at 8-over through just 4 holes, which is a terrible start by any metric. However, MJ held his composure and finished the rest of the 14 holes at only 6-over, eventually finishing at a score of 86.
This was good enough to beat Justin Timberlake’s score of 88, but Roethlisberger was the runaway winner at a score of 81. Still, Jordan managed to beat Tiger’s prediction by a whopping 6 shots – a huge achievement.
