Tiger Woods, Phil Mickelson Planning $10 Million Head-To-Head Match

The Highlights

• Tiger Woods and Phil Mickelson joked in May about playing head-to-head for a large sum of money.
• That might become a reality. Golf.com reports that the two are planning a $10 million match after the initial target date of July 3 didn't work out.

Two months ago, Tiger Woods and Phil Mickelson engaged in some lighthearted trash-talk about a potential high-stakes, winner-take-all match. Now it appears this will become a reality.

According to a Golf.com report, the two golfers are planning a head-to-head match for $10 million.

The report states that the match was nearly booked for July 3 in Las Vegas, but never came to fruition.

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“We’re working on a different date,” Mickelson told Golf.com. “I thought it was done for the 3rd, but obviously it wasn’t.”

The idea of a head-to-head match was first proposed during the lead-up to The Players Championship in May.

Asked about competing alongside Woods during the first two rounds of that event, Mickelson didn’t hold back.

“The excitement that's been going on around here, it gets me thinking,” he said during his pre-tournament news conference. “Why don't we just bypass all the ancillary stuff of a tournament and just go head-to-head and just have kind of a high-stake, winner-take-all match. Now, I don't know if he wants a piece of me, but I just think it would be something that would be really fun for us to do, and I think there would be a lot of interest in it.”

Woods, of course, was later informed of this idea — and didn’t hold back.

“First of all, big picture,” he said with a smile. “How many times have we both won on the PGA Tour?”

For the record, Woods’ odometer has been stuck on 79 wins for the past five years, while Mickelson notched his 43rd earlier in 2018.

Westgate Las Vegas SuperBook oddsmaker Jeff Sherman told BetChicago.com that Tiger would be a slight favorite in this match at -125.

In May, Tiger discussed a potential match with his longtime rival and a player with whom he’s formed a kinship with later in their careers.

“I'm definitely not against that,” Woods offered. “We'll play for whatever makes him uncomfortable.”

Woods’ comment may have been a not-so-subtle dig at Mickelson’s usual retort about money matches with fellow players, of which he says they play for “enough to make you interested, but not enough to make you uncomfortable.”

Competing for $10 million should keep both parties interested.

By comparison, this year’s Masters Tournament had a full purse of $11 million, with winner Patrick Reed receiving just less than $2 million.

Woods and Mickelson are the two all-time leading money-winners on the PGA Tour — Woods has earned $111,878,724, while Mickelson has cashed $87,517,908.

And of course, those figures don’t include endorsement deals or other off-course revenue.