Tiger’s comeback greatest in sports history? Not a chance

Tiger Woods hysteria resumes this week at the PGA Championship, in the wake of his widely proclaimed ‘‘greatest comeback in sports history’’ last month at the Masters.

I am going to say this one time and one time only, and I am going to be very, very, very, very, very clear about it:

It was not the greatest comeback in sports history.

Alas, it is only the second-greatest comeback in golf history, maybe the fifth-greatest comeback in sports history and probably not among the 25,000 greatest comebacks in human history.

Let’s start with golf comebacks.

Tiger Woods: Marital and back problems. Goes 11 years between major titles.

Ben Hogan: Near-fatal car accident — fractured pelvis, chipped rib, broken collarbone, fractured ankle, blood clots, hospitalized 59 days, might never walk again — in 1949. Won U.S. Open in 1950.

Let’s move on to a handful of other sports comebacks.

Muhammad Ali: At his career peak, the heavyweight champ was banned from boxing from 1967 to 1970 after refusing military service. Regained the heavyweight title twice after his return, including at age 32 in 1974, knocking out George Foreman in the ‘‘Rumble in the Jungle.’’

Greg LeMond: In a hunting accident in 1987, the 1986 Tour de France champion was shot with 100 lead gun pellets in his back and right side, was airlifted to a hospital, lost 65 percent of his blood volume and was told he was within 20 minutes of bleeding to death. Returned to cycling and won the Tour again in 1989 and 1990.

Monica Seles: Ranked No. 1 in the world, she was stabbed in the back with a 9-inch blade by a 38-year-old spectator while playing a tennis tournament in Germany in 1993. Did not play for two years, resumed in 1995, then won her 10th and final Grand Slam title at the Australian Open in 1996.

George Foreman: Lost his title to Ali in 1974, quit boxing in 1977, became an ordained minister, returned in 1987, became the oldest heavyweight champ ever in 1994 at age 45 and launched a line of George Foreman Grills that can be found in garage sales from Peoria to Poughkeepsie.

(Going back to Tiger for a moment: In all fairness, he had four back surgeries and lost his Gatorade endorsement deal.)

Let’s finish up this week’s work — it’s amazing they still pay me for this — by running down some great, unlikely comebacks elsewhere in life.

Richard Nixon: Lost to JFK in 1960, lost California gubernatorial race in 1962 and retired from politics. Unretired to win the presidency in 1968 and 1972. P.S.: If he subsequently had bounced back from Watergate, you could retire the ‘‘greatest comeback’’ award in his name.

Robert Downey Jr.: From a 1992 Academy Award nomination to unemployable addict — drug abuse, multiple rehabs and some jail time between 1996 and 2001 — to fronting huge movie franchises such as ‘‘Iron Man’’ and ‘‘Sherlock Holmes.’’

Ulysses S. Grant: Entered the Army, quit the Army, drank excessively, fell into depression and struggled as a civilian. After rejoining the Army during the Civil War, he was promoted to top general of the Union forces, kicked the Confederacy’s butt and twice was elected president. On $50 bill.

John Travolta: Vinnie Barbarino, ‘‘Saturday Night Fever’’ and ‘‘Grease,’’ then nothing for a decade, then ‘‘Pulp Fiction’’ got him A-listed to the head of the Spago reservations line.

Japan and Germany: Both were written off after World War II. You wouldn’t believe what Skip Bayless said about them.

Old Spice: They went from smelling like your grandfather to ‘‘smell like a man, man.’’ Sources tell me Vladimir Putin and Justin Bieber douse themselves in it.

Betty White: The woman is 97 years old and still gets work. Somewhere in there at some time, she had to make a comeback from something.

Mayonnaise: Every time you think it’s out, it gets pulled back into the condiment game.

Lazarus: Uh, he was dead. And then he wasn’t.