The recent inductions into the NFL Hall of Fame gave our Grant Boone pause on how golf is missing a great opportunity to truly celebrate greatness in its ranks with its Halls of Fame.

By Grant Boone, Special to PGA.com

First off, a disclaimer: I don't as a rule condone wearing yellow blazers. At least not in public. (Privately, I condone it frequently.) There are two notable exceptions. First, if you're broadcasting Monday Night Football or Baseball for ABC and it's no later than 1986. (Special dispensation may also be granted on a case-by-case basis to anyone announcing Battle of the Network Stars.) Second, if you're being inducted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame.

Saturday's induction ceremonies in Canton, Ohio - highlighted by ex-Browns' lineman Gene Hickerson, suffering from Alzheimer's, being wheeled out by some of the men he blocked for (most notably the great Jim Brown) and former Cowboys' receiver Michael Irvin's tribute to his mom were must-see (click here if you haven't yet) - and even baseball's festivities the weekend before reminded me of what a hall of fame is supposed to be. And what golf's version is not.

Golf's history is more formidable and storied than most sports, and the World Golf Hall of Fame facility in Florida is awesome. But how inductees are selected for enshrinement in Canton and Cooperstown is far superior to the way they do it in St. Augustine. While football and baseball rely on the votes of carefully-selected committees, the men's and women's tours have separate but equally convoluted performance standards that serve to set high standards but instead choke out the mystique that a hall of fame should have and which baseball's and football's do in spades.

The World Golf Hall of Fame should consider adopting one selection standard for men and women and going back to the way the first class in 1974 was selected, i.e. by the votes of a panel of journalists and others connected to the game. Take a look at that inaugural class (click here) and tell me if you see any interlopers. Halls of fame ought to be big enough to include those who should be there and small enough to stir debate about who's not.

By any standards, Tiger Woods long ago clinched his spot in St. Augustine. Golf's other #1, Lorena Ochoa, moved a step closer to earning hers. Ochoa's four-shot win at the Women's British Open at St. Andrews, with trusty sidekick Dave Brooker on the bag, ended any lingering doubt that she's the best player in the women's game. Her four-point lead in the world rankings going into the British belied the two significant nits that could legitimately be picked in her career: one, that she's been unable to win a major championship; and two, that she's repeatedly played her worst when a tournament's on the line, earning from some players and media members the nickname "O-choke-a."

I have to admit my first thought when I saw her take a six-shot lead through 54 holes was the 1996 Masters where Greg Norman had the same advantage and still lost by five. There would be no such drama. After three brilliant rounds in difficult conditions, Ochoa was plenty good enough Sunday to win going away, which is probably how she'll win her second straight Player of the Year Award and Vare Trophy this year. Her lead in the world rankings now is more than six points clear of Karrie Webb, who's second.

Ochoa's an even better person than she is golfer. I'm not sure why I took this picture with my cheesy little camera phone after she won in Phoenix in March. She'd already run the gantlet of reporters and well-wishing tournament dignitaries. I think I was so struck that she'd stand there after an emotionally-draining win - she'd blown a lead at the same venue a couple of years before - and be such a humble hero to the hundred or so Hispanic people, many of whom were small children, who waited in line to get her autograph or just tell her how proud they were of her.

Ochoa is Tiger-like in terms of popularity in her native Mexico. It might be more appropriate to say Tiger is Lorena-like here. But she also has shades of Arnold Palmer in how much she is loved by her people. I don't think we in America love our heroes like they do in places like Mexico. Something about being a world superpower, perhaps. When you don't have much, maybe you more eagerly pin your national pride on someone who has a chance to accomplish something on an international stage. In Ochoa's case, it helps that she so readily embraces her role. She's only 25 but already has opened golf academies in Mexico City and her hometown of Guadalajara. And her foundation has established a school to educate hundreds of underprivileged children.

There's a rule you learn quickly when covering games as a sports journalist: "No cheering in the press box." I violate that rule regularly. I cheer for Lorena Ochoa.

Woods, meanwhile, isn't as beloved here as Ochoa is there. But no one in golf or maybe any other sport has ever been so greatly revered. Monday, my buddy Steve sent me this text:

Tiger: greatest champion in history of sports, even if he quit today?

Great question, and not just because he worked in three different punctuation marks into a single thought. Woods evokes those kinds of questions by doing what he did Sunday, namely turning a dead heat into a runaway win. That he did it in the final group with Rory Sabbatini only added to the drama.

Sabbatini has spent the better part of this season playing great golf (currently sixth on the money list) while carving out an unusual niche for himself as the game's best post-loss trash talker. After Tiger beat him head-to-head at the Wachovia, Sabbatini said he likes the new Tiger and that he's beatable. In his defense, Sabbatini never said HE could beat Tiger. Just that Woods was beatable, ostensibly by someone else. Then Sunday, after his one-shot final round lead melted into an eight-shot loss, he vowed to keep his place on Woods' bulletin board, saying, "Why (would I keep my mouth shut)? I hope I inspire him and play well enough to give him a good challenge."

Sabbatini is golf's new Black Knight. Not as in fellow South African Gary Player. More like the one from Monty Python.

After Wachovia: 'Tis but a scratch. I've had worse.

After Firestone: It's just a flesh wound.

Meanwhile, Woods has another skin on his wall. Sunday's win at the Bridgestone Invitational was his sixth at Firestone, 14th World Golf Championship, and 58th overall. That he won by eight and was the only player under par for the week probably has less to do with the rest of the field being Sir Robins - who, bravely talking to their feet, beat a very brave retreat - than it was about Woods performing at a level no one else can touch.

Now, he enters the PGA Championship as the prohibitive favorite, just as he was the last time Southern Hills hosted a Grand Slam event. When he arrived at the 2001 U.S. Open, Woods was playing the best golf of his career, having won the four previous majors, not to mention that year's Players Championship. Woods opened with 74 that week in Tulsa, never contended, and finished seven shots back in a tie for 12th.

But coming off this latest triumph at a Firestone layout that players agree was major championship tough, Woods is as firmly enthroned as ever, wielding supreme executive power over the kingdom of golf. And not because some watery tart threw a sword at him. No, to him, major championship trophies are Holy Grail. A new quest begins Thursday. Cue the minstrel.

Grant Boone is a husband, father, golf broadcaster, and sports journalist based in Abilene, Texas. His column appears on PGA.com each Wednesday and every day during major championships and other big events. He can be contacted at pgagrant@hotmail.com.

The views and opinions expressed here do not reflect those of PGA.com or The PGA of America.