No drama this Masters; Scheffler wouldn’t allow it

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AUGUSTA, Ga. — It wasn’t dramatic, the final round of the 88th Masters, but it certainly was emphatic. Scottie Scheffler grabbed the tournament by the lapel of its green jacket Sunday and never let go.

While many of the guys chasing him self-destructed with one double bogey after another, Scheffler played like the top-ranked golfer in the world.   

Which he is.

Now he’s also a two-time Masters champion after this overwhelming victory, four shots in front of the surprising Swede, Ludvig Aberg, joining Scheffler’s win of 2022.

“It’s hard to put into words how special this week has been,” added Scheffler. “It’s been a long week, a grind of a week. The golf course was so challenging, and to be sitting here wearing this jacket again and getting to take it home is extremely special.”

There’s an old saying that the Masters doesn’t start until the back nine Sunday. Oh, really? By then it was virtually over. Scheffler, in truth, locked this up with birdies on eight, nine and 10, and went on to shoot a 4-under 68.

Just before that, he had just bogeyed 6 to have his lead cut to a shot. 

“The best momentum turner that I had today was the birdie putt on 8. I hit two really good shots in there long of the green. I had an extremely difficult pitch that I hit up there about 10, 12 feet from the cup. It was a challenging read because it turned early and it was really straight at the end. So it was a putt that you had to really start on line and hope it held its line. I poured that one in.”

That gave him a four-round total of 11-under 277. Aberg, a rookie skilled enough to be chosen for the winning Euro Ryder Cup team, shot 68 for 281. Meanwhile, the Englishman Tommy Fleetwood shot a 69, joined by Cal alums Max Homa (73) and Collin Morikawa (74), all tied for third at 284. 

Last year’s winner, Jon Rahm, never was in it — the last person to repeat was Tiger Woods in 2001-2002. Tiger shot 77 on Sunday.

Scheffler is not yet another Tiger — no one will be — but at 27, he possibly could equal Woods’ five Masters victories in the coming years, one fewer than Jack Nicklaus.

Scheffler already owns one mark — he’s now the only golfer with a beard to win the Masters.

Tiger sets another record — 24 straight Masters cuts

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AUGUSTA, Ga. — He was talking like a man who believes he still has a chance because in his mind Tiger Woods always has a chance if he’s still in the tournament.

And Woods who Friday set a record by making the cut in the Masters for the 24th straight time — or every time he’s played as a pro — definitely is in this one.

Look, we know that with only two rounds left and behind players such as Max Homa, 2022 Masters champ Scottie Scheffler — the current No. 1 in the world rankings — and 2020 U.S. Open champ Bryson DeChambeau, Woods isn’t going to win.

But Tiger doesn’t know it, or if he does, he never would admit it.  He’s come from behind so many other times, although, yes, now Woods is 48 and has been hurt so often it’s remarkable he still can walk, much less make birdies. He made enough in what virtually was a round and a half of golf at Augusta National.

Because darkness kept Woods and others from completing Thursday’s first round, Tiger had to play 14 through 18 Friday morning, then after a 50-minute break, tee off in the second round. He did so in a very Tigerish style, responding with an even-par 72 after a one-over 73.  That 145 total may have put him five shots to the rear of Homa’s 138, but Tiger has won the Masters five times.

"I'm tired," Woods said after the second round. "I've been out for a while, competing, grinding. It's been a long 23 holes, a long day. But Lance Bennett (his caddy) and I really did some good fighting today, and we've got a chance."

Which means the telecast (Saturday and Sunday on CBS, after the first two rounds on ESPN) has a chance to attract a massive amount of viewers. Not much else is going on this weekend and Tiger on the tube lures people who normally wouldn't watch.  

There’s golf, and then there’s Tiger. When Woods is involved, so is the public. Especially at a major championship. Especially when that major is the Masters.

“I’ve always loved playing here,” said Woods. “I’ve been able to play here since I was 19-years-old (After winning the U.S. Amateur). It’s one of the honors I don’t take lightly, being able to compete.” 

He’s not alone. As winter ebbs, pro golfers become obsessed with finding a place in the Masters. Tiger, along with the rest who made the cut, has that place. The ride should be very entertaining. Enjoy!

Fifty-seven years of Masters cheers and tears

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AUGUSTA, Ga. — A tradition unlike any other. Jim Nantz’s brief phrase about the annual first major golf championship has been parodied and mocked, but it lives on. For good reason.

Indeed there is nothing quite like the Masters, which has become a rite as much as a festival of spring, as an event, a competition which has elevated what once was a small southern city to a place of prominence in the world of sport.  

The name is pretentious and became an embarrassment to the great champion, Robert Tyre Jones, who helped create it as the Augusta Invitational.

But if the designation has changed, the location remains the same. Augusta National Golf Club.

It’s where at the second Masters, 1935, Gene Sarazen knocked his second shot into the cup on the par-5 15th, a double eagle — or if you prefer, albatross provided a bit of excitement languishing through the Great  Depression. It’s where Tiger Woods not only won the tournament but because of his ethnic background and jubilant success grabbed our attention for years.

Who knows now what man that will end up the winner in 2024. Maybe it will be Jon Rahm, who could become the first back-to-back winner since Tiger in 2001-2002. Maybe it will be Scottie Scheffer, who has a Masters of his own and currently tops the golf rankings.

True, a veteran experience in the mysteries of Augusta’s greens, invariably wins. But not always. Fuzzy Zoeller won his first Masters — only the second golfer to have done that.

This will be the 88th Masters. This will be my 57th Masters. I had made 54 straight until Covid stopped the streak. Yeah, I’ve eaten a lifetime supply of (ugh) pimento cheese sandwiches and purchased a ton of shirts with the Masters logo on the left front and a large number of Masters hats with the year embroidered on it. 

My first Masters, when I was a writer for the San Francisco Chronicle, was 1967. The winner was Gay Brewer. Yes, I believed San Francisco’s Johnny Miller was going to win a couple of times — he was ahead at the 15th hole one year and said “I kept thinking how proud my Dad would be to see me in a Green Coat” — but he never could do it.

The memories include Roberto Divincenzo signing the incorrect score in 1968 that cost him a tie for first — “I am stupid,” the Argentinian sadly kept repeating — and of course, Greg Norman blowing the six-shot lead in 1996. There were cheers for so many. There were tears from Arnold Palmer after his last round and Ben Crenshaw after his second Masters victory, days after the death of his longtime tutor.

Hey, a tradition unlike any other and a fantastic run of golf.

Mickelson gets one more Masters memory

AUGUSTA, Ga. — He told us he was hesitant to say too much, which was so unlike Phil Mickelson. But that’s OK. His game told us everything we needed to know, almost.

It told us at 52, after the money losses, after in effect jumping ship — well leaving a lifetime link to the PGA Tour to hook up with the contentious LIV Tour — and after slipping past his 50th birthday, Mickelson still is one of golf’s main men.

This 87th Masters, which came to a stunning conclusion Sunday, belonged as much to Mickelson the outcast, as it did to Jon Rahm, the champion. 

That Rahm, who began the final round two strokes behind the guy who led from virtually the first shot of the tournament, Brooks Koepka, ended up the winner wasn’t the shock. He had been atop the world rankings most of the spring, and through history, many leads have been squandered — blown, if you choose — on an Augusta National course full of promise and heartbreak.

You know the saying: The Masters doesn’t begin until the back nine on Sunday.

That’s when 52-year-old Phil Mickelson, a three-time Masters champ and a six-time majors champ, made his run. He was 1-under for 54 holes. He was 8-under for 72 holes. Yes, a 7-under-65, the low round of the day. May I add, wow?

What Mickelson added was, “I had so much fun today. I feel I’ve been hitting these types of quality shots but have not been staying focused and preset for the upcoming shot, and I make a lot of mistakes; Kind of like you saw Thursday, and that cost me a bunch of shots.”

Not so many he couldn’t soar up the leaderboard to finish second, at 280, only four behind Rahm, who had a 69, Saturday. Not so many that in the group press conference, he couldn’t revert to the cocky kid who always came up with a smart-aleck response. Not so many we couldn’t think of the times when Phil was challenging Tiger.

Woods, who made the cut for a 23rd straight time in a Masters but withdrew Sunday morning because of plantar fasciitis, aggravated by long rounds Friday and Saturday.

Mickelson, stashed away on the Saudi-financed LIV Tour, had not been noticed of late. Other than when he made the tour switch with what seemed a lot of guilt, calling the Saudis “bad mothers.”

Why did he join them? He wanted leverage against the PGA Tour, after questioning how purse money was distributed. Mickelson has made millions as a golf pro, but he’s also lost millions at the gambling tables or betting on sporting events.

Whatever, he was gone, an aging star who almost disappeared — as did another tour jumper, Koepka, since the LIV didn’t have any attention and until a few weeks ago had no U.S. TV coverage. Fortunately, the four major championships were unconcerned with affiliations. They just cared if you could play.

As re-learned, Mickelson very much could.

“I’m hopeful this kind of catapults me into playing the rest of the year the way I believe I’m playing,” he said. “I worked hard in the off-season to get ready.”

Asked what he learned about himself, Mickelson said, “It’s not so much what I’ve learned. I was thinking when you come here to Augusta, you end up having a sense of gratitude. It’s hard not to, right? This is what we strive for. There’s a kind of calm that comes over you.”

“The fact that we get to play and compete in this Masters. I think we’ve all been appreciative of that,” Mickelson added. “I love everything about this, because it’s what I dreamed of as a kid to be a part of and I’ve got so many great memories wrapped up here at Augusta.”   

Especially this one.

Masters: Tales of Koepka and Tiger

AUGUSTA, Ga. — Part of the deal. Brooks Koepka said it. He understands you can’t do a thing about the weather, major golf championship or not. He also understands how to play the game, whatever the conditions.

As indicated by his place on the scoreboard, which is better than anyone else’s through a Masters which was supposed to be over, but like one those old European films that just keeps going and going.

Then again it is over. Probably. Technically. Koepka is running away with the thing — sorry, sloshing away. It’s been wet — “Super difficult,” said Koepka. “Ball’s not going anywhere.”

However, Koepka, who’s already won two U.S. Opens and a PGA Championship, almost certainly is going on to a victory and the green jacket presented to Masters winners.

When on this cold (55 degrees) soggy Saturday play was suspended yet again, Koepka had a four-shot lead over Jon Rahm and 30 holes remaining. Yes, there’s a lot of golf left but the other guys are the ones struggling, not Koepka, who like most who win the Masters, turns the par-fives into fours and never blinks.

The only real question when Friday’s worrisome second round, the one halted because of falling trees and fleeing spectators, resumed Saturday morning was whether Tiger Woods would retain his impressive record of never missing a Masters cut. He would.

Woods has now expanded his streak to 23 in a row. From 1997, the year he won the first of his five Masters, and shares the mark with Gary Player (1959-1982) and Fred Couples (1983-2007). 

"I've always loved this golf course, and I love playing this event," Woods said Saturday. "Obviously I've missed a couple with some injuries, but I've always wanted to be here. I've loved it.”

He’d love to win again and tie Jack Nicklaus’ total of six championships, but his body is against him after that 2021 car accident, and so is time. Woods is 47,  which is 15 years older than Koepka, who, having recovered from his own injuries, a knee requiring surgery, appears as strong and no less eager than a couple years back.

“I’m not too concerned with playing 30 holes,” Koepka said of his Sunday round, which after the storms is supposed to be held in acceptable weather.

“I’m pretty sure I’ll be up for it, considering it is the Masters.”

If he isn’t there’s something very wrong.

Could Bennett be the first amateur to win the Masters?

AUGUSTA, Ga. —  “Yeah,” Sam Bennett’s pals told him. “Hope you get low amateur. That’s pretty much all they were saying.” Because there wasn’t much more they could say.

Sure, they could have suggested he could make history. Fulfill a wish of the man who founded the Masters, Bobby Jones, do the unprecedented if not the impossible, and give the Masters an amateur winner.  But let’s be realistic.    

Golf, especially the major at the championships, belongs to the pros, to the men who have spent years of practice and competition earning their niche.  

So even though Bennett, 23, a senior at Texas A&M and the U.S. Amateur champion, was 8-under par and temporarily in third place when Friday’s second round came to a jolting suspension because of falling pine trees and falling rain, he’s not going to finish on top. 

Not with three-time major winner Brooks Koepka in first place and likely to stay there. Not with the sad tale of Ken Venturi being retold every time an amateur works his way up the Masters’ leaderboard.

“I haven’t played great this college season,” said Bennett, who shot 68-68—136 (Koepka was 132) and was efficient if not great in his first rounds of his first Masters. 

“I don’t have a pretty swing like some of the other amateurs. But it’s golf, not a golf swing (that counts).” 

Venturi had one of the prettiest swings ever. He grew up playing Harding Park in San Francisco and after time at San Jose State and the U.S. Army had developed into arguably the best golfer in the U.S., pro or amateur.

Three rounds into the 1956 Masters, Venturi was four shots ahead. Oh, the excitement. Oh, the disappointment. Venturi finished with an 80 and in second by a shot to Jackie Burke Jr.  

In those days Bay Area writers didn’t travel. When he arrived home Venturi, who was swarmed by reporters from what then were a half-dozen reporters, was asked what went wrong.

Years later Venturi told Golf Digest his mistake was trying to 2-putt every green. But originally there was the contention that playing partner Sam Snead had, contrary to accepted golf etiquette, intentionally rattled Venturi. It sounded like an excuse, which it wasn’t meant to be. 

Venturi went on to win the 1964 U.S. Open and had a fine career as a broadcaster for CBS. And has come as close to finishing first in the Masters as any amateur.

That’s not to dissuade Bennett from continuing to try. The guy has plenty of desire, and just incidentally a few tattoos, including words of advice from his late father. “One on my left arm,” Bennett explained. “I see it every time I grip a club. It’s right there, ‘Don’t wait to do something.’” 

The golf world has waited the tournament’s entire 87 years for an amateur to win the Masters. You have to be patient, but isn’t there a limit?

“Everything I’ve done in my golf career, playing in these big tournaments,” said Bennett. “has led me to succeed this week and leading forward.”

Nothing wrong with that attitude.

Masters: Old names, new games

AUGUSTA, Ga. — They’re knee-deep in nostalgia at the Masters. The opening shots of round one Thursday were struck by guys in their 70s and 80s, former champions Gary Player, 87, Jack Nicklaus, 83, and Tom Watson, 73, who once shot in the 60’s.

Then after waking up the echoes, providing a few moments to recall how it was, the year’s first major steps back quickly to the way it is. To a new generation, to names like Viktor Hovland, Jon Rahm, and straight from his self-chosen disappearance on the LIV Tour, Brooks Koepka. Big hitters, boomers, and big names. That’s usually been the case at the Masters, where the grass, with an exception, is short and the tee shots long, where you can score low.      

It was the late Tony Lema, who said in so many words, the U.S. Open, where the fairways are narrow and the hazards severe, is hard work, a struggle, but the Masters is a pleasurable bit of recreation, entirely almost predictable, and fully enjoyable.   

In golf and tennis, the fans want success for the favorites and at the Masters that’s what they get, Nicklaus won six times, Tiger Woods five, and Arnold Palmer four. 

Eighteen holes into the 2023 Masters, Hovland, Rahm and Koepka are tied at 67, five-under par. Koepka has won three majors but none since he took the money and fled to the Saudi-finance LIV Tour — LIV in Roman numerals is 40, the number of holes for that tour’s tournaments.    

Rahm has won a U.S. Open and for most of this season was No. 1 in world rankings. Hovland, the Swede, seemingly always is in the contest. Not an anonymous soul in the group, normal for a Masters. The event brings out the best of the best.  

No, Woods, tied for 54th or something like that after a two-over 74, isn’t up there, but, hey Tiger is 47 and dare we remind you again, only two years away from that car accident which, if it didn’t take his life, took away much of the strength in his legs. 

Of the three tied for the leader, Koepka may be the most surprising, to us, not to himself. He did it with back-to-back U.S.Opens and a PGA, but other than being mentioned as a footnote in the war between the PGA and LIV tours there’s hardly been a word about his play. There was, however, television coverage of his lifestyle in the Netflix series Full Swing.    

Koepka, whose swing is very full, was told in one episode of the show that his game appeared to be far away from a great Masters round.    

“Anytime with something like that,” Koepka insisted. “You don’t see everything right, a lot of it was injury-based. They (the doctors) told me after (knee) surgery it was going to be pretty much a year and a half; I mean getting out of bed takes 15 minutes.”

Then, asked if the LIV issue puts more pressure on him in the Masters than when he’d been on the PGA Tour Koepka said, “I don’t really think about things like that. It’s just a major.”  

Hard to imagine Jack or Tiger saying that.

Masters success still elusive for Rory; he shoots a 76

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Sam Snead won 82 pro golf tournaments, more than Jack Nicklaus, more than Gary Player. More than anyone except Tiger Woods, who also has 82 victories.

But Snead never won the U.S. Open, and that bothered him until his final days.

The four majors, the tournaments we remember, the ones we remember. Or in the case of Snead, choose not to forget. Snead won three of the four, as did Arnold Palmer and Phil Mickelson.

Rory McIlroy also has three. He lacks the Masters, and although Rory is skilled enough, and days from his 32nd birthday young enough, it is legitimate to wonder if that shortcoming can be conquered.

Not only because of what McIlroy shot Thursday in the opening round of the 2021 Masters, a 4-over-par 76 that left him 11 shots behind Justin Rose, whose play at Augusta National of late has been as exciting as McIlroy’s has been discouraging, but because McIlroy seems perplexed by what continues to happen year after year — from heartbreak (that collapse in 2011 when he shot 40 the back nine) to humor (on Thursday he hit his own father in the small gallery with an approach shot to the seventh green).

“Obviously there have been a few rounds where I’ve put myself behind the 8-ball, not being able to get any momentum,” McIlroy said Tuesday when asked to describe his relationship with a course that should fit his game.

“But they all are learning lessons, and you just try to go out next time and do a little better.”

What he did the first day here was par the first four holes, then bogey the next three. You win at Augusta by making birdies, and McIlroy had only two on 8 and 15, both par-5s. Yes, the greens were hard and slick, and the wind was blowing, but you’re talking about a young man who has been No. 1 in the world rankings.

“It was tricky,” said McIlroy. Not so tricky, one must remark, that Rose couldn’t shoot 65, even though he was 2 over par after seven holes.

Surely there’s a zone of comfort — in 2017, Rose tied Sergio Garcia for first and lost in a playoff — or a zone of discomfort. Ten years on, what befell McIlroy remains the stuff of nightmares.

Tied for first with the final nine holes to go, McIlroy yanked his drive from the 10th tee so far left the ball nearly smacked into one of those buildings Augusta calls cabins and took a triple bogey. He followed that with a four-putt double bogey at 12. A final score of 80 dropped him into 15th.

Other majors, the U.S. Open, the PGA, the British, rotate among several courses. The Masters goes nowhere. It’s always at Augusta National, and so are the memories and agonies.

The Masters is back. So is Rory. So are the same questions.

Sort of golf’s version of the film Groundhog Day. Say, Rory, can we talk about where the ball landed at 10?

What McIlroy discussed after his round Thursday was everything from plunking his dad down at the seventh to the instructor with whom he once worked and again is providing assistance, Pete Cowen.

“My goal is to play well,” said McIlroy, “at least give myself a chance. Honestly, I’m quite encouraged the way I hit it on the way in. I think anytime you’re working with things on your swing it’s going to feel different.”

His father? “I knew it was my dad when I was aiming at him,” McIlroy said. “Give him an autographed glove? I don’t know. He needs to go and put some ice on it. Maybe I’ll autograph a bag of frozen peas.”

The return of sports? Not so fast

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By Art Spander

The Masters was supposed to begin Thursday. But you knew that. You also knew it has been shifted to a weekend in November, one of the few apparent certainties we’ve been offered in sport.

Otherwise, it’s a series of possibilities and wishes. And worries.

We keep hearing there will be improvement, the coronavirus will be limited if not controlled, and life and sport will return to normal — schedules full of games, stands full of fans.

People would be in church on Easter, we were promised. The country would be open. The only masks needed would be worn by catchers.

Then another medical person told us in so many words, “Not so fast, folks.” Never mind searching for a place in the bleachers or lower boxes while epidemiologists still are searching for a vaccine. And before you even think of selling tickets for an NFL game, you’d better sell the players on the idea there’s no danger coming together in a huddle or the locker room.

Only the other day, Dr. Jeffrey Smith, the Santa Clara County executive officer, said he didn’t expect sports until Thanksgiving. “And we’d be lucky to have them then,” he added.

Thanksgiving, when high school football usually concludes. When college football often plays its traditionals. When the NFL — and the 49ers are based in Santa Clara, of course — would be three-quarters of the way into the schedule.

Baseball? Basketball? They’ve almost reached a point of desperation. Or resignation.

By the time the NBA figures how and when to resume a season that never made it past the halfway mark, it will be time to start the next season. Major League Baseball have a bizarre scheme to play every game, all 30 teams, in Arizona, without fans. That doesn’t work.

It can be done. But it shouldn’t be done. Our sports are more than digital matchups among distant athletes. We need people in the seats, behind the ropes, as well as people inside the lines.

Sport is not silence. Sport is huge galleries lining the fairways at Augusta National. Sport is obsessed fans tailgating in the parking lots before Auburn-Alabama. Sport is parents and kids unloading at the 161st Street station in the Bronx to see the Yankees play the Red Sox.

Sport is jerseys and T-shirts, golf hats and baseball caps, anticipation and excitement.

But before any of that, we need a go-ahead from those best qualified to judge our health and safety. Not politicians or football coaches or businessmen who want the economy to rebound and our entertainment to return. But from medical professionals.

The numbers of those stricken by the virus, those who have died from the virus, ought to be warnings not to take chances, not to allow, say, a Warriors-Lakers game to take place until all doubts are eliminated. Sure, we want to see Steph or LeBron, but what we don’t need to see is one more victim.

Impatience? Indeed. Would you expect another response? The head football coach at Oklahoma State, Mike Gundy — remember how he challenged the media a few years back? — insisted his team is getting back to business on May 1. “We’ve got to get these guys back in here,” he said.

Back in where, the locker room? Or since they are student-athletes, the classroom? Most schools around the country have been shut down because of the contagion. And if Oklahoma State hasn’t, the guess is at least the schools of some opponents have.

“From what I read,” said Gundy on a teleconference, “the healthy people can fight this ... we all need to go back to work.”

Until, if we’re callous, careless, the healthy people become infected. As has been the case virtually everywhere.

The future is a question. If it is not safe enough to hold a 49ers game or a Cal or Stanford — or De La Salle — game in September, will it be safe enough to hold the PGA Championship in early August at San Francisco’s Harding Park?

With luck, and maybe a vaccine, the threat of the virus may be diminished to the point where a golf tournament or football game will return to being the attractions and joy that sports are meant to be.

We hardly can wait. But wait we must.

Global Golf Post: Bradley's Long, Cool Ride to Augusta

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By Art Spander
For GlobalGolfPost.com

PACIFIC PALISADES, CALIFORNIA -- The mirrors were taped to the sides of the car, a Ford Focus. "They fell off too much," Keegan Bradley remembered.

Not what you want to make an impression at Augusta National. Or even at the Subway sandwich shop down the street.

Bradley's mode of transportation is better now. It should be. He won the PGA Championship...

Read the full story here.

Copyright 2012 Global Golf Post