In a Masters without drama, a green jacket for Matsuyama
The crew in the CBS booth kept hoping, kept pointing out that Xander Schauffele might hole that putt or Will Zalatoris could close the gap. And who could blame them?
They didn’t necessarily want Hideki Matsuyama to stumble in this Masters. They simply wanted some competition, some drama, some reason to watch and listen other than to view another shot of the azaleas — yes, they were in bloom — or hear for the 50th time how nobody from Japan ever had won the tournament.
They wanted someone to be able use the line, “The Masters doesn’t begin until the back nine on Sunday.”
But they didn’t get it. What they did get was an historic win by Matsuyama.
The other players never really made a run, and Matsuyama only stumbled occasionally, holding a lead in the final round that usually was at least two strokes and at times was as much as six.
At the end of the 85th Masters, in which the 29-year-old Matsuyama made history by making off with the famed prize to the champion, the green jacket, the margin of victory was only one. But that was because he bogeyed the 72nd hole, which was all he needed to do.
This was Matsuyama’s Masters since he grabbed the lead Saturday and entered the last round four shots in front. Sure, he had a shaky start, in the last day, a bogey on the first hole, but immediately Matsuyama birdied the second.
The others were going to have to catch him. But they could not, even though he shot a 1-over 73 for a 72-hole total of 278, and with bogies three of the last four holes, he became first Masters champ since Trevor Immelman in 2008 with an over-par closing round.
Matsuyama finished at 10-under 278. Zalatoris, who grew up in the Bay Area before moving, had a 70 for 279. Jordan Spieth and the star-crossed Schauffele — he had a double bogey and then at 16, into the pond, a triple — tied at 281.
Immelman, interestingly, was one of the announcers on Sunday for CBS where a main theme as play progressed was the unrelenting pressure on Matsuyama, real or perceived, from the country of Japan, impatient for their first men’s major golf champion.
Yet Matsuyama never flinched.
After his one large error, a ball into the water on the par-5 15th — the hole where a few years ago Tiger Woods also hit one in, and then when an official blew it, was allowed to drop in the wrong place — Matsuyama took only a bogey.
Y.E. Yang of Korea became first Asian man to win a major, holding off Woods in the 2009 PGA Championship at Hazeltine. That Matsuyama would join him is no surprise.
Ten years ago, he was low amateur in the Masters. When Matsuyama won the 2014 Memorial, Jack Nicklaus’ event at Muirfield, Nicklaus said, “I think you’ve seen the start of one of the world’s best players the next few years. This young man is going to win a lot of golf tournaments.”
He’s won 15 around the world, six on the PGA Tour. He doesn’t speak much English, a translator being used for interviews — although when he walked off the course on Sunday, Matsuyama said in English, “I’m really happy.”
Then he said in Japanese, “Hopefully I’ll be a pioneer in this and many Japanese will follow. I’m glad to be able to open the floodgates so more will follow.”
Eight days before the Masters, Tsubasa Kajitani of Japan won the Augusta National Women’s amateur. Matsuyama didn’t see that, because he was in the Valero Texas Open. But you can be certain Kajitani saw Matsuyama.
The entire world of golf did.
“I can’t imagine what it’s going to be like,” he said, “but it will be a thrill to take the green jacket back to Japan.
It will be no less a thrill for all the country.