It’s a Masters unlike any other, but some things never change

AUGUSTA, Ga. — The last time I was here was in mid-March, when things were shutting down. I was driving home to Philadelphia from Ponte Vedra, Fla., after the Players Championship was canceled. You wouldn’t call Augusta on the way but I had nothing to do. I stayed in the downtown Marriott. The place was empty. I drove out of town via Washington Road, past the club entrance, past the course. Nobody was on it. Things were shutting down. I despised that phrase lockdown, but everybody was using it, right about then.

I arrived here midday on Monday and drove from the airport to the golf course by way of downtown, for this November Masters. The first and you hope the last, because the Masters, of course, is supposed to be game’s spring flower. It’s an April event, through-and-through, along with earthworms dangling on Eagle Claw fishing hooks. Downtown was quiet, but it wasn’t things-are-shutting-down quiet.

After all these years, you know what to expect when you arrive at Augusta, the city and course both. Past the stately red-brick building, where a John Grisham character could be at her desk, forensic evidence in her gloved hands. Past James Brown Boulevard. Past the shotgun shacks with their metal roofs. Past the church and the steeple, the laundry on the hill.

You don’t need Waze here — I don’t, not after all these years. Broad Street turns into Calhoun Expressway and Calhoun turns into Washington Road. On the right, an enormous construction project is underway. It’s up the road from a potpourri shop called Meme Had one. Earth is being moved in the name of a new Masters TV complex, with a tunnel under Washington Road, to the course. Cliff Roberts, the club’s first chairman, would have called this expensive undertaking “an improvement,” as he used that phrase for all changes at the club, which conveniently meant no changes ever came to his beloved course and club.

You go into the Fresh Market, a half-mile up the road, in search of lunch. That could be Patrick Cantlay, on his way in, but it’s hard to say for sure, owing to his mask. You’re gonna get a Covid-19 test, before you’re allowed through the great green great. A half-hour after swabbing, here she comes, paper work in hand.

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“Here you go, sir,” she said.

“I passed?”

“You passed.”

And then you are in. On campus and in the bubble. Tiger’s on the course and Adam Scott is in the interview room. I can see the driving range from my work station. A dozen yellow flagsticks, scores of circular beds of brown pine needles, one white caddie shack. We all know the color of the grass. Augusta green. Acres and acres of it. Beyond it all, the course beckons.

They’re going to have a golf tournament here, in the middle of this pandemic. It won’t be anything like last year’s Masters, or any year’s Masters. But nobody can say we’re in lockdown. Lockdown is a term of prison. This isn’t March, and this isn’t April. It’s Monday, Nov. 9, and the Masters is going to be played for the 84th time. Only a fool would say it’s all good, but would you want it to be the ides of March again?

Soon enough here, tee times will be announced. Good deal.

Michael Bamberger welcomes your comments at Michael_Bamberger@golf.com.