At a different Masters, a different vibe as the sun sets on day one

AUGUSTA, Ga. — Nightfall came slowly, here at Augusta National on Monday, sixish. It felt like a summer night.

It did not feel like Monday night of Masters week, but, of course, it actually was, in all its oddness, at the tail end of this odd, odd year.

Larry Mize was putting under a lighted practice green, on land that was bumpy parking lot when he won here, in 1987. Scottie Scheffler, born in 1996, twirled his putter as he came off the 18th green, having just knocked off his first practice round of his first Masters.

“You hear that the putts break towards Rae’s Creek,” he said, “and you find out that sometimes they do and sometimes they don’t.”

News

He missed the U.S. Open in September at Winged Foot, after testing positive for Covid-19. This week can be his year.

Adam Scott played nine holes in the late afternoon. It took three hours but only because he wanted it to. He stood above the hole on the 9th, with its pitched green, and breathed on a series of downhill 5-footers, knowing all the while that Monday’s green speed would tell him nothing about Thursday’s. It didn’t matter. There was no place he’d more want to be.

“I’m actually surprised that they’re playing it at all,” Scott said. He won here in 2013 and tested positive for Covid-19 last month. “To play a Masters in November, with no fans. But it’s good that they are. After the kind of year we’ve had, with all the turmoil, you know this tournament will bring a lot of pleasure to a lot of people, just watching it from home.” He is, surely, among the most measured and thoughtful of professional golfers.

There was something casual, about this later-afternoon golf, Monday at the Masters. Have you ever seen a wife walking down a fairway with her golf-pro husband in a Masters practice round? It happened in Monday’s dusk, Jolande Lyle, walking with her husband, Sandy, winner of the 1988 Masters and playing on Monday in suspenders. Without the fans, without the gallery ropes, without the large numbers of Pinkerton guards and Richmond County sheriffs on patrol, the vibe is loose. It’s casual.

News

Bernhard Langer flew late Sunday night to get here, from a senior event in Phoenix.

“When I heard there was going to be the Masters in November, I anticipated wind and highs in the 40s,” Langer said Monday night. It was downright balmy. “I thought we’d be wearing sweaters.” He was wearing a short-sleeved shirt. “I wasn’t expecting this.”

Nobody was expecting this. No one could have predicted this. But here we are. A beautiful Monday night. A lousy forecast. A grand tournament being played, smack-dab in the middle of a deadly pandemic. It was a gorgeous night here. Nothing seemed amiss, deep inside this deep inside. 

Michael Bamberger welcomes your comments at Michael_Bamberger@Golf.com