AUGUSTA, Ga. — Carlos Ortiz of Mexico, the LIV Golf golfer, got into this Masters tournament by way of a T4 finish at last year’s U.S. Open. He’s a highly skilled golfer, of sound mind and body, playing in his second Masters. He shot 80 on Thursday. You could say he played poorly but this would be a more accurate statement: Augusta National is an insanely difficult course.
If you have ever played it, you know that any two-putt from 20 feet is an accomplishment. Augusta National during the Masters — back tees, fairways lined with spectators, cameras pointed at you, and millions watching on TV, fairways cut to crew-cut length, and the prospect of immortality — is almost impossibly difficult.
We ordinary golfers cannot even conceive how difficult it is.
My friend Mike Donald and I discuss this now and again. Not quite a decade ago, when Mike was in his 60s, we played as guests and Mike played all the way back. He played well, holed everything and shot 80.
In the 1990 Masters, Mike played in his first (of two) Masters. The course played hard on Thursday and the stroke average was 74. Mike had to be one of the 100 best golfers in the world then. Bill Harmon, son of a Masters champion, was Mike’s caddie and he knew what he was doing. Things were clicking. Mike shot 64.
In those days, the field was re-paired for the Friday round based on the Thursday scores and Mike was in the final twosome on Friday. It wasn’t like he forgot how to play, one day to the next. Mike shot 82 without playing that poorly. He started with three three-putt bogeys. It happened before that day, it’s happened since then and it will happen again.
Somewhere out there in this great moment of podcasting, there are people talking about what ordinary golfers could shoot at Augusta. There was one podcast this year where the co-host, a 7-handicap golfer, wondered what he could do in the Masters if he could play every hole under certain fantasy conditions: Second shots on the eight par-4 holes from 100 yards, third shots on the four par-5 holes from 100 yards; tee shots on the four par-3 holes from 100 yards. The 100-yard fantasy.
This 7-handicapper said he could win the Masters on those conditions.
Mike and I were in complete agreement: He’s deluded.
“Rory McIlroy couldn’t pitch that shot on the green on 13,” Mike said, recalling McIlroy’s short third shot into the par-5 13th on Sunday. He made 7.
“From 120 yards on 18, he puts that ball in a bunker,” Mike said, referring to McIlroy’s play on the 72nd hole at last year’s Masters. He needed 4 to win, but he was playing for immortality. “He couldn’t do it and he’s the best in the world. How’s a 7-handicapper going to play those shots?”
Not gonna happen.
Let’s recap: Back tees, fairways lined with spectators, millions more watching on TV, cameras pointed at you, fairways cut to crew-cut length, playing for immortality? And your playing partner is staring bullets through you?
No 7-handicapper would have a chance.
Mike and I devised our own fantasy scoring situation, with the same 100-yard-shot rules. Our theoretical golfer would be a club champion at Acme Golf & Country Club, able to shoot 77 at home any day of the week and right around par on better days. This imaginary golfer is now the Masters leader through 54 holes, playing under 100-yard rules. Will the golfer make it to Butler Cabin?
Mike’s verdict: Not a chance.
“Anytime you’re putting from 30 or more feet, you’re never going to make one and you’re going to be lucky to two-putt,” Mike said. That was his starting point and it was a devastating one. You would do well to go around in 45 putts, with nine two-putt greens and nine three-putt greens. If you hit nine greens and missed nine greens and needed only one chip or bunker shot on those nine holes, that would add up to 71. Even that seems fantastical.
You’re a good club player and now you’re trying to win the Masters? Rory McIlroy was the best player in the world with a three-shot back-nine lead and he needed a playoff to win.
“You’re a 100 yards out, and that ball is sitting up and it’s a perfect lie — if you’re a Tour player,” Mike said. “But for the good country-club golfer, anything other than solid ball-first, take-a-divot contact will mean something fat and short or thin and long. Now you’re looking at one or two chips and, as often as not, three putts. The next hole, you’re looking at the same lie again — it’s like a ball on a driving range mat, except when you fat it the clubface doesn’t bounce up and into the ball. As for your last three-putt, it’s lodged in your head. Your putting issues are like a runaway snowball.
“On 15, fat is in the lake and thin is in the other one,” Mike continued. The third shot there from 100 yards is a downhill shot from a downhill lie, a gruesome combination. “If you’re chipping from over the 15th green, do you know how easy it is to run it through the green and into that lake?”
Very, very easy.
Maybe you’ll two-putt.
The 6th hole could be the hardest 100-yard par-3 in the world, playing to the traditional back-right Sunday hole position, on a shelf about the size of a White House banquet table. Even if you could get your tee shot to stay on the shelf, any missed putt for 2 could wind up on the front part of the severely sloping green. You would do well to three-putt from there. Another double on the card, with 12 more holes of torture to go.
Any Sunday score under 80 for our club champ from central casting in these conditions would be an achievement.
“It’s late in the day, the greens are blue and you’re nervous as hell,” Mike said. Yep, 80 would be a good score.
Rory McIlroy showed how hard Augusta National is last year on Sunday. Carlos Ortiz showed it on Thursday. Here comes Friday, Saturday, Sunday. It only gets harder.
Michael Bamberger welcomes your comments at Michael.Bamberger@Golf.com
