With the inexorable, steady, staccato sweep of the second hand, the clock creeps far too slowly for Angel Cabrera, Kenny Perry and the rest of the hopefuls at the 2009 Masters. Cabrera, the surprise winner of the 2007 U.S. Open at Oakmont shocked everyone when he followed a dreadful Saturday 76 with a sparkling 69 to close the tournament, including three birdies on the inward nine. To everyone’s amazement, he did it while only hitting five fairways! That’s the stat of a man who shoots 79 at Oakmont, not 69. Before the round, a Japanese reporter in the media tent was near my desk talking on his cell phone and he said, “Anybody can win this thing except Cabrera.”
Well Lo! and Behold! Duck Bites Tiger, Tames Oakmonster! Once again showing the ethnocentrism of the American Internet Golf Fan, in yesterdays FoxSports.com poll, only 11% picked him to win, despite his being a former major winner. Yet Augusta suits his game: he’s long, hands a buttery smooth short game and can putt in hit streaks. “I learned I can win big tournaments,” he said after yesterday’s round.
Meanwhile Ponce DeLeon ain’t got nuthin’ on Kenny Perry. The fountain of youth is not in Florida, but Knoxville. He’s won ten of his fourteen PGA Tour events after age forty. Perry will try to best Julius Boros as the oldest major champion in history and dethrone Jack Nicklaus as oldest Masters champion today. David Barrett of Golf Observer has a terrific biopic.
“Normally, when we think of a player trying to win a major at this age, it’s a guy who was once great but has been through a lull and is trying to take one last stab at glory,” explained Chad Campbell, Perry’s good friend and playing partner yesterday, who stands just two shots off the lead himself. “That was the case for Ray Floyd at the Masters in 1990 and 1992; he had already been Ryder Cup captain, and he won only once after 1986. But Perry’s more in the mold of Boros, who in his late 40s was a week-in, week-out threat on the Tour.”
Perry won the 2009 FBR Open in Scottsdale; in 2008, he won the Memorial Tournament, the Buick Open and the John Deere Classic, in addition to four Top-10 finishes. He competed in his first Presidents Cup in 2005 and he has scored 12 PGA TOUR titles and this is his ninth Masters appearance. His best finish was tied for 12 in 1995.
He’s also trying to exorcise the demons of Vallhalla 1996 where he lost the PGA Championship in a playoff with Mark Brooks. Perry took some heat for yukking it up in the broadcast booth instead of going out to the range to stay loose in case of a playoff.
“I wish I could redo that one over,” Perry said in a post-round interview yesterday. “The 72nd hole is the one that cost me that tournament, not the playoff. You know, that stings. That one is still with me today. I’ve carried that a long time. People criticize me, but it’s 110 degrees, it smoking hot out there, I hit the best tee shot I could have hit but just went further than I normally could hit it. I just was pumped up on adrenaline.” Perry bogeyed the last and Brooks caught him with a closing birdie, then defeated him in a three hole playoff.
Though 17 of the last 18 winner have come from the last group on Sunday, don’t tell that to the players. The pins today are the same as always on Sunday: reasonably accessible, which means, weather permitting, a Sunday charge may be in the cards.
As such, watch out for Steve Stricker, whose three-day tally of 72-69-68 has him in shouting distance. A steady, even-keeled grinder, he could charge and win if the leaders falter. Jim Furyk and Todd Hamilton are also major champions who’s past successes galvanize their mental attitude as tough as Hattori Honzo steel, hard and tempered. They won’t melt in the crucible of Championship Sunday.
“I think experience has always played a huge part in this golf tournament,” said Furyk thoughtfully. “I guess Fuzzy would have something to say about that. Usually it takes a while to figure out how to get around this golf course. I understand how a young guy like Anthony, coming out and making 11 birdies, and I’m not saying that it can’t be done or a first-timer can’t win, but definitely the first or second time you walk away from this golf tournament, a lot of times, the light bulb goes on and you say, wow, I could have played so much better. Hopefully you figure out how to save those shots and how to work your way around the golf course.”
Furyk continued by summing up the chances of the field outside of the final group:
“You see Anthony Kim put up 11 birdies, so it can be done. But that also — a guy like Cabrera, Kenny Perry if they come in at 11- or 12-under par, they control their destiny as well. If they go out and shoot 4- or 5-under, they take the other guys out of play.”
For those wondering, Barrett spells out the chances of Mickelson, Woods and the seven other players at 4-under, seven off the lead:
“Jack Burke, Jr. came from nine strokes back in 1956, but Ken Venturi had a four-stroke lead that year. This time, there are two players to make up seven strokes on. A better example is Gary Player coming from eight strokes back to win in 1978. He was tied for 10th place, just like Woods and Mickelson are this year. Player shot a final-round 64, and that might be what it would take for the big two on Sunday.”
Woods and Mickelson have seventeen other players tied or ahead of them. It will take no less than a 66 for them to have a reasonable chance. History dictates that when paired together, one plays well, and the other struggles, with about 3-1 ratio advantage to Tiger. Sometimes two guys feed off each other and skyrocket a la Nicklaus-Watson at Turnberry in ’77. Sometimes, they both break hard and jagged like Retief Goosen and Jason Gore at Pinehurst in ’05. Either way, there are a staggering number of players that have to plummet off the leaderboard for the dream pairing to become relevent today.
Survive the front nine, and position yourself for a final charge: that’s the game plan today. Take advantage of the par-5s. Carefully pick your spots to be aggressive. Pray your putts fall.
Tick, tick, tick: infinitely slowly, yet inexorably the second hand marches on until the leaders names are called, and the final knots unravel, and the winner drinks deeply from the cup while another has it dashed from his lips. As Omar Khayyam wrote, “a hair they say divides the false from true.” The same edge of the blade decides victory and defeat at the Masters, where one false step towards the siren’ss tempting call means a watery grave in Rae’s Creek: one foot toto short, too long, too far left or right means eagle of double bogey. Some men’s hopes will dreams will scatter like ash in the wind, and some men’s dreams will blossom into eternal spring, part of Augusta lore forever. Then every year from now when we once again await the return of the Masters, generations will share tales told of courage bold upon our heavely field of verdent green. It’s Easter Sunday today, but for one man every day will be Easter Sunday forever more as Masters Champion.
