Augusta

The History

Perhaps my favorite part of March Madness occurs during commercial breaks, when CBS airs its Masters promos, and for the first time in eleven months I get to hear that sweet, melodious Augusta tune. 

I'm sure you've seen these before. The video replays some of the Masters' greatest moments -- Ben Crenshaw winning in '96 and breaking down on the 18th green; Tiger's monumental 12-shot victory in 1997, at the ripe age of 21; and finally Phil Mickelson in 2004, when lefty shoots 32 on the back 9 on Sunday to capture his first career Major -- to promote the tournament, which airs annually on CBS, the only network ever to broadcast the weekend rounds since The Masters first appeared on television in 1956. 

Founded in 1930 by Clifford Roberts and Bobby Jones, the game's most well-know and celebrated player, Augusta National quickly fell on hard times because of a lack of members due to the Great Depression. But in '34, Roberts cobbled together the Augusta National Invitation Tournament, and five years later renamed it The Masters when Jones somewhat backtracked on his original claim that "The Masters" was too "hoity-toity" a name for a golf tournament. 

In the summer of 1998, a year after Tiger Woods' evisceration of Augusta National, board members got together and decided the course needed a remodeling, or "Tiger Proofing" as it was later called, to combat the influx of stronger players and breakthroughs in modern golf technology  -- lighter shafts, titanium club-heads, better golfballs, etc -- that allowed players to hit the ball distances previously thought to be unattainable.*

*During that '97 Masters tournament, when Tiger and other players hit pitching-wedges into the famed par-4 18th green, CBS commenter Ken Venturi, who had played in fourteen Masters tournaments and twice finished in 2nd place, famously recalled on-air that players during his era had to use 4-irons to reach the green. 

But even after reconstruction, the course still kept its history and tradition in tact. The salient azalea bushes still highlight Augusta's beautiful landscape. Rae's Creek still lays ominously in front of the par-5 13th, ever resting in the minds of players who've seen their tournament hopes come crashing down with a simple plunk. And on the Par-3 course, the same bank still exists on which Clifford Roberts, by then beaten down and gravely ill, shot and killed himself in 1977, leaving with him instructions for an unmarked grave. 

Jack Is Back

Of course, you can't talk about the history of Augusta National and The Masters without prominently mentioning Jack Nicklaus. Augusta is and forever will be The Golden Bears course, no matter what Tiger does henceforth and no matter what hot shot comes along in ten years and steals his thunder. With six Green Jackets (to go along with 18 career Majors), Nicklaus is the winningest player in Masters history, earning his first Jacket in 1963 and his last in 1986, at age 46, during the 50th and perhaps greatest Masters of them all. 

Nicklaus, the game's erstwhile dominator, entered the '86 Masters in 160th-place on the money list, having not won a tournament in two years. Newspapermen, golf commentators and armchair experts alike began wondering aloud when Jack would hang up his spikes, retire with his aura in tact. And with opening rounds of 74-71, putting him six shots behind young phenom Seve Ballesteros, Jack did nothing to quell or assuage those concerns. 

But on a windless Saturday that rendered the course defenseless, Nicklaus put up a 69, of which he later recalled "was the first time I'd broken 70 since I can't remember." Heading into Sunday --his Sunday, on his course, in his tournament -- Jack lurked in 8th place, some four shots back of Greg Norman with six players standing in his way. 

Recalled Nicklaus. "My son Steve called me at the house we're renting this morning," he said, "and he asked me 'well, Pop, what's it going to take?' And I said 'well 66 will tie and 65 will win." 

"Well," his son said, "go ahead and do it."

The day started inauspiciously for Nicklaus, missing short putts at the 4th and 6th, and he stood on the 9th tee at -2, even for the day and five back of Norman. 

Then, as Rick Reilly so eloquently recalled, "all heaven broke loose." 

On the 9th, Nicklaus drained an 11-footer to put him four back. A hole later, on the par-4 10th, Nicklaus dropped a 25-foot snake, but still stood four back after Ballesteros holed out a wedge from 40 yards out to give him sole possession of the lead. 

But at the 11th, the outset of Amen Corner, Nicklaus picked up two shots with a birdie after Seve bogeyed the 9th. Two back.

At the par-3 12th, Nicklaus faltered and made 4, the bogey putting him three back of Seve. 

A steaming Nicklaus ("that [bogey] really got me going") stepped up to the par-5 13th, where his tee-shot hugged the tree-line on the left side of the fairway, narrowly skirting the creek. Determined, Jack striped a 3-iron onto the green and two-putted for birdie. Again, two back.

But later on, with Seve's ball resting in the middle of the 13th fairway, the Spaniard elected to do some pin-hunting of his own. After hitting the ball two within eight feet, Seve eagled, lofting himself four shots in front of the previously charging Nicklaus. 

After parring the 14th, Jack whacked his tee-shot on the par-5 15th some 300 yards, leaving him a hair over 200 yards for his 2nd shot. Thinking eagle all the way, Nicklaus knocked a 4-iron to within 12 feet, and made his eagle putt. It vaulted him back to within two shots of the lead and, perhaps just as importantly, cultivated a roar that reverberated through the Augusta pines. 

Now on the par-3 16th, where a few moments earlier the pond located on the left side of the green began to ripple from the crowds' boisterous response to Jack's eagle on 15, Nicklaus stepped up to the tee knowing he had to knock one close.

How's three feet sound? A Birdie two, putting Jack one back. 

The roar cultivated from Nicklaus' tee-shot traveled all the back back up to the 15th fairway, where Seve, who later admitted he knew a roar that explosive could only come from Nicklaus, chunked a 4-iron into the creek into front of the 15th green, ending his Masters hopes. 

By this point, Nicklaus, after his magnificence on the 16th, felt the enormity of the moment. On the 17th tee, with the cheers and well wishes and hopes all being directed at him, tears began to cover his eyes. 

"Hey, I still got some golf to play," he thought. 

Now tied for the lead, Nicklaus put his drive in the left rough, but hit his approach shot to within 12 feet. Verne Lunquist, who's patrolled the 17th green as an announcer for CBS since God knows how long, offered his play-by-play after Nicklaus stroked the putt. 

"Maybe....YES SIR." For the first time all day, Jack had the lead to himself. One up. 

On the 18th, after falling a club short on his approach, Nicklaus two-putted from 45 feet (nearly making the first), for a final round 65, the score he thought before the round would be good enough to win. 

But with Norman making a birdie at 17, the two players stood deadlocked at -9. Norman, in what was just the first of his many final round chokes, stood in the middle of the 18th fairway and hit his 4-iron into the gallery. After failing to get up an down, he finished at -8, one shot behind the champion. 

"I finally found the guy I used to know the golf course," Jack would later tell him wife Barbara." It was me."

Phil, Finally

18 years later, in April of 2004, Phil Mickelson staged a Sunday comeback of his own, shooting 32 on the Augusta back 9 and forever removing the "Best Player to Never Win a Major" monicker that had followed him around for nearly a decade. 

At the time, Lefty encapsulated everything about my favorite sports team, the Red Sox. Phil was a great player who couldn't get it done when it mattered most (like the Sox). His rival, Tiger, seemingly won tournaments at will and dominated Phil whenever the two crossed paths (like the Yankees with the Sox). The perennial underdog (like the Sox), Phil was an easygoing guy with a hot wife who was easy to root for. And on that day, I sat in my living room with my mother and father, golf fans themselves after having watched me play for so many years. 

On that same day, April 11, 2004, David Ortiz smacked the first of what would be many walk-off hits that season to give the Red Sox a 6-4 victory (in 12 innings) over the Toronto BlueJays. 

But on that day, all eyes were on Phil. 

On the 18th hole, on that Easter Sunday, Mickelson stood over an 18-footer to win the 68th Masters and his first Major Championship. After a decade of near-misses and heartbreaks, with millions of fans behind his back, Phil drained the putt that caused Augusta National, and my living room, to erupt.