AUGUSTA, Ga. – Welcome to Augusta NationalMasters Sunday. Scottie Scheffler, now driving. Rory McIlroy in a practice bunker, just in case. Two afternoons crawling inside. Under the tree, near the club and in the shade, it’s almost cool, almost windy, the players and the corpses are coming, between the jackets and with the lucky badges. Off the course, the tees and tees and greens are baking. This is the first Masters in 15 years where no umbrellas have appeared, according to weather historian Justin Rose. He is English. He points out things like that.
Here comes Chema – José María Olazábal, a two-time winner – in a green club coat and red trousers, his prominent Basque nose sunburnt from his Thursday to Friday rounds. Go past the tree and enter the club. There is always a table for him on the second floor veranda, red wine and Spanish flowing from his table. He must lose Seve. Seve Ballesteros represented freedom of a wild and windy kind, like any man ever.
For a moment there, early on this Masters Sunday afternoon, the whole world, or our little corner of it, was a state of pure flux. It won’t last, but however long it lasts, it’s all good.
Rory had it on Friday and Saturday, for some brief and brilliant moments. He was driving it all over the yardage book and still he was the 36-hole leader by one stroke. We remind you of his closing Friday, dinner on the stove: bird at 15, bird at 16, bird at 17 and bird at 18. Flow state, peak experience, in the zone, whatever. A dream state.
We all get there, from time to time. We are drawn by Rory McIlroy, co-leader with Cameron Young through three rounds because we can all feel it when he has it and share his pain when he doesn’t. With Tiger it was different. Tiger was relentless, hole by hole and round by round, and he invented an entire category, winning as an act of humiliation against your opponents. That is why there was and is so much fear for him, but less love. You might ask: If McIlroy wins today, is there anything diminished about it because he had a six-shot lead and gave it up? Absolutely not. Golf as a human experience, McIlroy shows this, most every time he plays. Cameron Young isn’t having it. It’s not his fault at all. All my accounts, an admirable young man. But its peaks and valleys are not there for all to see.
You had four-hole stretches where you even played, didn’t you? Or fill in your own blank, depending on your skills. A dream state, to be sure. These things are there, lurking, appearing without warning. You may have heard Bruce Springsteen, last month at the Target Center in Minneapolis, singing the Prince anthem, “Purple Rain.” At 5:20, he’s offering something complete. who-who wa-who; who-who, wa-who. The band is with him, the backup singers are with him, the whole house is with him. A moment, if you were there, you’d like it to last and last, but it can’t.
Or, to continue this Twin Cities theme, here’s F. Scott Fitzgerald, native son of St. Louis. Paul, describing a train ride from Union State, Chicago: When we retired into the winter night, and the real snow, our snow, began to lie beside us and glitter from the windows, and the dim lights of the little Wisconsin stations drifted away, a sharp wild bearing came suddenly into the air.
Where do you think those 44 words came from? The same spot where McIlroy made those four birdies early Friday night. He can’t tell you the source. Bruce and his friends, they were in an altered state, five minutes into “Purple Rain”. They can’t tell you where it came from. Fitzgerald, closing Gatsby, had to be the same.
It can happen in the final round of a major golf championship, dream golf. It can happen, where golfers go out of their way and the ball is just another moment along the swing. McIlroy has talked about playing with freedom, now that he’s won a Masters, now that he’s completed his career Grand Slam. Freedom comes and goes. It comes and goes. In 1977, at the British Open at Turnberry, Jack Nicklaus shot a final-round 66. His playing partner shot a final-round 65 and won by one stroke. It was warm and quiet and their golf was free and easy. Rare.
McIlroy scorched his tee at 1 on Sunday. He used the bank over the hole for his second shot and he got to the green and saw that he had maybe 15 feet for birdie. An easy two-shot par. What’s next? What will happen next?
Michael Bamberger welcomes your comments at Michael.Bamberger@Golf.com
