Image via WikipediaThe Masters usually brings out the best and worst in golfers, no matter how much the folks at Augusta National try to dress it up for their patrons and for their enablers at CBS and ESPN. This year was no exception.At times it seemed like nobody wanted to win this tournament, what with several different golfers bunched together on the leader board and none of them taking control. Then Charl Schwartzel came out of nowhere to win the Masters by two strokes, on the fiftieth anniversary of his fellow South African Gary Player winning the first of his Green Jackets.
Adam Scott and Jason Day were two Australians trying to become the first from their country to win this tournament. But just like the man they grew up watching, Greg Norman, they would finish in a tie for second at -12.
Another uncomfortable reminder of Norman at Augusta was Rory McIlroy of Northern Ireland, who led the tournament for the first three rounds before imploding in spectacular fashion in the last one. Big things are predicted for the young man touted as the Future of Golf, but first he has to avoid becoming the Next Norman.
The youngest person to win a Masters, Tiger Woods, has not been himself on the golf course lately. He tried to remedy that with some big shots to pull into a tie for the lead on Sunday, but his putter went south on him in a way that has been all too familiar during his long, strange odyssey off the pedestal he was put on. Woods ended up tied for fourth with two others at -10.
We should mention that Norman has won many tournaments around the world during his career, and could very well have been a Masters champion had it not been for some strange goings-on that resulted in someone else winning the Green Jacket.
As CBS' Jim Nantz likes to say, the Masters are "a tradition like no other". This was a tournament like no other.
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