AUGUSTA, GEORGIA | The Masters officially begins at 7:25 a.m. Thursday morning when Jack Nicklaus, Tom Watson and Gary Player will make their age-restricted swings in the morning chill, reminding us of what used to be. A charming moment that ties the years together as another April unfolds.
The day will soon come when that threesome is replaced by another group of past champions but the sense of continuity will endure. Among all the Masters’ special qualities, none may be more precious than the “as it is and ever shall be” feeling that lives and breathes in the Georgia pines.
It is for that reason that the absence of both Tiger Woods and Phil Mickelson this week matters. They are a part of this place, their Masters moments kept eternally alive in photographs and memories, a part of the Augusta National story as much as Arnold Palmer and Amen Corner. And, until this year, it feels as if they have always been here.
Woods and Mickelson, who shared a rivalry that rarely intersected on major championship leaderboards, are missing for deeply personal reasons, the first time since 1994 that neither of them have been on the tournament tee sheet.
Woods is reportedly in Switzerland, where he is believed to be working on his personal well-being. Mickelson, meanwhile, has played only one tournament this year while “my family continues to navigate a personal health matter,” he posted last week.
The relative silence surrounding their situations suggests the seriousness of each. Both of them have passed their 50th birthdays and, between them, they have won 140 professional tournaments and 21 major championships, including eight green jackets. Their names are pressed into the history of the Masters like dimples on a golf ball.
It doesn’t matter that neither of them were likely to have contended had they played this week. Woods struggles just to walk and move normally while the elasticity in Mickelson’s game has been stretched too many times to snap back properly.
“I tell [Tiger Woods] I love him and things can always get better.” – Fred Couples
It has been 29 years since Woods changed more than golf with his record-setting victory in 1997. He came to define a sport and a generation while redrawing the boundaries of an historically exclusive game.
His hugs – with his father Earl behind the 18th green in ’97 and with his son Charlie behind the same green in 2019 – wrapped those monumental victories in warm teardrops, painting portions of the unique tapestry Woods has constructed at Augusta.
His chip-in birdie at the 16th hole in 2005, the swoosh on his golf ball hanging for an extended instant on the edge of the hole before falling in, is now a part of the Augusta story like the place being a nursery when Bobby Jones found it.
Unfortunately, Woods’ life isn’t limited to his story at Augusta.
“I tell him I love him and things can always get better,” Fred Couples said this week when asked what he tells Tiger when they text.
Walk the par-5 13th hole and patrons still stand and peer through the trees that Mickelson split with his 6-iron second shot that came to rest 3 feet from the hole en route to his third Masters victory in 2010. His jump for joy when he won his first Masters in 2004 may be the defining image of his pre-LIV Golf career.
There is something to seeing them here, the way we watched Palmer keep showing up and how they cheered Bernhard Langer until he said goodbye a year ago.
Golf tournaments are played almost every week of the year and most of them have a transactional existence. Workers show up in their logoed shirts and caps, post their scores and, if they play well, cash lucrative checks. The connections are fleeting.
The Masters is different. It’s more personal, more rewarding, more meaningful because, as much as today matters, yesterday still matters, too.
The faces change, some are new and others have acquired creases over time and some others, like Adam Scott, seem untouched by the years.
It’s the anticipation, it’s the sense of familiarity with the place, it’s the taste of an egg salad sandwich even if you’ve never been within a thousand miles of the place.
But when April in Augusta rolls around, there are ties that bind us to the Masters. It’s the anticipation, it’s the sense of familiarity with the place, it’s the taste of an egg salad sandwich even if you’ve never been within a thousand miles of the place.
It’s about knowing Nicklaus is going to be there, maybe not for long and only in the ceremonial role he swore years ago he would never embrace.
It’s about knowing someone will run out fast Thursday morning, like a speed horse in a Triple Crown race.
It’s about knowing the Sunday hole locations from years of watching, knowing that the last hour of the final round can change everything like when Charl Schwartzel birdied the last four holes to win in 2011, and knowing it only happens once a year.
That’s why it feels different this year without Tiger Woods and Phil Mickelson.
We are reminded of what we have had and what we are missing.