By Jimmy Roberts
Look … whatever year it is … whoever wins, the Masters is going to be special. That’s the somewhat inexplicable magic of the thing.
I’m guessing that explains why Masters Sunday has been the most watched golf day of the year since … 1988 (the lone exception being Tiger’s win at the 2002 U.S. Open at Bethpage).
I think of Ben Crenshaw and Dustin Johnson crying. I think of Greg Norman in 1996, self-immolating before our eyes in the equivalent of a four-hour NASCAR pileup. And for all the people who think Bubba Watson is just some kind of country simpleton, he had one of the most profound and thoughtful quotes I can ever remember from any athlete anywhere:
“I never got this far in my dreams.”
Rory McIlroy winning this year really just took the whole thing to another level.
You know the story: all the talent, all the years of frustration trying to win the one tournament which would seem tailor-made for his game … and, of course, the pursuit of the career Grand Slam, which is a small and very exclusive club.
Five men had previously collected all four major championships, but all of them with seemingly much less fanfare, angst, and drama. Four of them – Jack Nicklaus, Gary Player, Tiger Woods, and Gene Sarazen – got it done at a younger age than McIlroy; the first three MUCH younger.
Only Hogan was older. It would seem, though, that the slam wasn’t such a big deal to the Hawk; by choice, he didn’t even play in golf’s oldest major until he was 40. His win at Carnoustie in the 1953 British Open was actually the only time he ever played the event!
But McIlroy, in this age of the omnipresent and prying media (guilty as charged), became an epic and annual 11-year saga. The green jacket became his white whale.
As McIlroy said after winning at Augusta: “I don’t know what we’re going to talk about next year.”
So that was the headline – this massive and cinematic win that had so many people both emotionally invested in its outcome … and at the same time, unable to allow themselves to watch. Everyone I know seemed more nervous than McIlroy himself!
But it got me to thinking that the greatness of the accomplishment isn’t perhaps best measured by who’s in the career Grand Slam club … but who spent a hall of fame lifetime with their noses pressed up against the window and was never able to get through the door.
The fact is … It’s golf’s version of Murderers’ Row.
Sam Snead is tied with Tiger Woods for the most PGA Tour wins of all time. He even has one LPGA win to his credit (don’t ask). He won three Masters, three PGAs, one British Open … but never a U.S. Open. Painfully, he finished runner-up in the national championship four times!
Majors-wise, Lee Trevino won everything but the Masters. Arnold Palmer and Tom Watson, everything but the PGA.
It underscores how insanely hard it is to do something we are certainly willing to give McIlroy credit for … but perhaps, not enough.
There are similar comparisons in other sports – Ted Williams never won a World Series … Dan Marino never won a Super Bowl – but there’s a difference: Someone who plays golf (or tennis) doesn’t get to the mountain top by winning just one World Series or Super Bowl; he needs to win four of them … four DIFFERENT ones.
“I think it tells you how hard it is for your golf game to travel,” says Bamberger.
John McEnroe, an all-time tennis great who won 77 ATP titles and was No. 1 in the world for 170 weeks – and who, by the way, has a pretty impressive lefty golf swing – is “slamless” because of only getting (painfully) close at the French and Australian Opens.
As interesting as it has been watching McIlroy over the last decade or so, what’s next could be even more compelling. With all that talent … and an Everest-sized mountain flattened in front of him, what was once among the best stories in golf because of what he couldn’t do … very shortly could turn into a better story because of what might be around the corner.