Augusta: Jordan Spieth found water again. But not at the 12th this time. Last year’s Amen Corner calamity was behind the 2015 champion when he fell to a quadruple bogey nine at the 15th hole, the scene of Gene Sarazen’s immortal double eagle in 1935. Once more, we saw the splash of ball in pond.
Two watery mishaps in consecutive Masters rounds points to a flaw somewhere in Spieth’s make-up. Yet his ability to regain his poise in the face of mortifying setbacks will also keep his career on track.
Falling apart completely is not in his repertoire. So, after his second quadruple bogey in 22 Augusta holes (this year and last), Spieth hit a beautiful tee-shot to the par-three 16th, and clawed a shot back with a birdie.
The Masters throws them this way and that, up and down. And all this, at the 15th, after last year’s protagonists, Spieth and Danny Willett, had swapped roles, with Willett crashing into the trees at the first and Spieth briefly slaying his demons at the 12th, where his chance expired 12 months ago in Rae’s Creek.
England’s Willett was the winner here a year ago, but the memory was no use to him on the first tee, where he bent his drive almost out of bounds, then cracked his second shot into a thick branch that sent the ball shooting past our feet in the gallery. Willett pressed on, tense and embarrassed.
On the adjacent sweep of fairway, Spieth was heading down the ninth and steeling himself for the march to hole No 12: the 155-yard Golden Bell, where the quadruple-bogey seven he took 12 months ago has pursued him ever since — certainly in press conferences.
No one remembers Spieth’s two subsequent birdies on that round, where he blew a five-shoot lead and ended up tying for second place. They recall only the double plop of his ball in the watery grave of his title defence.
For Spieth, this whole day was about jumping through the hoop that the public and media had set for him.
Repeat or redemption at 12? Swirling winds, water, and three bunkers — two in front and one behind — make this patch of Amen Corner a test at the best of times, but never more than when everyone is picking at your scars.
Willett’s start to his first round as defending champion was truly salutary. The crack of second shot on pine, and the path the ball took straight back to sender, will fester in the memory.
While Willett started double-bogey, bogey, Spieth reached the turn level par and looked comfortable heading down the 10th, where Rory McIlroy’s infamous duck hook in 2011 laid another chapter in Augusta’s history of humiliation.
At the 12th, a packed Amen Corner gallery watched earlier groups flow by and waited for Spieth’s moment of truth.
The wind loosened pine cones, dropping them on unsuspecting heads. Tree fragments blew across the scene. A paper napkin even flitted across the 12th tee: a rare violation of Augusta’s studied perfection. Usually rubbish disappears here as if by magic.
Up ahead, Korea’s Jeunghun Wang was setting an extra little test of Spieth’s nerves: a jangler to stir the 2015 champion’s memories of 12 months ago. Wang struck his own tee-shot into the woods behind the green.
A hiking party set off to find it, with no luck. So Wang strolled back across the Ben Hogan Bridge for another go, with Spieth forced to watch from the side of the 11th green, where his own ball had settled on the left edge, only 10-feet from water.
The patrons at Amen Corner knew their job and rose to applaud Spieth as he stepped on to the tee, cheering and willing him on.
The old master, Phil Mickelson was coming up behind. Spieth was not looking to make a splash this time. His tee-shot soared over Rae’s Creek to the back of the green, from where he putted twice to make par. Drama over, demons dead. For half an hour, at least.
Recalling the 12th on the final round last year, Spieth had said: “It’s one of many tournaments I’ve lost from a certain performance on a hole or a stretch of holes. It happens in this game.”
He was not to know this kind of chaos would strike him again so early in his very next Masters round — 15 holes in.
“I’m excited about the opportunity ahead. Now I can go back and really tear this golf course up,” he announced on Tuesday.
In the event, he tore his own opening round apart, with that nine at 15, finishing with a three-over-par 75. An ominous stat began to do the rounds. No player has made worse than seven on any hole and won the Masters that year.
The “fear” Spieth said he would strike into this Augusta field was turning into sympathy for a player who was blamed by television pundits for wedge-shot errors at consecutive holes (14 and 15).
This, on a day when Dustin Johnson’s injury propelled Spieth to favouritism when the 81st Masters commenced.
He put the 12th behind him nicely, but found another pond to splash in three holes later.
So now Spieth’s amphibian tendencies will remain a talking point, and plant a fresh doubt in his head.
— The Telegraph Group Ltd, London 2017
