Weekly Recap: Matsuyama Masters Augusta

There wasn't a whole lot of drama at the Masters on Sunday. Oh, it was great to watch and, c'mon, it was the Masters. But it didn't quite have the oomph that it has had many times through the years.

You can blame it on Hideki Matsuyama.

Matsuyama began the day with a four-stroke lead and never completely lost it, brilliantly delivering a metronomic and history-making performance to win the 85th Masters at Augusta National.

The 29-year-old Japanese star thus became the first Asian-born golfer -- and therefore, the first from Japan -- to win the Masters and the second to ever win a golf major, joining South Korea's Y.E. Yang, who famously took down Tiger Woods at the 2009 PGA Championship.  

Matsuyama was never in any great peril. His lead ballooned to six strokes on the back nine and only twice all day did it dip as low as one -- early in the day, when a gallant Will Zalatoris had a birdie putt to tie from off the green at No. 3 but wound up with a bogey, and then after the final stroke of the tournament, which Matsuyama tapped in to complete the historic one-shot victory.

Of course, there coulda/shoulda/woulda been a whole lot more drama had Xander Schauffele not astonishingly rinsed his tee ball on 16 while sitting two strokes back with three to play at 10-under-par -- the very same number that Matsuyama won with. Much more on Schauffele in a bit.

Matsuyama ended a three-and-a-half-year winless drought in capturing his first major, one that set off a nationwide celebration in golf-smitten Japan. The Japan Times, an English-language newspaper, had a story on its website late Sunday night headlined, "The global impact of Hideki Matsuyama's historic Masters triumph." In congratulating Matsuyama, Woods said the victory will resonate worldwide, and he knows a little something about resonating worldwide.
 

For years, Matsuyama has been one of the best ball-strikers in golf, and it carried him as high as No. 2 in the world rankings. But that was in 2017, also when he had won the fifth of his five PGA Tour titles. As he stopped winning, he slowly dropped out of the top 10, then the top 20 and even the top 30 for a while. Tour win No. 6, the Masters, moved him up to 14th in the rankings.

After a shaky drive on No. 1 led to an opening bogey, Matsuyama steadied and largely hit his woods and irons with precision the rest of the day. When he was off, he was able to scramble his way out of trouble. That's been a secret strength of Matsuyama's game. We all know about his ball striking and shaky putting, but he's been quietly proficient with his wedges. In four of the past five seasons, including this one, he has ranked top-20 on Tour in Strokes Gained: Around-the-Green.

Here's another little under-the-radar component of Matsuyama's game: While he was ranked 170th in Strokes Gained: Putting entering the week, he was a far-better 60th in three-putt avoidance. At Augusta, avoiding three-putts is crucial to success.

To be fair, let's not lose sight of the fact that this major win pretty much came out of nowhere. Not only had Matsuyama not won in since 2017, he had recorded only two top-10s in the past 14 months and none since early November. Last week, he played the Valero Texas Open for the first time. When a top player tees it up the week before a major, that points to him trying to find something missing in his game. Matsuyama didn't really find anything, tying for 30th.

But none of that matters now.

Matsuyama is a major champion -- the Masters champion, an accomplishment that could reverberate in Japan and Asia for years to come.

"I hope it will affect golf in Japan in a good way," Matsuyama told reporters at Augusta National. "Not only those who are golfers already, but hopefully the youngsters who are playing golf or thinking about playing golf, I hope they will see this victory and think it's cool and try to follow in my footsteps.

"Up until now, we haven't had a major champion in Japan, and maybe a lot of golfers or younger golfers, too, thought, well, maybe that's an impossibility. But with me doing it, hopefully that will set an example for them that it is possible and that, if they set their mind to it, they can do it, too."

MONDAY BACKSPIN

Will Zalatoris
There's not much more to say about Zalatoris that you don't already know about this rising superstar. He followed up his tie for sixth at the 2020 U.S. Open with a runner-up at the Masters. Wins and major wins seem only a matter of time. What's surprising is that if he's so good at age 24, which he is, why is he just emerging now? So many early-20-somethings leap from college or college age directly to the PGA Tour, such as Jordan Spieth, Collin Morikawa, Viktor Hovland, Matthew Wolff, Sungjae Im and Joaquin Niemann. Zalatoris actually tried that route, playing six PGA Tour events in 2018 as a 21-year-old. But he made only one cut and turned to the Korn Ferry Tour. Even there, he was marginal in his age-22 season, with three top-10s in 15 starts. It wasn't until less than a year ago, after the return of golf following the pandemic, that he all of a sudden found a new gear. The 2020 U.S. Open was his first PGA Tour event in more than two years, and he hasn't looked back since. One other thing about Zalatoris: He's still not a PGA Tour member. He has Special Temporary Membership and thus needs to win a tournament to qualify for the FedEx Cup Playoffs. Imagine the outcry if he doesn't qualify! The Tour is really hoping for a Zalatoris win between now and the Wyndham Championship.  

Xander Schauffele
Schauffele tied for third, and his water ball on 16 will be the most memorable shot of the 2021 Masters -- much like Jordan Spieth finding Rae's Creek (twice) on No. 12 in 2016.  This was nothing new. Schauffele also made the inexplicable mistake of rinsing his drive on 17 at Phoenix in February, clearing the way for Brooks Koepka to win. These are mind-boggling errors. Schauffele's winless streak is now 28 months, and the comparisons to Tony Finau are growing. But Schauffele has made it as high as No. 4 in the world and has been entrenched in the top 10 for more than two years, while Finau has resided mostly in the teens. Being a top-5 golfer with zero wins in the OWGR counting period is astounding. But so is Schauffele's record in majors: In 15 starts, he has two seconds, two thirds, six top-5s, eight top-10s and 11 top-25s. The question is, do all these close calls move him closer to winning or just add more heartache and scar tissue, like with the 1990s Buffalo Bills? He's won only four PGA Tour events, curiously three of them coming in small fields -- the 2017 TOUR Championship, the 2018 WGC-HSBC Champions and 2019 Tournament of Champions. Of course, that is much more than Finau can fall back on.
 
Jordan Spieth
Spieth tied for third, his fifth podium finish in eight Masters. He's up to 29th in the world, moving steadily toward a return to the top 10. It would surprise no one if he won again this season, or multiple times, or won a major. That could happen next month at Kiawah Island, where a win at the PGA Championship would give Spieth the Career Grand Slam.

Jon Rahm
Rahm's tie for fifth made it four straight top-10s at Augusta. Excellent, of course. This may sound ludicrous, but let's compare him to Schauffele. They are close in age, with Schauffele 13 months older. Rahm has five PGA Tour titles, one more than Schauffele, but one was the Zurich Classic team event. He has no major, no WGC, no PLAYERS, nor no TOUR Championship wins. In 18 career majors, he hasn't finished second, as Schauffele has twice. His best was a T3 at the 2019 U.S. Open. He has four top-5s, six top-10s and eight top-25s in majors. Really, Schauffele's major record is superior, but the perception of choking clouds that. Rahm won twice within the past year at the Memorial and the BMW Championship, and winning surely does count for something, even a lot. But does his big-event resume, which is now moving away from a small-sample size, fall short of what we expect from a top-5 golfer? Does he deserve to be viewed in a softer light than Schauffele?

Marc Leishman
Leishman tied Rahm for fifth, and now has three top-10s in nine career Masters. He also was T13 in 2020. He is one of a number of examples from this Masters that if you know how to play Augusta, even if you're playing not so great coming in, you can make a dent on the leaderboard. Just like this next guy:

Justin Rose
Rose had fallen outside the top-40 in the world while advancing into his 40s, yet he tied for seventh, giving him a sixth top-10 and 13 top-25s in 16 career Masters. It's dicey to assume this will turn a corner for Rose.

Cameron Smith
Smith gave Australia two golfers in the top-10 and his tie for 10th with Tony Finau gave him three top-10s in five career Masters.

Webb Simpson
After some lean years at Augusta, Simpson has figured things out. He tied for 12th, following a T5 in 2019 and a T10 in 2020.

Stewart Cink
Golfers may never know when they've played their final Masters until they never get invited back, and the 47-year-old Cink very well could have thought he was done. He had played just one since 2014 – and it took a stunning T4 at the 2018 PGA to get him to Augusta in 2019. Then he won for the first time in 11 years at the Safeway last September, and it got him into this Masters. And now with his tie for 12th, he'll be back next year for his 20th career Masters. Pretty cool.

Robert MacIntyre
Will Zalatoris stole the show among Masters first-timers, but another 24-year-old was impressive himself. The Scot tied for 12th, and therefore has already qualified for next year's tournament. Of course, like Zalatoris, MacIntyre could be a staple in the top-50 OWGR for years to come, setting up annual automatic visits to Augusta.
  
Brian Harman
Harman was the 88th and final qualifier for the Masters. He tied for 12th, so he already knows he's coming back next year.

Phil Mickelson
He tied for 21st and adds to the evidence that if you know how to play Augusta, you can deliver into your 40s and 50s, even 60s (if you're Bernhard Langer, though not this year). Mickelson now has top-25s in two of his past three starts, but we'd be surprised if those foreshadows some sort of return to real relevance on the PGA Tour.

Henrik Stenson
The 45-year-old Swede tied for 38th in his 16th and perhaps last Masters. This was Stenson's fifth and final year of eligibility stemming from his win at the 2016 Open Championship. He's well outside the top-50 OWGR – in fact, outside the top-100 at No. 107.

Bryson DeChambeau
We expected much more than a tie for 46th. Now the evidence is growing that Augusta may not be DeChambeau's cup of tea. He's gone T38-T29-T34-T46 in his four Masters as a pro (T21 as an amateur in 2016).

Jose Maria Olazabal
The 55-year-old Spaniard was the only "legacy" champion to make the cut, tying for 50th in his 32nd Masters. Olazabal hadn't made a cut since 2014.

Sergio Garcia
Since winning in 2017, Garcia has missed the cut three times and didn't play in 2020 after testing positive.

Dustin Johnson
The world No. 1 missed the cut, which isn't entirely surprising given the poor record of defending champions going back 20 years. On the other hand, Johnson has gone T54-T48-T28-MC in his past four starts. As an RBC guy, he is in the field for this week's RBC Heritage.

Patrick Cantlay
This missed cut was a stunner. Cantlay almost won the 2019 Masters; he had the lead after 69 holes. But this time around he shot 79-73. Of all the big-name missed cuts, perhaps Cantlay was the biggest surprise. But it also wouldn't surprise if he contended next time out, which will be this week at the RBC Heritage.

Brooks Koepka
It was Koepka's first start since knee surgery. Making the cut would've constituted a successful week. It was not a successful week.

Rory McIlroy
Maybe now more than ever it's time to worry about what's up with McIlroy's game. He missed the cut at a place where he usually could be counted on for a top-10, even if it was a backdoor top-10. He had top-10s in six of the previous seven Masters. Much will now be written about McIlroy returning next month to Kiawah Island, site of his runaway eight-stroke win at the 2012 PGA Championship.