~First comes first, time to give Zach Johnson his just due. At the turn I thought only Retief or Tiger had a chance to win, they have the pedigree, and Retief was playing better than anyone on the course. But Zach Johnson turned it up a notch and nestled himself close to the pin and made every makeable birdie putt on the backstretch. He definately lucked out when his ball on the 18th fell a few feet short of the bunker but hey everyone needs a little luck sometime.~Honestly, I'm not that shocked that Zach Johnson won a major, unlike the majority of the planet I actually know who Zach Johnson is thanks to playing fantasy golf every year on ESPN. Sure he never really won tournies in the past, but he was always a quality choice because he makes 90% of the cuts and typically finishes well. Hence why he made the Ryder Cup team least year. And in the Ryder Cup last year he was probably the best American in an otherwise dreadful showing. So while him winning the Masters is certainly a surprise, especially over Woods and Goosen, I am not shocked he won a major, he's a very good yet under the radar golfer.
~Now the attention shifted to Tiger. I think something needs to be said about how he never 'comes from behind' to win any of these majors. It seems like for the most part when he wins a major he blows the field out of the water completely. But he has yet to win one down the stretch when he's not in the lead coming into the final round. So while everyone was thinking to themselves Tiger is going to win this, there is no way he doesn't win this, I think people, myself included, were missing the fact that he just doesn't come back and win these things. When he's on his A game he destroys the field, and when he isn't like yesterday he's good enough to finish top 5, but he just doesn't have it in full gear and it only takes one guy playing well to beat him.
~And lets be completely honest, despite Johnson playing well down the stretch, Tiger had every single opportunity to win this tournament. On 14 he had a completely makeable putt for birdie and missed it. On 15 while down three he went for the green, despite having to slice it around the tree, and aggressive move that myself and my family thought he should do, but in retrospect it was the wron choice. If he had laid up and made birdie than he would have still been in it, instead he dunks it into the water and pars the hole. On 16 he had a makeable putt and missed, and on 17 he had a wonderful drive and completely misread his approach shot. All in all it was there for Tiger to take and he didn't do it.
~Tiger snapping his club on the tree was pretty darn humurous. How often do you think we will get to watch the best golfer of a generation to be forced to swing at a ball with full knowledge that his club is going to snap in half on his follow through.~Tiger wasn't showing enough red.
~Federer is betterer.
~JJ rocked out at +14 aka tied for 37th. Atleast he made the cut.
~One of my favorite parts of the afternoon was on 17 when Justin Rose who had just moved to +2 and completely in contention hit his tee shot over the trees and into a completely different fairway. Talk about succumbing to the pressure.
~I think it would have been cool had Retief won. Why? He made the cut at +8 simply because of the Master's clause that if you're withing 10 strokes of the lead you make the cut. I wonder how many times that a player has won the Masters after making the cut solely because of that clause. Plus Retief's approach shot where he had to go over 3 trees and stuck it within 5 feet was pretty ridiculous.
~I have another all week training session this week so the posts will be sparse most likely.
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