Major caddie changes are made since 2017 Masters

Players change caddies all the time. It just doesn’t happen very often with those near the top of the world golf ranking, which makes this year’s Masters Tournament different.

In the past 10 months, several major champions who come to Augusta National as favorites to don a green jacket Sunday have made caddie changes.

Phil Mickelson, Rory McIlroy and Jason Day – who have combined to win 10 majors – have new men on their bags, dating back to June.

“Usually there’s hardly any change in the top 30 (players),” said Damon Green, who has been on 2007 Masters champion Zach Johnson’s bag since 2004. “It’s been some (kind of) turmoil.”

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“I think a lot of people think of who are the two best players of our generation and they point to Phil (Mickelson) and Tiger (Woods),” said veteran caddie Paul Tesori. “They had relationships (with their caddies) that were long.”

While Mickelson and Jim “Bones” Mackay worked together for 25 years, Woods won 13 of his 14 major championships with Steve Williams as his caddie. They worked together from 1999 to July 2011, winning 72 times worldwide.

The caddie change is the the first one for Day and McIlroy since their Masters debuts.

The biggest shocker is Mackay, who had been by Mickelson’s side for all but the first of his 25 Masters appearances and caddied in all three of his victories.

Also gone is J.P. Fitzgerald, the veteran who worked with McIlroy, a four-time major champion and former world No. 1, since his first Masters in 2009.

Colin Swatton, Day’s teacher/caddie, is also off the bag. Day, also a former world No. 1 who finished as a Masters runner-up in his 2011 debut, has played in seven Masters.

None of the three caddies have picked up another bag on the PGA Tour this season.

Mackay did loop for 2017 PGA Tour player of the year Justin Thomas at the Sony Open in early January, subbing for regular bagman Jimmy Johnson, who was out with plantar fasciitis. Since July, Mackay has worked for Golf Channel and NBC Sports as an on-course reporter.

Williams, who has caddied for four Masters victors, is also missing this year. Williams caddied for Adam Scott from July 2011 until late last year, helping Scott read the winning putt in the 2013 Masters.

Also missing from the Masters this year is Mike “Fluff” Cowan. Cowan, who helped Woods win his first Masters in 1997 and has been with Jim Furyk since 1999, isn’t here because Furyk didn’t qualify. This would have been Cowan’s 35th Masters.

So what gives with the changes among Mickelson, McIlroy and Day? They all said it was just time for a change.

“I think guys get tired of the same face; that’s all it takes,” Green said.

Mickelson, who parted with Mackay in June, hired his younger brother Tim to finish out the season and has kept him on. Tim is the former golf coach at Arizona State and a former agent.

McIlroy’s new man is his childhood friend Harry Diamond (hired last July) while Day hired Rika Batibashea and Luke Reardon, longtime friends from Australia, parting ways with Swatton before the BMW Championship in September. Batibashea and Reardon have been splitting time on Day’s bag.

Day and Batibashea teamed to win at Torrey Pines in late January, the Mickelsons won the Mexico Championship in early March and McIlroy and Diamond captured the Arnold Palmer Invitational in mid-March.

None of the new caddies, however, have caddied in the Masters, so they have been taking a crash course on the Augusta National.

“How are they going to fare at the Masters? That’s a great question,” said Tesori, who will be caddying in his 17th Masters.

Tesori says Augusta National’s ‘local knowledge’ can’t be found in yardage or greens books given to players by the club.

“At Augusta ... you can’t beat experience,” Tesori said. “I still don’t have it dialed in and this will be my 17th. So I think experience there is the most important thing you can have. If we show up and it’s 5- to 10 (mph for the winds) every day and it’s warmish, the experience factor is less. But all of a sudden we show up and you’ve got those low 50s, high 60s and that wind is blowing 15-20 mph, you can’t put a price on the experience factor. So that (having a new caddie) can be a negative depending on the weather we get.”