Masters drama ends far too soon

Scrap the most famous Masters Tournament cliche of them all. This one didn’t start on the back nine Sunday – it ended before it ever got there.

One minute, 20-year-old Jordan Spieth was chasing history with a two-shot lead, walking up to the 8th green. The next he’s walking off the 9th green two shots down and engaging in a futile attempt to catch Bubba Watson on a back-nine that was allergic to drama.

Watson didn’t apologize for sucking the life out of the proceedings desperately needing a spark in the absence of headliners Tiger Woods and Phil Mickelson.

“Double Bubba” was a headline Watson had no trouble drafting himself with a three-shot cushion on the last six holes. He probably could have won it by six if anybody had bothered to engage him down the stretch.

“No, I feel a lot better,” Watson said of his second time around that required no rally or miracle hook shots out of the scarred Augusta foliage. “The shot out of the woods made me famous, but this one was a lot better for me and my nerves, my family, probably on (my caddie).”

It was better for everything but ratings. Sunday unfolded unlike any other in Masters history. A day that started with a wide assortment of 15 golfers clustered within five shots of the lead never materialized into the kind of free-for-all the Masters is famous for producing. The roars that make the Masters special petered out once the last group made the turn.

“You could just tell, just nobody really caught fire,” Watson said. “There weren’t too many birdies after No. 10, I don’t think.”

It became quickly apparent that it was up to Watson and Spieth to muster any magic to make the 78th Masters memorable. Matt Kuchar flashed early with a pair of birdies then spit it right back with a double bogey on No. 4. The ageless Freddie Couples caused a quick stir with back-to-back birdies to start and hung in the wings before retreating on the forgettable back.

Only Spieth made Watson have to work for it with what he called “a dream start.” Birdies at 2, 4, 6 and 7 gave the phenom a two-shot lead that would have been bigger if Watson didn’t answer with birdies of his own on the two par 3s.

“I was 3-under through the first seven,” Spieth said. “So if you told me that when I woke up this morning, I would have thought it would be difficult for me to not win this golf tournament.”

The script, however, completely flipped with a pair of two-shot swings on 8 and 9. Spieth pitched up short on both greens, one checking up on 8 leading to a three-putt and the other spinning off the front of the green on 9.

Watson birdied both and that turned out to be that.

“Eight and 9 were really the turning point where momentum kind of went my way,” Watson said. “I knew once the momentum switched it was a little bit in my favor. If you have the lead you always have a little advantage on everybody.”

The back nine was deader than Ike’s Tree. Only one player who finished among the top 13 – 50-year-old Miguel Angel Jimenez – shot better than 1-under on the back. There were only three eagles on the two par 5s Sunday, none of them by players in the hunt.

“Those two seemed harder than normal,” Kuchar said.

It was up to Watson to provide his own amusement on those holes. He put his foot on the throat of anyone thinking about challenging with a 366-yard drive so far around the corner that Spieth thought it was 70 yards out of bounds. It turned out to be a perfect layup to 140 yards from the pin.

“That’s not the line I really wanted to go on,” Watson said of the drive that actually clipped a tree and kept going. “I knew it, when it took off, it was cutting a little too much. I knew I hit it really hard. Obviously, when you get a roar on your tee shot, you know it’s pretty good. I could start breathing again once I hear them clapping and roaring.”

Spieth realized it was all but over at that point.

“When he had wedge into 13 I said, ‘OK, well this is pretty ridiculous,’” Spieth said. “So I knew it would be pretty hard from there.”

The only thing that might have stopped Bubba after that was Bubba. On 15 he decided to punch a 6-iron through the pines and over the pond.

“Oh, he’s lost his marbles,” David Feherty said on the air.

Watson’s caddie, Ted Scott, just shrugged it off as “Bubba golf.”

“Freak show,” he said. “I mean, I can’t describe it any other way. ... I asked him on 18, after he hit the tee shot, I said, are you from Mars or something? Because I don’t believe that you can hit these shots that you hit.”

Spieth left Augusta “hungry.”

“That was fun, but at the same time it hurts right now,” he said.

Watson walked off in tears again – this time with his 2-year-old son, Caleb, wandering up to the edge of the 18th green to get scooped up in his daddy’s arms.

“Having my son means more to me than the green jacket,” Watson said.

A second green jacket opens even more doors for Watson. No player that’s won two Masters has ever been left out of golf’s Hall of Fame.

“To get the first one, it was a dream come true,” Watson said. “To get the second one, it’s icing on the cake.”

The 2014 Masters may not have been a classic, but in the end it enhanced a growing legend.