Michaux: Field full of talent makes Masters predictions tough

History is made every year at the Masters Tourna­ment, but rarely has it been harder to predict who might write his story than this year.

The list of favorites to win the 80th Masters is longer than Adam Scott’s retired broomstick putter. You could poll a dozen experts and get a dozen different answers with legitimate arguments for all of them.

The Masters field is set at 90 starters, but the pool of players with the experience capable of winning might run 25 to 30 deep.

“I don’t think there’s a person that’s favorite-hands-down kind of thing,” said Jason Day, the reigning PGA champion considered by many the closest thing to a hands-down favorite. “There’s so many good players right now that anyone could win.”

Defending champion Jor­dan Spieth – who hasn’t finished worse than second in two Masters starts – might have to get in line behind the most accomplished and in-form list of contenders to convene in the first full week of April.

“I think this year’s Mas­ters might be the hardest one to win in quite a while as far as the depth of the field and the quality of golf being played by people who play Augusta National very well,” Spieth said last week at Houston, where he tied for 13th. “There’s a bunch of guys who love the tournament and the course that are playing great golf. You kind of always see a little bit of that, but I think it’s widespread this year.”

The question is, where does the list of favorites stop? There are a half-dozen golfers with green jackets already in their lockers who should figure prominently into the conversation.

Spieth, who tied the Mas­ters scoring record last year, threatened the all-time PGA Tour scoring record with 30-under in an eight-shot win to open 2016 at Kapalua.

Two-time Augusta champion Bubba Watson won already at Riviera and has his game perfectly tuned for another even-year run.

Scott, the 2013 champion, won back-to-back to kick off the Florida swing. Three-time champion Phil Mickelson leads the PGA Tour in scoring average this season.

Charl Schwartzel, the 2011 winner, already has three wins this season on the European and PGA tours. Zach Johnson is the reigning British Open champion.

“It think it’s exciting times and maybe one of the most exciting lead-ups to the Masters,” Scott said.

The cast of characters hoping to crash next year’s Cham­pions Dinner is daunting. Rory McIlroy, a four-time major winner, might not even top the list as he tries for the second time to complete the career Grand Slam. That spot probably belongs to world No. 1 Day, who comes in off consecutive victories at Bay Hill and the WGC-Match Play.

Then there’s reigning Players champion Rickie Fowler in peak form, 2015 runner-up Justin Rose hitting his stride, 2013 runner-up Louis Oosthuizen sporting a perfect swing, Henrik Stenson hot off a runner-up finish in Houston.

We haven’t even gotten to Tor­rey Pines winner Brandt Snedeker, serial major contender Dustin Johnson or a half-dozen others with good histories at Augusta.

“There are so many storylines I think with all the top players playing well and past champions playing well like Bubba and myself,” Scott said. “Of course, the obvious stories of the Big Three and Rory going for a career slam is going to be a story every year until it happens.”

How do you winnow all of the candidates into a manageable list of favorites? The answer might be as simple as who’s won it.

If fate takes us to Sun­day afternoon with all of them bunched atop the leader­board, the edge would have to go to the handful of players who have done it before.

“Hopefully, we’re the ones that are in contention and we’re the most recent winners of it,” Spieth said. “We’ve got it fresh in our mind. Hopefully, it’s an advantage.”

Day, for one, thinks that’s true. He has twice played through the crucible of a Masters Sunday only to flinch at the heat. McIlroy, too, knows the pressure of trying to break through after his painful back-nine meltdown with the lead in 2011.

“Yes, I think they kind of know what they’ve gone through to win a tournament,” Day said of the past-champion edge. “They’ve lived that feeling of walking up 18 either being around the lead or having to make a par at the last to win the tournament. So, there’s that feeling, and I’ve never had the opportunity to do that yet. So, they do have a slight advantage coming to the last holes.”

Of course, every Masters winner had to make that breakthrough once, so Scott understands it’s not as simple as that.

“Now coming here, it’s only to gain,” he said. “I’d like it to feel like that. I don’t think it’s just that easy. If I could actually remove myself at that point and remember standing here having this conversation and say, ‘Hey, it’s just a bonus.’ That doesn’t mean you can throw caution to the wind and just attack because out here you can make 7s and 8s. I’d like to be in that mindset where I’m a little more free.”

The potential for something extraordinary this week is high. But whose story will be history by Sunday is anybody’s guess.