Growing up in the south there are three weeks that standout and compete for the most anticipated seasonal beginnings of the year. Typically the first Saturday in September signifies the start of college football season. Just after the BCS national championship in the first week of February you have national signing day for high school seniors making their decision on what college football program they will sign with. But for me and many sons of the south, the first week in April stands alone as the most anticipated week of the year. On Monday you have the NCAA men’s basketball championship. I’ll never forget my first trip to Augusta, Georgia. It was 1992 and a week earlier Christian Laettner hit a jump shot near the foul line at the buzzer to beat Kentucky. If you’re from Tennessee like I am it couldn’t have happened to a better bunch of college basketball fans- If only they could have been wearing crimson. That Monday night Bobby Hurley, Christian Laettner, and Grant Hill defeated the Fab Five from Michigan in the national championship game. That next morning at around 7:00 am I walked in the north gate just off of Washington Road to watch John Daly and Jack Nicklaus play a practice round. That area is now the new tournament practice facility. The most amazing thing to see when you first arrive on the actual golf course is all the people on their knees touching the ground to determine if the turf is in fact real. I thought that was something that only Masters rookie spectators (patrons) did. Eight years later on my second trip I did it again. However the second time I attended the committee had decided to “ Tigerproof “ the course and grow the rough. Prior to 1998 the entire property was cut to fairway height. When I say entire property that’s exactly what I mean. The entire property was sown in the same hybrid of turf as the golf course and was cut to the exact mower height as the fairways were. The grass was so pristine that people would just plop down and have a picnic any place they could find a spot. One of the most impressive sights is what’s called the members practice range. It’s no longer used as such but from the back porch of the clubhouse you can see all the way to the very back of the property through a natural amphitheater to Amen Corner. It’s an area of about 40 acres that was cut just as tight as the fairway. From the clubhouse you can hear the roar of thousands of patrons as players make birdies and eagles in Amen Corner.To this day I have never been able to shake the feeling of intimidation at thought of hitting an iron shot from the tightest fairways in the world. Not the narrowness of the hitting areas because Augusta National is pretty generous as major championship venues go, but the actual fairway height has got to be no more than a quarter of an inch. Rumor has it that the tee boxes roll at 6 or 7 on the stimp meter. Most of the greens we play roll at 8 or 9 on a good day. If you’re fortunate enough to play at one of Chicago’s great private courses you might get to experience greens that roll at 11 or 12. After living in the Midwest for eight years now, the first week of April and the Masters always signals the start of spring and another golf season. As anyone who lives in the Midwest knows, winter seems to drag on well into May, so just seeing the bright green Augusta rye grass and fully bloomed azaleas on the Masters telecasts gives us hope that spring has finally arrived.
My predictions
Win - Mickleson
Place - Watson
Show - Kuchar
Low Amatuer - Uihlein
Also rans - Bill Haas, Hunter Mahon, Francesco Molinari
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