Now that the Masters is behind us, it’s time to take stock of the whole week from Augusta National.
It was a solid Masters overall—I’ll give it a B+ on the whole—as Rory McIlroy made history by becoming the fourth back-to-back green jacket winner.
These are my individual grades for every element of the 90th Masters that I could think of.
Rory vs. Scottie (A)
We didn’t necessarily get the head-to-head drama down the second nine on Sunday, but the macro view of the Rory McIlroy vs. Scottie Scheffler battle is that they have each won two of the past five Masters.
Who will be the first one to three Masters?
And then there is the career trajectory. McIlroy is at six majors and leads Scheffler by two, but McIlroy is more than six years older.
They are in a race to establish themselves as top players in the game’s history.
Par 3 Contest (D+)
Where do we even start?
Get Jason Kelce out of there. Get Kevin Hart out of there. This is supposed to be a fun family outing, not a celebrity/influencer event where Jelly Roll is getting lessons on the range.
Yeah, the TV ratings were strong—but the Masters shouldn’t stoop that low.
Course setup (B)
We got a little bit of everything from a course setup standpoint but ended up in a good place.
Thursday felt like a U.S. Open as the afternoon wave of players were battered by firm conditions.
On Friday and Saturday, the Masters artificially softened the course as the temperature rose and the wind died to a standstill. Players took full advantage of receptive greens.
Sunday felt like a mixture of the two as some players were able to get after it but the value of par still held strong.
Overall, good shots were rewarded and bad shots were punished. The only complaint is how much the course changed throughout the tournament despite the weather forecast being fairly consistent.
LIV golfers (D)
Other than Tyrrell Hatton surging to a T3 finish, no other LIV golfer finished in the top 30 of this 91-man tournament.
Jon Rahm ejected early with an opening-round 78 and Bryson DeChambeau caught two triple bogeys to miss the cut.
Temper tantrums (D-)
Robert MacIntyre got reprimanded for flipping off the course and then posted an AI gnome of himself with the middle finger. Then Sergio Garcia got reprimanded on the course for taking a chunk out of a tee box and breaking his driver.
The petulance is tough but I do love public reprimands from the green jackets.
Sunday drama (B-)
We got drama on the first nine Sunday as McIlroy, Scheffler, Justin Rose, Cameron Young and others jockeyed for position.
But the dream scenario of a five-man playoff died around the 12th hole when McIlroy took control of the tournament
Justin Rose (A-)
My heart breaks for the 45-year-old Rose who had a great shot to finally win a green jacket but finished with a 2-over 38 on the second nine.
It’s wildly impressive that he is able to manage his way around ANGC. I find myself rooting hard for him.
My pre-tournament predictions (F)
I said this could be a wide-open Masters where the favorites aren’t in contention.
Whelp. The two best golfers in the world finished first and second.
Collin Morikawa (A)
What a gritty performance by Morikawa.
It was questionable whether he would even tee it up this week, and it was clear he wasn’t at 100 percent. Morikawa talked openly about his back issues and how it affected him mentally.
Going 68-68 on the weekend is solid, solid work.
TV coverage (C-)
A rarity in the modern Masters era, the TV coverage was decidedly bad this year.
Despite there being very few commercial interruptions—but perhaps more than usual—CBS had a bizarre Sunday that was out of character for this tournament.
Sam Burns was a co-leader of the Masters, chopping it up the second hole. They didn’t show his poor tee shot but did have time to show Hideki Matsuyama missing an eagle putt on No. 13.
That was a microcosm of the day. CBS was heavily delayed following Scottie Scheffler’s run and then completely botched the 72nd hole when it took an absurdly long time to find where McIlroy and Young’s second shots had finished.
It didn’t feel like there was as much gravity to the tournament.
However, on the flip side…
Masters App (A)
There were occasional glitches on the app this year, but this is still an incredible piece of technology.
I ran out of the house for 20 minutes on Sunday and being able to catch every shot from every player is so convenient.
And each of the streams available were produced/announced brilliantly throughout the tournament.
Masters social media (A)
Shoutout to the round recap videos on Instagram that the Masters unveiled this year. Truly awesome and creative stuff.
There was some tremendous output from the social media team all week. Kudos.
Merch haul videos (F)
Nope. Nope. We’re not doing this.
The Masters merch operation as a whole needs to be reined in as gnomes, dumb hats, over-purchasing and Disney-ification has become standard fare.
Part of this is on the Masters and part of it is uncontrollable. It’s hard to stop people from buying 30 of everything and making TikToks.
But you can take it all away.
What did you think of this year’s Masters?
Let me know below in the comments.
Top Photo Caption: The 90th edition of the Masters was a solid one. (GETTY IMAGES/Hector Vivas)
Kevin Kane
2 months ago
Can’t agree with you more on the merchandise sales. I was there for two days and could not believe some of the wait times to get into the golf shops and then when I finally did get in, it felt like a hockey game. Lots of sharp elbows to get up to the counters to ask for a shirt or a hat. Then, seeing people coming out with huge bags in both hands and multiple gnomes. Asked one of the young women at the checkout what was her largest sale, and she said one guy spent $12,000.